GRAIL

One of the many obscure releases from a one and done band from the early London prog scene. GRAIL may have existed for a brief moment in time having existed for a mere two years from 1969-71 but the band remains enigmatic for not only the bizarre eye-catching album cover(s) but for this band's eccentric and eclectic approach that captured everything from early heavy metal to folk music and progressive rock and even Egyptian music and Indo-raga rock!

This band was formed by Terry Spencer who was the lead guitarist of the freakbeat band called The Game which joined the pack of psychedelic rockers in the mid-60s and released a series of singles. Being the restless type, Spencer was a bit too adventurous for his bandmates and moved on to form his own band called Lavender Grove along with bassist Stan Decker. Together they would release one single in the vein of The Game but as the progressive era was dawning, the duo upped their game and added Chris Williams (vocals, autoharp), Paul Barrett (guitar, clarinet, vocals), Dave Blake (cello, sitar, flute, vocals), Stan Decker (bass, guitar, keyboards), Chris Perry (drums, percussion).

Ironically by the time GRAIL's first and only self-titled album was released in 1970, founder Terry Spencer had already moved on and left the band. The album if famous for anything would be for the appearance of an early Rod Stewart sitting in the producer's chair. The album is also notable for having been ignored in its native UK and found its first pressing in Germany with a ghoulish black and white album cover and then released in France with an equally ominous cover only more cartoonish and in color. This is a strange beast as the seven tracks on board are all quite distinct and diverse leaving you wonder if this is a various artists compilation or just one band.

The opening "Power" is an early heavy metal monstrous beast with wicked heavy guitar riffs that focus on the band's aggression and heavy distortion and occult lyrics however the following "Bleek Wind High" takes a complete 180 and turns into a progressive folk song that sounds somewhat like what Gnidrolog would sound like a couple years down the road. "Day After Day" follows the folk lead but sounds more like a throwback to cheeky psych folk from the late 1960s in the vein of early Incredible String Band and similar artists with lots of flute and acoustic strumming. The album just gets weirder as the title track drifts completely into Indo-raga rock territory with pronounced sitar leads and a marching percussive stomp.

The original side 2 drifted even further with the opening "Camel Dung" with jittery rhythmic drive and a progressive rock off-kilter deviation into bizarre time signatures that find a flute and what sounds like a talking drum. Once again sounding like the future Gnidrolog a bit, the track takes a few cues from Middle Eastern music but also returns to some hard rock with guitar, bass and drum heft alternating with the folkier moments. This particular track perfectly examples the weakest link on this album and that would be the rather weak vocal abilities of lead singer Chris Williams who wasn't quite ready for prime time here but nevertheless doesn't really come across as annoying either. It's just that some of these tracks would've come to life with a vocalist with a wider range.

After the rather short "Sunday Morning" which opens with calm organs and placid acoustic guitars thus returning to mellow folk, the final and highlight of the album, "Czechers / The Square" is the highlight of the album. This prog sprawler is the longest track at 11 minutes and 22 seconds and mixes the folk aspects of the majority of the album with a few spastic hard rock moments and a totally spaced out psychedelic sound. The track is quite bizarre (well the album is really) in how it is on molasses mode and just chillin' and suddenly jumps into spastic heavy rock with oddball time signature freakiness. Sounds like a lot of this may have been spontaneously created much of the time!

One thing is for sure and that is that GRAIL will not go down in history as the best of what 1970 had to offer but this is an intriguing album for sure and even somewhat enjoyable but it's really a quirky one and literally unlike anything i've heard, ever! While this album is imperfect in many ways it certainly is a wild crazy ride. As i've already mentioned, i think this band may have been a major inspiration for Gnidrolog as the lead singer sounds similar however Gnidrolog would take many of the ideas here and perfect them on a whole different level. GRAIL is probably more influential than actually well executed but if you really love to hear the lesser known albums of the era then this isn't a bad listen. It's just not a ridiculously great one either. Still though, that album cover will draw you in if you love freak shows!

3.5 rounded down