Product Format: CD
Price: Normally
£14.99 Currently
£9.16 (exc)
£10.99 (inc)
Qty:
2009 2nd album, and if you are a fan of either The NICE or EMERSON LAKE & PALMER, you need the instrumental keyboards driven music of this US band!
CASTLE CANYON must have turned a lot of heads back in the early 70’s!
Described as: “the greatest band that nobody heard in the early 70's” they have returned for their 2nd opus: ‘Criteria Obsession’, an album that won't disappoint (unless you were looking for banjo versions of Greg Lake tunes)!
CASTLE CANYON were/are a US based (mostly) instrumental Prog band that actually existed in the early 70’s but never released anything!! In 2009 keyboardist Erik Ian Walker released an archival CD entitled: ‘Gods Of 1973’ (also available from CDS Towers) featuring their early recordings, but now Erik has gotten the boys back together (more or less) in 2015 to record ‘Criteria Obsession’, which contains older material that never saw the light of day.
‘Criterea Obsession’ is also dominated by keyboards, but this expanded version of the original line-up features some healthy use of guitar as well. Chunky blocks of Hammond organ, wicked and wild ARP solos and languid piano interventions all feature throughout. So, if you are an ELP fan, you will love CASTLE CANYON for sure!
About the album’s seven tracks…
‘Criteria Obsession’ starts out delivering the thrill-a-minute Hammond organ feature ‘Wiggy Beets’, based VERY LOOSELY on Beethoven’s ‘Piano Sonata #1 in F minor (Presto), and it’s a seriously fun romp through the rock landscape with liberal doses of the classical piece weaved in by snarling Hammond B3. What's not to like?
Then there’s the 1972 Progressive Rock masterpiece that is: ‘Criteria Obsession/The Mushroom Song’ a track that is finally seeing the light of day here in 2015. Originally composed in 1972, the band, due to becoming unstuck in time, arrived at various random intervals to record the track between 2012-2014. An Art Rock masterpiece of grand sweep and gritty perspective, ‘Criteria Obsession’ gives way, after a psychedelic interlude, to the ‘Mushroom Song’, written in 1968 by Jeffrey S. Walker. If you can't trip on this, you can't trip. OK?
‘My Lady Carey’ was written centuries ago but rocking in 2015! It was an anonymous keyboard solo composed in 1549, and originally called: ‘My Lady Carey's Dompe (dance)’ and it has been a firm band favourite since the early 70's. Unlike most other written pieces of the time, ‘My Lady Carey’ has a great stomping' bass-line and a burning solo line that sounds like it was written yesterday. Guitarist Luke Schwartz, the amazing teenager who has joined the unstuck in time teenagers of CASTLE CANYON, really shines on this one.
Here's you chance to test your trippin' DNA. Included, because they knew you wanted them, are TWO Arp 2600 synthesizer solo works, the first of which is: ‘Pope's Cabin’ – recorded in 1974 and capturing that HUGE animal Krakken kind of vibe that only a modular synth and a most excellent 70's spring reverb can give. ‘Pope’s Cabin’ was recorded at Dan Pope's cabin on Mt. Hood in Rhododendron, Oregon on the Arp synth in 1974. Performing were Leroy Laush and Erik Walker, with Leroy twirling knobs and Erik playing keys (at the same time, live). This location is just a couple miles from the Castle Canyon trail, from which the band got their name. They use the name CASTLE CANYON because of a bizarre and amazing aural experience that happened to them while hiking on the Castle Canyon trail, and without going into crazy detail we can tell you it was related to the time travel thing!!
‘Disaster’ is the album’s epic piece – a wild explosion of vistas inspired by a train wreck of a performance in 1974 that we are told turned out to be the best thing that could have ever happened to it.
It takes some nerve to title a song ‘Disaster’, but that's what original member Jim Goodwin yelled into the mic after bassist extraordinaire Fred Chalenor started off the song at a blistering pace (and didn't look up) live in concert, and Jim knocked over a couple mic stands in shock. Apparently the track never really decided to play itself the way it was laid out, and something entirely new was born. The resulting: 'Disaster' (not the original title) was, at the time, thought to be an amusing recording of a ‘live’ performance, but over the years the band grew to prefer this fabulous ‘live’ rendition with all of its wild improvised changes and all. So, when they got together again over tea and mushrooms, they decided to record this like the original ‘live’ ‘Disaster’, and dump the fussy score. However, they allowed for new ‘disasters' to occur in the making of the piece and now love the combination of well-constructed form with the wild spontaneous element included.
‘Exit Strategy’ is a reprise of a snip of ‘Criteria Obsession’ played solo on Hammond M3 and sets up the next track, which is: ‘‘Zig Zag River’, the 2nd of the two Arp 2600 synthesizer solo works recorded in 1974 live at Pope's cabin. This track delivers more of that HUGE animal Krakken modular synth vibe and this one really has that primitive animal quality that Walker loves from early synthesizers. Remember, this is not two synths - it's one 'monophonic' synth with two people goofing with it at the same time!
The CASTLE CANYON line-up: Erik Ian Walker (all Hammond organ / Arp 2600, Korg MS-20, Oberheim & Matrix-12 synthesizers / Fender Rhodes / Clavinet / pianos), Luke Schwartz (all guitars), Paul Elias (drums), Fred Chalenor (bass on ‘Disaster’), Bill Noertker (bass on ‘Criteria Obsession’) and Jack Chandler (saxes).
BTW: Ignore the offer price as being reflective of the quality of the music - This band is being really generous!
Highly recommended!
Also available by CASTLE CANYON: GODS OF 1973 - Stock # 1674074
CASTLE CANYON: CRITERIA OBSESSION Track List:
01. Wiggy Beets (5:35)
02. Criteria Obsession / The Mushroom Song (14:35)
03. My Lady Carey (5:21)
04. Pope's Cabin (2:50)
05. Disaster (13:00)
06. Exit Strategy (0:45)
07. Zig Zag River (2:43)
TPT – 44:49