DEEP CUTS

I own all the Strawbs albums from their debut up to Ghosts, except for Dragonfly (their first two albums are harder to find than their others, I was lucky to score an original LP of their debut). Ghosts is apparently their last great album, their followup Nomadness was the beginning of their decline. Obvious A&M was not happy with the lack of commercial successful, they were commercially on a decline after Bursting at the Seams, although, of course, Hero & Heroine and Ghosts were artistic successes. Strawbs moved on to Oyster, a Polydor subsidiary, a label which Rainbow recorded for, and released Deep Cuts. It's not entirely surprising they take on a more straightforward direction here, in fact, this pretty much sound like any given prog album of the late '70s responding to the changing musical landscape. What's really amazing is Mellotron is used on every song! A couple of them rather low key, others with quite a bit, so it's one of those rare albums where every cut has tron (along with Änglagård's Hybris and Viljans Öga, Cathedral's Stained Glass Stories, and the first two Greenslade albums). True, this album is less adventurous than their previous ones, but this out of the way: the last song, "So Close and Yet So Far Away" is quite dreadful. It's a truly awful soft rock ballad with lyrics that look like they came out of the Air Supply songbook. "The Soldier's Tale" and "Beside the Rio Grande" are clearly the best things on the album because they harken back to the band's glory days. "My Friend Peter" and "Charmer" are pretty enjoyable songs, while "(Wasting My Time) Thinking of You" is pretty untypical for the band, having a bit of a lounge feel to it. The rest of the album seems pretty give or take. It's a great thing that a copy of this album (as well as any of their other albums, except for their first two) are pretty easy to find and can be had for cheap, so I obviously didn't feel ripped off paying the small amount for an LP of this. It's basically an album for the fans, but while has some nice moments, and only one song I can't stand, it's not something I recommend the newcomer. Still pretty good, so three stars.