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"...Things You Do To Me..."
Ah the mighty Pie! They
might have been white on the outside but inside their Souls were black and
raring to batter the lugholes of the world with their brand of British Blues
Rock and Rock Soul.
Preceded by four
underwhelming studio albums on two different labels (Immediate and A&M
Records) and after the groundbreaking and rocking live double
"Performance: Rockin’ The Fillmore" broke them huge everywhere
(especially in America) – it was time for more studio shenanigans. The wildly
underrated single studio LP "Smokin'" from April 1972 came next and
was itself followed in 1973 by this - the equally fantastical double LP set
"Eat It" – another strangely forgotten milestone in this British
band’s stellar career.
Split between three studio
sides of soulful Rock tunes and Acoustic ballads (beefed up with backing vocals
from The Blackberries –a trio of veteran American ladies - see below) and one
final side recorded live at Green's Playhouse in Glasgow (mostly cover
versions) - their second double-album paired back on the band's usual cache of
swagger and snake trouser boogie anthems and instead went for mellow and
tuneful as Soul Music seemed to consume Steve Marriott whole.
Marriott wrote all of Side 1
and 3 and the lyrics to the opener on Side 4 "Up Our Sleeve" (the
band wrote the music) with all of Side 2 and the remaining pair on Side 4 being
Deep Soul covers from the Sixties (O.V. Wright, Ray Charles, Edwin Starr, Ike
& Tina Turner, Jr. Walker & The All Stars etc). "Eat It" was
also housed in a chunky and colourful gatefold sleeve (a John Kosh design)
complete with a gorgeous illustrated 20-page booklet (reproduced here in full).
But what issue to buy on CD?
Fans will know that Humble
Pie's back catalogue (on A&M Records especially) has been strangely ignored
by British reissue companies (licensing issues perhaps) and Japan has and still
is your first port of call for remasters. I’d recommend this reissue from
November 2016 that offers the full double-album Remastered onto 1CD as your
fastest and best poison. It can be purchased as new for about £22 to £24 online
from several sites including Amazon (sometimes less secondhand) – has a 2007
Remaster that wrestles well with a dense mix, Mini LP Gatefold Repro Artwork
with the Booklet (separated from the sleeve) and both looks and sounds great.
Here are the Drugstore Cowboys and Black Coffees...
Released 23 November 2016 in
Japan - "Eat It" by HUMBLE PIE on Universal/A&M Records
UICY-77981 (Barcode 4988031188149) is an SHM-CD Reissue (Double-Album onto 1CD)
in Mini LP Repro Artwork with a 2007 Remaster that plays out as follows (65:25
minutes):
1. Get Down To It [Side 1]
2. Good Booze And Bad Women
3. Is It For Love
4. Drugstore Cowboy
5. Black Coffee [Side 2]
6. I Believe To My Soul
7. Shut Up And Don't Interrupt
Me
8. That's How Strong My Love
Is
9. Say No More [Side 3]
10. Oh, Bella (That's All
Hers)
11. Summer Song
12. Beckton Dumps
13. Up Our Sleeve [Live]
[Side 4]
14. Honky Tonk Women [Live]
15. (I'm A) Road Runner
[Live]
Tracks 1 to 15 are the double-album
"Eat It" - released April 1973 in the UK on A&M Records AMLS 6004
and March 1973 in the USA on A&M Records SP-3701. Produced by HUMBLE PIE
[Sides 1 to 3 are Studio Recordings - Side 4 is Live] - it peaked at No. 34 in
the UK and No. 13 in the USA.
HUMBLE PIE was:
STEVE MARRIOTT – Lead
Vocals, Lead Guitar and Harmonica on "Good Booze And Bad Women" and
"(I'm A) Road Runner [Live]"
(DAVE) CLEM CLEMPSON (ex
Bakerloo, Colosseum) – Second Lead Guitar and Backing Vocals
GREG RIDLEY – Bass and
Backing Vocals
JERRY SHIRLEY – Drums
Guests:
THE BLACKBERRIES [Clydie
King, Venetta Fields and Billie Barnum] - Backing Vocals on all Tracks except
9, 10, 11, 12 and 15
B.J. COLE - Pedal Steel
Guitar on "Oh, Bella (That's All Hers)"
SYDNEY GEORGE – Saxophone on
"Shut Up And Don't Interrupt Me"
Fans will know that Japan
has had a 'long' history of reissuing Humble Pie – in this case a whopping four
times on the SHM-CD format alone. Number one came 14 February 2007 on
Universal/A&M Records UICY-93223 (Barcode 4988005459770) - that issue
featuring SHM-CD technology and Mini LP Repro Artwork (or Paper Sleeve) and
most importantly - a new Remaster by Audio Engineer HIDEAKI NISHIMURA (all
reissues since have been based on this variant).
Second was 22 April 2009 on
Universal/A&M UICY-94070 (Barcode 4988005555199) – again on SHM-CD and Mini
LP Artwork. Third arrived as part of the 'Back To The Rock Years...' reissue
series on 9 November 2011 – but this time the SHM-CD Universal/A&M Records
UICY-25064 (Barcode 4988005677952) came in a standard jewel case only.
Which brings us to number
four and our chosen poison today - the 23 November 2016 variant again in Mini
LP Artwork. Essentially yet another reissue of the 2007 Remaster but one that
is still on catalogue (the earlier discs are all deleted) - the Mini LP cover
repros the original double-album gatefold colour artwork and 'the lovely
Sheena' drawn booklet that came with original copies. The CD insert consists of
a foldout white paper inlay that approximates lyrics in English and Japanese
with a separate history of Humble Pie in Japanese (only). In its sealable
plastic outer sleeve with an Obi strip along the side, this reissue is a sweet
thing to look at and hold.
As a recording "Eat
It" is a notorious mishmash of sound quality. Whilst Side 1 and 2 feel
good (dense in places) - it's as if audio quality abandoned the record for Side
3 - many of the primarily acoustic tracks are a tad hissy and sound like they
were recorded on the huff - more for feel than fidelity. The live side (4) is
crude and rude and feels at times like a bootleg - huge and snotty nonetheless.
But the Hideaki Nishimura Remaster is great and the enhanced SHM-CD brings out
the sheer power of the band ("(I'm A) Road Runner" is a beast of Bass
and Drums - the band rocking like mad as Marriott whips the audience into a
frenzy) and the delicacies of the softer material and that's the real winner
here. Let's get to the music...
Side 1 opens on a winner and
a musical mission statement - out goes straight up 'Rawk' and in comes Humble
Pie doing 'Soul Rock' with the wonderful "Get Down To It". The first
thing you notice is his deliberate inclusion of The Blackberries giving it some
bolstering Soulful Backing Vocals on every track. A trio of veteran ladies in
the shape of Venetta Fields, Clydie King and Billie Barnum – their names will
be familiar to anyone who has poured over inner sleeves for decades from
hundreds of appearances on huge catalogue albums throughout the Seventies and
Eighties. Marriott was clearly trying to move his hard-rocking band into
different and looser territory and a No.13 chart placing in the USA in March
1973 proved that the American public at least thought this a good idea.
A rare barroom rocker
"Good Booze And Bad Women" sees Marriott bring in the wailing
harmonica as it chugs Ten Years After-like along - the girls shadowing his lead
vocals as Clem Clempson solos away like a goodun. "Is It For Love?"
has sadness to it - a slow melancholia like the Faces bemoaning a relationship
breakdown (the girls add subtle power as they sing back Marriott's pain - so
hard to feel the same again). The near seven minutes of "Drugstore
Cowboy" - a fabulously sloppy rocker - probably reflected SM's lifestyle
just a little too realistically - higher than a hog in L.A. Side 2 offers four
Soul covers - a fantastic slow Blues screamer in Ike & Tina Turner's
"Black Coffee" (probably my fave tune on the whole double) - a slow
pleader in "I Believe To My Soul" by Ray Charles - a cheeky R&B
dancer by Edwin Starr where Marriott shouts "Shut Up And Don't Interrupt
Me" over the saxophone of Sydney George and finally the Roosevelt Jamison
song made famous by O.V. Wright in 1964 (Goldwax 106) - "That's How Strong
My Love Is" - Marriott duetting with the ladies to amazing effect.
After the full-on Band vs.
Soul Singers noise of Side 2 - Side 3's acoustic opener "Say No More"
comes as a shock and something of a relief. If you're my foot, them I'm your
sock, I just need you, you're my long shot...say no more. It's a gorgeous
little tune really. "Oh, Bella (All That's Hers)" continues in that
vein but is even more delicate - his vocals sounding like he's even so slightly
stoned. B.J. Cole's Pedal Steel guitar lends the lonesome lyrics a pathos
quietly pinging away in the background for that beautifully vocalised chorus.
He employs some very cool and musical slide acoustic guitar for "Summer
Song" - asking you to listen to his summer song as he warbles on the
Harmonica - while the jaunty Mickey Jupp rhythms of "Beckton Dumps"
again feature lyrics about a sleepy head in someone else's home - a restless
body that needs to wake up and move on from cravings that need to be tended to.
Side 4 is like the first
three sides didn't exist. Live in Glasgow - raw and rocking - this is the
Humble Pie of "Performance". First we're treated to the naughtiness
of "Up Our Sleeve" - Marriott shouting his customary 'aw right!'
before letting rip into those twin guitars. After a 'finest Rock 'n' Roll band
in the country' intro they roar into the lethal new song and you can't help
think that the stuffy-voiced announcer was in fact right. It ends with two
covers - a tribute to the Rolling Stones with "Honky Tonk Women" and
a nod to Motown with the encore of Jr. Walker's "(I'm A) Road Runner"
which runs to a crowd shredding thirteen and a half minutes. What a
ride...
We would lose Marriott in
1991 aged only 44 from a horrible home-fire accident – robbing the world of one
of the great front men and characters in Rock (much like the equally beloved
Ronnie Lane). I miss him and them – and this entire reissue series has brought
that home with a hammer blow. And isn't that the best compliment of all...
The Japan-Only 23 November
2016 Series of
HUMBLE PIE SHM-CD Reissues in Mini LP Repro Artwork are:
1. "Humble Pie"
(July 1970) – Universal/A&M UICY-77977 (Barcode 4988031188101)
2. "Rock On"
(March 1971) – Universal/A&M UICY-77978 (Barcode 4988031188118)
3. "Performance:
Rockin' The Fillmore” (November 1971, Live 2LP Set onto 1CD) –
Universal/A&M UICY-77979 (Barcode 4988031188125)
4. "Smokin'"
(March 1972) – Universal/A&M UICY-77980 (Barcode 4988031188132)
5. "Eat It" (April
1973, 2LP Set onto 1CD) – Universal/A&M UICY-77981 (Barcode 4988031188149)
6. "Thunderbox"
(February 1974) – Universal/A&M UICY-77982 (Barcode 4988031188095)
7. "Street Rats"
(February 1975) – Universal/A&M UICY-77983 (Barcode 4988031188156) – 11
Tracks
8. "Street Rats – UK
Version" (February 1975) – Universal/A&M UICY-77984 (Barcode
4988031188163) – 15 Tracks
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