(HW) BOTE (my review)

[mary ann sullivan]

Funny thing, "Sonic Attack," has always been a household favorite, I don't
know how Kosh feels about it, though.  I do agree, BOTE does sound
unfinished, but it's all good, I do really dig the album, I do admit it took
longer to grow on me than usual.

Mary  

-----Original Message-----
From: BOC/Hawkwind Discussion List [mailto:BOC-L at LISTSERV.ISPNETINC.NET] On
Behalf Of Jonathan Jarrett
Sent: Friday, April 01, 2011 5:23 AM
To: BOC-L at LISTSERV.ISPNETINC.NET
Subject: Re: (HW) BOTE (my review)

On Tue, 15 Mar 2011, SUBSCRIBE BOC-L Jamun wrote:

> BOTE cannot be taken out of context. It is a Hawkwind album and as 
> such, has to be compared with other Hawkwind albums. If we do such a 
> comparison we can see that compared with the Golden age of Hawkwind 
> albums: "Hawkwind", "Doremi Fasol Latido", "Hall of the Mountain 
> Grill",  "Space Ritual", "X In Search Of Space", "Warrior on the Edge 
> of Time", "Astounding Sounds, Amazing Music", "Quark, Strangeness and 
> Charm" BOTE doesnt hold up. Then compared with the Silver age: "25 
> Years On", "PXR5", "Levitation", "Sonic Attack", "Church of Hawkwind", 
> "Choose Your Masques", "The Chronicle of the Black Sword" it also 
> doesnt hold up. In the bronze age its beaten by "Electric Tepee". 
> Infact I would go as far as to say its only better than "Distant
Horizons".

 	Well, each to their own; I like the good bits of DH a lot better
than I like this, for all that it's not really a finished album, but there
are plenty of HW albums I think less of than this one, starting with _Sonic
Attack_ I suspect, and then, well, most of the ones you choose not to name
there would at least be a contest. But that's obviously going to vary person
to person, and all I was saying was whether I thought it was worth having,
which I do.

> Like the works of any artist, Hawkwind wont be remembered for BOTE.

 	That's not so much that it's bad, though, as much as it's that
they've been going for forty years and most people tuned out after ten. 
If, by some chance that I agree is unlikely, they produced a new _Doremi_
next year, they still wouldn't be remembered for it because only a fraction
of their `fanbase' would ever hear it.

> It is off course nice for fans that we have another Hawkwind album, 
> but I would like to remember everyone that since Dave Brock 
> trademarked the name Hawkwind he can basically release anything under 
> that name. But is it really Hawkwind, that is the question?

 	Well, what is? Have they ever managed more than three albums in a
row (SA, CoH, CYM? No, even there, because Nik is on a tiny tiny part of
CYM. ET, IItBotFtBD, BT, I suppose) where `Hawkwind' was the same as it had
last been? So how on earth does one decide what is and isn't Hawkwind except
by setting one's own preferences to the fore?

 	I would admit, though that _Spacebrock_ is a step too far in this
game. There are parts of it I like, but it's a DB solo album with the wrong
name on it. Yours,
 			 Jon (who is apparently all about the acronyms this
morning)
ObCD: Down - _Nola_
-- 
       Jonathan Jarrett, Oxford       jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk
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