HW: IN YOU AREA!

[Doug Pearson]

On Fri, 12 May 2000 00:27:30 +0100, Melvyn Vincent <mel at MVA.U-NET.COM> wrote:
>I much prefer 'In your Area' overall, even though it's not all new
>material. However I do have a few major moans about some of the tracks.
>The 1st track.......Brainstorm!!!!!????? Now come on Dave Brock, this is
>really takeing the piss!

At this point, all I can assume is that Dave wants to ensure that Nik has a
steady flow of songwriting royalties from all 18 versions of "Brainstorm"
that have come out on various live albums.  Either that, or Dave's trying
to spread so many versions around that Nik will never be able to track all
his royalties down!

>This once great track has been well and truly flogged to death now,and this
>has to be the worst version yet. The 'reggaed' middle bit with Captain Rizz
>on the vocals is like something out of 'Playschool', with the
>chorus....."jump up and down.....swing yourselves around......Hawkwind in
>your area.........Hawkwind on your land"!!!!!! (sounds like a nursery
>rhyme!!!)

I agree that this is Rizz at his worst.  Thoroughly embarassing, and far
more annoying (to me, at least) than Nik at his 82-84 wackiest.

>The nice surprise is Track 8 , "hippy"............brilliant ( and I even
>like Rons vocals on this one!)

It's good to know that they can still come up with a classic, although I
find it a bit disconcerting that both it and the best songs on 'Distant
Horizons' ("Wheels", "Reptoid Vision", "Alchemy") were all written without
Dave's involvement.  Up through 'Alien4', even if other members made good
contributions, the best song on almost every album was always a Brock
composition.  I think this song represents a more "mature" Ron and I
certainly look forward to his future work with Hawkwind.

On Thu, 11 May 2000 19:17:14 -0500, flossbac <flossbac at NLCI.COM> wrote:
>Well I actually rather liked In Your Area....  I agree that Captain Rizz is
>pretty execrable, but the "Rat Race" rant in the bridge of Love In Space is
>cool, I think!  ... Speaking of psychedelia--that live snippet called "I am
>the Reptoid" is one of the most freaked-out sounding things I've heard in
>ages.

I gotta agree on both accounts.  Rizz is pretty OK on both "Rat Race" and
"I am the Reptoid".  I still gotta get around to getting a Passport so I
can get 'Hawkwind 1997' for its versions of "Reptoid Vision" and "Phetamine
Street" (yeah, I like Ron - so sue me!).

On Fri, 12 May 2000 09:39:50 -0500, MissileCommand <antisol at SOFTHOME.NET>
wrote:
>Think of the creativity gap between that version of Brainstorm and the
kind of
>improvisation done by ICU 15 years earlier.

Yes!  If you haven't heard the ICU mkII live version of "Brainstorm", by
all means surf over to Steve Pond's website http://www.doremi.co.uk right
now and download the MP3! (nobody will even whine about you stealing their
royalties!)  The "Ghost Dance"-style chants and bizarre turntable
manipulations are far more interesting (and groundbreaking! live DJ's in a
rock band are commonplace these days, but in 1985?!?) than Hawkwind's
reggae bit.  Although I'd rather have the reggae bit than the completely
empty-sounding middle section as on 'Zones'.  I was greatly relieved that
the "Brainstorm" midsection on 'Collector Series: Choose Your Masques Live'
is much better than the one on 'Zones' (despite the tape problems *sigh*).

On Fri, 12 May 2000 14:55:20 +0100, Jon Browne <jon at COMICS.DEMON.CO.UK> wrote:
>IMHO, Nik is 2nd only to Dave in establishing the HW vibe, even more so
>than Bob or Lemmy and ICU were even more exciting than Iggy Pop, even on
>a good night. Honest ta gosh.

That's very high praise, but I'll agree.  Wish I could have ever seen ICU
in their day, though ...

Certainly these days, Nik is a far more exciting performer than Iggy.

But yeah, I'm not dissatisfied with 'In Your Area'.  I could have done with
less Rizz and more than one truly fine new song (that IS better than
anything on 'Distant Horizons' IMO), but I'm not complaining ...

        -Doug
         ceres at sirius.com