A TAB IN THE OCEAN

This was one of the first NEKTAR albums I ever bought, the American LP copy on Passport Records. I have not heard the original 1972 German Bellaphon version, I only heard the 1976 Passport Records version, which was remixed by Larry Fast (who was recording a series of electronic albums at that time on the same label as SYNERGY), so I really can't say the difference in sound. What I do know is "A Tab in the Ocean" is even better than "Journey to the Centre of the Eye", and that's saying a lot, because "Journey..." is such a great album. This time around, many of the spacy Krautrock experiments had been abandoned, concentrating more on great prog rock. No collections of cuts all segued in to each other like their previous, these are actual separate songs.

The album starts with the truly wonderful side-length title track, with plenty of wonderful instrumental passages, as well as vocal passages which tend to be short. "Crying in the Dark" is another favorite of mine, a great rocking number with a great organ solo from Allan "Taff" Freeman that reminds me of CAMEL (and remember this is 1972, when CAMEL were starting to get their recording contract, and they themselves wouldn't have an album released until the following year). "King of Twilight" is dominated by guitar riffs from Roye Allbrighton, and strangely enough, if I remember right, none other than IRON MAIDEN did a cover of this song years later. I understand the current CD reissue contains both the original 1972 mix and the 1976 Larry Fast mix on one disc, probably not to shock American buyers who might have only been familiar with the Passport Records version.

My rating: 4 1/2 stars