HW: Bedouin album - Ginger

[Stephen Swann]

cannibal at CUTEY.COM writes:
>
> At 13:56 17.12.97 -0500, Andrew A. Apold wrote:
> >
> >(shrug).  Levitation is my favorite HW album because of Baker's drumming,
> >without it it would still be good, but not on the same level....  I
> >hesitate to think what Levitation would have been with Danny Thompson's
> >drumming, (shudder)...
>
> No shit...! That album has a rock hard SPINE! Levitation: chuggachuggachugga!!
> Thompson would have butchered the material. I mean, he's cool for the sleazy
> HM of the mid 80's and all, but, eh, NOT Levitation: "I got Levitation
> Levitation Levitation! (suddenly drums!:) thud, thud, thud - bash."

ROFL!!!

That's exactly the way I described his drumming, when I was attempting
to explain why it took me so long to warm to _Xenon Codex_.  It's that
god damned monotonous "thud thud thud" of Thompson's drumming that
wrecks it for me.  It didn't help that I bought Xenon about 2 weeks
after getting seriously turned on to Hawkwind via _Levitation_...

To see what Baker brought to Hawkwind, compare the version of
"Motorway City" on _Live 79_ to the version on _Levitation_.  The
version on _Levitation_ *moves* because of that rolling beat that
Baker uses.  The one on _Live 79_ plods leadenly along with a
heavy handed thump-thump-thump (who the hell was drumming on that
album?).  Not that I'm putting down Live 79, or whoever was
the drummer on it, I quite like the album.  But that one song
sounded like shite just because of the uninspired drumming; and
Ginger Baker turned it into a positively wonderful tune just
by fixing that awful static beat.

Steve