LITTLE RED RECORD

'Little red record' is Matching Mole's second and last studio record. As you might have noticed there are some political allusions on the cover (and in the lyrics as well: "Like so many of you I've got my doubts about how much to contribute to the already rich among us/How can I pretend that music is more relevant than fighting for a socialist world."'Gloria Gloom'). The cover was originally a propaganda postcard with the title "We are determinated to liberate Taiwan". The heads of the soldiers being replaced by those of the members of Matching Mole. Now, On the first record the majority of compositions was by Robert Wyatt with a little help of his friends. On 'Little red record' there is not one(!) Wyatt composition; he wrote all the lyrics so. Since the release of the first record the band had toured and developped a 'band sound'.Dave Mc Rae, who guested on the first record had become a fulltime member and is very present on 'Little red record' in terms of compositions and sound, it is a keyboard oriented record.The record was produced by Robert Fripp and a part from the band you got the 'Mütter Chorus' (Dave Gale, Robert's wife Alfreda Benge and her friend the actrice Julie Christie), on background vocals and 'occasional smalltalk'. The record is a mixture of Jazz-Rock, tongue in cheek humour and political lyrics. On the first side of the vinyl all tracks were seagued into each other and formed a long suite, with a strong presence of Dave Mc Rae's distorted and treated e-piano. There is a nice equilibrium between the instrumental and vocal passages. Side Two started with 'Gloria Gloom',a Bill Mc Cormick composition and the most openly political statement on the record, followed by a Phil Miller composition 'God's song', a beautiful ballad played on acoustic guitar. The record ends with a beautiful theme by Dave Mc Rae 'Smoke Signal' , a signature tune for Matching Mole and it's swan song. My personal advice would be to listen to this masterpiece from start to beginning to enjoy it as a whole and to discover it's subtilities.