THE SHADOWS
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1960–2004 |
Early rock’n’roll |
Shadoogie (1961) |
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Album
released: Sept. 1961 |
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Tracks: 1) Shadoogie;
2) Blue Star; 3) Nivram; 4) Baby My Heart; 5) See You In My Drums; 6) All My
Sorrows; 7) Stand Up And Say That; 8) Gonzales; 9) Find Me A Golden Street;
10) Theme From A Filleted Place; 11) That’s My Desire; 12) My Resistance Is
Low; 13) Sleepwalk; 14) Big Boy; 15*) Apache; 16*) Quartermaster’s Store;
17*) Man Of Mystery; 18*) The Stranger; 19*) F.B.I.; 20*) Midnight; 21*) The
Frightened City; 22*) Back Home; 23*) Kon-Tiki; 24*) 36-24-36. |
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Unlike
their mascot Cliff Richard, the Shadows very strictly distinguished between
singles and LPs: of their first several charting singles, starting with
‘Apache’, not one is included on their self-titled debut LP, which makes it a
bit confusing for collectors — compilations of the band’s materials are
usually oriented at singles, so there is relatively little overlap between
them and the LPs. Ultimately, I simply generated for myself a special
homemade deluxe edition of The Shadows,
with its 14 LP-only tracks, plus 10 more tracks covering the A- and B-sides
from ‘Apache’ all the way to early 1961. |
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And this is where we start, since the legend of the
Shadows as something more than just a backing band for Cliff Richard lies
with the major success of ‘Apache’. Their previous three singles made no
impact whatsoever on the British market, but with ‘Apache’ they somehow
caught the vibe — even though Jerry Lordan’s composition has little to do
with any sort of rock’n’roll, sounding more like a mix of Ennio Morricone and
Dick Dale. These days, it would be quite hard to understand what all the hype
was about, and in the US, there was no need for this even back in the day —
although the Shadows broke big all over Europe, they never conquered the
overseas, what with the American market already being saturated with
surf-and-Western instrumental music. But perhaps for those British and other
European kids, as well as some of their parents, stuff like ‘Apache’ did
provide an easy approximation of the magic of That Other World. The mystical
tribal drum sound, the haunting, echoey guitar sound of battle signals and
horses galloping over the prairie, the general tense atmosphere of wariness
and subtle danger — and mixed, perhaps, with a slight touch of patriotic
pride, what with the local boys now being able to materialize their own
version of the Old West without the need to import it straight from the
source. But as nice and dreamy as
‘Apache’ is, it also gives us a glimpse into the main problem of the Shadows
— the problem which prevented them from becoming not just the instrumental
Beatles or Stones, but even placed them well beyond their main American
competition, the Ventures. Hank Marvin and the rest of the boys did quickly
establish themselves as Britain’s tightest, best-oiled, most decidedly
professional instrumental pop band, the one that could easily play everybody
else under the table with their ferocious discipline and technique. Yet each
and every second of their recorded output feels as if this is precisely what
they were always about — discipline and technique prevailing over passion,
excitement, spontaneity. Across the ocean, the Ventures were able to find a
solid middle ground between professionalism and sheer fun, but the Shadows
took a strictly academic approach to it all. This is perhaps even
better observable on the B-side to ‘Apache’, a rock’n’roll arrangement of the
traditional British song ‘The Quartermaster’s Store’, probably intended as
the homeland counterbalance to the American worship of the A-side. It is
fast, it is tight, it is perfectly produced, with the gruff chugging rhythm
guitar and the ringing lead guitar ideally complementing each other, yet
somehow it all sounds too perfect,
like a performance from a bunch of A-grade musical college students passing
their final exam. This is not a crime, but in the end it transforms the song
into a perfect soundtrack for your local dance party, or into decent
background music for chores — hardly into some sort of self-sufficient groove
which might make you drop everything else and just get carried away to a
different place. Every now and then, they
offer tiny hints of being able to
break out of the self-imposed robotic shells: ‘Man Of Mystery’, the
successful follow-up to ‘Apache’ whose main theme sounds like a cross between
a future James Bond movie and a sentimental French melodrama, suddenly erupts
in a (relatively) wild, speedy, choking instrumental break where — oh the
horror! — not every note seems to
be perfect, only to return to the cool, calm, and collected delivery of the main
theme twenty seconds later. But even when the opportunity presents itself,
there is still something which always holds the band back — say, for
instance, on ‘36-24-36’, the B-side to the romantic travelog of ‘Kon-Tiki’
which is probably the closest they get to «dirty blues-rock» on these early
singles; and even then, when it comes to Hank breaking out the rock’n’roll
lead guitar, he does this in a quiet, reserved manner, with tasty little
licks played at humble volume levels so as not to offend the neighbors or
anything. So if you want to move
past this skeptical mindset — the exact same one that the Beatles probably
shared about the Shadows — the one thing you will probably want to
concentrate on is the sheer melodic aspect. There are quite a few fun, catchy
themes strewn across both the early singles and the self-titled LP itself,
and they do not necessarily have to be all about rock’n’roll: ‘Nivram’, for
instance, is a charming little jazz-pop shuffle whose chords and atmosphere
keep reminding me of Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Feelin’ Groovy’ — since the
tune does not even pretend to rock, all you have to do is sit back and relax
to the silky tone of its lead guitar, as well as Jet Harris’ surprising
little bass break. The cover material is typically flawless, be it the
lazy-sunny-day-at-the-pool serenity of ‘Blue Star’ or the moonlit romanticism
of ‘Sleepwalk’, or even a totally out-of-the-blue stab at a Hoagy Carmichael
song (‘My Resistance Is Low’, which receives a smidgeon of «guitar fireworks»
for the intro and the outro). On a few of the numbers,
the Shadows even dare to sing. Hank takes lead on Sonny Curtis’ ‘Baby My
Heart’, showing a pleasantly warm vocal tone, but with arguably less
confidence than Cliff would have; Jet Harris leads the band in quite a touching
version of ‘All My Sorrows’ (certainly not any worse than the Searchers), and
Bruce Welch does the same for ‘That’s My Desire’. That said, even if Hank
later expressed his sorrow at not following George Harrison’s advice about
moving away from the status of an instrumental band, it also seems clear
enough that, had they taken it, the best they could have achieved would be to
put the Searchers out of business, and even that one is questionable. On this
album at least, the vocal numbers feel like harmless, useless filler next to
the lead guitar-driven ones. But enough with the sour
notes, and let us end this review with just a bit of admiration anyway.
Spontaneity be damned, after all, when your daily boogie dose is administered
with the kind of aesthetic precision you find in the first guitar break of
‘Shadoogie’, the band’s temporary anthem of self-presentation which opens the
album. Just put yourself in that one specific frame of mind, and all of a
sudden the Shadows, with their perfectly produced sound, their perfectly
matched tempos and tonalities, and their ideally planned stage choreography,
begin to look like an early guitar version of Kraftwerk — a set of ideally
groomed rock’n’roll robots, friendly on the outside, but a bit spooky and
sinister on the inside. Honestly, there is a kind of weird mystique about
this band which would totally be lacking in the Beatles — then again, I guess
they weren’t called ‘The Shadows’ for nothing. That type of reserved distance
they put between them and the audience, while not necessarily a thing to be
loved, has a certain artistic significance, and it might even be argued that
the attitude itself was quite influential on generations of British artists
to come — hell, as much of a stretch as it would be, I’d argue that echoes of
it may be seen in bands as artistically remote from the Shadows as, say, King
Crimson. And to people like myself, this «don’t you dare to join together
with the band» stylistics actually has quite a bit of charm. |
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Album
released: Oct. 1962 |
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Tracks: 1) The Rumble; 2) The Bandit; 3)
Cosy; 4) 1861; 5) Perfidia; 6) Little ‘B’; 7) Bo Diddley; 8) South Of The
Border; 9) Spring Is Nearly Here; 10) Are They All Like You?; 11) Tales Of A
Raggy Tramline; 12) Some Are Lonely; 13) Kinda Cool. |
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REVIEW
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Still, ‘1861’ is as nice as a British pop-rock
reinvention of American mid-19th century marching band music can be, with
Hank Marvin at the top of his melodic sensitivity as he recreates that trusty
old patriotic vibe with a clean, sharp tone (I do wish there would be at
least the slighest bit of variation between the two «verses», though).
‘Spring Is Nearly Here’ (maybe not the most perfect title for an October
release) is a nice little waltz, which Hank largely rides through on his
highest notes to override Norrie Paramor’s generic orchestration. The
funnily-titled ‘Tales Of A Raggy Tramline’ is a fast and friendly pop ditty
with great synergy from Brian Bennett’s drums, Jet Harris’ bass, and Hank’s
lead parts — genuinely outstanding musicianship for a pop record in 1962. (I
assume that is Jet Harris, though it might as well have been Brian
"Lickorice" Locking, who ended up replacing Harris midway through
the sessions). And ‘Kinda Cool’ is a good showcase for Marvin’s piano skills,
even if he tends to play the piano in much the same way as he plays his
guitar — sharply staccato, each note a part of a carefully premeditated
geometric structure and each melodic phrase and verse repeated several times
in the exact same way so you might actually get it all memorized upon your
very first listen. Some of these lines may very well have been learned from
the likes of Ray Charles, but good old Ray, of course, would never have
treated any of his recording sessions as training exercises. Top of the crop is ‘Little B’, the most outstanding
thing about which is its length — a jaw-droppin’ five minutes, most of which
are occupied by an extended drum solo from Bennett. I do not know if this was
the first ever lengthy drum solo on a UK pop record, but definitely the first
one known to me, and definitely a sign that the Shadows were pining for some
jazz credentials. This may not exactly be Buddy Rich quality stuff, but
Bennett’s performance is both fluent and varied, and I would definitely take
it over dozens and dozens of rock-era drum solos by second-rate artists (I
mean, people like John Bonham could get away with it due to sheer monstruous
power, but the majority of rock drummers who could not match that power just
plain sucked at this business). The main guitar theme, with its
Carl-Perkins-meets-James-Bond riff, is no slouch either, though way too short
relative to the drum solo. Of the non-original tracks, three are vocal numbers,
and they are predictably the least impressive of the bunch: Bruce Welch is
most certainly no ‘Bo Diddley’ (predictably, they play it with all the energy
of an electric guitar unplugged from its amp), the collective Shadows are no
Searchers when it comes to singing folk-pop harmony (on Tim Gale’s ‘Are They
All Like You?’), and yet another attempt to go Mexican on our ears (‘The
Bandit’, from Michael Carr’s songbook) is just as bland and limp for a
mariachi anthem. But as soon as they shut their mouths and just play, life
begins anew: Michael Carr’s famous ‘South Of The Border’ gets a crystal
clear, upbeat, uplifting arrangement with yet another of Marvin’s perfect
geometric constructions — the band is tight as a clock, and Hank’s lilting,
drip-dropping notes mark each second with algorithmic accuracy that manages
to delight rather than annoy. Indeed, it is quite amusing how this perfectly
gelling bunch of instrumentalists becomes a boring band of nobodys as soon as
even a small amount of their brainpower refocuses on the vocals — and while
it is understandable that they did not want to bring in Cliff to help them
out (if this was going to be a «The Shadows» album, it was going to be one
through and through), the idea that The Shadows, as a band, could be capable
of anything was just wrong. The instrumentals are so tight, and the melodies
so perfectly shaped that it is rather easy not to notice their shortcomings,
such as the lack of spontaneity, the lack of primal power, the limited
musical vocabulary, the unwillingness to take risks and experiments, etc. But
when the vocal numbers start coming in, these Gods of instrumental
performance suddenly expose themselves as mere mortals, with very
disappointing limitations — and, of course, it becomes crystal clear why the
Beatles would soon sweep them away despite possessing only a small fraction
of their instrumental skills. |
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Album
released: May 1964 |
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Tracks: 1) Chattanooga Choo-Choo; 2) Blue
Shadows; 3) Fandango; 4) Tonight; 5) That’s The Way It Goes; 6) Big ‘B’; 7) In The Mood; 8) The Lonely Bull; 9)
Dakota; 10) French Dressing; 11) The High And The Mighty; 12) Don’t It Make
You Feel Good; 13) Zambesi; 14) Temptation. |
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In
the brief period separating the Shadows’ second and third LPs, Prometheus
stole fire from the Olympian gods, Moses separated the waters, Newton created
the laws of motion, and the Beatles conquered the musical world — which means
that even within an artistic camp as stoically conservative as that of the
Shadows, it would be ridiculous to expect no changes whatsoever. Of course,
the most easily detectable changes were in their declining commercial
fortunes: ‘Foot Tapper’ from early 1963, a catchy little twist number with
melodic nods to the Rivingtons’ ‘Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow’, would be their last #1
single on the UK charts (although ‘Atlantis’, a moody instrumental with
clever use of orchestration and futuristic guitar tones, done in their more
conventional Western style, would come very close to replicating that success
a few months later, still stalling at #2, though). |
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Even so, 1964 still saw them remaining quite steady
in the public’s eye: a major legend does not just die overnight, and Dance With The Shadows managed to
climb all the way to #2, though it still failed to displace the Rolling
Stones’ debut (predictably, it took the Beatles to do that). And as both that
album and its follow-ups clearly show to anybody willing to listen, the
Shadows were anything but
completely out of touch with the times. Where they truly refused to evolve,
possibly more out of personal taste and feeling than due to a misguided
judgement of changes in fashion, is in their public image: their live shows
and TV appearances remained steadily rigid and ritualistic affairs, with the
band absolutely refusing to loosen up and go wild on their audiences. The
music, however, did evolve and reflect both technical and substantial
progress in popular entertainment — not always for the better, perhaps, but
neither could anybody in their right mind claim, upon listening to Dance With The Shadows, that the band
was completely clueless to what was going on. Granted, this line of
defense may seem a bit thin when you intentionally begin your latest record
with ‘Chattanooga Choo-Choo’, a track whose origins go all the way back to
Glenn Miller and the year 1941. (Imagine the Beatles starting off any of
their 1964 albums with a cover of ‘The Sheik Of Araby’!). But the Shadows’
arrangement of it is fully in step with the musical standards of the time, as
they get louder, more bombastic, noisier on the hi-hat à la Ringo, and thicker, juicier, slightly more distorted
on the lead guitar. Besides, already the second track, ‘Blue Shadows’, takes
us into the completely modern playground of electric 12-bar blues, a
direction which the Shadows did not tackle all that often in the past — here,
though, they are finally ready to acknowledge the significance of the genre
for contemporary audiences, with Hank delivering a fully competent blues solo
and the entire band punching out a steady metronomic groove as if they wanted
to adapt blues music to military needs. (That is actually a problem — it does
sound more like they are rehearsing a new unfamiliar genre than having genuine
fun with it). Of particular interest are
the two Marvin/Welch-written vocal numbers, ‘That’s The Way It Goes’ and
‘Don’t It Make You Feel Good’, both of them cast very strictly in the
Merseybeat mold — tight, uplifting, slightly echoey group harmonies over the
noisy, but super-rhythmic punch of acoustic strumming and hi-hat-heavy
percussion. Both songs are catchy, both songs contain quirky individual
moments of not-quite-predictable chord and harmony changes, both songs show
that, had they truly wanted to, the Shadows could easily have blown out of
the water all the likes of, say, Gerry and the Pacemakers — but, of course,
neither of the two songs has that vital special something that would elevate
them out of the common pop chorus and place them on a special individualistic
pedestal. They do make you feel
good, and that’s certainly the way it goes, but they lack the secret
ingredient of the Beatles’ recipé, one that has to do with raising and
lowering dynamic tension. Then again, that sort of seems to be the problem
with the Shadows’ entire career, not just those few moments when they tried
to forge for themselves a bunch of fake Liverpool passports. Far more exciting, rather
than simply curious, is ‘Big B’, an instrumental that almost reaches the
4-minute mark due to an extended drum solo by Brian Bennett (he is actually
listed as the composer) — not only is this a first for the Shadows, but the
solo itself is quite unusual for a pop album, with major emphasis on kicking
the shit out of that bass drum, which gives the whole thing a strong «jungle»
feel. Given that only guys like Gene Krupa could have been a primary
influence for this approach, I could not call it particularly «fashionable»
for the time, but as far as drum solos in pop music go, I’d say this is
definitely one of the loudest and wildest ones in pre-John Bonham days. Curiously, Bennett is also
listed as sole composer for the fast-paced country-rock instrumental ‘French
Dressing’, which has little to do with anything French and sounds more like
Johnny Cash arranged for surf guitar, but that’s alright, it is still a lot
of fun. However, this is largely where any attempts at original songwriting
stop and problems begin — because, for all the attempts to modernize, at
least half of the album is still given over to covers from West Side Story (‘Tonight’), Bing
Crosby (‘Temptation’), and The High And
The Mighty (title track, composed by Hollywood maestro Dimitri Tiomkin).
This is all just standard professional Shadows fodder, listenable while it’s
on, instantly forgettable when it’s off. The mix of urban, country, and
spaghetti-western elements, to which they also add some Tijuana Brass (‘The
Lonely Bull’) and South Africa (Nico Carstens’ ‘Zambesi’), is respectable,
but nothing new for the band, whose interest in various popular styles from
all over the world dated back to their very inception. Ultimately, it all comes
down to the title of the LP: the Shadows’ goal is very humble — they just ask
you to dance with them, much like George Harrison in A Hard Day’s Night.
While they are certainly ready to acknowledge the evolution of popular
entertainment, they seem to have no clue about the substantial direction of that evolution. But in 1964, they could
still hardly be blamed for that, as the world of «progressive pop music»
would not really become philosophically self-conscious until at least a year
or two later. Even A Hard Day’s Night, given a slightly less lucky
turn of events, could have easily been slapped with a title like Dance
With The Beatles (though it is also quite telling that it was not). |
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Album
released: July 1965 |
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Tracks: 1) Brazil; 2) The Lost City; 3) A Little Bitty Tear; 4) Blue Sky,
Blue Sea, Blue Me; 5) Bossa Roo; 6) Five Hundred Miles; 7) Cotton Pickin’; 8)
Deep Purple; 9) Santa Ana; 10) The Windjammer; 11) Dean’s Theme; 12)
Breakthru’; 13) Let It Be Me; 14) National Provincial Samba. |
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REVIEW
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Not that they were totally oblivious to what was
going on. Around the same time that Dance
With The Shadows re-pledged their allegiance to all those looking for
light entertainment, they also got together in the studio to record ‘The Rise
And Fall Of Flingel Bunt’, a blues-rock instrumental «dedicated» to the life
of an imaginary character that sounded sharper and harsher than any
previously released Shadows track. Opening with an aggressive, bass
drum-heavy beat and a grim stop-and-start guitar riff, this new composition
erased any signs of twangy surf-rock, being rhythmically far more close to
Booker T & The MG’s than Duane Eddy or The Surfaris. In the bridge
section, the composition also borrows a bit from the Merseybeat (there’s a
chuggin’ rhythm pattern that is completely identical with the Beatles’ ‘Thank
You Girl’), and Hank’s lead guitar part bends and vibrates along with the
most seasoned of bluesmen. It’s true that the overall vibe of the song
remains tame and polished — like it did in the blues-themed work of such
«cautious» performers as Manfred Mann — but there’s only so much you can ask
from a band dressed in bowties. It still packed a mean punch, enough to send
it all the way to #5 on the UK charts, despite featuring a sound to which
Shadows fans were not at all accustomed. The band’s next step in
this direction was, however, a mistake: the faster-paced, livelier ‘Rhythm
And Greens’, released in early 1965, could only be perceived as a joke number
— not just because of the title, but also because of the ridiculous
vocalizations, consisting mostly of a set of "yeah, baby!"s, "ooh!"s,
"aah!"s, and cartoonish
whistles. The thing sounded like a mean parody on the loud-and-dirty
rock’n’roll sound, completely out of place at a time when it was already
obvious that the loud-and-dirty rock’n’roll sound was not a passing fad, but
a way to the future, and, most importantly, a pretty dumb choice for an
A-side: stick this «Chuck Berry meets Binkie The Clown» ridiculousness in the
middle of a filler-choked LP if you wish, but why follow up a perfectly
legitimate way to earn your place in the modern musical world with the
equivalent of an ignorant old man’s grumble? (at least, that’s what it might feel like even if the band
members themselves would probably defend ‘Rhythm And Greens’ as simply being
in good fun). The band was definitely
more in its element on such subsequent singles as ‘Genie With The Light Brown
Lamp’ (an excerpt from a joint «pantomime album» with Cliff Richard on the
adventures of Aladdin), a nice fast-paced number with a good contrast between
the sharper, bluesier verse and the poppier, more colorful chorus. After
that, ‘Mary Anne’, written by Jerry Lordan (who’d previously given them
‘Apache’ and several other compositions), was a nice change of pace,
featuring group harmony singing à
la Searchers which, by this time, Hank and the boys could do surprisingly
well, but without too much distinctiveness. Finally, in May 1965 it happened:
‘Stingray’ was the first Shadows song to feature a heavy, jarring fuzz effect
on the lead guitar, sending out a sign that the old-timers may have caught
the young Who at the Marquee once or twice (the tone is more or less the same
as Entwistle’s bass on ‘The Ox’, which came out later but must have already
been in the band’s repertoire in one form or another by early 1965). It’s not any sort of tremendous
progress, given the overall cautiousness of the recording, but it does
signify that at least in theory, The Shadows were open to reform; the one
thing that they were not open to is
loosening their collars, meaning that both the singles and the LPs continued
to be tightly disciplined, glossy and «polite» — and, consequently, less
commercially successful in an era when the people were more hungry for
‘Satisfaction’ than the likes of ‘Stingray’. The Sound Of The Shadows,
released on the heels of ‘Stingray’, was anything but not diverse — with
folk, blues, Latin, and even occasional proto-psychedelic motives, one could
never accuse the band of slacking in their creativity — yet the
quintessential «stiffness» of The Shadows was firmly in place. The album
still made it into the Top 5 on the UK charts, but this was probably due more
to the overall UK LP market being generally underfed compared to its US
equivalent; certainly there was no such thing as downplaying The Shadows’
singles while waiting for a Shadows’ LP, especially since, according to the
standard UK custom, the singles and the albums rarely, if ever, overlapped. The most curious thing
about the record is that there are three vocal numbers this time, and none of
them are Merseybeat-style pop-rockers like last time around: instead,
continuing the line of ‘Mary Anne’, The Shadows take an even heavier interest
in folk, country, and folk-pop music, recording Hank Cochran’s ‘A Little
Bitty Tear’, Hedy West’s ‘Five Hundred Miles’, and the Everlys’ ‘Let It Be
Me’ — all three numbers featuring soft acoustic arrangements and joint
harmonizing from both guitarists and the bass player. It’s all done in good
taste, and it’s nice to know that the band had its own hobby, but in all
honesty, with Dylan going electric and with the actual folksters beginning to
look into a more «baroque» representation of their material, this chosen style
feels about two years out-of-date and totally superfluous. What does not feel superfluous are their idiosyncratic
takes on the folk idiom: a track such as John Rostill’s ‘Windjammer’, despite
the somewhat excessive orchestration, features a beautiful «guitar lead
vocal» with an expressive tone that nobody except for Hank Marvin could
produce even as late as 1965. His sustain control, coupled with a honey-like
timbre of the guitar, turns what could have been a completely passable and
generic slow folk instrumental into a near-psychedelic delight for the
senses. The same goes for the faster-paced ‘Lost City’, contributed for the band
by Russ Ballard (later of Argent fame) — sort of a thematic sequel to
‘Atlantis’, but with a more Western feel to it, although when Hank starts
using weird proto-wah-wah effects on the guitar, he still somehow puts the
whole thing underwater for a while. These might be two of the
best instrumental numbers here, but the overall quality of the remaining
non-vocal tracks is still pretty high: with the exception of the rather jokey
‘National Provincial Samba’ and the rather sleepy and melodically retrograde
ballad ‘Blue Sky, Blue Sea, Blue Me’, I sincerely enjoy just about
everything, from the opening cover of Ary Barroso’s ‘Brazil’ (playful,
tasteful, and romantically expressive) to the oh-so-Shadowey take on ye olde
time banjo musicke (‘Cotton Pickin’) to the upbeat pop-rock rearrangement of
the old standard ‘Deep Purple’ to the tongue-in-cheek vaudeville blues of ‘Dean’s
Theme’ to the straightforward power-chord based rocking of ‘Breakthru’ (with
the most energetic drumming part on the album) — have I forgotten anything of
importance? Probably not. Even so, it’s difficult to pretend being
particularly excited about this
kind of material. In the context of all the other things going on in the
spring and summer of 1965, The Sound Of The Shadows would hardly even expect you to get excited. It might
not be an old man’s sound, but it is the sound of somebody who, let’s put it
this way, is content to give an occasional tip of the hat to
«counter-culture» without ever truly embracing the counter-culture as such. Then again, what else
could we hope to get from The Shadows? To me, it’s just curious — if not
exactly «fascinating» — how they exploit all those new guitar tones, fast
rhythms, and stylistic trends in their own gentlemanly fashion (much like The
Ventures overseas, though The Shadows have never had such an encyclopedic collective
mind as their spiritual brethren from Tacoma) while still somehow creating
the impression of time standing still. That’s what The Sound Of The
Shadows is all about: plus
ça change, plus c’est la même chose. Perhaps you do need The
Shadows, after all, standing behind the backs of all those hyperactive,
trend-setting, rule-changing heroes of the Sixties, if only to cut back on
all the brouhaha from time to time and remember that, after all, it’s just
entertainment. |
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