Arden House
Band members Related acts
- unknown
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- Jasper Wrath
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Genre: progressive Rating: 2 stars ** Title: Coming Back Company: Dellwood Catalog: DLD 56009 Year: 1977 Country/State: US Grade (cover/record): VG+/VG+ Comments: still in shrink wrap (opened) Available: SOLD Catalog ID: SOLD 4 Price: SOLD $150.00
Genre: progressive Rating: 2 stars ** Title: Coming Back Company: Dellwood Catalog: DLD 56009 Year: 1977 Country/State: US Grade (cover/record): NM/NM Comments: still in shrink wrap (opened) Available: 1 Catalog ID: 4 Price: $200.00
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Produced by Christopher Hawk (reportedly Christopher Hawke of Jasper Wrath fame), 1977's "Coming Back" is your typical tax scam label release. That means no writing credits, little or no biographical information, and an extremely short running time - the album barely clocks in over 30 minutes. Musically the collection took a little while to warm up to. My initial impression was that these guys were competent, but faceless purveyors of mid-1970s AOR ... Material like 'The Way You Feel', 'Midnight Mary' and 'Follow Me Down' was tuneful, instantly forgettable, and could easily have been mistaken for something from April Wine, Loverboy, Kansas or any one of the hundreds of big hair bands that jammed top-40 play lists, while occasionally trying to gain a little credibility with the critics by injecting progressive flavors into the mix. Giving credit where due, these guys were at least flexible when it came to drawing inspiration. I have absolutely no idea why the abysmal 'Streakin' was included on the set, but the clever and catchy 'Pleasure Trip' recalled something out of 10C.C.'s catalog, while 'Somewhere Beyond the Sun' demonstrated they'd mastered Yes-wannbes 101. So having played the album a dozen or so times, I'll tell you that there's nothing awe inspiring here, but it's far less pompous then anything the original Genesis ever did.
"Coming
Back" track listing: 1.) The Way You Feel - 3:00 2.) Midnight Mary - 3:00 3.) Streakin - 3:00 4.) Pleasure Trip
- 2:45
(side
2) 2.) Lady Modesty - 3:50 3.) Somewhere Beyond the Sun - 5:05 rating; *** stars The first couple of times I heard 'Somewhere Beyond the Sun' the tune struck me as pretentious rubbish. Imagine the worst of Yes after they'd spent a long weekend listening to English folk-rock bands like Fairport Convention and Steeleye Span. Clocking in at just over five minutes, the tune had more lyrics than my graduate thesis with lyrics like "Spy a foam born nymph at waters edge, oblivious working at her play, Frolicking within the world around around her, around the world within her frolics me ..." Clearly I'm not going to try to convince you this was a wonderful performance, but I will admit it's campiness actually had a certain charm and the anonymous lead guitarist got to cut loose a couple of times. 4.) Coming Back - 9:09
We
may never know the whole story behind this album, or that of its companion
release, Zoldar & Clark. What is known is that both albums are the work
of a band called Jaspar Wrath, who were a Conn. based outfit that managed to
release only one album under their own name in 1971. Despite being on a
relatively obscure label, the album sold reasonably well, and could still be
found at sensible prices well into the 90's, though it has gotten quite
scarce by this late date. They continued on long after their album, and
along the way, recorded two more album’s worth of material. It is not well
documented exactly how these tapes found their way into the clutches of the
infamous Guinness tax scam label. This label is well known for releasing
albums with, and without, the owner’s permission, sometimes despite the
album already being released. They would usually just change the artist name
and album title to something completely fabricated, create their own
artwork, and then press up usually no more than 200 copies to release as a
tax loss. Whether Guinness acquired the tapes on their own, or were
presented with them by the band themselves, is unknown, though the latter
scenario is unlikely, due to the alternate artist credits. Whatever
happened, Guiness relegated both to their Dellwood subsidiary and released
them in 1977, the same year as virtually all releases on this family of
labels. Exactly when the albums were recorded is another area of intense
speculation. Based on the sound of the material included, the Zoldar album
sounds as though it was recorded much prior to the Arden album, probably
within 2 years of their first album, circa 1973. The Arden House record
sounds noticeably later, circa 1976.
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