![\"\"](\"http:\/\/musoscribe.com\/images\/blodwyn_pigthology.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
On their two well-regarded late 1960s albums, Blodwyn Pig<\/strong> forged a singular musical path, one which some might say paved the way for such acts as Roy Wood’s Wizzard.<\/strong> This is especially true on tracks like \u201cDrive Me\u201d from 1970’s Getting to This<\/em>. Elsewhere they sounded not wholly dissimilar to Jethro Tull<\/strong>; this is unsurprising in light of the fact that founder Mick Abrahams<\/strong> played guitar in Tull’s early lineup.<\/p>\n While Blodwyn Pig formed and re-formed over the years, the two albums cut before their initial 1970 split form the core of what the group is remembered for. Subsequent lineups included Peter Banks<\/strong> (later of Yes<\/strong> and even later of Flash<\/strong>), but the sonic centerpiece of the group was the jazz-leaning Jack Lancaster<\/strong>. He played saxophone, flute, violin and (occasionally) piano.<\/p>\n Fast forward to 2013. The original lineup \u2013 not some of ’em, but instead all of ’em — have reunited to release something called Pigthology<\/em>. I approached this release with some trepidation, owing to the fact that its provenance is a bit murky. Yeah, all the guys are here on this album subtitled \u201cAn Anthology Featuring the Original Band.\u201d In addition to Abrahams and Lancaster, original bassist Andy Pyle<\/strong> and drummer Ron Burg<\/strong> are on board. So far, so good, right?<\/p>\n Here’s where things got troubling, where red flags popped up. The term \u201cAnthology\u201d connotes \u2013 but doesn’t strictly mean \u2013 a collection spanning an artist’s career. Most people think of Beatles Anthology<\/em>, a collection of unreleased material from the old days, chronologically sequenced. But a look at the back cover of Pigthology<\/em> shows that among Lancaster’s instrumental credits is this: \u201cYamaha WX7.\u201d If you don’t know, I’m here to tell you that the WX7 is a modern MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) device. Simply put, it’s a synthesizer controller that one plays like a wind instrument. It was first sold in…1987. Math enthusiasts might note that this is some seventeen years after the release of Getting to This<\/em>.<\/p>\n So Pigthology<\/em> is an adventure in modern recording, then? Well, it’s simply too tough to tell. The liner notes \u2013 penned by Mick Farren<\/strong>, who has since passed away \u2013 note that most of the recordings on the album are from the period during which the band \u201cplayed alongside Led Zeppelin<\/strong>, The Who<\/strong>…\u201d and so on. That places this recording in the late ’60s or ’70s. So which is it?<\/p>\n At its core, this question is one that ought to be simple enough to answer. But neither the packaging nor liner notes* clear up the mystery. What we’re left with is the music.<\/p>\n And of course that’s what it’s all about. Regardless of when the band cut these twelve tracks, they had it together. That curious British interpretation of the blues, imbued with a roadhouse boogie feel, forms the foundation of the songs. Lancaster’s jazz feel pulls things in that direction. The end result sounds \u2013 once again \u2013 like Roy Wood’s solo work, and his recordings with Wizzard and with the Super Active Wizzo Band<\/strong>. Beefy sax lines give the band a grittier sound than Jethro Tull ever had; this stuff rocks a lot harder than Ian Anderson<\/strong>‘s band ever did, and sports little in the way of medieval trappings (even when Lancaster’s blowing flute).<\/p>\n Yet Blodwyn Pig are pleasingly eclectic. On \u201cDear Jill,\u201d acoustic slide guitar and fiddle create a folk-blues ambience that is extremely atmospheric. A few of the tracks don’t work: \u201cMonkinit\u201d sounds not at all like the product of an actual band; nearly everything about it \u2013 especially the stuttering drums \u2013 sounds like a band-in-a-box, laptop-sourced recording. Maybe not, but that ‘s what it feels like. Only Abrahams’ stinging guitar playing saves it from being completely bloodless.<\/p>\n But that’s the exception. Most of the material here \u2013 regardless of when and how it was created \u2013 is first-rate. A remake of \u201cDrive Me\u201d adds little to the 1970 original, but it’s still worth hearing; Abrahams is in fine voice, belting out the tunes in a Lonesome Dave Peverett<\/strong> style. An acoustic live reading of \u201cThe Change Song\u201d shows off the group’s perhaps-unexpected quiet, reflective side. \u201cCosmogification\u201d does The Average White Band<\/strong> one (or two) better, wedding the funk of that group’s style with the ambition of Colosseum<\/strong>. \u201cSame Old Story\u201d rocks like mad, and an instrumental country blues \u201cSly Bones\u201d is a highlight.<\/p>\n \u201cIt’s Only Love\u201d amps things up again, and would have sounded right at home on 1969’s Ahead Rings Out<\/em> or the second LP. Save for an unnerving vocal effect (digital echo?) \u201cStormy Monday\u201d wraps the album up on a delicious note.<\/p>\n Ignoring the slapdash packaging, the murky origins of the material, and the AWOL status of one track (a cover of \u201cHound Dog\u201d), this is a worthwhile package.<\/p>\n Postscript: A quick check suggests this album was first released a decade ago; that fact \u2013 like most all other facts \u2013 is noted nowhere on this album’s packaging.<\/p>\n * Postscript #2: As it happens, source info is included on the back of the one-sheet sent to reviewers. I completely missed it when I first wrote this review. Most tracks date from 1969-70; a few are from the early\u00a0 70s. The suspect ones (including the Thelonious Monk<\/strong> tribute “Monkinit”) are — not surprisingly — listed as “date unknown.” Well, okay then. I think that’s linernote-ese for “recently.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On their two well-regarded late 1960s albums, Blodwyn Pig forged a singular musical path, one which some might say paved the way for such acts as Roy Wood’s Wizzard. This […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,19,42,62],"tags":[340,1140],"class_list":["post-5007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blues","category-compilation","category-jazz","category-rawk","tag-blodwyn-pig","tag-jethro-tull","cat-9-id","cat-19-id","cat-42-id","cat-62-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5007"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5007\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30579,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5007\/revisions\/30579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}