ALL OVER YOU ... TOO
Caravan
•Canterbury Scene
From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website
3.44
| 26 ratings | 4 reviews | 8% 5 stars
Good, but non-essential |
Boxset/Compilation, released in 1999 Songs / Tracks Listing 1. Hoedown - Pye Hastings / Rhythm guitar, bass, vocals HTD HTDCD 102 Thanks to ProgLucky for the additionand to AtomicCrimsonRush for the last updates Edit this entry |
Buy CARAVAN All Over You ... Too Music
-
DOUG LARSON IMPORTS — Buy prog rock music and rarities (Free shipping on orders over 10 CD's)
- AMAZON.COM — Best-selling prog vinyls
CARAVAN All Over You ... Too ratings distribution
(26 ratings)
Essential: a masterpiece of progressive rock music(8%)Excellent addition to any prog rock music collection(35%)Good, but non-essential (38%)Collectors/fans only (15%)Poor. Only for completionists (4%)
CARAVAN All Over You ... Too reviews
Showing all collaborators reviews and last reviews preview | Show all reviews/ratings
Collaborators/Experts Reviews
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR Prog Folk
PROG REVIEWER
From Girls: Hoedown, Cthu thlu, The Dog's at it again From Cunning Stunts: Stuck in a Hole From Bling Dog at St Dunstans: A very smelly, grubby litle oik From Better BY Far: Nightmare
Well I'll happily be in a minority of one with this one: i think this album is absolutely great fun. it's hard not to smile at the exuberance and
Caravan are one of my favourite prog bands (although I've hardly reviewed any of their albums yet). This absolutely the wrong one with which to start. Having said that ....
Very Smelly Grubby Little Oik is a merry upbeat humorous track. Infectious. I've played it at parties, in between modern numbers: it always gets a great reaction. A nice cathcy guitar riff and with Jim Leverton and Richard Coughlan the rhythm is mesmeric. Bobbing Wide is a real mood change, as the band switch to a more sophisticated sound.
The Dog brings us back to the classic Canterbury sound. Pye Hastings' charactersitic restrained understated vocal is the antithesis of the flash front man. Doug Boyle really adds dome spice to this track for the heavier proggers but this is and remains firmly within the Canterbury Scene.
I think the stand out factor about this album is the new dynamic that Doug Boyle brings to the equation. It has been a revelation to me. hear it in this album and watch the DVDs: incredible - it just really works. I suppose it helps that he has obviously had a vulcan mind meld with Geoffrey Richardson. Here you have a genuinely grat prog band with a bona fide lead guitarist in a combination that is greater than the sum of its parts (unlike the awesome Trevor Rabin & Yes partnership).
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR Honorary Collaborator
There are some incredible moments on this album. Hoedown and Very smelly grubby little oik sound terrific with the heavier guitars, Hastings vocals are fabulous. The dog the dog he's at it again is an excellent version of the classic. Stuck in a hole has a great lead break and very powerful guitar work. Doug Boyle is a key factor to the heavier sound and it is a welcome change darkening the music that is usually lighter and giving it a razor's edge to make these versions some of the best the band have played, 'Cthlu Thlu' is masterful and one of the best Caravan songs.
Nightmare is a well executed throwback to the classic version and it ends with a reprise of Bobbing wide (Reprise). I was surprised and delighted at the dynamic enthusiasm and vibrant energy of the band even in their twilight years. They still inject humour and potent instrumental breaks in the songs making them one of the genuine survivors of the 70s Canterbury prog movement.
PROG REVIEWER
Then there's All Over You... Too, recorded in mid-1999, which is the sequel to All Over You. It's another set of updated songs, and is recorded by essentially the same lineup - with the addition of Jim Leverton on bass (who'd sat out the All Over You sessions despite having joined the band for Battle of Hastings) and Doug Boyle on guitar (offering an extra twist similar to those he contributed on the Canterbury Comes To London live album), and with a guest spot from Hugh Hopper of Soft Machine on one track.
This feels like a more successful take on the same general experiment that All Over You was trying. It helps that Caravan aren't necessarily messing with their most beloved material here. That's not to say they don't touch any of their sacred cows - some of the tracks here (like the cuts from For Girls Who Grow Plump In the Night) are highly-regarded Caravan tracks which are undeniably in the top tier of their catalogue.
At the same time, they're more willing this time around to dip into material which perhaps isn't so well-remembered - many consider Caravan to have been on the wane a little on Blind Dog At St. Dunstans' and at a low ebb on Better By Far, but they're happy to dip into those albums for that material, and arguably Nightmare (from Better By Far) the sections of the Grubby Little Oik suite (from Blind Dog) they rework here have never sounded better - and it's less of a shock to hear the experiment because even if you are a Caravan fan you probably don't regard the original versions with quite as much fondness as, say, any of the material on In the Land of Grey and Pink.
That said, even the reworkings of truly first-class Caravan classics here are somewhat interesting, the band doing a decent job of casting their classic material in a more modern form which suggests that their perceived unfashionability in the 1990s may well have been one of the great musical injustices.
If you only care for Caravan as a 1970s classic prog act and have no desire to hear that material played in a way which substantially differs from the original albums, you won't like this album regardless of how well-executed it is. If, on the other hand, you're open to a different take on familiar and not-so-familiar Caravan songs, it's worth a punt.
Latest members reviews
No review or rating for the moment | Submit a reviewPost a review of CARAVAN "All Over You ... Too"
You must be a forum member to post a review, please register here if you are not.
MEMBERS LOGIN ZONE
As a registered member (register here if not), you can post rating/reviews (& edit later), comments reviews and submit new albums.
You are not logged, please complete authentication before continuing (use forum credentials).