Thursday 1 January 2009

East of Eden - Mercator Projected

Some records seem to come from nowhere.

I remember "jig a jig" in the charts. An Irish jig, seemed harmless enough. Nobody minded Folk music in those days. In the charts was fine. You could do medieval music if you wanted. But Mercator was an album that broke even the farthest barriers of the early 1970's

This was a right mix. Turkish and Hungarian dances, Bartok, vertiginous electric violin, flute, recorders, sax.... not ordinary sax mind, but amazing driving sax, with a hard AND soft rock band at the centre.

"Isadora" is a wonderful mix of all these. Tracks veer from muscular rock (Centaur Woman) to acid folk (Waterways)... but there are moments of real beauty, and once you get the whole Mercator feeling they all meld into a lovely stew.

A final note, Snafu is harder, faster, and more fun. It's a great romp and less pomposity, but also proportionately less beauty too. This one is a better album, I feel, though the first might have been a truer reflection of what they sounded like live, in their pomp.
 
View blog top tags