what is your top 5

[Doug Pearson]

On Mon, 26 Jan 2004 12:02:25 GMT, M Holmes <fofp at HOLYROOD.ED.AC.UK> wrote:
>pauleatonjones writes:
>
>>      As a few people have included their five least favourite albums I
>> thought I might as well post mine.
>>   Business Trip Live ( ditto )
>
>I just don't get this. I reckon it's Space Ritual quality in terms of a
>live album.

I thought more highly of it when it first came out, but I think it suffers
from having the 3-person lineup.  There's just too much "pre-programmed"
material on it.  Much of it has the feel of the band playing along with
canned backing tracks, while one of the things I like most about Hawkwind
(especially live) is their ability to "go off", jam a bit, mix things up,
throw in some variety, etc.  That's just not possible when the musicians
have to worry about synchronizing their playing to precise, fixed, cues
and tempos.  There are a few parts of the album where I get (perhaps
erroneously) the impression that *only* pre-programmed/pre-recorded
backing tracks are playing and the band are actually taking a smoke
break.  I'm not saying that *using* pre-programmed material is bad (to
some extent the band pioneered this in the late 1970's with things like
the sequencer usage on "Forge Of Vulcan"), only that *relying* on it is.

I think Hawkwind is MUCH better off with *real* synth (Kniveton) and/or
keyboard (House/Blake) players, as with recent lineups (the Canterbury
live album is fantastic, and I can't wait to hear the new Spaced-Out
one!).  Although I think that the band has also gotten much better at
integrating "backing-tracked" material with "completely-real" material
into their live set since the Business Trip tour.

Oh yeah, and my top 5 as of today (no particular order):
Space Ritual
Warrior
Quark
Hawklords Live
Nottingham 1990

    -Doug (just back from Germany ... again ...)
     jasret at mindspring.com

P.S. Nice to see some serious discussion on the list this week!