National Health - Missing Pieces

[calyx]

why no solo album with such an incredible voice?

Maybe she was too into Canterbury-style music to make an album as would have been commercially "acceptable" in the 1980s ?
Maybe, more likely, other things in her life took precedence. After all she was only a full-time musician for a year or so (early 1976-early 1977).

[Rand Kelly]

Another thing that has puzzled me is the uncalled for dissing of Neil Murray's bass playing on National Health. I think what he does is perfect for the music. He is on fretless on every track btw. That may be why John Greaves gets the accolades more than Neil,because John is a powerful player but he is using a fretted bass and that makes playing bass a bit more solid. Where are you guys on the bass playing for N.H.'s 2 studio releases?

[Rand Kelly]

Maybe she was too into Canterbury-style music to make an album as would have been commercially "acceptable" in the 1980s ?
Maybe, more likely, other things in her life took precedence. After all she was only a full-time musician for a year or so (early 1976-early 1977).

I do see your viewpoint. Straddling prog and pop never was a wise move esp. in the latter years of the 1970's. It seems that N.H.,UK and Bruford were some of the last prog bands that were brave enough to carry on with the complex while their counterparts had already succumbed to the will of the music business.

[Kcrimso]

Where are you guys on the bass playing for N.H.'s 2 studio releases?

Murray is fine but Greaves is great!

[Steve F.]

Another thing that has puzzled me is the uncalled for dissing of Neil Murray's bass playing on National Health.

Who disses him?

[Scrotum Scissor]

Murray is fine but Greaves is great!

I like Murray's playing well enough, but the guy does have more of a decidedly "fusion" style to both technique and timbre, and I assume that's why he's not as appreciated. Greaves, on the other hand, was one of the most interesting British bass players (with Hopper, IMO) of the entire period - no matter the context. Few others would have left a similar mark in the first place.

Why Murray would choose to play with Whitesnake for several years after this is a wholly other subject, of course. Possibly wine, women and dough, but who knows.

[Zeuhlmate]

I love Murrays playing on their first, sensitive & melodic. He also played with Brufords band before Berlin joined. I suppose his work with heavy bands was more of a bread&butter thing. On the other hand thats what he did mostly. He must have liked it.

Other interesting british bassplayers from that period: Percy Jones, Mick Karn, the very underrated Steve Lamb... with Kevin Coyne http://youtu.be/SICAlea72mU?t=1m56s with Brian Godding https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=405vKD76VZ4

[calyx]

I like Murray's playing well enough, but the guy does have more of a decidedly "fusion" style to both technique and timbre, and I assume that's why he's not as appreciated. Greaves, on the other hand, was one of the most interesting British bass players (with Hopper, IMO) of the entire period - no matter the context. Few others would have left a similar mark in the first place.

I think the reason why Greaves may get more appreciation is just that he was a vital part of several major Canterbury/RIO projects. Neil Murray, on the other hand, played on just one (the first NH album) although he'd also played with Gilgamesh (as belatedly documented on "Arriving Twice") and even a very early incarnation of Slapp Happy. Post-NH, he became a ubiquitous figure of British heavy-metal which probably lost him a lot of love from the Canterbury/RIO crowd. But from quite early on, Murray was playing with people like Cozy Powell, Gary Moore, etc. and he has said that he was into simpler forms of music than the kind NH or Gilgamesh were playing. This, plus the obvious financial dead end that playing this music was, contributed to his move to Whitesnake etc.

For more on this, my 1997 interview with Neil -
http://calyx.perso.neuf.fr/interviews/nmurray.html

[GuitarGeek]

Straddling prog and pop never was a wise move

Why not? If you have the ability to write good pop songs and also the ability to write good "complicated dren", why not put the two together? That's one of the thing I like about bands like Spock's Beard, IQ, Fish era Marillion and Genesis: the interest in combining the "accessible" with the "weird" and "difficult-to-listen to".

[zeprogmeister]

Why Murray would choose to play with Whitesnake for several years after this is a wholly other subject, of course. Possibly wine, women and dough, but who knows.[/QUOTE]

Maybe because he wanted to make a living as a musician?

[NogbadTheBad]

Nice interview with Murray, seems pretty well grounded.

[Steve F.]

Nice interview with Murray, seems pretty well grounded.

He seemed like a really nice, sensible guy when I contacted him a long time ago about the Gilgamesh material for Arriving Twice.

[Scrotum Scissor]

Fish era Genesis

[Udi Koomran]

Why Murray would choose to play with Whitesnake for several years after this is a wholly other subject, of course. Possibly wine, women and dough, but who knows.

Maybe because he wanted to make a living as a musician? [/QUOTE]

"I wanted to play with a band that had more in common with my blues-rock roots (though there are some jazz-rock influences on the first Whitesnake album) and that had the potential to attract a much bigger audience, though the band started off playing very small clubs."

[Udi Koomran]

Thank you Aymeric for this interview indeed he seems like a very sensible guy
VERY interesting
especially this part provides some perspective and food for thought
"What are your memories, musical and non-musical, of playing in National Health? You certainly moved to another style, and a much higher profile, in later years. Do you still like that sort of music, though, with much more of a progressive/jazzy style?
My memories contain rather conflicting impressions, and I realise I may be committing sacrilege by daring to criticise some of your favourite musicians! There was a strong anti-establishment, rather 'hippy' bias within the group especially from the ex-Hatfield guys - less so with Bill Bruford, obviously. There was a tendency towards feeling that if a band was successful then it couldn't be any good; and vice versa, if a band like Henry Cow was doing very uncommercial music and playing free festivals, then they were more praiseworthy.
Technical facility in music was rather frowned on, rather it was better to struggle to play something that wasn't expected or easy to listen to, though in fact that often became as predictable as doing standard blues or jazz 'licks'. I thought Dave Stewart wrote some very interesting 'songs', though after one had mastered the complexities of reading the parts he had written for you there wasn't much that one could add of one's own style. The other guys' compositions had more areas in them which allowed more freedom, but frankly there wasn't enough mastery of 'feel' for the more 'jamming' parts to be really comfortable, in my opinion. I wasn't particularly turned on by the bits that were difficult just for the sake of it, but I enjoyed the memorable tunes and interesting arrangements. There were definitely some time-changes that were in the songs just to be clever, and I personally prefer music that has more 'groove', whether it's jazz, rock or funk-influenced. However I do think that the most 'English' and 'cerebral' portions of the music were the most successful.
We made almost no money from gigs, and obviously had to spend a lot of time rehearsing, and luckily Dave was good at organising what tours that were possible, though by 1977 the audience for that kind of music had become pretty small. However good the compositions and musicians were, it wasn't possible to make a living from it, and it was rather depressing to play to small audiences who were either interested in getting stoned or analysing every note for deep significance. I (probably quite rightly) feel that I was too mainstream in my musical and lifestyle tastes for some of the band and the audience, though it's interesting that later Dave became quite a bit more commercial with his projects."

[Rand Kelly]

Why not? If you have the ability to write good pop songs and also the ability to write good "complicated dren", why not put the two together? That's one of the thing I like about bands like Spock's Beard, IQ, Fish era Marillion and Genesis: the interest in combining the "accessible" with the "weird" and "difficult-to-listen to".

Gentle Giant-Giant For A Day
Genesis-And Then There Were Three
Yes-Tormato
Triumvirat-A La Carte
Emerson,Lake and Palmer-Love Beach
Starcastle-Citadel


and what's the common denominator here?

[GuitarGeek]

Gentle Giant-Giant For A Day
Genesis-And Then There Were Three
Yes-Tormato
Triumvirat-A La Carte
Emerson,Lake and Palmer-Love Beach
Starcastle-Citadel


and what's the common denominator here?

Your argument would have been stronger if you had left out Tormato (whose main problem isn't the material, other than Arriving UFO, so much as the production) and ...And Then There Were Three (which I think is mostly a very strong album with some very good songs). The other records you name I have only passing familiarity with, and I don't think I've ever heard A La Carte and I'm positive I've never heard Citadel.

And even if some of those records are particularly weak, what does it prove? That Gentle Giant, ELP, Triumvirate, and Starcastle should have quit an album or two sooner? Would they have made better records if they had ditched the "pop" side of things and just made full on (ahem) "prog" albums? Not necessarily. When you've been delivering an album a year for several years running (as at least a few of those bands had done), you're eventually going to hit a wall at some point.

And if you really wanted to make your point, you should have included Magma's Merci, and even then, if you ignore the drum machine and the "Ooh Oooh Baby" refrain on the first song, it's mostly a pretty good record. The Night We Died, I Must Return and Otis (well, the first part of Otis) make up for the shortcomings. But having said that, I doubt anyone saw God while listening to this record.

[Rand Kelly]

Your argument would have been stronger if you had left out Tormato (whose main problem isn't the material, other than Arriving UFO, so much as the production) and ...And Then There Were Three (which I think is mostly a very strong album with some very good songs). The other records you name I have only passing familiarity with, and I don't think I've ever heard A La Carte and I'm positive I've never heard Citadel.

And even if some of those records are particularly weak, what does it prove? That Gentle Giant, ELP, Triumvirate, and Starcastle should have quit an album or two sooner? Would they have made better records if they had ditched the "pop" side of things and just made full on (ahem) "prog" albums? Not necessarily. When you've been delivering an album a year for several years running (as at least a few of those bands had done), you're eventually going to hit a wall at some point.

And if you really wanted to make your point, you should have included Magma's Merci, and even then, if you ignore the drum machine and the "Ooh Oooh Baby" refrain on the first song, it's mostly a pretty good record. The Night We Died, I Must Return and Otis (well, the first part of Otis) make up for the shortcomings. But having said that, I doubt anyone saw God while listening to this record.

I never listen to Magma. Having said that my point is what happened to all my favorite prog bands in 1978. It was the year that the record companies dropped the hammer on their acts to persuade them to go more commercial. SINGLES for radio became the reason to be. Follow You,Follow Me was the only song on the album that made it to platinum status. I heard it again today at work on Muzak-FM-1. They also play Throwing It All Away too but that was 1983 so it is not really part of this discussion. None of the other bands had hits from these albums. Yes tried with Don't Kill The Whale and it was an epic fail. GG and Starcastle didn't even bother but caved in nonetheless. Love Beach had no single for radio and was never played by them except maybe Canario could have had a spin or 2. I see all these albums as transitional releases from Prog to Pop and the result was lower sales,except for the Genesis. In 1978 american music broadcasting changed everything and I blame it on CLEAR CHANNEL. When they automated the programming is where it all went haywire. As far as money goes Genesis did the best the earliest. Yes would have to wait until 90125 in 1983 to garner their first number one hit. Little did they know it would end up being an albatross around their neck for the next 3 decades. 1978 is the year of the demise of mainstream prog forever on radio.

[Rand Kelly]

Btw, I have no problem with Arriving UFO.

[moecurlythanu]

audiences who were either interested in getting stoned or analysing every note for deep significance.

The 2 wings of Casa Progfan, succinctly described!

[Steve F.]

I never listen to Magma. Having said that my point is what happened to all my favorite prog bands in 1978. It was the year that the record companies dropped the hammer on their acts to persuade them to go more commercial. 1978 is the year of the demise of mainstream prog forever on radio.

Did you or the too many other people on this board who make this same argument ever consider that

1. Maybe the bands did these musical changes to themselves in some cases because they wanted to remain 'relevant' .

2. Even if the record company told them they 'had to', are every one of these bands you love so much such fucking pussies and so afraid that they don't know how to say 'no' ??

sheesh.

[GuitarGeek]

I never listen to Magma. Having said that my point is what happened to all my favorite prog bands in 1978. It was the year that the record companies dropped the hammer on their acts to persuade them to go more commercial. SINGLES for radio became the reason to be. Follow You,Follow Me was the only song on the album that made it to platinum status. I heard it again today at work on Muzak-FM-1. They also play Throwing It All Away too but that was 1983 so it is not really part of this discussion. None of the other bands had hits from these albums. Yes tried with Don't Kill The Whale and it was an epic fail. GG and Starcastle didn't even bother but caved in nonetheless. Love Beach had no single for radio and was never played by them except maybe Canario could have had a spin or 2. I see all these albums as transitional releases from Prog to Pop and the result was lower sales,except for the Genesis. In 1978 american music broadcasting changed everything and I blame it on CLEAR CHANNEL. When they automated the programming is where it all went haywire. As far as money goes Genesis did the best the earliest. Yes would have to wait until 90125 in 1983 to garner their first number one hit. Little did they know it would end up being an albatross around their neck for the next 3 decades. 1978 is the year of the demise of mainstream prog forever on radio.

And how does any of this have any bearing on whether or not mixing "pop hooks" with "complicated arrangements" is a bad thing?

[Steve F.]

And how does any of this have any bearing on whether or not mixing "pop hooks" with "complicated arrangements" is a bad thing?

Even better stated than my reply about this.

[zombywoof]

I LOVE to hear bands mix pop hooks and with Prog complexities. See Cardiacs, XTC, Knifeworld, Bob Drake, Kate Bush, and so on. In fact I'd say that has been the main focus of my musical listening lately. Even the most out there stuff is rooted in good songwriting (at least the good stuff is - IMO)

[No Pride]

I've never heard this one. I have "National Health - Complete," but I guess it wasn't complete after all.