The Fireman (Paul McCartney & Youth) - Electric Arguments (2008)

Year: 24 November 2008 (CD Nov 24, 2008)
Label: mpl communication ltd. (UK & Europe), tplp1003cd
Style: Experimental Rock, Alternative Rock, New Age
Country: England
Time: 63:11
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 408 Mb

Paul McCartney (vocals, bass guitar) - Liverpool, England (18 June 1942). Youth - Martin Glover (bass, keyboards, vocals), Slough, Buckinghamshire, England (27 December 1960).
Ten years after Paul McCartney and Martin 'Youth' Glover (ex Killing Joke) released their last collaborative 'mystery disc' under the Fireman moniker (the dancey Rushes) they return. Any right-thinking musicologist may balk at the the wisdom of two bassists working together, but the pair's efforts have always borne interesting fruit. However, anyone expecting Electric Arguments to fit under the same 'experimental' or 'electronic' bracket as previous work may be surprised. Only Universal Here, Everlasting Now's collages are really mind-melting. Much like Eno and Byrne's recent reunion, this album defies expectations by featuring not only vocals and lyrics but, gasp, songs! In fact Electric Arguments is nothing less than a rather fine McCartney solo album, perhaps shoved out under the alias to show a certain label who's really boss. Whatever, it's a spry 13-track (and one hidden track) jaunt through styles a-plenty; from psychedelic folk to blues grit.
If there's any argument for calling this truly 'experimental' it's because the duo leave the endings rough as a badger's bottom and have a tendency to throw in some Mellotron, a touch of flanging to the voice, or play stuff...backwards. Wow. But this is Macca and he's on form, seemingly using the freedom of relative anonymity to stretch out, relax, turn on, tune in, drop out and make like a kid in a sonic sandbox, mixing it up and throwing some curveballs. Opener, Nothing Too Much Just Out Of Sight comes on like Zep meeting Beefheart, full of mealy-mouthed blues harp and Helter Skelter raging. Light From Your Lighthouse comes direct from Dylan and the Band's rootsy basement and Lifelong Passion's raga and synth mix may well be Paul's tribute to George Harrison.
Not everything convinces. Is This Love? meanders dangerously like a b-side. Sun Is Shining drones with bucolic good-naturedness but goes nowhere: Paul gets up sees the sun shining down etc etc. Lovers In A Dream ("...warmer than the sun" repeated over a trance burble) falls down a somewhat featureless hole between early Primal Scream and the Orb, while Dance 'Til We're High misses being Paul Oakenfold and instead ends up like Phil Spector.
No matter, this is a rather tasty little album that reminds us again who was the adventurous one in the Moptops. Thumbs aloft, indeed.
(bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/wjcz/) Review by Chris Jones. 2008

01. Nothing Too Much Just Out Of Sight (04:55)
02. Two Magpies (02:12)
03. Sing The Changes (03:43)
04. Travelling Light (05:05)
05. Highway (04:16)
06. Light From Your Lighthouse (02:31)
07. Sun Is Shining (05:11)
08. Dance 'Til We're High (03:37)
09. Lifelong Passion (04:48)
10. Is This Love? (05:51)
11. Lovers In A Dream (05:21)
12. Universal Here, Everlasting Now (05:05)
13. Don't Stop Running (10:30)

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Egg - The Civil Surface (1974)

Year: December 1974 (CD 2003)
Label: Sunrise Records (Europe), 30523032
Style: Canterbury Scene, Progressive Rock, Avant-garde, Instrumental
Country: London, England
Time: 40:24
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 227 Mb

The Civil Surface is the third and final studio album by the English progressive rock band Egg, originally released in 1974 on Caroline Records. The band had broken up in 1972, leaving some of their favourite stage pieces unrecorded. At organist Dave Stewart's suggestion, the trio re-united solely to record these final numbers. Among the guest musicians on the album are Steve Hillage (guitar), Lindsay Cooper (oboe, bassoon) and vocalists Amanda Parsons, Ann Rosenthal and Barbara Gaskin.
Listeners have complained that the drums are mixed too loud on the album's organ trio pieces. In an article written for the UK fanzine Ptolemaic Terrascope in 1990 (quoted in Mark Powell's liner notes of the Esoteric Recordings CD re-release), Stewart explains that it was the unbending wish of drummer Clive Brooks that his drums be featured prominently in the mix, and that the other members were unable to persuade him otherwise.
In a 2007 review for website All About Jazz, John Kelman wrote, "The Civil Surface reflects widening interests, with Stewart's greater jazz-centricity and wryly melodic Canterbury flavor most notable on the longer tracks "Germ Patrol," "Enneagram" and "Wring Out the Ground (Loosely Now)" ... The complex writing—episodic tracks filled with complex meters, rich harmonies and tight arrangements, as well as some strong solos—bears an unmistakable link to Hatfield but, with Campbell's rigorous classicism an equal part of the equation, it still sounds like Egg."
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Civil_Surface)

01. Germ Patrol (08:30)
02. Wind Quartet 1 (02:20)
03. Enneagram (09:07)
04. Prelude (04:17)
05. Wring Out the Ground Loosely Now (08:11)
06. Nearch (03:11)
07. Wind Quartet 2 (04:46)

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Egg - The Polite Force (1971)

Year: February 1971 (CD 2008)
Label: Esoteric Records (UK), ECLEC 2036
Style: Canterbury Scene, Progressive Rock
Country: London, England
Time: 42:57
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 255 Mb

It was inevitable that Egg would be compared with Emerson, Lake & Palmer - a trio of bass/keyboards/drums with the bassist also singing, coming along at the very end of the 1960s, incorporating serious classical influences (and directed quotations) into their extended pieces. On their second album, The Polite Force, they try for a higher wattage sound than Emerson, Lake & Palmer, without as high velocity a brand of song. Dave Stewart's organ playing is as aggressive and melodic as Keith Emerson's, and he accomplishes a lot with less in the way of high-speed histrionics. That doesn't mean they aren't given to some electronic excesses. The album is diverting enough in its successful spots to carry the rest of it, but there are some missteps -- including one track dominated by guest horn players - that were enough to keep this album from being a favorite, even among art-rock fanatics. Reissued in Japan in the late '90s as part of the Decca/Deram psychedelic retrospective series.
(allmusic.com/album/the-polite-force-mw0000261107)

01. A Visit To Newport Hospital (08:28)
02. Contrasong (04:25)
03. Boilk (Incl. Bach: 'Durch Adams Fall Ist Ganz Verderbt') (09:22)
04. Long Piece No. 3: Part One (05:08)
05. Long Piece No. 3: Part Two (07:38)
06. Long Piece No. 3: Part Three (05:03)
07. Long Piece No. 3: Part Four (02:51)

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Egg - Egg [3 bonus tracks] (1970)

Year: 13 March 1970 (CD 2008)
Label: Esoteric Records (UK), ECLEC 2035
Style: Canterbury Scene, Progressive Rock
Country: London, England
Time: 50:15
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 267 Mb

Egg were an English progressive rock band formed in July 1968. Remembered for their strange, experimental sound, the band produced three studio albums before disbanding in 1974.
The album was re-issued on CD in February 2004 by Eclectic Discs. Remastered from the original tapes, the re-issue has three bonus tracks, including both sides of the band's first and only single ("Seven Is a Jolly Good Time/You Are All Princes") and "Movement 3" from "Symphony No. 2", which was omitted from the original LP days after release due to copyright difficulties, because its tune bears a similarity to part of Igor Stravinsky's ballet The Rite of Spring. There are also similarities to the final Neptune movement of Gustav Holst's orchestral suite The Planets.
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_(album))

01. Bulb (00:09)
02. While Growing My Hair (04:02)
03. I Will Be Absorbed (05:11)
04. Fugue In D Minor (02:49)
05. They Laughed When I Sat Down At The Piano... (01:21)
06. The Song Of McGillicudie The Pusillanimous (or Don't Worry James, Your Socks Are Hanging In The Coal Cellar With Thomas) (05:09)
07. Boilk (01:02)
08. Symphony No. 2 - First Movement (05:46)
09. Symphony No. 2 - Second Movement (06:17)
10. Symphony No. 2 - Blane (05:27)
11. Symphony No. 2 - Third Movement (03:10)
12. Symphony No. 2 - Fourth Movement (bonus track) (03:13)
13. Seven Is A Jolly Good Time (bonus track) (02:47)
14. You Are All Princes (bonus track) (03:45)

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