Brinsley Schwarz - Last Orders!

Brinsley Schwarz - Last Orders! - 2021 

During its life as a British pub rock band from 1969-1975, Brinsley Schwarz released seven albums. And over the years other archival material has found its way onto various media. 

The latest, and probably final chapter, is Last Orders!, a collection of some of the earliest recordings Brinsley Schwarz made for radio and television, outtakes, rehearsals, home recordings, and unreleased tracks culled from rhythm guitarist Ian Gomm’s personal archive. 

The sound quality varies a bit from track to track, but overall it is fairly decent. The album opens with the previously unreleased “Seymour (I Love You),” a catchy pop rock instrumental dating from 1970, which is followed by a broadcast version of the country rocker “Funk Angel.” Another unreleased song dating from the same time period is “Indian Woman” with its similarity to Neil Young and Crazy Horse, especially “Down by the River.” There is some cool boogie and stride piano on “That’s What It Takes.” “The Old Country” first appeared on the Rarities album and it signaled a change in the band’s direction to a more laidback country rock sound recalling the Grateful Dead and New Riders of the Purple Sage. In fact, some of the vocals sound like Jerry Garcia. 

Quite a nice set of songs that showcase Brinsley Schwarz’ off-kilter approach to what was happening in British music in the early 70s, successfully blending West Coast country rock with their soulful pub rock vibe to create their own unique style.

01. Seymour (I Love You) 

02. Funk Angel

03. Indian Woman 

04. The Old Country

05. That's What It Takes

06. Strange Feeling

07. What Would You Do

08. Crime Of Passion

09. Unknown Number

10. Silver Pistol

11. She's Got To Be Real

12. Country Girl

13. Range War

14. Murder On My Mind

Tracks 1 to 3 recorded live in the studio circa 1970

Tracks 4 to 8 are Silver Pistols era recordings

Tracks 4 to 6 are unreleased studio recordings

Track 7 was recorded live

Track 8 is a home recording

Tracks 9 to 14 recorded live in the studio for a radio broadcast

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Kippington Lodge - Shy Boy - The Complete Recordings 1967-1969

Kippington Lodge - Shy Boy - The Complete Recordings 1967-1969 - 2011

Kippington Lodge released five excellent singles on Parlophone Records between 1967 and 1969, yet they remain one of the least known English pop groups of the late sixties – despite boasting a line-up that included Nick Lowe, Brinsley Schwarz and Bob Andrews (a future member of Graham Parker & The Rumour).

The group evolved from Lowe’s first band, Sounds 4+1, which he formed with school pal, Brinsley.

After leaving school, Lowe, already used to a nomadic existence as his father was in the Royal Air Force, decided to go and see some more of the world, leaving Schwarz to return to his native Tunbridge Wells in Kent. Here Schwarz formed Three’s A Crowd who were signed to EMI in 1967.

Changing their name to Kippington Lodge they released their debut Shy Boy in October. Lowe returned to England and joined his friends in time for the second single, Rumours.

To supplement their lack of income from record sales, Kippington Lodge became Billie Davies’ backing group and released three further singles during 1968-69. The last single, a version of The Beatles’ In My Life, was released in April 1969.

In September the group replaced Pete Whale with American drummer Billy Rankin and the name Kippington Lodge was dropped in favour of that of their lead guitarist, and the band became Brinsley Schwarz.

Original keyboard player Barry Landerman resurfaced in Vanity Fare.

01. Shy Boy

02. Lady on a Bicycle

03. Rumors

04. And She Cried

05. Tell Me a Story

06. Understand a Woman

07. Tomorrow Today

08. Turn Out the Light

09. In My Life

10. I Can See Her Face

11. Land of Sea

12. Rumors

13. And She Cried

14. Shy Boy

15. Younger Girl

Brinsley Schwarz - Guitar, Vocals

Barry Landerman - Keyboards (1967-69)

Bob Andrews - Keyboards (1969)

Pete Whale - Drums (1967-69)

Bill Rankin - Drums (1969)

Dave Cottam - Bass, Vocals (1967-68)

Nick Lowe - Bass, Vocals (1968-69)

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Brinsley Schwarz - It's All Over Now (recorded 1974)

Brinsley Schwarz - It's All Over Now (recorded 1974) - 2017

FROM PennyBlackMusic
Missing in action to one degree or another for over forty years, 70's country-rockers Brinsley Schwarz’s final album will properly see the light of day on Mega Dodo on April 28th. The aptly named 'It’s All Over Now' was recorded at Rockfield Studios with producer Steve Verocca, who was brought in to steer the project toward an American audience.

Despite Brinsley Schwarz’s management’s legendarily disastrous attempt to break America the first time, with a badly planned press junket and publicity event surrounding their Fillmore East debut, they were determined to give it one last try with this album. It may well have done so, too, with a pub rock by way of Nashville sound and the first recording of singer Nick Lowe and guitarist Ian Gomm’s song 'Cruel to Be Kind'. The problem was that the band was also in the process of breaking up.

The album was shelved for the first time and languished on a shelf at Rockfield Studios. Meanwhile Brinsley Schwarz had launched the successful careers of its members: Nick Lowe and Ian Gomm as solo artists, guitarist Brinsley Schwarz and Bob Andrews as the nucleus of The Rumour, and Billy Rankin as a member of Big Jim Sullivan’s Tiger.

In a rescue effort that should earn Ian Gomm a service award for the arts, he prevented the album’s master tapes from being destroyed in the 80s. “When I came to Wales to work at this recording studio, and help build it, Royal Studios it’s called, we had a sixteen-track recorded there that took two-inch tape,” Gomm says. “We’d wired the studio up and wanted to test it, and I thought two-inch tape, that’s what that Brinsleys album was recorded on. So I phoned up Kingsley Ward at Rockfield Studio and said ‘Do you remember that Brinsleys album that never got finished?’ And Kingsley said: ‘Funny you should mention that we’re clearing out the tape library this week and that’s going in the dumper.’ So I got in my car and I drove that afternoon to Rockfield and rescued it. Then I mixed it down because I had the studio time.”

'It’s All Over Now' was again scheduled to be released in the 80s but was then withdrawn – for a second time. Undaunted, Gomm sold CD-Rs of the album for years on his website.

The album sounds like a bar band on the verge of a massive breakthrough, but the choice of material designed to achieve that breakthrough in America is somewhat odd. There is the expected country-tinged rock, but there’s also a strange glut of AM radio sweetness emphasizing sugary harmonies and nods to early soul. The band’s interpretation of white soul works best on their brilliant version of Garnet Mimms’ 1966 hit 'I’ll Take Good Care of You' but is baffling on 'God Bless (Whoever Made You)', recorded by Jona Lewie a few years later.

Nick Lowe’s voice is rich and unabashedly sentimental, somehow cutting through the heavy orchestral backing on 'As Lovers Do' (written by Dave Edmunds) and 'Hey Baby (They’re Playing Our Song)' that seem taken from early 60's American pop vocal groups. Lowe uses his effective and now well-established narrative voice of a wayward lover, who is well aware that he is a bit of a bastard, swanning back into someone’s life on 'We Can Mess Around' and 'Private Number', either of which could have been an early Rumours song.

The lovely early version of 'Cruel to Be Kind' here is much mellower and less choppy than the well-known hit from Nick Lowe’s solo album 'Labour of Lust'. A similar version was recorded for the B-side to Lowe’s 'Little Hitler'. It’s by far the strongest original track and undoubtedly would have been the first single off 'It’s All Over Now'. Glimpses of Rockpile to come, 'Everybody' and 'Give Me Back My Love' are the hardest rocking and least treacly moments on the record. There is a pointless instrumental, 'Do The Cod', and a silly reggae version of Bobby Womack’s 'It’s All Over Now' that was hopefully recorded when they were all very high indeed.

01. We Can Mess Around
02. Cruel To Be Kind
03. As Lovers Do
04. I’ll Take Good Care Of You
05. Hey Baby (They’re Playing Our Song)
06. Do The Cod
07. God Bless (Whoever Made You)
08. Everybody
09. Private Number
10. Give Me Back My Love
11. It’s All Over Now

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VA - Greasy Truckers Party 1972

VA - Greasy Truckers Party 1972 - 3CDs -  2007

From AMG

The Greasy Truckers Party, as a double-LP set, was the Great White Whale of many a music lover's collecting efforts in the 1970s and '80s -- always talked of being sighted by others and ever-eluding the best efforts. So in 2007, some 30-plus years later, the idea that the original eight-track master tapes had survived, and could be retrieved and -- more to the point -- would be retrieved by someone who cared enough to do something with them (and, equally important, had the time and budget with which to do anything with them) seemed a remote possibility, at best. But here it is, on three very fully packed CDs, the complete sets of Man, Brinsley Schwarz, and Hawkwind (with Magic Michael & Friends thrown in for good measure), a legendary performance on a legendary night for each band. For those unaware, in the world of British underground rock, the Greasy Truckers Party, as it was billed at the London Roundhouse on February 13, 1972, looms about as large as the Monterey International Pop Festival does in American rock lore; it wasn't the biggest gig ever played by the bands involved, but for reasons of exposure, and resulting word-of-mouth, and the excerpted live album that followed, it came to define what they were capable of, and who they were. Man, who'd shown a lot of promise on their early records leading up to this event, ripped the envelope with the show they put on that night. Hawkwind, who'd enjoyed some recording success and made a big splash at the previous year's Glastonbury Fayre, was boasting a partly new lineup, with a rhythm section comprised of ex-Rocking Vicar Lemmy on bass and Simon King on drums -- they overcame some initial technical problems to do a live set that, despite being abbreviated in earlier releases of this performance, loomed large in their legend for more than a decade. And included in that set on this release is their first-ever performance of "Silver Machine," the song that -- with Lemmy shifted to lead vocals a few months later -- would propel the band to the number three spot on the U.K. singles charts. And then there was Brinsley Schwarz, who were in many ways the most improbable act on this bill -- where the other two groups were known for doing extended jams, running as much as 20 minutes at a clip, the Brinsleys did short songs mostly based on American country music and other traditional forms; indeed, their opening number, "Country Girl," sounds like a lost outtake from the Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo, and is about as far removed as can be from the heavy electric jams of Man that preceded them, or the space rock extravaganzas of Hawkwind, who followed. 

READ MORE HERE


CD 1 -  MAN

01. Spunk Rock
02. Many Are Called But Few Get Up
03. Angel Easy
04. Bananas
05. Romain

CD 2 - Brinsley Schwarz

01. Intro
02. Country Girl
03. One More Day
04. Unknown Number
05. She's Got To Be Real
06. Home Work
07. Nervous On The Road (But Can't Stay At Home)
08. Range War
09. Silver Pistol
10. Going Down The Road
11. Midnight Train
12. Private Number
13. It's Just My Way Of Saying Thank You
14. Wonder Woman
15. I'm Ahead If I Can Quit While I'm Behind
16. Surrender To The Rhythm
17. Music Belongs To The People

CD 3 - Hawkwind

01. Announcement / Apology
02. This Is Your Captain Speaking (Breakdown)
03. This Is Your Captain Speaking
04. You Shouldn't Do That
05. The Awakening
06. Master Of The Universe
07. Paranoia
08. Earth Calling
09. Silver Machine
10. Welcome To The Future
11. Born To Go
12. Brainstorm (Jam)
13. Andy Dunkley / End Announcement

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