"Crime of the Century" was my introduction to Supertramp. I bought the album in 1974 when it was first released having never heard anything from them but the FM radio hit "Give a Little Bit". To be quite honest, I didn't even like that song all that much, so I don't know what possessed me to buy COTC. Actually I had heard one other song, now that I come to think about it. "Bloody Well Right" was getting a bit of airplay 'round that time, but I don't think I even knew that was by Supertramp. I was actually very surprised to find out that the song was by the band.No, if memory serves I think I bought the album because I thought the cover was really cool. It looked like something I would enjoy. Remember, I was only 12 years old at the time. Usually such was the case for me...if the cover art was cool I would probably like the music inside (just think of Roger Dean's work for Yes...even if you hated the music, or even the band, the thing was worth the money for the art alone).
As it turned out I did enjoy "Crime of the Century" very much. It's by no means a "great" album. I don't know that Supertramp ever made a "great" album, though some may disagree, pointing to "Crime"'s excellent follow-up, "Breakfast in America". But it is a consistantly good record. Quite enjoyable from start to finish, with good pacing and solid songwriting.
If I had any major complaint with Supertramp (and by proxy, this album), it is Roger Hodgson's singing. Thin and nasally, he sounds like Phil Collins with a sinus infection. Actually some of the songs do have a little bit of that post-Gabriel Genesis feel...not the commercial sound of the trio, but the transitional period with Steve Hackett. More of a mainstream sound, and "Crime" was released too early for it to have been influenced by that era of Genesis, but all the same. But that's not something I would fault them for, cause they do a good job of it.
Supertramp are what I like to think of as "prog-rock lite". There aren't all the quirky time signatures or out-of-this-world fantasy lyrics that are often associated with that genre. But there is definately a prog-rock sensibility here. As Bread is to Black Sabbath, so Supertramp is to Nektar.
As for the songs...the stand-outs are "School" (yet another tome in rock music's grand tradition of bashing that institution, re: Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall [Part Two] and Alice Cooper's "School's Out", among others), the quirky "Bloody Well Right" (a precursor to their hit "The Logical Song", which I have always loved), "Dreamer" (though I usually hate such peppy, upbeat stuff, this one is saved by inventive production and solid melodies), and the majestic title track. My least favorite here is "Hide in Your Shell", which has too much of an "Everybody Hurts" feel lyrically. "If Everyone Was Listening" and "Asylum" are a little tedious to my ears as well.
So maybe you're thinking, "well, there's three songs out of eight that you weren't crazy about...I thought you said it was consistant?" Good point. I can only respond that it's the sequencing that saves it. Even though the songs I don't care for are not on the level as the others, they aren't bad. If you were listening to a track here and there you might skip those in favor of "School" or "Bloody Well Right". But within the context of the album, if you listen to it as a whole, they do contribute a lot to the overall effect. I usually do listen to albums in their entirety, so I'm not complaining (at least not about anything other than Hodgson's voice).
You rarely hear these songs on the radio anymore. Usually if they're playing Supertramp it's "The Logical Song" or "Take the Long Way Home", maybe "Give a Little Bit" (don't you hate the TV commercial that uses that one?). To be fair, I have heard our local classic rock radio station (KRXO) play "School", which was certainly a refreshing change from all the Steve Miller Band stuff they feel obligated to keep in endless rotation. I pulled "Crime of the Century" out of the annals of my CD collection and listened to it because I heard "Rudy" on XM's Deep Tracks channel. It reminded me that I once thought very highly of the record. It has aged pretty well, I must say, but there's a reason why this stuff is played on a station called "DEEP" Tracks. It seems to have been buried and forgotten as the years go by and the classic rock genre expands.
It's worth rediscovering.
Philip Glass.Ever since I first saw short excerpts of "Einstein on the Beach" on a late night music show in the late 70's I have been intrigued by the man's work. "Koyannisqatsi", which I saw not too long after, was one of the most unique audio/visual experiences I had ever seen. I spent more than I usually did on the deluxe 3-record set of "Satyagraha" and it didn't take long to become enamored of Glass. In the intervening years between then and now I amassed a fairly large collection of Glass' compositions, but it's only recently that I've had the opportinity to really sit down and listen to "Einstein on the Beach", which was the initial spark that made me want to check the guy out in the first place.
I have listened to it once before in it's entirety. After that I would begin and get stuck on the first disc, maybe halfway through the second (there are 4 discs in the original recording, which I'm referring to). There are a couple of sections in those two acts that I think are incredible. Having sat through the whole thing again I can attest that there are several moments of brilliance peppered throughout.
BUT...and I really hate to say this...BUT...and don't get me wrong, I love Philip Glass and understand that repetition is one of the hallmarks of his material...BUT, the repetition that fills up the bulk of this opera is simply tedious. Not only that, I'd go so far as to say that it is downright boring. It starts off intriguing, you can see yourself following the repeating passages, listening for the notes and rhythms that will signal their evolution into something else entirely...and maybe that's actually what's happening, but if so it's too subtle and doesn't happen soon enough to hold the attention of even the most patient of listeners.
"Einstein" is one of the most original works of music I have ever heard. I've heard it described as "a landscape of a dream", and that's a very good way of seeing it. Vocal parts that consist of numbers being counted...snippets of stream-of-consciousness "poetry" recited and repeated in a loop, broken into the left-right channels and set into a phase pattern that makes it very difficult to make out what's being said, with only a phrase or two surfacing to be heard ("It could be very fresh and clean"..."These are the days, my friend and these are the days, my friend")...what sounds like a seasoned old man breaking in now and again to tell about the highlights of Paris and other seemingly random bits of information...
...but then there's all this repetition between the interesting bits. On and on and on it goes until by the time it stops and something interesting shows up you can't help but feel as if you've earned it the hard way.
"Einstein on the Beach" is just too lengthy to be bogged down by so much of what most would call "filler". You might as well go to a music rehearsal studio and listen to students practicing their scales, because that's exactly what the low points of this opera sound like.
There...I said it. Merited or not, I've always thought that an appreciation of Philip Glass' music was a badge of coolness. Especially when it comes naturally. I honestly enjoy his style, and there's no mistaking it once you've got it's feel. It's not as engaging as Steve Reich's music (Reich being Glass' only contemporary as far as my exoposure to this kind of music). But it does have a grandiosity about it that suits me well. He is a minimalist version of Bach, with complex mathematics integrated into his work. They play a huge role in why his music is so engaging, and "Einstein on the Beach" is pretty much all of that, undistilled.
Yet, honesty being the best policy, I am not planning on sitting through all 4 acts again any time soon.
