HW: Current Hawk Situation

[Max Wilcox]

Greetings all,

            I've been thinking on this a bit, for some reason - and I think
it's time for me to air my thoughts...
            First, let me say that I really like both of the two recent
Hawkwind albums - both have their great bits and both have some quite bad
bits. So, here is my prognosis on their situation at present.
            I'd say that they're well into a "new era" as it were. By this I
mean, that they've progressed to a different sound/image/feel/whatever.
There was the early years, the Calvert years, the Levitation-era years, the
long synth-based song years, and now they're moving into something new. I'd
have to say that I'm very keen to see what is going to happen - they're
certainly on some kind of threshold at the moment - Davey leaving, Brock
slowing down his output, Richards "heavy-ing" up some of the music, Tree
contributing some interesting and slightly strange themes, etc... I get the
impression that they're still attempting to synthesise into a cohesive
whole, still. There are times when they're all working together well, and
there are others where the music is a bit confused and patchy.
            Looking at Alien4, I'd have to say that the music was a bit
poor, whereas the concept and the overall atmosphere was very cohesive and
well thought out. Distant Horizons, though, seems to be about the opposite.
It is mostly well played throughout, the music is much better than Alien4,
but there is very little concept behind it and seems a little "thrown
together".
            Perhaps if the band learns to work together a little more
cohesively, with more live performance etc, the future may hold some gems
yet. But then again, perhaps they're trying to hold on to something that
they only had at a particular moment (IMHO, from In Search of Space until
Levitation). I'd say that if they are keen to move forward, we will see some
more fantastic stuff from them. But who knows.....
            "Ramble mode" - off...

- Max Wilcox