Argent: The BBC Sessions

ARGENT: THE BBC SESSIONS (1970-1973; 1997)

1) Rejoice; 2) Where Are We Going Wrong?; 3) Cast Your Spell Uranus; 4) Tragedy; 5) Keep On Rolling; 6) Hold Your Head Up; 7) Liar; 8) Rejoice; 9) Keep On Rolling; 10) Tragedy; 11) It's Only Money (part 1); 12) It's Only Money (part 2); 13) God Gave Rock'n' Roll To You.

Coincidentally, I am writing about this CD exactly one day after reviewing The BBC Sessions by the Beatles — and what I said about that easily applies to this: the «BBC live album» is a genre in itself, an interesting curiosity that is neither here nor there, most often falling in the cracks be­tween a properly engineered studio creation and a «genuine» live album, equally lacking the supposed perfection of the former and the supposed raw excitement of the latter.

Granted, in the case of Argent the difference between a proper live album, like Encore, and a «BBC album» is not as well pronounced as in the case of the Beatles or the Who: with Rod favo­ring the «progressive» formula, the basic idea was to simply play live with the same level of technicality, detail, and finesse, as in the studio. But even so, Encore showed some room for re­arrangements, improvisation, and kick-ass rock'n'roll. We had Russ Ballard throw in a raunchy, distorted boogie-woogie guitar solo on ʽKeep On Rollinʼ, for instance — no signs of which ap­pear on either of the two versions of this song recorded for the BBC.

And they did not vary the approach in between the sessions, either: the two versions of ʽTragedyʼ, the band's most dedicated attempt to do something in the «Epic Funk» style, are pretty much in­terchangeable, which begs for the obvious question — and certain alternate semi-official releases from the archives show that Argent did do other songs live at the BBC (at least ʽBe My Lover, Be My Friendʼ, ʽSweet Maryʼ, as well as Nexus-era material appear on these releases), so, apparent­ly, someone at the BBC must have been a big fan of Ballard's funk and Rod's honky-tonk.

The most interesting selection here is a performance of ʽLiarʼ, probably the only selection from Argent that ended up on a live record. It is a bit louder here, with a bigger drum sound and a brawnier vocal and instrumental part from Russ, including a little screaming and a little wah-wah guitar solo. Possibly influenced by the 1970 Three Dog Night cover — which took the song's hooks, dropped the song's humble subtlety and made it accessible and acceptable by a more ge­neral audience at the expense of you-know-what. So it's interesting to see Argent give a nod to their competitors, but a little humiliating as well.

On the positive side, I was never a big fan of Argent's production style on the studio albums — constantly laden with echos, sometimes poorly mixed, etc., and some of these BBC arrange­ments do sound clearer and sharper than their studio counterparts: the opening funk rhythms on ʽTra­gedyʼ, for instance, hit much harder here than on All Together Now, where they seem rather muff­led. Serious fans of the band will definitely want to hear the songs this way and decide for themselves, which particular approach to the sound suits the refined Argent fan better.

But on the whole, the package will be neither fully satisfactory for completists (who would pro­bably rather see a larger, maybe a 2-CD, release with all the missing songs included), nor ne­ces­sary for non-completists. An un-enthusiastic thumbs up here.

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Rod Argent: Moving Home

ROD ARGENT: MOVING HOME (1978)

1) Home; 2) Silence; 3) I'm In The Mood; 4) Summer; 5) No. 1; 6) Tenderness; 7) Pastorius Mentioned; 8) Well, Well, Well!; 9) Smiling; 10) Recollection.

This is NOT an «Argent» album; it is a «Rod Argent» album, his first official solo project, after which he retreated into session work shadows for a whole decade. Technically speaking, this should certainly not have gone under the «Argent» session; but factually, it is not all that far re­moved from Circus and Counterpoints, and there is always room for a little cheating — in a way, Moving Home is not so much a new beginning for Rod as an album that, on the contrary, closes the book that was started in 1969. Hardly on one of its more interesting pages, but still, gi­ven the circumstances, it could have been much worse.

The legacy of Argent (the band) is all over this album: lush balladry, portentous attitudes, and jazz-fusion textures are on every track, sometimes even all of them at the same time. But there is no drive to make a really big statement. Even when things get «pompous», it is a homely sort of pomp, never backed with mighty crescendos or lots of physical force applied to the instruments. You'd think that on an album where Rod Argent is responsible for the keys, Phil Collins for the drums, and Gary Moore for the guitars, testosterone would be running high on a permanent basis — wrong! Even Moore mostly sticks to acoustic playing.

Naturally, if you are all set on making a «homely» album, conveying a peacefully tranquilizing mes­sage, you will probably be more successful with the «ballad» rather than the «rocker» form of things. So the only track here that could be called a minor classic, and deserves inclusion on any collective Zombies/Argent anthology, is ʽHomeʼ itself, with a nice, soulful vocal part and almost gospel harmonies in the background. Synthesizers are used as a substitute for strings and church organ at the same time, and produce a fine effect — unlike so many other songs here, where, un­fortunately, the selected keyboard tones mostly range from boring to stupid.

For instance, ʽSilenceʼ is a potentially decent upbeat art-pop song, hopelessly spoilt by a moronic «bubbling» synth bass line and several layers of electronic keyboards where pianos and older-fashioned Mellotrons could have worked much more effectively. The same keyboards also spoil large parts of the fusion-esque instrumentals (ʽNo. 1ʼ, ʽRecollectionʼ), and occasionally poison the fun in other places. All of which is strange, because, up to this point, Rod seems to have ex­ercised good taste and restraint in his complex mix of acoustic, electric, and digital instruments. Here, every now and then he seems to be losing his head, going crazy over some new electronic toy or other. This prevents me from taking Moving Home too seriously.

Another bad piece of news is that most of the «energetic» compositions never really come toge­ther. The «modern jazz» number ʽI'm In The Moodʼ wastes some pretty nimble Phil Collins per­cussion over a piece that tries to present Rod as some sort of jazz pro, but come on now, who are you kidding. And I was subtly hoping that ʽWell, Well, Wellʼ could turn out to be a John Lennon cover, but it is a completely original piece of piano-driven funk aiming for a «badass» attitude (the lyrics seem to be a harsh attack on musical criticism) that fails completely — Rod could ne­ver sing or play «badass-wise» even if his life depended on it. I mean, I have no idea: in real life, it is theoretically possible that he can punch his fist through a brick wall without feeling pain, but there was hardly a time when he could believably vent his frustration on record.

So, once all the nits have been picked and squeezed out, this leaves us with ʽHomeʼ, ʽSummerʼ (not a very memorable, but a very cute-sounding piano ballad with «aethereal» vocals), and ʽTen­dernessʼ — decent, medium-fast moving Brit-pop reminiscent of classic ELO. And while, on the negative end, the inclusion of  the ridiculous ʽSmilingʼ is a serious incentive for a negative rating (calypso should be left to calypso artists, period), on the whole, this is one of those classic «on-the-borderline» thumbs up cases when there is very little to love, very little to hate, but the final feeling hovers around «well, that was kinda cute» rather than «Jesus Christ, life is way too short to waste it in such a pointless manner».

As it happens, Moving Home is that final part of the slide when the journey still goes on, but the speed is decelerating and the feet are already drag­ging on the ground. Worth owning by Rod fans, but it is quite understandable that the guy went on a lengthy hiatus in its wake — because, want it or not, everything that could be said had already been said, so why say it again?

Argent: Counterpoints

ARGENT: COUNTERPOINTS (1975)

1) On My Feet Again; 2) I Can't Remember, But Yes; 3) Time; 4) Waiting For The Yellow One; 5) It's Fallen Off; 6) Be Strong; 7) Rock & Roll Show; 8) Butterfly; 9) Road Back Home.

The band moved to RCA for their next album, but the new deal never helped: not only was Cou­n­terpoints to become their epitaph, but, so far, it is the only Argent album that has consistently avoided a CD re-issue. So bear with me — I had to listen to it as a mediocre vinyl rip, plagued with skips and crackles, and whether that circumstance has in any way colored my judgement, you won't ever know until you hear it for yourself... but, on the other hand, I cannot honestly recommend the record, especially considering that it requires hunting for, so here we are, locked in a vicious circle over an album that doesn't deserve getting locked upon.

Generally, Counterpoints expands upon the «fusion» inklings of Circus, with a lot of the focus taken away from Rod's keyboard-directed landscapes and placed upon the band's rhythmic drive and frenzied jazz guitar soloing. Why they thought this could ever become the right road to fol­low is beyond me: Argent's primary source of inspiration had always been classical motives, not hard bop, and by the mid-Seventies, fusion was so well established that they could never even begin to hope to make a dent in the market. Who wants to see Argent turn into Weather Report? Probably the same people who'd expect Horowitz to start playing ʽBlue Monkʼ.

The album starts out with a weak promise: ʽOn My Feet Againʼ is an optimistic pop rocker with a pretty McCartney-like sentimental prelude. It is not sharp or powerful enough, on its own, to con­vince us that the band is on its feet again, but it does introduce the possibility. And then, starting with the second track and almost all the way to the end, we learn that «back on their feet» means «competing with Jeff Beck and Alan Holdsworth, because that is what all the creative people in the business should be betting their dollars on». Well, technically, the songs are passable, but I cannot say that they add anything interesting to the set of technical and mood tricks already im­plemented by masters of the genre. Grimaldi's and Verity's speedy guitar runs sometimes reach actual ignition, but there's a good reason for most people not associating the jazz-rock fusiom movement with the «Grimaldi/Verity duet» — they are copycats, not true creators. Fun fact: on some of the tracks, due to drummer Bob Henrit's unexpected illness, Phil Collins himself is sit­ting in: no wonder a few of the tracks have a «Brand X» feel to them. (My strongest guess is the instrumental ʽIt's Fallen Offʼ, which you could indeed sneak on a Brand X album without anyone taking serious notice). But it isn't a big consolation.

And thus, after twenty five minutes of passable, mildly listenable, generally unmemorable fid­dling about (including at least one «mini-epic», called ʽTimeʼ because there were too few songs called ʽTimeʼ written by 1975, and at least one limp, unconvincing «anti-rocker» called ʽRock & Roll Showʼ), we get to ʽRoad Back Homeʼ, a soulful ballad on which Rod's own honey voice does everything in its power to seduce you into thinking that nothing has really changed — that Argent are still a band that values traditional melodicity and sweet vocal modulation over jazzy-schmazzy finger-flashing and tricky percussion figures.

But the seduction is not working. Even ʽRoad Back Homeʼ itself is still built on a bass foundation that we'd rather be hearing from Jaco Pastorius, and besides, one ballad don't remedy no jazz-fusion show. Counterpoints is true enough to its title — it's an album that makes no points, only counterpoints; the only album in Argent's catalog that has very little reason to exist. If it had even one master­piece of a ballad, of the same caliber as ʽShine On Sunshineʼ, things might have been different. But it hasn't. (Actually, there is one more ballad: ʽWaiting For The Yellow Oneʼ con­ti­nues Rod's heliophilia subject, with intricate vocal overdubs but little in the way of hooks).

Predictably, the album did not sell at all, which led to the band's dissipation — according to some sources, Rod simply dumped the rest of the guys, tired of it all (some of the members, like bassist Jim Rod­ford and drummer Bob Henrit, went on to work with late-period Kinks). Too bad: I do not regard Counterpoints as a «loss-of-steam» for the band, rather as just an unhappy, thumbs down-worthy, move in a completely inappropriate direction. But sometimes, once you start mo­ving the wrong way, you just end up stuck there. It's a brain thing. Difficult to understand.

Argent: Circus

ARGENT: CIRCUS (1975)

1) Circus; 2) Highwire; 3) Clown; 4) Trapeze; 5) Shine On Sunshine; 6) The Ring; 7) The Jester.

So Ballard is out, replaced by not one, but two guitarists — John Grimaldi and John Verity, and thus begins the final, very brief, stage of Argent, almost completely ignored by history. Only one of the band's last two albums has so far been released on CD, and even so, finding it is quite a treat. Unjustly: Circus is really as fine a record as Rod could produce under the circumstances. Working almost alone, with a little help from bassist Jim Rodford (who wrote ʽTrapezeʼ), having to sing much of the material himself, but still refusing to move in overtly commercial directions — and still displaying plenty of inspiration.

As you can see from the song titles, Circus is sort of a concept album, but in a very loose sense. The lyrics use various circus metaphors to convey all sorts of points ("I'm on a highwire, baby, moving far above the ground... I'm on a wheel of fire, spilling my breath into the ground..."), and the music, as far as I can tell, features no circus-related themes whatsoever. If you are nervous about the prospect of hearing a bunch of «creative variations» on ʽEntry Of The Gladiatorsʼ, be relieved — these songs have no comic overtones, most of this stuff is grimly serious, but not tre­mendously convoluted progressive rock.

With Ballard's testosterone-drenched rock anthems out of the picture, something had to take their place, and the band finds new inspiration in the world of «art-funk» and even «jazz fusion». Both of the long epic pieces, ʽHighwireʼ and ʽTrapezeʼ, particularly the latter (ʽHighwireʼ is still more of a «symph-prog» composition overall), feature lots of syncopated bass, fusion piano, and even shredding-type guitar solos from the new guitarists — all sorts of stuff that one can see, for in­stance, on contemporary Soft Machine albums.

Both compositions suffer from clumsy, cluttered structuring and lack of individual identity: there are instrumental passages that resemble each other more than they should, and if the band actually decided to stick them together as one eight­een minute-long composition, I'm sure nobody would really mind. But it would be a fun eighteen minute-long composition. The vocal melodies are original and sometimes even catchy, Rod plays everything in sight — electric pianos, organs, Mellotrons, synthesizers — and some of these guitar solos are damn, damn good. And the circus metaphors add a little bit of purpose: you don't get to perceive the tracks as «just» lengthy fusion jams. The instrumental battles sort of symbolize the ongoing battle of life the same way as the «highwire» and «trapeze» metaphors. Ah well.

Of the shorter songs, ʽClownʼ is a serious highlight — a solemn ballad that returns us to Argent's baroque pop sensibilities; although its main leading arpeggiated piano line is rather generic, the whole combination (majestic piano, gorgeous vocal part, «heavenly» harmonies, psycho-fusion-esque synth solo, etc.) works very well. And yes, the clown is sad. If there is any sort of a humo­rous relief on the entire record, it only comes at the end — ʽThe Jesterʼ is a bouncy, light, but «progressified» music-hall number whose merry piano-banging is only slightly offset by the ac­companying «astral» synth parts and a brief, sharp blues-rock solo.

All said, the simple music lover inside myself still regards the only «non-circus» track on the record, the lovely-lovely ballad ʽShine On Sunshineʼ, as its highest point — one of the greatest McCartney piano ballads that McCartney never wrote. Peaceful, humble, memorable, and the falsetto harmonies are killer. The fact that even Rod himself must have regarded it as one of his finest creations has now been directly confirmed by the re-recording with Colin Blunstone on vocals on the latest «Zombies reunion» album — a recording vastly inferior to the original, strip­ped almost completely of its warm, cuddly charm. By all means, seek out the old version with Rod himself on vocals: the masterpiece.

Summing up, Circus shows that the band did get up on its feet after the loss of Ballard. The fact that it did not last too long on those feet has everything to do with technical matters — lack of promotion, decrease of demand for that kind of music, an intentionally anti-commercial stand — and almost nothing to do with the quality of the music. Except that, as each and every Argent al­bum, Circus is not tremendously original, and, as usual, you can get all of its separate elements (Yes-like symph-prog, Soft Machine-like fusion, McCartney-like balladry, etc.) in various better known, better promoted, and, let's admit it, usually better executed packages. But in some res­pects, it is still a unique synthesis, fully deserving of a thumbs up.

Argent: Encore

ARGENT: ENCORE (1974)

1) The Coming Of Kohoutek; 2) It's Only Money (part 1); 3) It's Only Money (part 2); 4) God Gave Rock And Roll To You; 5) Thunder And Lightning; 6) Music From The Spheres; 7) I Don't Believe In Miracles; 8) I Am The Dance Of Ages; 9) Keep On Rollin'; 10) Hold Your Head Up; 11) Time Of The Season.

This seems to have mostly been a «stopgap» record — a live album released to keep the record company happy while the band was regrouping after the loss of Ballard. But since Argent was, after all, a «prog»-type outfit, and the live album was appropriately double, the whole thing was very much in the spirit of the time. Perhaps, were Argent on the same scale of notoriety as Yes and ELP, they would have been allowed a triple format?

The setlist here concentrates almost exclusively on three of the band's latest albums, completely ignoring Argent and Ring Of Hands — and generally concentrating on the longest, loudest, and most pompous of the band's compositions, downplaying their «poppier» side. In this context, the weak, unconvincing call of «let's get it on and boogie!» that rings out towards the end of the set, with ʽKeep On Rollinʼ, is a relative disappointment, even though Ballard throws on a frantic Chuck Berry-style guitar solo that the original studio version never knew. It's one of these tri­butary ges­tures that way too many «artsy» bands of the 1970s engaged in, just to show the world that they never hung up their rock'n'roll shoes, and it was almost never credible, regardless of whether it came from good bands like ELO or horrible ones like Uriah Heep.

On the other hand, credible or not, five minutes of basic rock'n'roll can still work as a brainchar­mer after three full sides of heavy and/or symphonic art-rock showpieces. And it may not sound nice, but Rod is simply not a very interesting live player. In the studio, it is his compositions, sense of taste, and overall creativity that has always attracted me over Ballard's; but live, it is the Russ show all the way as long as Russ is on that way. ʽThe Coming Of Kohoutekʼ remains faith­ful to the original and nothing more; but ʽMusic From The Spheresʼ, for instance, is hopelessly spoiled by the band's inability to recreate the «cosmic kaleidoscope» of sounds in the coda — Ballard sets a thick, effects-laden guitar tone that smears the whole feeling, and Rod's keyboards are lost in the background.

ʽI Am The Dance Of Agesʼ and ʽHold Your Head Upʼ are both extended with lengthy solo parts, played consecutively on Rod's array of Mellotrons, Hammonds, and Moogs. Neither of these parts is particularly inspiring: perhaps they should have left the extra space for ʽBe Gladʼ or a couple more heavy guitar rockers like ʽBe My Loverʼ. Thus, it's up to Ballard to keep the energy flowing on ʽIt's Only Moneyʼ and ʽThunder And Lightningʼ. For the record, he also performs a non-Argent song: ʽI Don't Believe In Miraclesʼ, a soft-rock hit he wrote for Colin Blunstone's Ennismore album from 1972. It isn't very good. Too much pathos set to weak hooks.

You'd think that, perhaps, in order to heat up the public interest, Argent would agree to perfor­ming a good deal of old Zombies material — at least the real old hits like ʽShe's Not Thereʼ, stuff that certainly wasn't considered «dead and gone» by the mid-Seventies. But the only Zombies song here is ʽTime Of The Seasonʼ, recast in a hard-rocking mood, with a lengthy screeching gui­tar intro and a very rough coating, compared to the smooth studio original. They do it as the final encore — implying that, perhaps, quite a few people came to the show in hopes of hearing it — but that's the only nod to any kind of past that precedes 1972.

Which is too bad, because it means that Encore, Argent's only official live document, does not provide a comprehensive picture of the band — they were more than creators of lengthy second-hand instrumental suites and sprawling heavy rock anthems; their pop sensibility, one of their strongest sides, remains almost completely unseen. Encore deserves to be heard — the songs are good, the performances aren't rote — and so it gets a thumbs up, but there's no rush. This is not one of the decade's great live art-rock albums, like Yessongs or Jethro Tull's Burstin' Out. It is merely admirable for showing how a band that is clearly more comfortable in the studio can still honestly get away with giving a good time to a live audience.

Check "Encore" (CD) on Amazon

Argent: Nexus

ARGENT: NEXUS (1974)

1) The Coming Of Kohoutek; 2) Once Around The Sun; 3) Infinite Wanderer; 4) Love; 5) Music From The Spheres; 6) Thunder And Lightning; 7) Keeper Of The Flame; 8) Man For All Reasons; 9) Gonna Meet My Maker.

The last Argent/Ballard studio collaboration is generally quite underrated, I think. It yielded no hit singles whatsoever, sank on the charts, directly preceded the loss of a key member and only rose as high as two stars on the All-Music Guide — most probably, rated according to its histori­cal trajectory rather than actual song quality. It ain't no masterpiece, for sure, but it's hardly worse than In Deep — in some respects, it might even be better.

Band members are usually known to quit because of ego conflicts, yet it would be hard to suspect an ego conflict on Nexus: the balance here is tilted significantly towards Argent on Side A, then leans to the other side with the flip of the turntable. Lovers of Argent's brand of pompous hard rock will be placated with two heavy numbers, but Russ also shows his sentimental side on the minimastically titled ʽLoveʼ, and a new-found passion for Scottish martial music on ʽMan For All Reasonsʼ. In the meantime, Mr. «Hot Rod» Argent gets ever more and more progressive, with two long, complex, baroque-soaked suites (one of them fully instrumental) and yet another self-elevating anthem — after ʽI Am The Dance Of Agesʼ, comes ʽKeeper Of The Flameʼ.

All the usual caveats, reprimands, and honors alike apply to Nexus as well. ʽThe Coming Of Kohoutekʼ will be seen as a triumph of creativity and emotion by some, as a pretentious deriva­tive bore by others. I think it deserves credit at least for the wide variety of tricks it pulls together. There are overwhelmingly pompous, «imperial» synthesizer parts, light atmospheric guitar jams à la mid-period Floyd, Bach-derived organ interludes, Chopin-esque piano rolls, and a couple ag­gressive synth / organ / guitar climaxes that The Comet of Kohoutek might have enjoyed, had it actual ears to hear. On the other hand, everything is a little too limp and restrained to properly re­flect such a kick-ass-tral force. Enjoying is one thing, getting overwhelmed is another.

Therefore, I would say that the real highlight of the album is ʽMusic From The Spheresʼ, a com­position that does not try to invoke the feeling of Absolute Might, but instead plays out like an extended fairy dance — a jazz/classical hybrid driven by Rod's high-pitched melody, always stay­ing on the right end of the keyboard until the effect becomes almost hypnotic: the three-minute long coda brings a new meaning to the word «repetitive», but if you play it long enough in the dark, you might eventually start seeing little musical fireflies hopping under your nose. In the good tradition of ʽLothlorienʼ and particularly ʽBe Gladʼ, the song once again gives us Rod Ar­gent as an illusionist-mesmerizer, his best emploi in his prog years.

Ballard, in the meantime, is dreaming of giving his muscular rockers a religious flavor — ʽThun­der And Lightningʼ would hardly be out of place on a Manowar album, what with its GENUINE THUNDER INTRODUCTION, echoey electric current-imitating synths and guitars, and, of course, Mr. Ballard himself, screeching and bellowing like the great Thor himself. It would be utterly awful if the chorus weren't catchy, and the arrangement weren't so creative. As it is, «hi­larious» is more like it. On the other hand, ʽGonna Meet My Makerʼ is slower, more stately, ba­sed on a simple and memorable blues riff of a ʽBorn Under A Bad Signʼ-threatening quality, but never seems to decide whether it really wants to be a commanding Old Testament-oriented blues-rocker, or an operatic performance — Ballard's vocals clearly veer towards the latter, and this, again, gives the whole thing a sort of pre-Meatloaf sheen that I find irritating.

Nevertheless, even the worst stuff is still interesting, in one way or another, and Nexus certainly does not feel like the end of the road — the band is literally bursting with ideas, good, bad, or otherwise. It's just that the audience for these ideas is steadily dwindling: in 1974, the commercial appeal of Ne­xus was close to zero (way before the punk revolution), and Ballard was no longer content to «waste his talents» by pandering to Rod's artistic ambitions. In fact, listening to ʽThun­der And Lightningʼ, you can almost sense the man's potential dissatisfaction with how the band treated the song — instead of concentrating on its heaviness and «thunderous» attack, Argent keeps pushing wimpy synths, spoiling its hit potential. (Never mind the emerging subtlety — in the mid-1970s, subtlety did not translate well into fame and revenue).

I could be imagining things here, but facts are facts: Ballard quit soon after the recording of Ne­xus, making it the last «genuine» album by Argent as a band — the next few efforts would be completely dominated by Rod. Despite its ambiguity and occasional cheesiness, it still gets a thumbs up. Besides, it's always fun to encounter obscure records titled after Latin metaphorical terms. And they did it first! Gene Harris only released his own Nexus in 1975!

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Argent: In Deep

ARGENT: IN DEEP (1973)

1) God Gave Rock And Roll To You; 2) It's Only Money (part 1); 3) It's Only Money (part 2); 4) Losing Hold; 5) Be Glad; 6) Christmas For The Free; 7) Candles On The River; 8) Rosie.

Strange album cover, if you ask me. Of course, it's Hipgnosis and all, but I know what is my first reaction: «Oh, hello, Mr. Argent. Going... down?» And indeed, the figure on the front sleeve is captured in a fairly uncomfortable position — matching the music, which, by now, is also begin­ning to feel somewhat strained. Or, perhaps, not so much «strained» as «misplaced» — just as the band was finally getting a grip on the progressive stylistics, the stylistics itself was slowly getting on the nerves of the musical community. In Deep never went as deep as the notorious prog-rockers were going in 1973, and thus, was doubly doomed: too lightweight, primitive, and even «regressive» for defenders of the faith, yet too pompous, long-winded, and unfocused for the modest, undemanding pop consumers.

It charted, at least. But at what cost? Since their previous hit record was ʽHold Your Head Upʼ, it was assumed that the follow-up should also be anthemic — and ʽGod Gave Rock And Roll To Youʼ becomes the most blatantly Bick-flicking power vehicle in the band's career. Admittedly, it is nowhere near as cheesy as the KISS cover two decades later, because it wasn't really conceived or executed in the «glam» idiom. It's got plenty of tasteful organ work, an elegant bass line, a pretty baroque chime-filled interlude, and bits of genuinely beautiful harmony arrangements. Still, most people will not fall for all these flourishes — they'll go straight ahead to the Monster Riff and the tribal incantation of "GOD GAVE ROCK'N'ROLL TO YOU, PUT IT IN THE SOUL OF EVERYONE!" At this point, I'd rather save my tears (and lighter fuel) for a different purpose — I always thought it was Chuck Berry who gave me rock'n'roll, and I do not exactly recollect see­ing a holy aureole around it when it was given. Honestly, I rarely take this crap from Freddie Mercury — why should I take it from Russ Ballard?

There is far more grit and actual rock'n'roll in the two-part blues-rock suite ʽIt's Only Moneyʼ, occupying the bulk of Side A and giving the impression that Ballard is now dominating all the songwriting. The first part in particular is quite heavy, riff-based, slightly funky, pierced with flashy bullying guitar and organ solos, whereas the second is a little more laid back, veering to­wards rowdy, but well-meaning pub-rock. But there is a standard problem — Argent is not a hard rock band, and its «brutal» mode simply cannot stand competition even with the likes of contem­porary Budgie, let alone the mega-popular heavy metal monsters.

The bad news is that the Argent/White team is also starting to lose steam. Of the two contributed ballads, ʽLosing Holdʼ is a rather sterile power thing that tries to get by on the strength of a «mas­sive» coda, in which a tiny recorder painfully tries to outsing a simplistic, but loud wall-of-sound — nice, but a better mix couldn't hurt. ʽChristmas For The Freeʼ is relatively more listenable and beautifully sung, yet it is such a blatant take on the «McCartney piano ballad» style that it is al­most impossible not to throw it on the same shelf with ʽLet It Beʼ and ʽMaybe I'm Amazedʼ — which it conveniently misses, landing instead on the same shelf with second-rate Elton John compositions. (But the vocals are gorgeous, I guarantee).

Then there are the two complex epics — ʽBe Gladʼ and ʽCandles On The Riverʼ. They are pro­bably the main reason to care about the album at all, although ʽCandlesʼ also suffers from exces­sive heaviness and too much pathos in the vocals; I place most of my personal trust in the piano-dominated ʽBe Gladʼ, with its merry martial rhythms, classical/boogie piano interludes where Argent keeps switching from Mozart to Fats Domino as naturally as if the two were graduates of the same music college. This is a genuinely inspiring piece, fully deserving an eight-minute run­ning time. But there is no explaining why nothing else on the album really sounds like it — pro­bably the misguided result of trying to get a more «commercial» gloss.

Unlike most listeners, I think that the barroom rock of Ballard's ʽRosieʼ forms a suitably «defla­ting» conclusion to the album — if one takes it that way, as a light, relaxating slide from the stuffiness of ʽCandlesʼ, rather than one more of the band's questionable «sure we can rock'n'roll with the sim­ple people» statements. But it certainly does not remedy the general feeling: flashes of brilliance aside, In Deep generally feels lost in space (or, rather, in deep waters). I would still award it an ever weakening thumbs up, since there is only one significant lapse of taste, and the actual songs range from incidental greatness (ʽBe Gladʼ) to listenable above-mediocrity (most of the rest). But the curve is clearly past its peak, and descending at an alarming rate.

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Argent: All Together Now

ARGENT: ALL TOGETHER NOW (1972)

1) Hold Your Head Up; 2) Keep On Rollin'; 3) Tragedy; 4) I Am The Dance Of Ages; 5) Be My Lover, Be My Friend; 6) He's A Dynamo; 7) Pure Love.

After two years of commercial unluck, Argent finally hit Gold (no pun intended) with ʽHold Your Head Upʼ — one of only two songs, I think (the other one is the far flatter anthem ʽGod Gave Rock'n'Roll To Youʼ), that have been carefully shrink-wrapped for classic rock radio. Don't think too much of it: the success was a fluke, and it had everything to do with the rather crude, but ef­fective hook power of the chorus — apparently, there is a way to repeat the line "hold your head up, whoah, hold your head up, whoah" several times in a row so cleverly that it grabs your entire attention. It may have something to do with the faint falsetto echoing overdub of "up!" in the background as well, or with the stern guitar/organ interplay, but I think it's just the basic slogan­eering that does the job.

Of course, the song in total is more than that — it's got an optimistic verse melody as well, a fine stomping bassline, and a long, reliably tasteful organ solo from Rod (the latter, however, was mos­tly edited out of the single version, I believe). But hit power never comes from organ solos, and, as a result, the success of ʽHold Your Head Upʼ inevitably pushed the band even further into the world of arena-oriented bombast, which could hardly have been Rod's original intention.

For now, though, the band's third album only marginally departs from the style established on Ring Of Hands: a balanced mix of «hard-art-rock», supported with Ballard's meaty riffs, and «light-progressive» paintings, dominated by Argent's keyboard playing. Only one track, ʽKeep On Rollinʼ, departs from the general rule — a side excourse into the world of piano boogie, sort of like a nice, heartfelt tribute to the likes of Amos Milbourne and Fats Domino. Its only draw­back is that a song like this demands total recklessness, whereas Rod would hardly ever «stoop» to bashing away the piano keys à la Jerry Lee Lewis, and this is why people will still be listening to ʽGreat Balls Of Fireʼ by the time ʽKeep On Rollinʼ descends to the bottom of the archives.

Ballard contributes two of the heavy rockers, one of which is done in «pub» style (ʽHe's A Dyna­moʼ), and the other one takes a stab at acid funk (ʽTragedyʼ). The former is rather dispensable, but ʽTragedyʼ, I think, manages to hit something, especially when it comes to the «flying vocals» of the chorus — the only thing it lacks is a properly roaring acid guitar solo; Rod's trademark or­gan does not kick the proper amount of ass required for such a groove. The third «heavy» num­ber, however, is contributed by the Argent/White team, and it may be the best of the lot: ʽBe My Lo­ver, Be My Friendʼ quickly sets up a genuine «monster groove» — its soul-based vocal melodies are not particularly seductive, but the joint guitar/drum attack spells out seriousness of intentions, and there is a brilliant five-note guitar flourish after each chorus that adds a light psychedelic touch as well.

Meanwhile, the tradition of ʽLothlorienʼ is preserved and strengthened by allotting most of the second side for ʽPure Loveʼ, a track that consists of (a) Rod «noodling» on the organ for five mi­nutes, paraphrasing as many quotations from Bach and Elizabethan music as can be done within five minutes; (b) two minutes of disoriented band jamming in «rootsy-tootsy» mode; (c) seven minutes of a long, slow, «sleazy» blues-rock composition, graced by powerhouse drumming and blazing guitar solos. Rather boring, if you need my honest opinion, and that applies to the first part of the suite as well — Rod Argent is a fine keyboard player, but his solos work much better within the contexts of particular songs rather than on their own. Somebody like Keith Emerson can at least entertain the listener with sheer virtuosity, but in most cases, a classically-based solo piano / organ tune should probably be played a classical pianist / organist.

Thus, altogether, the album is no big deal. Just for the sakes of ʽHold Your Head Upʼ and no big gaffes other than the final suite, I'd give it a weak thumbs up — but it has to be understood that the Zombies link has been sawn through, with no tra­ces of the elegant baroque-pop of old in sight; and the new directions are, at most, okay when they are backed up with solid hooks (be it vocal, as on ʽHold Your Head Upʼ, or instrumental, as on ʽBe My Loverʼ), and, at worst, quite pointless (the whole ʽPure Loveʼ suite). From here begins the swift decline of the briefly mighty Argent — a band that bravely sacrificed its steady position on a small island of a well-established style by diving head first into the ocean of limitless mu­si­cal possibilities. And sinking right down to the bottom, more or less.

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Argent: Ring Of Hands

ARGENT: RING OF HANDS (1971)

1) Celebration; 2) Sweet Mary; 3) Cast Your Spell Uranus; 4) Lothlorien; 5) Chained; 6) Rejoice; 7) Pleasure; 8) Sleep Won't Help Me; 9) Where Are We Going Wrong.

Evolution happens. Where Argent could, more or less, be seen as the last true Zombies album in spirit, Ring Of Hands represents the crucial bend after which you no longer see the train (might still hear the echo). As the new band gains momentum and ensures its own stability, two new mu­sical directions are emerging. Russ Ballard is now officially the «rocker» of the band, leaning to­wards a louder, sweatier, more aggressive sound — an early brand of «arena-rock». Rod Argent, on the other hand, is taking his cue from contemporary progressive rock, exploring the world of complex structures and lengthy keyboard solos. Counterbalancing all of these tendencies is Chris White, retained as resident songwriter and contributing as many good old pop hooks as can with­stand the pressure of Ballard's Big Buffalo Riffs and Argent's Extended Toccatas and Fugues.

Does it work? How could it not work, when so much talent and freshness is involved? At the risk of occasional bits of corniness and silliness (yes, ʽCast Your Spell Uranusʼ is an unlucky title, and naming your songs after Tolkien toponyms never helps in the long run), the album as a whole is excellent, with nary a single genuine misstep. Neither Ballard's hard rock nor Argent's progres­sive experiments sound forced or boring, and almost every single song shows just how much fun it must have been for Rod to do this — he attacks the keyboard with the verve of a teenager at­tacking a brand new video game. There is no condemning Ring Of Hands, even if you don't like it: these guys are clearly excited, and an excited Rod Argent is beyond condemnation.

The troops are still marching behind hippie-idealistic banners: ʽCelebrationʼ opens the procee­dings on an exultate-jubilate folk-rock note that might just as well open a Crosby, Stills, & Nash record. But in reality, the song is not at all typical of the rest of the album: round-the-campfire idealism only serves as a formulaic bait, upon which the artists launch into either more personal or more heavily «intellectualized» ventures. It does stress the album's relative diversity, though: folk-rock anthems, heavy rockers, blues stylizations, romantic ballads, keyboard pop-sonatas — the band casts its net quite far and wide, even despite its main songwriters already patenting their own established songwriter styles.

Ballard is, of course, the weaker link here. He is not only incapable of matching Argent's talent and experience as player and composer, but also shows less taste, which would eventually doom the band. Most unpleasantly, he tends to overscream and kick up too much pathos where a slight­ly more tongue-in-cheek attitude wouldn't hurt (was there no one in the studio to let him know just how ambiguous the word URANUS may sound when it is made into a chorus hook?). Which, somehow, still does not prevent ʽUranusʼ from kicking some ass, mostly due to Argent's piano and organ parts that genuinely rock harder and sharper than Ballard's vocals.

Russ fares somewhat better on the more guitar-driven ʽChainedʼ, with a well-constructed solo and interesting work on the harmonies; but his best contribution is probably ʽWhere Are We Going Wrongʼ, which manages to end the album on a frenzied / paranoid note, in a disturbing manner that contrasts impressively with the rose-colored start of ʽCelebrationʼ. With psychedelic choral harmonies, an R'n'B-ish drive, fluent guitar and piano solos (Rod brings out his fastest jazziest licks for the latter), it's one of those «intelligent rockers» that requires a little sinking in to take full effect, but don't miss it.

Of the Argent/White collaborations, ʽLothlorienʼ is the most easily notable, if only due to the eight-minute length. Although the title may look provocative, the whole thing is really not so much a Tolkienist fantasy as it is a pretext for launching into some keyboard-dominated jamming: for the first time ever, Mr. Argent feels himself fully free to engage in anything he likes, swit­ching several instruments along the way and gliding from Bach into Art Tatum without effort. For the record, Tolkien's Lothlorien is the last place I would be associating with this kind of mu­sic, but it's nice to know J. R. R. can be so different for different people.

One should not miss ʽRejoiceʼ, either, a McCartney-inspired ballad with a sprinkling of gorgeous falsetto vocal hooks framed with even more Bach quotations (organ sound this time); ʽSleep Won't Help Meʼ, where Rod seems to be inspired by Ray Manzarek's solo on ʽRiders On The Stormʼ, playing highly similar patterns on the same electric piano (unfortunately, like any other «tribute», this one is emotionally inferior, even despite Argent's irrefutable technical superiority over Ray); and even the blues-boogie shuffle ʽSweet Maryʼ, potentially generic, boring, and ta­king one too many cues from ʽThe Night Time Is The Right Timeʼ, is lifted off the ground by an exquisitely tasty Ballard solo. (They never did this kind of material no more, which is a pity — some old-school blues-rock instead of Ballard's lumpy-leaden-metal on subsequent albums could actually help to enliven them).

In the end, Ring Of Hands is probably the best «proper» Argent album — only the debut hits me emotionally in a manner truly comparable with the best of the Zombies, but Ring Of Hands ex­plicitly tells us that this band is not the Zombies, and, well, we'd have to understand that: they didn't change the name for nothing, after all. And as far as a non-Zombies Rod Argent-led band is concerned, Ring Of Hands is tops, with a fair balance between simplicity and complexity, a co­herent attitude and plenty of diverse ways to realize it. And, historically, it is a good example of a great band doing its finest work before becoming destroyed by commercial success — Ring Of Hands didn't sell, and in this particular case of this particular band, we can only thank God for that. So, thumbs up.

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Argent: Argent

ARGENT: ARGENT (1969)

1) Like Honey; 2) Liar; 3) Be Free; 4) Schoolgirl; 5) Dance In The Smoke; 6) Lonely Hard Road; 7) The Feeling's In­side; 8) Freefall; 9) Stepping Stone; 10) Bring You Joy.

As far as I know, the Zombies disbanded in 1968 not because the band members hated each oth­er's guts or anything, but generally out of desperation: for the average band in the 1960s, three years without a major hit single meant artistic bankruptcy, even if it still managed to maintain a cult following. The Almighty rewarded them with an ironic twist of fate, turning ʽTime Of The Seasonʼ into a big international hit one year after the band's demise. By that time, however, lead singer Colin Blunstone had already entered insurance business, and somehow the band members must have thought it uncool to make a hasty regrouping.

However, the success of ʽTime Of The Seasonʼ must have been enough for lead organist and one of the chief songwriters, Rod Argent, to believe that there was still a place in this world for him. Furthermore, by 1969 the record-buying world was slowly beginning to develop a better under­standing of that strange kind of music that the Zombies kept pushing ahead of their time: classi­cally influenced, complex, «pretentious» art-pop. Giving it one more try seemed natural. And while it may seem somewhat arrogant to slap your personal family name on the visit card of your four-piece band — give our regards to Santana — «Argent» was certainly a much more appropri­ate appellation for a late 1960s / early 1970s progressively-oriented art-pop team than «Zombies» ever was. (Which begs the question: did the actual Zombies ever sit back and think just how many non-bought records their name cost them in the long run?).

Although all the other official band members are new (Russ Ballard on vocals and guitar; Jim Rodford on bass; Bob Henrit on drums), original Zombies member and songwriter Chris White semi-officially remained on board as one of the band's major creative personalities — making the «Argent» brand a completely legitimate follow-up to «Zombies»: there can hardly be any doubt that, had the actual Zombies managed to keep their act together through the years, they would have turned into Argent even without any lineup changes. Proof? The self-titled Argent still sounds more like the Zombies than the «classic» Argent of ʽHold Your Head Upʼ — and it is this transitional, fence-straddling nature exactly that makes it my favorite Argent album.

It is probably just a coincidence that Argent opens out on pretty much the same simple arpeggio as the Beatles' ʽI Want You (She's So Heavy)ʼ, not a subtle arrogant hint that the band is ready to pick it up where the Beatles have just left it off. On the other hand, late-period Beatles are an un­deniable influence: Argent is «art-pop» that is not afraid to experiment with structures, arrange­ments, and genre-melanging, but still strives to be old-school commercial, with modest composi­tion length, catchy choruses, and generally transparent moods — most of the tracks are una­bashed love songs (with occasionally cringeworthy or clumsy lyrics: am I out of my mind or is the opening line "Like honey, you're sweeter" thoroughly ungrammatical? And what is "when night falls on rare wine" even supposed to mean?).

But never mind the lyrics: the Argent/White team, with just two years past their Odessey And Oracle peak, is still going very strong, and newcomer Russ Ballard is quite competent in the songwriting department as well: it was his own ʽLiarʼ, after all, that was turned into Argent's first hit... unfortunately, not before Three Dog Night covered it one year later, in an arrangement that was very close to the original, merely replacing Ballard's soft, McCartney-like, vocal for a rowdy barroom rasp (I am going to take it easy on 1970's record-buyers and believe that it had every­thing to do with better promotion, something Rod Argent never cared too much about).

Only one number points to the long road ahead, on which Argent would only embark with the subsequent album: a six minute long mystical circle dance, appropriately titled ʽDance In The Smokeʼ. The length finally gives Rod plenty of space to practice his half-Bach, half-Ray Charles organ chops, with lots of inspired, elegant passages that succeed far more successfully than the song in general — if, that is, the ambition behind the song was to come up with their own perso­nal ʽHey Judeʼ, because the overall atmosphere is just a bit too stern and reserved to match the supposed euphoric joy of "every branch we'll tie somebody's worry to it, we will burn it and dance in the smoke". Still a great sonic landscape, though.

Overall, Argent is extremely romantic: on subsequent albums, hard rock and darker-tinged pagan mysticism would seriously concur with heart-baring lyricism, but this debut, with the exception of ʽDanceʼ, almost reads like a focused assault on some particular young girl's heart. Songs like ʽThe Feeling's Insideʼ and ʽBring You Joyʼ are almost too beautiful for their own good, the for­mer written on a serious Bach organ kick, the latter more modernly R'n'B-ish / blue-eyed soulish, but both sung from the mental perspective of a medieval troubadour, no less. And why not? The vocal progression during the verse flow of ʽFeeling's Insideʼ easily ranks on the same level with the best Zombies material.

The «rockers» of the album are also quite clever in that they are almost exclusively keyboard-based (think of ʽLady Madonnaʼ as one of the chief inspirations), so there's speed, power, and energy, but no attempts to compete with hard-rockers that would be doomed from the start. ʽBe Freeʼ essentially flies by on the strength of its vocal arrangement, and Ballard's ʽLonely Hard Roadʼ is one song on here I could possibly see evolving into a long jam — the rhythm section is particularly tight, I wouldn't mind Argent practicing his razor-sharp organ solos some more while the groove is still on.

For some reason, my personal favorite on the album, for a long time, was Ballard's ʽSchoolgirlʼ — a clear attempt on his part to write a particularly simple, but effective pop tune in the classic early ʽShe's Not Thereʼ-era Zombies style. It's not quite up to those standards, but close, with an unforgettable falsetto resolution of the chorus melody, and Rod is playing these keys with classic restraint, exactly the way he used to around 1964. Other than that, there is not that much happe­ning in the song, but it is a touching retro gesture the likes of which, unfortunately, would not be seen on subsequent Argent releases.

The record is not problem-free, of course. The songs usually blast off their full potential on the first minute, so repetitiveness is an issue. Ballard's singing is generally tasteful, but sometimes over the top, especially when he succumbs to the temptation of hitting notes outside of his normal range (the coda flourish on ʽFreefallʼ is simply awful) or tries going into full-scale operatic mode (ʽBring You Joyʼ could definitely use a different vocalist). The permanently keyboard-driven arrangements can get wearisome after a while (although if you are a Zombies fan already, that shouldn't be a serious drag).

But, in addition to there being no genuinely «bad» songs on here (I'd say even the worst ones are still memorable), Argent is also a very important record — it is one of the very few examples of a «typically 1960s» artist managing to re-orient himself at a «typically 1970s» musical paradigm without sounding forced or fake. Very few, if any, «pop» people from the former decade could reinvent themselves as «prog» people for the latter; the usual tendency was either for 1960s «pop» peo­ple to go on being «pop» and gradually falling out of grace, or for 1970s «prog» people to emerge out of some obscure 1960s shadow. Of course, neither the Zombies nor Argent counted as «1960s giants» (not back then, at least) or «1970s idols», but both bands had moderately res­pectable careers, and Rod bears primary responsibility for both. Thus, good songs + certain his­torical uniqueness = thumbs up guaranteed for life.