ELTON JOHN

Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy (MCA)

It wasn't until I watched a black restaurant worker make it through his shift singing "Bennie and the Jets" to himself that I began to understand Elton John's potential power. After all, his appeal as a purveyor of bland-seeming pop songs had been certain from the start. With the singersongwriter wing carefully tucked away, Elton was then able to reveal the di;ive of a closet rocker with parodies like "Crocodile Rock" and stage shows that unleashed an uninhibited extrovert: not just a record artist, but an entertainer.

Now the organist at Pistons basketball games plays "Bennie and the Jets" during time-outs; without any "blue-eyed soul" affectations, the song became a top ten soul record. It seemed clear that Elton was capable of taking it all, any way he wanted it.

That "Bennie and the Jets" was a turning point for Elton was confirmed with "Philadelphia Freedom," a number one record that was both calculatingly shrewd and irresistibly pleasing. The title alone managed to exploit the bicentennial; the tennis team that drafted Elton; and of course, the connection with Philadelphia soul made explicit by the driving track and the soaring string arrangement. Embellished with a few soul-gospel

cliches ("shine a light..." "rollin" stone...") the song catapulted Elton to what someone noted as "the real big time": an appearance on Soul Traip.

Though "Philadelphia Freedom" doesn't appear on Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, that didn't seem to dampen the^Dublic's enthusiasm for the product: a perhaps unprecedented one million copies were shipped upon release. And though a disco-directed album might have been a left-field thrill at this point, Elton continues to be the masterful dilettante, mixing up the hard ones and the ballads, the sentimentality and the toughness.

In this thoroughly autobiographical album, The Captain (Elton) and the Cowboy (Bemie Taupin) achieve a unity as a songwriting team that they've been striving for ever since they started working together seven or eight years ago. For the first time, Elton does not seem to be speaking someone else's words. Given the secure framework of a narrative he knows something about first-hand (his life!) Taupin manages to curb the mawkisnness that has hampered his writing about Hollywood or the Old West. He has also learned that what lyrics say isn't as important as how they sound: "Fantastic the feedback/the honey the hive could be holding." Words and music meet: Eltaupin.

What's curious, though, is why an autobiographical album now. Besides the songs, the package contains both a lyric book with family pictured and]another book called "Scraps," with a lifetime's annotated odds "n" ends. It seems strange to be writing one's memoirs at the peak of a career. But underneath the millions of dollars and the mass adulation, and a surface musical sound of easy accessibility, there is a core of bitterness about the music business that one would expect from three-time loafers rather than our most rewarded superstars. ) v A very clear answer becomes apparent in "Tower of Babel." The song is certainly about the death of Average White Band drummer Robbie McIntosh at a Hollywood party where the revelers snorted a white powder alleged to be "Snow/cement," but which turned out to be "Jiink./Angel/This party's always stacked." The anger about that party comes pouring out.

It's party time /or the guys in the tower of Babel

Sodom meet Gommorrah

Cain meet Abel

Have a.ball y 'all

See the letches crawl... *.

But if the bitterness has a recent focus, it also goes back, to when Elton and Bemte tried writing pop songs on London's Tin Pan Alley. "Bitter Fingers" recalls those* "where-were-you-whenw;e needed-you" days:

It's hard to write a song with bitter fingers So much to prove so few to tell you why Those old die-hards in Denmark Street start laughing

At the keyboard player's hollow haunted eyes While the lyrics reflect a preoccupation with the "this-was-our-life" concept, the music is " more diverse than on any previous Elton John album. Elton and Gus Dudgeon seem to be taking more chances with melodies, rhythms, and arrangements. "Better Off Dead" (still so bitter!) has a reckless-, irregular rhythm that sweeps across a room; "We All Fall in Love Sometimes" takes the familiar structure of "Your Song" but adds a rich string arrangement, with unpredictable pacing and considerable bite. And "(Gotta Find A) Meal Ticket" proves the funk experiment is no fluke: it is the freshest rock "n" roll Elton has ever recorded.

"Copyright 1975 Big Music Ltd./Leeds Music Corp. ASCAP

THE ROLUNG STONES

Metamorphosis

(Abkco)

Made in the Shade

(Rolling Stones)

Here we have the "best" (most popular, anyway) of the Stones" Seventies work, and a concurrently released crop of old studio outtakes, and which one wins hands down? You guessed it.

It's not that the contents of Shade don't wear well—their familiarity, rather than sabotaging them, reaffirms the recently questionable potency of the Stones. They slice clean. But that's exactly the point. Metamorphosis is messy, cluttered, half-done, a jumble of first takes, scrapped projects and rejected alternate versions of classics. In contrast to the B-sides ("Who's Drivin" My Plane," "Sad Day") on the recent British No Stone Unturned, these soggy coffee grounds hold together as a/ surprisingly vital listening experience. Some tracks ("I Don't Know Why," "I'm Going Down") sound like the prototypes for later masterpieces like "Soul Survivor," some are just trashy fun ("Jiving Sister Fanny"), and some are plain oddities: a Bill Wyman tune with bullfrog."Yep, yep, yep" chorus and notable lyrics ("lyin" on a naked bed/with an AlkaSeltzer head"), Keith) and Andrew Oldham indulging in a very early piece of euphemized homoerotica ("I'd Much Rather Be With the . Boys"), and a "Memo From Turner" that is so jerkabout sloppy that there are only two possible explanations: it was a first take or the band was so ashamed of the lyrics they performed it as incompetently as possible.

Best of all are the Only slightly more proficient early-days numbers on the first side ("Don't Lie To Me," "Walkin" Thru the Sleepy City"). They're not very imaginative compositions, and in spite of the addition of period production filler (strirlgs, chick backup choruses) they're, not played very Well either, but they're the first thing I've heard in years (the old albums don't count, because they still sound up-to-date) that reminds me how fine it wa$ to be alive in 1964-5, knowing the Stones were too and living for them if nothing else. I was there, j remember, and I know I'll never have another experience quite like it, as long as I live.

Lester Bangs

BACHMAN-TURNER OVERDRIVE

Four Wheel Drive

(Mercury)

Nobody has ever found fault with B.T.O."s musicianship, as even the most jaded metalimaniacs have had to concede that B.T.O."s riffs are as hard and heavy as they come—the difference between the connoisseurs" til-deathdo-us-part embrace of the Stooges and their furtive groping around B.T.O."s runs is one of edge, which also seems vitally interlocked with image. For the'Stooges, the edge in their heavy, metal was esoteric avantgardism, for the MC5 it was leather neofascism, for the Blue Oyster Cult it's their critical puppeteering; for any English h/m groups, add twenty points for groovy accents and general charisma.

B.T.O. have gone a long way toward providing that edge, in physical terms at least, with their playing and production on Four Wheel Drive. Whereas earlier songs like "Takin" Care of Business" became annoying in the jogging al> temation between the heavy guitarxcrashes and the limper vocal passages, Four Wheel Drive, most notably in its title cut, shows that B.T.O. can now sustain an integrated metal roar throughout a song.

The emotional/intellectual part of the necessary edge is going to be harder for B.T.O. to come by. The last band that tried to promulgate asexual hard rock, Creedence Clearwater Revival, enjoyed brief success before collapsing disastrously.

Rock'n'roll is sdx, as thousands have written before, but B.T.O. are not so much asexual as they are steadfastly monogamous. They write plenty of songs about groupies (cf. C.F."s "She's a Devil" on this set), but the feeling is always one. of detached observation, never indulgence in the road food, as Mrs. B. and the kiddies are waiting faithfully back in Winnipeg. Burton Cummings couldn't accept that, but it may be the wave of the future if we're to believe all we read in the papers about the conservatism of contemporary youth. Randy Bachman may have outsmarted Bryan Ferry at his own game (trend-milking) without even meaning to.

Richard Riegel

WILLIE NELSON

Red Headed Stranger

(Columbia)

I used to think Willie Nelson wrote sissy spngs, that he was just another doily-brained sensitivo. Thep, about two years ago, I came across an old album of his, Country Music Concert, recorded in 1966 at Panther Hall in Fort Worth. The album is a whorl, a beautiful whorl of pissin-the-wind sensibilities and stomach poetry, and it slapped my opinion of'Willie Nelson into an about-face. I began paying more attention to him. His first Atlantic LP came out. It had some good stuff, but basically it sounded just what you'd expect an Atlantic country album to sound like. Then came Phases and Stages, a concept album that seeme'd to owe more to Truffaut than to Hank Williams. The, Sensitivity queers loved it, and so did a lot of old-line country fans.

It was a little .too arty, a little too sentimental, a little too windy, but it was also a notch above most else that came qut of country music last year.

Red Headed Stranger, Willie's first Columbia album, delivers the goods he's been hinting at for too long, and it's a nice feeling, sort of like getting your wick into the pube-yap of a slit whose hips' and telephone fricatives have tantalized you for ten years.

The album deals with vicissitudes. There is a story line here, however vague and however, drifting. The first person singular discovers that his mate has fucked another human. His/ reaction, a noble one, is to kill both her and her lover. He will ride, he will find them, their brains will stain the ceiling of their lovenest and they will scream unto death. But like us, or at least most of 3s, he doesn't have the nuts to pull it off. He atches up with them, lets them live, and goesout into his own drunken night in search of the impletion that will salve;'

How Willie tells this tale is better heard than explained. Suffice it to say that he weaves his own original tunes with obscure and not so obscure country classics; that he weaves glare with softness, and cold .38 violence with pale penis pang. On every level,"the album is a great one. It's both sheer jukebox ecstasy and thousand-layered dream subtlety. Listen to it, then think of the huzzas that met "conceptual" tripe like Sgt. Pepper; you'll belch with gnarled lip. It'S a dangerous record and, like I said, a great one. Willie Nelson, it's now obvious, understands Ernest Tubb even, better than Bob Dylan.

NickTosdhes

" TANGERINE DREAM "

Rubycon

' _(Virgin)__

Basically/Tangerine Dream are to contemporary electronic music what whipped Dairy Queen shit is to ice cream; it's accessible (meaning you can find it and identify it),, it flows slowly out of a machine, and it's cold. Also, it only comes in one flavor.

What they are to rock, 1 don't know. They don't insert electronics into pop songs like latter day Pink Floyd or Amon Duul II and they don't combine rock and electronic elements to form something else altogether like Can dp. But they've captured a substantial segment of the space-rock audience*in England and on the Continent and who knows what may happen when these German switch-flippers hit these shores.

I subpose that their roots lie in those long space jams Pink Floyd used to do back in the late sixties, stuff like "Interstellar Overdrive" and "Astron -omy Domine." T. Dream tripled the keyboards while circumcising guitars and percussion; then, adding some watered-down Terry Riley riff manipulations, a few simplified Penderecki choral treatments, and some spare electronics they found in Karl Stockhausen's trash cans, they came up with their present formula. Pop electronics, served uprnice and slow, so ail the people can understand it.

What's it good for? Well, you can't dance to it, that's for sure, not even the Funky Robot. You could try listening to it but your mind will probably wander unless you're so blitzed it can't move. It might make suitable soundtrack material.

Me, I save albums like this one for that special time at the end of tht> evening when I gently peel people off the furniture arid roll them towards the door. Where the zonkers meet the zzzz's, that's where you'll find Tangerine Dream in my home.

Goodnight, Edgar.

Michael Davis

CHARLES MINGUS

Tia Juana Moods

(RCA)

Mingus At Carnegie Hall

(Atlantic)

Music has caught up with Charles Mingus and the visionary has become an established genius. Alternately praised (often in the offhand "of course he's great" manner) and put down (for either being excessive or underachieving) Mingus remains vital and his music alive with the contradictory passions of creation. Unlike Monk who, when music caught up with him, quickly became jazz's favorite anachronism, Mingus" gifts as a composer and arranger continue to surprise and delight. His skill as a bass player carries the same strength and originality as ever and his uncanny talent for picking exciting ydung musicians for his groups remains undiminished. Oblivious to fads and fashions; Mingus takes in everything and gives back a music that is at once eclectic and instantly recognizable as his own. Having said that, having given my objective critical bow, I must add that every time I'm faced with the prospect of listening to a previously unheard Mingus album I expect to have a good time. I expect to have fun. And I ain't been disappointed yet.

Tia Juana Moods was recorded in 1957, released in "62 and is now re-issued, hopefully to the larger audience who deserve to get into some of this good stuff. Mingus leads a sextet, augmented on one cut by percussion, castanets, and voice, through five compositions which, with the exception bf "Dizzy Moods," ably evoke the album'stitle. The best cut on the album, the most immediately likable, is a typically atypical Mingus composition called "Los Mariachis (The Street Musicians)," which starts with a boppish theme, slides into a beautiful elegiac statement and then slips into a festive melody.. This contrasting of moods and rhythms is a Mingus forte and sets the tone for improvs by Mingus vets Jimmy Knepper (trombone) and Shafi Hadi (alto) as well as the more obscure but incredibly eloquent Clarence Shaw on trumpet. Mingus perennial Dannie Richmond is the drummer. The album is cohesive, the moods are varied and the result is triumph for the artist and satisfaction for the listener.

The Carnegie Hall album, recorded in January "74, is a surprise. One has come to expect a Carnegie gig to be a "greatest hits" number and/ or the premiere of some heavy new sauce. But this one. is simply ah old fashioned jam session, one long song to a side, nine musicians cooking their buns on the old toasters "C Jam Blues" and "Perdido." No elaborate arrangements, just state the theme and then take your turn. It doesn't seem like a very promising premise. But Mingus has added to his'working quintet three heavyweights and one comer—John Handy (tenor & alto), Rahsaan Roland Kirk (tenor & stritch), Charles McPherson (alto), and Jon Faddis (trumpet). The range of styles and the fact that everyone is definitely dp for the occasion saves the album from jamland doodle time. McPherson and Faddis are rooted in Bird and Diz (Faddis a little too rooted for my taste) while Adams" modified-Ayler avant style pumps enough juice in your ear to make you crazy. And Rahsaan—well you should know by now that he can, and does, play any style he wants to convincingly with humor and feeling. There's a lot of love in this music, jazz love, black artistic tender muscle love. And Charles Mingus plays bass. Whew.

4 Richard C. Walls

THE BEAU BRUMMELS

(Warner Bros.)

The Beau Brummels weren]t the most eagerly anticipated reunion band, but they're the first to equal their earlier standards, an accomplishment the Byrds, Love, Spirit, and so on didn't approach.

The Brummels, though, were always good at whatever they did—British Invasion borrowings in "64, classic folk-rock in "65, arty s6ng cycles in "67, and early country-rock in "68, which is when they split up.

The new album could very well havejjeen a six-months-later follow-up to their last, Bradley's Barn—the continuity is that strong. Guitarist Ron Elliott writes timeless songs ("You Tell Me Why," a "65 hit redone, fits in exquisitely well), with slight country and western (separate influences in* this case) tinges and rich textures—striking melodies, intricate guitar patterns and full harmonies. Singer Sal Valentino adds the frosting—his velvetoned \ vocals were always among the classiest around. When the Beau Brummels delve into country-rock, as they do here and there ("First in Line," "Gate of Hearts"), they're immediately leagues ahead of the competition because Valentino sings the songs naturally without employing affected twangs. It's good to see him reunited with Elliott's tuneful songs, too, instead of the horrendous gospel travesties he wasted himself on for three years with the abysmal Stonegrouod. V

In fact, the whole group is much greater than the sum of its parts—none' of them really distinguished themselves apart, but this album is saturated with immediately recognizable quality. Top cuts include the lightly rocking "Wolf," "Down to the Bottom," and the western tiallad "Gold Rush" (co-written by Butch Engle, who fronted a 1965 Bay Area band called the Styx, for whom Elliott wrote and produced a strange and rather wonderful single, "Puppetrpaster"), but the overall level is very high—a slight leaning toward overlush ballads and a languid cocktail ditty called "Tennessee Walker" are the only minor flaws. The Beau Brummels are just as good in 1975 as they were in "65, and in their case that's saying plenty.

Ken Barnes

AEROSMITH Toys in the Attic (Columbia)

Uriderthe production of Jack Douglas, Stevie Tyler and company have in their third album finally matured as musicians, while maintaining their standing as promoters of the punk ethic. Aerosmith perform with a pythonic grace that's born outa playing second and third fiddle to such hoary rockers as Mott and the Dolls: When they surge out into the void with a song it's an expression of a certain kind of frustration: the essence of a soused punknacity created solely to keep the depths of boredom company. Toys in the Attic is the slickest thing they've ever attempted and will no doubt take a deserved place in the Rock Hall of Fame—it's an invocation to all our demon brothers. When it's nasty, it's a musical slaughterhouse; when it's sensuous, it's like doin" the do to your puderoo in a blender full of mushy artichoke hearts—ohhh, bay-bee!

While there are a few weak spots on the record, only two stand out: "Big Ten Inch Record" is a throwaway break song, and "You See Me Crying" just isn't given enough time to completely realize itself. The rest ranges from the thundering "Round and Round," with its rolling bass lines and crystalline, sky-slicing guitar passages, to the grey backbeat ballad "Sweet Emotion" and the pugnacious punkitude of the title track. What \vith the passing of the Lords, all hail the New Creatures; you see, Jim did know what he was talking about.

Joe Fernbacher

KING CRIMSON .USA /% (Atlantic)

Lots better ban^s than King Crimson have gone out on lots worse albums than this. I actually liked them off and on, mainly because their music was complex yet not without a sort of stupid edge to it. I think they may not have realized that it was stupid because they took themselves so seriously, but at least they never approached the numbing inanity of Yes (talk about bands that should split before they totally run out of ideas!) or the didactic-clobber-"em-over-the-head-with-profundity technique of Jethro Tull. Their instrumentals were genuinely progressive as well as powerful on a gut level, and side one of their last album, Red, was one of the most exciting things I've ever heard irv that field since the last Man dibum.

So here we have King Crimson's last album, recorded live-for-the-radiQat the Record Plant in New York. Preserving every last moment for the fans, right down to the last guy ever to shout "BOOGIE!!!" to them. A lot of it is instrumental, and while it sounds just a bit tired, lots of the old fire is still there. The set closes with the song that epitomizes everything good (music) • and bad (lyrics) about them, "21st Century Schizoid Man."

Good bye, King Crimson. I don't know if I'll miss you, but it has been fun.

EdWard

KICK WAKEMAN The Myths arid Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table , (A&M)

Until I received this record, I had never heard Rick Wakeman before, although I had seen the very attractive Sunset Strip billboards for his Henry VIII and Jules Verne LPs. So 1 wonder. Is this an advance over them? Did the others do so well that they went all-out with -this one, with its twelve page color booklet and text in four languages (English, French, Spanish, and German)? There is a large chorus, and what sounds like a full symphony-orchestra, and I imagine you could make a couple of dozen singer-songwriter LPs for what this cost. Who was the record made for? Who is the presumed potential audience? Is the record an ego tripior Rick Wakeman? Is Rick Wakeman the sort of person who goes on ego 'trips?

I am really stupefied. This is not a rock record, even though there are vocal solos by a couple of young men with high, off-pitch voices, and some heavy drums, and a synthesizer that I presume is played by the composer. There are some ragtime moments, and the chorus always sounds like it is about to break into "Sweet Kentucky Babe." There is a battle section that sounds like the composer once heard Prokofiev's Alexander Nevsky playing in the next apartment, and the main theme is not unlike Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries," which I remember from music appreciation class. There is a hint of what might happen if the medievalist Donovan freaked out in a fully-equipped sound lab.

But what the record most brings to mind is the music Sir William Walton wrote for Sir Laurence Olivier's film of Henry V. Perhaps this record is meant to be played while reading Classic Comics" King Arthur. Does Rick Wakeman have an album about Robin Hood in the works? Does he plan to tour with this music? If so, will the band travel in a supertanker? Is a television special pencilled in? If so, will 1 watch it?

Joe Goldberg

SWEET

Desolation Boulevard (Capitol)

Boy, is it inspiring to note any major metamorphosis in rocfy lately, mainly cuz every band and its mommy SOUNDS ALIKE7 (zombies snoring, that's what they sound like: mumble, mumble). 1 mean, it's great news when a group like the Sweet can get up off their ass, change tneir image, and retain some of that old charm. Slade couldn't do it, Suzi Quatro blew it, Mud fizzled, etc., but the Sweet abandoned the tiresome Chapman-Chinn tag team (Britain's answer to Kasenetz-Katz) and began to lean in the direction of "71 heavy-metal.

And the consequence is that the Sweet no longer chant in that redundant style which pushed "Little Willy" to the top, but they have begun to explore their musical virtuosity, creating an album as unified as Led Zep II (and possibly an equivalent landmark), while simultaneously churning out hit singles.

Desolation Boulevard, tho, is a compilation of the Sweet's last two English albums, neither of which hold together 'as total concepts. But this American combination of the two skims the cream of the crop, presenting an accurate record of where the Sweet have been since their first album in America on Bell. The transformation is an obvious one: from a mammoth studio bubblegum band (the best since the 1910Fruitgum Co.) to a lively buncha hoods.

The album begins with an introduction ("Are you ready Steve?/Uh huh Andy/Yeah! Mi^k? OKI/All right fellas/Let's go!") . That's "Ballroom Blitz," released finally as an American single, and a cut which relies entirely upon, crackling electricity and panting sexual twitches (responding to bands like Fancy, Diamond Reo, and Brownsville Station). "I Wanna Be Committed" uses noises and special weird effects from Star" lost and Star Trek so that yr brain fries like a sponge in molten lava. The Sweet even recall the phantoms of Slade on "A.C.D.C," which builds at loosegoose speed like anything on Stayed?. The second side is completely originals, and the band gets a chance to display their instrumental dexterity (evidence that they gotta be one helluva LIVE BAND). "Sweet F. A*" from Sweet Fanny Adams may be overly repetitive and lack the intensity of lodger exploratory cuts by, say, Led Zep, but it does substitute rock "n" roll SPIRIT for intense musical experimentation (just note the opening words: "Well it's Friday night and I need a fight/And if she don't spread I'm gonna bust her head!").

Undoubtedly Desolation Boulevard is the cleanest album the Sweet have ever made. Sure, the omissions are heartbreaking for loyal American fans ("Teenage Rampage," "Rock and Roll Disgrace," and "Turn It Down" to name a few), but overall the resulting package ain't no complete-bomb. Considering the faqf that back in Jari. of '72the Sweet were on an English budget album release with the kiddie' gimmedatding Pipkins, wellvit's easy to see that these guys have come a long way from their original mutation.

Robot A. Huli

HUMBLE PIE

Street RSts

PETER FRAMPTON

Frampton

(A&M)

Four albums already? Wow. It's been four albums since Peter Frampton was still in Humble Pie. Five albums since Rock On—the only album I ever hadda outright steal back from the people,! lent it to. But now they're both four albums past that proverbial fork in the road. And just .where did it all get "em folks? Well, Peter Frampton can say "I told you so" but Humble Pie can quote Sphlitz commercials in self defense. -

The Pie says Street Rats will be their last album ever, but there is no joy in Mudville. If they really wanted to go out with a little class, they should've quit while they were ahead. Like maybe rigHt after Smokin" because it's been all downhill ever since. Granted, Humble Pie's had their moments on the last three LPs, but Steve Marriott hasn't written a decent song since "Thirty Days In The Hole." Now, they're into vintage Beatle tunes and lethargic Chuck Berry numbers that sound like they were recorded in a Dempsey Dumpster. I just wish somebody would tell The Pie that distortion doesn't necessarily mean energy. Maybe they are a "live" band, but that's no excuse. When Humble Pie smokes .now, they need a roach clip.

But if Humble Pie is all burnt out, then Peter Frampton is just coming into his own. After leaving the Pie, Peter Frampton released a great album, a good album, and a not-so-very-good album (in that order), but now with Frampton, Peter seems to be solidly back on track even if it is all a little gutless and he has to stretch his lyrics to make a point here and there. At least Frampton's making progress -and worrying more about quality than some people we know. Frampton's got a sharp, clean sound and a well-layered mix. Like Street Rats, Frampton is also composed of predominantly three to four minute songs. However, perhaps the best way to illustrate the differences between the albums is to .say that Frampton's songs seem longer because you really get into "em, but the PieV songs seem longer because you can't wait until they're over.

It's funny, too, because right now, Peter Frampton is a lot closer to what Humble Pie should've been than Humble Pie. Of course, neither faction should've been able to keep the name>Humble Pie should've been retired after Rockin'The Fillmore. They could've been Jimmy Brown, but now they're Johnny Unitas.

Jim Esposito

NEKTAR

Down To Earth

(Passport)

ARGENT

Cirqis

(Columbia)

Because 6f the myriad connotations connected with the concept of the circus (colour, adventure, youth and innocence, candy floss, and if you care to stretch it a little, dominance, submission and freak show buggary) everybody loves a circus. Forget that they're grossly overpriced, reek from a mammoth assortment of animal dungs which nature clearly did not intend to be in one place at one time, usually crowded, drafty and chock-full of screamy kids and drippy ice-creams, and so damn" confusing that you could miss The Flying Fettacinis" plummet two hundred feet to their deaths because you were looking in the wrong direction.

But with so much childish, innocent fun connected with the mere mention of the name Ringling, it's no wonder that rock musicians from day one have been constantly picking up on the theme. The Stones did a TV programme one Christmas based around a circus, with lots of heavy names in supporting roles. Strangely, this never made the BBC for which it was intended, and is now something of an occasional underground classic (tho I've never seen it). Witness also—Circus Maximus;The Tingling Mothers Flying Circus; Chrome Cyrkus; Leo Sayer (as clown); Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear; Trapeze; Klowns; Bob "The Bear" Hite; Circus Magazine; "Everybody Loves a Clown"; and j now—by truly cosmic coincidence—two new albums about circuses.

I generally loathe concept albums, and that's why I find Nektar's Down To Earth easier to take than Argent's colossak'life is circus" metaphor. You wouldn't even know Down To Earth had a central theme unless somebody told you. It's mainly just Nektar's same old boogie stomp. Nektar are 1975's answer to Hawkwind, playing the same song over and over attain but wrapping it up in nifty covers so you think you're getting different music. Down To Earth is tehashed Re4 member The Future, which was little more than a refining of the band's three or four German albums ^hat were never released here.

But it's still neat stuff. Nektar are mired in the birth of psychedelia, and maintain strong links to overridingly electricized mainline rock and roll with the emphasis on beat and bass. Their music conjurs up images of "dropping a tab," sincere peace signs and tie-dyed t-shirts. For that reason alone, no true child of the sixties with a historical bent can afford to be without one.

Argent's Circus, however, as a sincere attempt at saying something meaningful, is more easily dismissed. Back when they didn't sound like everybody else, that is, their immediate postZombie beginnings, Argdht music was fun, distinctive and likable. Here at album number seven, they reek of pretension and their music is dull and hackneyed. If you can stomach lyrics like "In the circus, each must play a part/the clown, the jester, mirror the meaning of their art" sung to an ELP beat, then this is surely the disc for you. I prefer Nektar themes—that every circus has an Astral man, and that elephants like to eat oranges. Now that's useful.

Alan Niester

NILSSON Duit On Mon Dei

(RCA)

In many ways, a quirky elpee. Par for the course, Nilsson doing what he knows best: paying tribute to real life anti-heroes a.k.a. losers by spoofing "em, tainting his ballads with a characteristic kooky pathos—sarcasm touching on droll irony. Accordingly, Duit On Mon Dei is another rib-tickler. Then again, you'll probably tire of it. sooner than expected for a Nilsson album\ because:

A.) "better understated than overblown, Nilsson's delivery is mired in overproduction— string and horn sections, two full orchestras, five dozen or more friends in various capacities, including Ringo, Bobby Keyes, Van Dyke Parks, Klaus Voorman, Danny Kootch...

B.) Steel drums a-bonking throughout, Duit On Mon Dei (formerly, God's Greatest Hits) builds layer-upon-layer contradictions by shifting geographic settings with lyrics alone—from "Puget Sound" to the Guinea Coast lament, "It's A Jungle Out There"—whilst doggedly sticking to the Lazy Latin feel. Just close your eyes and listen to "Turn Out, The Light" or "Kojak Columbo," sipping a Singapore Sling with your legs propped up, and try not slipping into the same semitropical Caribbean isle fantasy every tune, for

G.) when Nilsson adopts a different voice on each cut, then cancels the dramatic impact by furnishing identical accompaniment (Robert Greenidge's steel drums, the hook that snagged), I really wonder whether Duit On Mon Dei is a concept album which became sidetracked or a polyphrenic demonstration of Nilsson's newest sarcasticuteness. Who else would sing the part of a retired geezer reproaching his little woman ("Down By the Sea.../Don't tell me that isn't what you wanted to do") after mutually agreeing to spend their golden years in a surfside beach cottage, only to realize "...the big question is/ Was it all worth it?/And who buries who?" Harry also has fun as Tarzan, telling Jane how much easier it is for civilized folk because "Whenever they need a new pair of shoes/They don't kill no crocodile/And when nighttime falls around them/They stay in their hotels." Ever Lover of the Improbable, Nilsson affirms self as endearable nut, wooing homely women ("Jesus Christ You're Tall," "Easier For Me") and TV sets ("Kojak Columbo": "You got nineteen inches baby/And that's real good size/...I could just twist your knobs right off...").

But "What's Your Sign," a funky humdinger off side two, saves Duit On Mon Dei from its omnipresent steel drum deja-vus. Featuring Gloria Jones and the Zodiac Singers, "Whats Your Sign" recaps a typical disco pickup, the male zeroing in with his rap, "I saw you dancing with some friends of mine/They told me/if I walked up slowly/And I gave you the-'eye," the female, belting her response: "You might like it/They say you never made it with a Gemini." Nearly chuckled my bunions silly after that one, and if you've got a weakness for steel drums, madcap incongruity, and/or Harry Nilsson, Duit On Mon Dei might be the answer to your prayers. Otherwise...oh!

Trixie A. Balm

THE SENSATIONAL ALEX HARVlEY BAND

Tomorrow Belongs To Me (Vertigo)

A slight departure from the first three, this one serves up some cushiony funk in place of that old tangy metallic, edge, and though staunch S.A.H.B. purysts may balk at Tomorrow, it's nonetheless Alex Harvey funk.

"Ah-lex's" band never sounded tighter or more throbbing, pushing themselves to the limit of precision; and while none of them better get any high-ass ideas about solo careers, I think their talents are sorely overlooked in the light of their namesake's manic carousing. Though maybe that's as it should be, a band in the true sense of the word.

Now then like I said, the metal edge has been honed down, partially due to their leader's desire for continuing creative freshness and survival, and partially because of the band's continuing maturity and mastering of, their instruments in general, making it possible for them to lay down without laying back. Witness Zal Cleminson's solo in the middle of "Snakebite," a flaming passage pyramiding in intensity because of its restraint, settling down to a slow, prolonged smolder, still getting you off, but not at all like his guitar mayhem of old; say like on "Vambo," with that adrenalin-charged "nyaah nyaah" slashing duel with the organ ripping you up but still getting you off in much the same way.

And that kiddies, is the sign of a truly great musician. There's the usual fairyland/Remus lyrics, rattling around the dense rhythms with their calculated vagueness, alluding to mysterious Scottish street happenings and impending nastiness, as well as carnival atmospheres and promises of the return of the beloved Vambo. Me, I'll settle for the unavoidable tour to correspond with this album, waiting to see what the old man can come up with in the way of theatrics to go along with these new tunes.

Clyde Hadlock

BLACK OAK ARKANSAS Ain't Life Grand (Atco)

Black Oak have emerged as a minor institution, and one to be reckoned with. Though we laugh at Jim Dandy's tortuously tuneless vocalizing and his grotesque cock strut/squat, nevertheless he and his band of merry morons turn up now in the front rank of the rock "n" roll color guard, if only by forfeit. Their simplistic,

overt country-tinged sound carries on the essential rock standards of Elvis, Carl Perkins, and the Beatles. BOA certainly can't be accused of trendiness; they aren't innovators (no imagination), but they're solid and careful assimilators with good memories, and that's their strength and the source of their distinction.

This record is knee-deep in blatant assimilation, and to a large extent is a tribute to rock's grand assimilators, the Beatles. Beyond the fact that the title cut is a raw, methodically rocking version of Harrison's "Taxman," Beatle riffs and effects color the best portions of this album. "Fancy Nancy" (dissincular to, but possibly BOA's attempt at a "Sexy Sadie" or "Polythene Pam") has a guitar intro that is a gritty cop of the opening of "I Feel Fine." Likewise, the guitar that opens "Let Life Be Good To You" is a crudely chopped and channeled version of the "Ticket To Ride" riff. "Keep On" is "Flying" with vocals, and it may not be too far-fetched to say that the chirping bird that introduces "Diggin" for Gold" is in the. "Blackbird" family. More specifics are difficult to come up with, but the-album's rockers have a definite mid-Beatles (primarily Beatles "65) feel.

The fans will eat this alburft up. It's a great BOA record. Though I hate to advise any strangers to the band to go out and buy this, primarily because of Jim Dandy's extremely idiosyncratic vocal style, the uninitiated might find this LP the group's most accessible.

Robert Duncan

LEON RUSSELL Will O" the Wisp

(Shelter)

It seems kind of unfortunate that a performer of Leon Russell's stature should fin himself trying to tunnel out from an artistic hole after all the things he has helped along in the rock world both behind the scenes and out front onstage. He had already gone through an entire career as a session man, arranger and producer before his "overnight" rise to stardom as Joe Cocker's Master of Space hnd Time. And though the! musicians who assisted him on his first classic solo album formed a veritable who's who of popdom,their presence certainly helping the superstar monicker to rise over Leon's gray locks (if all these people played on his record, he must really be somebody special, right?), it all did finally boil down to Leon's songs, hjs singing and his playing which took him up to the top.

Still, one must nourish and feed the beast, and fairly soon, Leon found himself typecast and Stuffed into the corner marked rock "n" roll revivalist. The Bangladesh belch party bingo's musical high point was Russell's rambling gospelly extravaganza (Dylan's stepping onto the "stage being the visual high), and it's strange how much, ip retrospect, that one night's-successful attempt at a shot in the arm altered the shape of Leon's image.,The crowds were showing.up to see Leon's first fire and brimstone flash arid for a spell, he complied. What was being lost in the shuffle though was' an entire side of Russell's personality, that side from whence stemmed "A Song For You," "Priftce of Peace" and "Hummingbird." The Carney album was a step back in that direction, perhaps too inward of a step, the Leon Live fiasco was just that, and after such a long road up, Russell was quickly heading back down. Hank Wilson's Back and last year's Stop All That Jazz were two rather obvious tries at doing something "different," and most people assumed fhat it was an open and shut case, to be filed under the heading rock."n" roll burn out It is in this light that one finds Will O" the Wisp so absolutely disarming, coming-as it does at a point where,Leon is at his lowest point popularity-wise. It is a generally underplayed record, surprisingly gentle and peaceful, and to my ears it's undoubtedly the best thing he's done since his very first lp. Although Leon plays a host of instruments here, from keyboards to bass to guitar to dobro to vibes, he does it with great subtlety arid without the bravura that once served as his musical trademark. The songs themselves, and Leon's singing, become the focal point of our attention. The singing is masterful anchthe songs are sublime.

The lyrics to the songs \ aren't really the quotable kind, for Leor*is at his best when he's simple and unselfconscious, and you find yourself feeling the words more than anything else. So forgive the superlatives that I can't keep away from and let this record do its own magic on you. I'm afraid to admit that I too just had just about forgotten about Leon Russell, and I'm glad that Will Of thp Wisp has made me remember ,what an honest talent this man is.

Billy Altman