{"id":33387,"date":"2015-10-30T04:00:35","date_gmt":"2015-10-30T08:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=33387"},"modified":"2015-10-29T21:59:59","modified_gmt":"2015-10-30T01:59:59","slug":"al-stewart-re-issues-reviewed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2015\/10\/30\/al-stewart-re-issues-reviewed\/","title":{"rendered":"Al Stewart re-issues reviewed"},"content":{"rendered":"

In Goldmine Magazine<\/em>, Dave Thompson<\/a> reviews three Al Stewart albums (Orange<\/em>, Past Present and Future<\/em>, and Modern Times<\/em>) being re-issued by Esoteric Recordings:<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a dilemma. Sacrifice the last round of Al Stewart reissues, with their healthy helping of bonus tracks, but not precisely stellar sound; or eschew this most recent bundle, which skip a few of the extra songs from before, but return to the original CBS tapes for a remastering that comes as close as Christmas to sounding like the original vinyl?<\/p>\n

That\u2019s for your ears to decide, but the fact is, these are the best-sounding Stewart CDs yet, and the most enthrallingly packaged too, with the original UK artwork restored; liners built around a brand new interview; and, between them, a large part of any self-respecting \u201cbest of Al\u201d that predates the cat.<\/p>\n

Certainly it\u2019s difficult to play favorites between them \u2013 Orange<\/em> boasts \u201cYou Don\u2019t Even Know Me,\u201d \u201cI\u2019m Falling\u201d and \u201cNight of the 4th of May,\u201d perhaps the all-time great mea culpa<\/em> confessional (hit Youtube for the Old Grey Whistle Test<\/em> rendition, and marvel in speechless joy), then adds the scintillating 45 version of \u201cNews From Spain\u201d alongside the already wonderful album take. Plus the b-side \u201cElvaston Place.\u201d<\/p>\n

PPF<\/em> starts slowly but quickly finds its feet with \u201cLast Day of June 1934,\u201d \u201cPost World War Two Blues\u201d and the remarkable \u201cSoho (Needless to Say),\u201d before marching resolutely into epic territory with \u201cRoads to Moscow\u201d and \u201cNostradamus\u201d \u2013 plus another stray single, \u201cSwallow Wind\u201d (and the 45 mix of \u201cTerminal Eyes\u201d); and Modern Times<\/em> opens with \u201cCarol,\u201d closes with the title track, and \u2026 okay so if you only want two of the three reissues, that\u2019s probably the one to pass over. Like Zero She Flies<\/em>, earlier in the canon, it\u2019s the sound of Stewart pausing for breath after one brace of brilliance, and before marching onto his next masterpiece.<\/p>\n

Which, on this occasion was Year of the Cat<\/em>, and all the fame and fortune that followed it. And which was also something of a mixed blessing, in that that album and single were so astonishingly huge that they drew a thick black line across his career, and rendered all those earlier albums \u201cformative\u201d works in the eyes of the Great Unwashed. When, in fact, it was simply one more highlight in a career that had positively overflowed with the things.<\/p>\n

Three albums precede this batch in the catalog \u2013 among them a maiden effort (Bedsitter Images<\/em>) that stands, in either of its originally released incarnations, among the most important, inspirational and, most of all, lasting of all late sixties singer-songwriter debuts; and a sophomore set whose subsequent renown is so unfairly focussed on the sidelong title track \u201cLove Chronicles,\u201d when it\u2019s side one\u2019s \u201cOld Compton Street Blues\u201d and \u201cThe Ballad of Mary Foster\u201d that are truly its greatest accomplishments.<\/p>\n

Hopefully we will be seeing similarly exacting reissues of both, plus the aforementioned Zero<\/em> and many more besides. But for now, to paraphrase another cut from Love Chronicles<\/em>, you should be listening to Al.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Goldmine Magazine, Dave Thompson reviews three Al Stewart albums (Orange, Past Present and Future, and Modern Times) being re-issued by Esoteric Recordings: Here\u2019s a dilemma. Sacrifice the last round of Al Stewart reissues, with their healthy helping of bonus tracks, but not precisely stellar sound; or eschew this most recent bundle, which skip a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[177,86,200],"class_list":["post-33387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media","tag-alstewart","tag-criticism","tag-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-8Gv","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33387"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33388,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33387\/revisions\/33388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}