Van der Graaf Generator – World Record deluxe edition (Esoteric)

If I was smiling during When She Comes, I was positively beaming by the time of A Place to Survive…

Amid the beauty, poetry, anguish, ferocity, and triumphant brilliance found in the music of Van der Graaf Generator, there is often an undercurrent of creepiness; an unsettling chill and slithering premonition weaving its way around the dark chords of organist Hugh Banton and the hissing, whispered lyrics of vocalist Peter Hammill. Take When She Comes, the opening track to their 1976 album World Record, for example. Ostensibly a song about simple desire (or is it obsession?), Hammill eschews common ‘I want you baby’ phrasing and opts for shadowy imagery about Edgar Allen Poe, feeling haunted, and ‘bleeding darkly’. Fun stuff for a rock song! And yet, to Graaf-heads, a song like this – or its comparable predecessor La Rossa – is dripping with addictive emotion and hair-raising passion, and a perfect example of why this band is such a favourite. And if Hammill’s grandiloquent howls aren’t enough to bring the goosebumps, there’s always the outstanding musical arrangements, such as the song’s midpoint breakdown, where Guy Evans’ jazzy cymbal work marries with David Jackson’s saxophone stabs as the piece crescendos and explodes into the final verse in typically elaborate and dramatic fashion.

The release of acclaimed albums Godbluff and Still Life in the band’s productive (and in Hammill’s case, prolific) mid-70s period had come quickly following their split and eventual rebirth. Soon they were back in the studio, recording their third new album in eighteen months at Rockfield in Wales – and that’s not even counting Hammill’s solo albums of the period that they tended to all play on as well. World Record arrived in the fall of ’76 and was supported for the first time by a cross-Atlantic tour, with concert tapes shared among bootleg trading circles for decades to come. The album would prove to be the swan song for Banton and Jackson, both of whom required a steadier income to fund mortgages and families, but it remains a formidable chapter-closer in an impressive catalogue.

Now, for the first time, comes new stereo and 5.1 surround remixes of this vital – no pun – release, by Stephen W. Tayler, the same engineering mastermind behind the excellent remixes found on the mammoth The Charisma Years boxed set from a few years back (and its subsequent individual titles H to He Who Am the Only One, Pawn Hearts, Godbluff and Still Life, all of which were given the Tayler treatment and sound spectacular). Vinyl lovers can also rejoice as it will be issued on wax as well (for the first time since 1985!) To be perfectly frank, if you are familiar with Tayler’s work on any or all of those albums and like what you’ve heard (and how couldn’t you? Evans himself says the experience is ‘like hearing the albums for the first time’), you can stop reading right now and simply order World Record… it’s a no-brainer, truly. But in the meantime, let’s give it a closer look anyway.

CD 1 features a newly remastered version of the original mix of the album by Ben Wiseman. This inclusion always gets a thumbs-up from me, as I like to have both mixes to compare and contrast, and it makes it an easy decision to toss old copies in the ‘sell’ pile. The edited version of Meurglys III, originally a b-side to the Wondering single, is included here as a bonus track. CD 2 is where you’ll find the new Tayler stereo mixes of the album, which of course are also on the included Blu-ray disc in a hi-res format, alongside the surround remixes, all of which sound fantastic. Tayler respects the scope of the original albums and does not go overboard, but he does unearth little moments here and there which my ears picked up on instantly, having known this album so well for so many years. With remixes, it’s important to remember that while you don’t want radical changes, you do want there to be a point to it all; it has to be worth doing, and it should sound good. And this is where Tayler succeeds in spades.

A Place to Survive might be the most impressive of the new mixes. Jackson’s varied saxophone lines and Hammill’s crystal-clear vocals are positioned well, with Banton’s full, rich organ providing that VdGG bedrock that is so effective throughout this whole period. Evans – always breathtaking – lays down heavy and complex grooves (seriously, is there a more underrated drummer in rock history? He is never anything less than excellent, and if the band have a secret weapon, he’s surely it). Numerous bits and bobs I had never noticed before suddenly rear their heads during the controlled chaos of the second half of this major album highlight, and if When She Comes had brought a smile to my face, I was positively beaming by this point. Pure, classic VdGG, and worth the price of admission right there.

Masks, with its more relaxed vibe and almost sultry opening, seems to have more delay added to Hammill’s voice, particularly during those short, stabbing ‘A clown, a fool!’ lines, and again when the band picks up steam in the middle section, all the right moments are accented: a crisp ride cymbal, a rumbling organ chord, a snarled vocal. Brilliant!

And then there’s Meurglys III: The Songwriter’s Guild. How one views this monster epic-length track is always a matter of debate. Is it the album’s triumphant centrepiece? Is it an overlong and meandering epic for epic’s sake? Is it a ill-planned exploration of reggae by pretentious prog rockers? I don’t think it’s any of those things, but I also wouldn’t argue any of them, as we all have our tastes. It’s an odd tale of how Hammill’s only real friend is his guitar, the only one he ‘can trust’. Of course, this was during his Great Sorrow, when he wrote an entire solo album about his ended relationship (Over) and the subject seeped into the VdGG albums of the period too. Still, the lyrics were beginning to go from those typical of a wine-guzzling poet to those of an emotionally damaged hermit:

These days, I mainly just talk to plants and dogs
all human contact seems painful, risky, odd...

Now, we’ve probably all felt like that from time to time, but one gets the impression Hammill lived that for a possibly unhealthy length of time. We know now in hindsight that he came out the other side okay, and perhaps – no, certainly – songs like Meurglys III were necessary catharses for the wounded songsmith. And to be taken on that ride, for those of us who may have felt something very similar in our pasts, can be quite a journey. For that reason alone, I feel Meurglys III is a very successful experiment, and the long second half is actually prime VdGG (whether you like Hammill’s lead guitar playing or not – I do). It took years for me to arrive there though, while others I know loved it straight away, and still others never will. But any way you slice it, it sounds pristine with these new mixes, and is yet another example of hearing new things in a piece I thought I knew like the back of my hand. Not to suggest these are mind-blowing sonic revelations; they’re not, but they do add something special to the listening experience.

‘Okay, there’s side two done and dusted’… is what most bands would have said having completed a nearly 21 minute piece for their new record. But VdGG, ever the chalk to the industry’s cheese, decided to plunk down another six and a half minute track, all but ensuring the original vinyl was never going to sound particularly great. But then, this piece was Wondering, a grand ballad I can’t imagine the album being without. A majestic and uplifting closer, this track is possibly the most beautiful since way back in 1970 when they released Refugees. But while that track featured a more fragile and angelic vocal performance, this ‘mk. II’ Hammill offers more of a fighting spirit; a confident and impassioned voice that adds to the jubilance of the piece. Tayler pays attention to textures, and draws out the beauty of Hammill’s brave falsetto, Banton’s marvelous swells, and Jackson’s fluttering flutes, and this glorious finale shines as it should. A Charisma Records promotional video of the song is also included on the Blu-Ray disc, with Hammill cloaked in all white, pacing around the studio as the band plays. A curious little oddity, really, and very much of its time (whose kid is that, anyway, sitting and watching them play? And why do they keep showing him? Ahhh… the 70s.)

One can only be thankful that Cherry Red and Esoteric continue to commission this work. I’m hard pressed to think of many catalogues that deserve the attention more (Hammill solo perhaps? Now we’re really jumping in with both feet!) Ancient 1980s CD copies and later ear-bleeding remasters do not do this music justice. This sparkling new edition of World Record sounds amazing and I’m crossing my fingers for a Tayler remix of The Quiet Zone/The Pleasure Dome next! Keep ’em coming, team.