HW: SpaceBrock review

[Nick Medford]

Well I guess quite a few people have this album now, but I've seen little in
the way of comment, so here goes:

Is it the greatest album HW have released since 'Quark'?  Er, no.

But is it a good album and a worthy addition to an HW collection?  Yes.

First point to note is that this really is a Brock solo despite what it says on
the cover: the only other Hawk to appear is Richard and he's only on 3
tracks. Even 'CoH' had more involvement from other band members than
this. A few other names are credited with contributions, but these include
'Dr Technical' and 'Hawkman' and one suspects these are Mr Brock's alter
egoes rather than separate entities. Could be wrong though.

So what do you get for your moolah? Well you get seventeen tracks, yes
seventeen ladeez and gents, plus a rather attractive CD booklet- really quite
impressive. The first thing the Hawkfan will notice about the tracklist is
that some of the titles are familiar: yup, there are some *remakes* here.
Now I go along with the consensus that says there's nothing wrong with a
remake if it adds something to the original or reworks it in an interesting
way. Only partial success on that score here: the CD kicks off with an
electronically-enhanced version of 'Life Form' which makes a cracking
opening track (always thought it was random filler on PXR5) , but then we
get 'Assassination' (aka 'Some People Never Die'), a (slightly) reworked
version of the 'Church of Hawkwind' track- now I loved the original but I
can't see the point of this. Meanwhile 'First Landing On Medusa' makes
another appearance and as far as I can tell is identical to the version on 'In
Your Area'... c'mon, the exact same track on two successive albums? What
are we meant to think of that?

Happily the track called 'Earth Calling' turns out to be a completely new
song, and would be a latterday HW classic if was a bit *longer*. But once
the whole band get hold of this it should be a scorcher.

What else? Well anyone who was at the Astoria will have heard the primal
space riffage of the title track- excellent. There's a beautifully done electro
piece called 'Dreamers', and a great multi-layered guitar and synth workout,
'You Burn Me Up'. There are also two trance-techno numbers- 'Sex Dreams',
which I find a bit throwaway, and 'Do You Want This Body', which is
brilliant- one of the most addictive beats you'll ever hear. Either of these
could be a club hit, and given their eye-catching titles may I suggest they be
released as a double A-side or similar and who knows we might get to see
the Hawks back on TOTP!! There's a great sample at the start of 'Do You
Want This Body' with a man desperately trying to communicate his vision..
it sounds absolutely right for our Dave- sounds like it must be from a movie-
anyone know?

Most of this album is instrumental, while the tracks with vocals tend to
have a few lines repeated as a refrain. This works perfectly well but one
can't help wondering if there is ongoing writer's block in the lyric
department. There's even a track which is credited to Brock/Shakespeare due
to its use of the famous "to be or not to be" soliloquy: now you can't get a
better lyricist than Big Bill but some original words *would* be nice, even if
they're not quite up to the Bard's standard!

Final point is that I do find much of the filler forgivable when the album is
played straight through, as it sounds like a suite of electronic space music
and actually hangs together remarkably well as a whole.

I suspect this album is intended as a showcase of a particular side of
Brock/Hawkwind's music so let's hope new fans will be won over by it. But if
this is the aim, then get the techno stuff out on single NOW! With 12"
remixes, sexy cover art and a lotta lotta hype!
--
Nick Medford