What does it sound like?:
Macclesfield, 1974. I am 16, 3 years into learning the guitar and keen for new music. I pop into Barry White’s record shop in Brook Green, location of many cool sounds. On the counter there is a mysterious looking sleeve with a strange exotic font and what looks like an ear but closer examination reveals it is actually an unidentifiable morphing shape hinting at a depthless vortex into which to fall. The music fills the shop – at one moment funky, the next rocking and bluesy, then spacy with swirling effects and layers of guitars. I’ve heard of Robin Trower, mostly second hand and of the “Hendrix ripoff” variety, but have never actually heard him. It doesn’t sound at all like Hendrix, I love it and my carefully coveted pocked money and paper round pay is exchanged for a copy. I’ve come back to this album many times in the ensuing decades, particularly the live album he released a few years later and never tire of Robin’s playing and particularly Jim Dewar’s great bass playing and sensational singing.
And so to the 50th anniversary of Robin Trower’s 1974 album “Bridge of Sighs”. This is a 4 disk (should you swing that way) with the original album newly remastered (it was also remastered in 2007 – why? We shall see…), a live album at the Record Plant in the year of release, lots of outtakes, instrumental versions/single edits/demos/rehearsal takes etc. Most interesting, though, is a complete remix and remaster of the album.
I’m generally a bit wary of remasters. They can usually be summed up as “a bit louder, a bit brighter” and this is no exception. It sounds fine, but I never had a problem with the original master on my vinyl or indeed the 2007 remaster on Spotify. Comparing the new one with the 2007 (via Spotify, so not a very good test) it conforms to my rule. It’s great but that’s because the album was well recorded in the first place. Onward…
The remix alone is worth the price of admission if you are a fan. It’s not a “Steven Wilson” style remix, where the original mix is scrupulously replicated but in new bib and tucker. The familiar tracks are still familiar, but there are now additional touches missing from the original album and to this listener Jim Dewar is beautifully presented in the centre of the stereo spectrum, soulful as ever, perfectly offsetting Robin’s lead guitar (typically) on the left with chording on the right. I was interested to hear a string synth on “About to begin”, for example, which I’d never noticed before. The rhythm section of bass and drums is tight and punchy and Reg Isadore’s compact playing provides a perfect foundation for Robin and Jim to soar above. The tracks are also generally longer than the original mix, (“Day of the Eagle” is 30 seconds longer, for example) and more is certainly more, the original track lengths probably imposed by the limitations of vinyl. The tracks aren’t faded, they just reach a natural end when the band grind to a halt. Nice. Sonically the remix is different too – there seems to be more space around the instruments and on my studio monitors the bottom end is tighter and rounder and the stereo panning more varied according to the part. All good.
The extras are fine and it’s nice they are there but as ever with these things, they’re usually outages for a reason though I do love a bit of studio chat etc. The instrumental versions seem to be the tracks sans vocals which is a bit of a chiz. The alternate takes have some great playing, of course.
I couldn’t help comparing the live album to the officially released one from 1976, and honestly though it’s fine, the official album is better. It was recorded in May ’74 and the album only came out in April, and I think the songs must have matured and seasoned. Jim Dewar sounds much more comfortable on the later album recorded in February 75 – singing at that level and also playing bass is a tough gig.
Overall a great package with lots of reasons to buy, for me the main one being the remix.
What does it all *mean*?
Well I guess it means it hasn’t suffered with age, though the same could be said for me. I loved it then and do now, though whether it will win any new listeners I don’t know. It’s maybe too gloomy and slow for the younger listener as sitting cross legged in headphones surrounded by pachouli smoke seems to be a lost pleasure but what do I know. I’m sure Twang jr would like it, the only representative of Gen Z I know, though he’s probably been indoctrinated by me and might not be a valid sample.
Goes well with…
Headphones, pachouli, crossed legs.
Release Date:
15/05/24
Might suit people who like…
Great singin’ and playin’.
Excellent review of this new version of one of my favourite albums. Already ordered but good to know they haven’t ruined anything. Thanks @Twang .
Just got an email saying delivery has been pushed back to June 7th.
weird one this, I already have the discs in at work, but we were told on Thursday (the day before the supposed release) to sit on it until that date in June. Don’t know why, we’ll be selling the exact boxes that are in my stockroom now so it’s not like it’s a duff pressing or the like.
I’m of a very similar vintage to our reviewer, and I too can well remember the buzz amongst my progressive music loving pals when Trower first stepped out on his own and subsequently delivered an exciting sequence of albums – first Twice Removed From Yesterday, then this one and then the final part of the triad, For Earth Below.
Between them this series set out upon a resolute exploration of what was possible with the electric guitar at the centre of things rather than the keyboard dominance that he’d played alongside in Procul Harum.
His solo work is far more blues based than what had come before, and with – inevitably given the times they appeared in – a frequently discernable Hendrix influence. In some ways it’s less ‘out there’ than Hendrix, but it’s also singularly Trower’s own musical odyssey, and even a brief listen makes it clear that here is no copyist; here’s a fellow explorer, treading his own path.
To my mind, or to my ears, Jimi’s echoes here in Robin’s playing are more about the sounds we hear than the music itself; on the title track in particular, we hear a similar bold willingness to show us the sheer sonic power and musical quality available to the guitarist who is keen to deploy the combination of string, guitar and overdriven amplifier as if they were a single tuning fork – the combination delivering a visceral sound that is totally uncompromising in the way it lands a sonic punch that cannot possibly be generated any other way.
This album is one I’ve owned for a very long time, but if I try to recall when I last played it, I realise it must be nearly 20 years ago. To replace a slightly battered LP I bought the 2007 remaster with extra BBC Live tracks, but I don’t think I ever listened to it all, probably just the live tracks that were added for that release – back in the day I’d bought the 1975 Live album that followed the three studio albums mentioned above, but that had been my dropping off point from his career.
Revisiting these tracks today they are familiar, still glorious to listen to, and just as exciting as when I first heard them. Any detectable sonic improvements are of marginal benefit to be honest – the 2007 remaster was pretty fine anyway. However, there is one real win; the biggest overall improvement, as @Twang mentions in his review, is in the way remastered tracks come to a natural close, rather than at the hands of a producer’s faders.
Somehow I doubt if this reissue will sell in bucketloads. It ought to, if there is any love left in the world for beautifully played, expertly produced rock music with blue roots and a surfeit of chops.
In the attention deficit age, where proper listening seems to be a lost art to many, all is sacrificed to mechanical artifice and an overwhelming reliance upon repetitious hooks, and Trower’s records may just be too difficult for many people to appreciate. This music doesn’t deliver the same bland soundtrack that pours from builder’s radios or through open car windows at school run times. This music pays back careful attention and deep immersion. I loved it for a long while back then, and I’ll be investing once more to hear all of the generous extras that are included across the 4 CDs.
If you are passed by a car with the windows down and hear great inventive guitar playing with well sung vocals that need no autotune playing out at full volume you may well have witnessed me indulging once more in a visit to Robin’s electric guitarland.
Highly recommended, man.
“Frequently discernible Hendrix influence”? That’s putting it very mildly! He has grabbed the core components of Hendrix’s late period sound (univibe and fuzz face into Marshall) and filled his playing with typical Hendrixisms. He does it nicely, but it’s hard to name another guitarist who has so heavily mined a single aspect of their influence.
On a seperate note, it’s strange how the now-cliched Hendrix guitar sound is something that appeared on no Hendrix studio album in his lifetime. Of course, it’s all over his posthumous stuff.
“Now-cliched”? Out of interest – and excepting Trower – who else would you say were responsible for perpetuating this “cliched” sound?
Stevie Ray Vaughan, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Stevie Salas, the guy from Pearl Jam, plus Frank Marino and a gazillion other guitarists in the 70s. Go to any modelling software to a Hendrix setting and it will be that sound. Go to any guitar forum where they talk about the Hendrix sound and it will be Univibes and fuzz faces into Marshalls.
In my local guitar pedal shop (Pedal Empire) there are dozens of vibes and Hendrix is the touchstone for all of them. Don’t get me wrong; I love the sound and have 3-4 vibe pedals myself. But 90% of the time when a guitarist uses a Univibe they are specifically recalling that sound.
(I’ll get me coat…)
That noticeable influence is, to my mind, a solid reason to praise his music, not an opportunity to damn it faintly. He’s exploring, extending and celebrating a playing style that he finds exciting. Nothing wrong with that, and the fact that hardly anyone else tread that path is, frankly, neither here nor there.
I’m not sure why you separate studio work during an artist’s lifetime with that issued posthumously – it seems a dubious distinction really. After all, the genius collage work of Side 2 isn’t strangely attributed differently to the poptastic work of the Beatles releases before their posthumous album.
It wasn’t intended to be damning, but I do think Trower is let down by forgettable songs. It is a lovely sound he makes, however. But even the tracks quoted in this thread show a very Clapton-inspired guitarist in the 60s who abruptly changed his style and sound right around 70/71.
If you’d asked someone to recreate Hendrix’s sound during the several years he was famous it would have been a far more aggressive, fuzzed out tone. Over the years it’s shifted to this late-period tone, probably due to the release of the posthumous albums in the 70s. I just find it interesting, the same way that the cliched George Harrison slide sound was never heard on a Beatles record (ignoring Threetles pap).
If you genuinely think that the five tracks below are “Clapton-inspired”, then your ears are very different from mine…
The first name that came to mind when I clicked play on the Whisky Train vid was Eric – that number could so easily have been an outake from a Cream session around the Wheels Of Fire time.
(Must be just me, then…)
Play the live Crossroads in your head, then click on the vid for Whisky Train. Shirley there’s a really strong whiff of Eric (or even Robert) in that riff!?
Every blues guitarist in the late 60s was influenced by Eric and Jimi I think.
Well…perhaps we should say that every British blues guitarist in the late 60s (including Eric and even Jimi, to an extent) was influenced by Johnson or one of the Kings.
Well of course, and the Kings were influenced by T Bone Walker etc etc. His7 far back shall we go? But my point was that the Eric clones were influenced by him possibly to the exclusion of earlier influences.
I suppose my point was that Trower wasn’t a Clapton clone (IMHO). And even the Hendrix comparisons are slightly over-laboured (IMHO, again). You seem to be a Trower fan, @Twang – do you really believe that he’s SO derivative?
No I don’t @fitterstoke. I think we’re disappearing in the sub-thread. I’m sure they all influence each other but I think Trower is his own stylist and a terrific player. And, note, no less than Roberts Fripp asked him for guitar lessons so I think that says a lot.
I knew that – but decided not to mention it – alluding to Fripp doesn’t always, er, improve matters on this blog…🙂
True, and I speak as one who got a shoeing after he posted my review of his weird book on his Facebook page!
Here it is again so nah.
Ah yes: I remember finding it surprising that Fripp’s FB followers were such humourless gits when the man himself seems able to take a joke. Don’t know why I was surprised…
And they were all so unctuous, calling him Mr. Fripp etc. Weird.
Needless to say Pod you’re going to have RT fans disagree with you. I think JH’s influences were evident on the first two albums but not on “For Earth Below” onwards.
I recall a period of time in the late 70s, early 80s even when anyone who covered or sounded at all similar to Jimi would be accused of sacrilege. Since then it seems to have become acceptable, indeed even necessary to cite him as an influence and OK cover his songs.
I don’t agree that RT was so singular in this respect but there are a number of guitarists who were called out for it – Frank Marino and Randy Hansen in particular, but Jeff Healey, Eric Gales, Kenny Wayne Shepherd and even good ol’ Stevie Ray. Some because of cover versions, some because of tone and gear, some because they did the playing with their teeth thing. or had a few similar licks. And we should all keep in mind that JH largely imitated Pete Townsend – according to Roger D.
Surely you mean Donovan?
I fully admit my knowledge of Trower is limited to his first two albums plus a live album.
Fabulous review. It’s great to see a remix getting a big thumbs up! 😉
Superb review, @Twang – makes me want to rush out and buy it!
(However, I may need to come back later and have a rant about the received wisdom that Trower was constrained in PH – not you, actually the review in Uncut – when the truth is, when you get past the Pale album, Procol’s output was littered with fine, bluesy Trower solos)
Yes, indeed: here we are – from the review in Uncut, June 2024
“Frustrated by not being allowed to let rip in his years with Procol Harum, Trower had given notice of intent with his 1973 solo debut Twice Removed From Yesterday, which included an incendiary cover of BB King’s ‘Rock Me Baby’ and rather suggested he’d been in the wrong group all along”. Bollocks, 16-karat bollocks.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m a fan of Trower’s solo material, but his work with Procol Harum is routinely overlooked – and it’s uniformly excellent.
After the big 1967 hit single, all the PH albums had plenty of bluesy , distorted solos from Trower. Anyone who thinks they were a twee psychedelic band from that point on hasn’t been paying attention. He also had writing credits on most of these albums, it wasn’t all Brooker/Reid! I’m not trying to pretend that being the guitarist in a five-piece is the same as leading your own power trio, but I get so fed up with the lazy journalism (ie, PH had a hit then stopped). Also, The Paramounts were a soul/rhythm n blues band, Brooker knew his way around the changes. You think that vanished in Procol?
Playlist, playlist!
Well, see below – it’s a start. I’ll see if I can get a proper playlist together
Great review and comments. Really enjoyed the forensic analysis of how the new remaster sounds compared to previous versions.
I ordered a copy back in March when I read your review here …. or so I thought. I seem to lose more of the plot each day. Anyway, splendid review – I look forward to getting my hands on a copy
Loved this album when it came out. Played it today and still sounds magnificent. Maybe a couple of average cow bell rock tunes but more than compensated by the moody atmospherics of much of the rest and in the second half of Too Rolling Stoned some of the finest rock lead guitar you’ll ever want to hear. I guess he’s just stuck with the Hendrix tag – just like Lenny was with being ‘miserable’ but it’s a bit of a lazy criticism. Yes there’s something in the guitar tone but not in the actual playing (IMHO) – other views are of course available. Thanks for reminding me about this album @Twang
⬆️This. I do so hate a lazy, “received wisdom” criticism…
First of all, this Hendrix thing; I just don’t get it and I never have done. He sounds nothing like Hendrix; it was simply an off-the-cuff remark made by a lazy journalist and it stuck. The Trower tracks I like are ones that I like very much indeed, but the mid-Atlantic funk-rawk stuff leaves me cold. Even Day Of The Eagle waned for me immediately after one listen. All that stuff is just noise.
The ones that do it for me are the ones where the guitar notes sound like molasses being slowly squeezed through Peggy Lee’s liberty bodice. Bridge of Sighs (obviously), Daydream (only the live version off Robin Trower Live), I Can’t Wait Much Longer (again, the live one will do for me), and Long Misty Days. Each one of those is close to perfection. A few others come close, but they’re the big-hitters for me. The shouty rock stuff sits nowhere in particular and could be almost any Seventies college band in style alone.
I’ll have to take the word of people who are far better qualified than me, that he was a superb technician. As a non-player I’ve never heard anything more than average guitar playing, but that didn’t matter, because to me it was all about the feel. His playing always seemed slightly messy to me, but that’s fine, because I like that.
Oh – nearly forgot … and no other guitarist comes even close when it comes to gurning while playing.