Challenge to early Supertramp fans

Famous Last Words has its share of very good crossover tracks ; Waiting So Long and Don't Leave Me Now are excellent, opener Crazy is pretty darn fine, even the nostalgic My Kind Of Lady wins me over. Probably a little underrated though a strong 3 is about right overall.
(Always editing coz I get lots of typos via my iPod)

Edited by Tom Ozric - April 05 2014 at 20:28

claugroi wrote: Definitely not Hodgson, my friend !

If it was that definite, I suppose this thread wouldn't exist. I get the point that "Shadow Song" has very unusual vocals - it's not easy to define who sang it.

If you listen to it many times and compare that voice with the one in Maybe I'm a Beggar, you'll surely notice it's the same guy singing. Listen to the bit from 0:42 to 0:48 from Maybe I'm a Beggar.

RPJ's voice in "Maybe I'm A Beggar" is indeed crisp, but it is smooth in the basic tones and a bit raspier in the higher overtones. Roger Hodgson, however, had this typical roundness somewhere in the mids of the sound spectrum - a kind of nasal resonance which also occurs in "Shadow Song", for instance in the "on a" in "on a lamplit wall".
Comparing the beginning of "I Am Not Like Other Birds of Prey" ('morning at last') with "Shadow Song" is another evidence.
Please note that the melodies of "Shadow Song" (E-F#-A-H-A-C#'-F#-E) and "Maybe I'm A Beggar" (D-F-A-F-G...) are sung in the very same register. "Shadow Song" later ventures in the higher octave, but in the beginning of the verses both songs are in the same octave. While I would have deemed it possible that RPJ sang "Shadow Song" if it had him singing in a higher register than on "Maybe I'm A Beggar", it's hard for me to believe that it's him when it's actually the same register.
(Indeed it's much easier to sing Roger Hodgson's songs than, for instance, Jon Anderson's because Hodgson quite often stays the regular tenor area - it's his prominent overtones which make his voice appear that high.)

Note that Palmer's voice trembles a bit on the word "much" from "I ain't got too much sense". It's the same trembling that happens in "figure" from "figure on a lamplit wall" in Shadow Song.

It's a similar technique, but it's a technique which is easily reproduceable by aspirating a word when singing it. (Rick Davies also uses it in the "we will stay" part in "Downstream", by the way.) It's no integral part of the unique timbre of a voice, so it's no reliable proof, I'm afraid. The only useful points in this debate are timbre and recollections by the participating musicians.

Another thing you'd have to explain is why RPJ (wrongly) attributes the lead vocal to Rick Davies if it's actually RPJ singing. Musicians forget a lot of details about sessions, but they definitely don't forget the moment when they sing their first (and only) true lead vocal on a commercial record.

Hodgson joins in at 1:21 doing the harmony vocal.

Yes.

^ I am sure Davies is divorced and Sue does not manage him anymore. Not certain...

Richard Palmer also sings on Try Again

Interestinf fun fact is that Scott Gorham also wanted to/was asked to become rythem guitarist in Supertramp, the Thin Lizzy came into the picture and tge rest is history

Edited by aginor - April 09 2014 at 12:28

The strange compromise on Wikipedia is (at the moment) "[both] Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson" on lead vocals. No Palmer vocals currently in the Wiki text ... which means, that Hodgson is in the debate as well.

Unfortunately, Palmer left very few documents of the voice he had when he was young, which makes comparing quite hard.

He also coined tge band name, ;)

M27Barney wrote: lazland wrote: ^ my dear chap, if I relied upon every obscure review on the intertit, especially those with a Russian address, to provide me with such facts, or leads, I would be in a pretty sorry state. Also, old Phil has never stated in a interview that Gabriel sang For Absent Friends. Quite the opposite Now then. 41 years ago. 1973. April. The second. I was living in Harlow, Essex. I was 8 years old (nine in that year). We lived in a place called Red Lion Crescent. My best mate was a lad called Paul Mason. I used to fight a lot with Wayne Bowden. At this time on that night, I had just finished watching Alias Smith & Jones, one of the finest tv shows ever made. My Mum had just smacked me for telling my annoying little sister to feck off. How's that, then? Well laz - I think you're mind is going a bit - the TV show was called "ALAS, Smith & Jones".... (however I cannot verify any of the other facts in the statement - so seeing as I think you're spiffing chap - I will all take as being TRUE!

Mind you - I appreciated loads of complete codswallop when I was a kid - I even loved "Dukes of Hazzard" when I was an early teen- I even read some Jilly Cooper in that period as well (Posh girls in riding pinks , getting all spanky with loads of naughty sex bits in) - when I was 13 anything with sex in was a big hit (Early james Herbert....)