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Plain and Fancy

Music gives soul to universe, wings to mind, flight to imagination, charm to sadness, and life to everything.

Plato

Friday, November 4, 2011

Rare Bird - As Your Mind Flies By (1970 uk, superb progressive rock, 2nd album, 2007 esoteric bonus tracks release)



Rare Bird's second album "As Your Mind Flies By" turned out to be their classic release. It's stuffed with a great 70's atmosphere and flawless songwriting. All the 5 tracks on the album are impressivly strong. "What You Want to Know" and "I'm Thinking" are melodic, organ-driven, early 70's progressive rock at its best.

The arrangements have lots of cool, twisted and varied organ-sounds and the vocals are great. The rest of side one is made up of the short, baroque-influenced "Down on the Floor" and the great, heavy-progressive "Hammerhead". The second side consists of the 20-minute "Flight". This is one of those tracks that will make any fan of 70's progressive rock cry of joy.

The first part of it is quite dramatic and classical-influenced, then it goes into a great jamming part with a choir and excellent duels between the organ playing of Graham Field and the twisted el-piano of Dave Kaffinetti. The two last parts of the track are energetic and heavy with the most perfect organ-sounds you can imagine. With no doubt one of the best progressive rock albums from 1970. By the way, the single-release of "What You Want to Know" had a very different arrangement from the album-version.
Vintage-Prog


Tracks
1. What you want to know - 5:59
2. Down on the floor - 2:41
3. Hammerhead - 3:31
4. I'm thinking - 5:40
5. Flight - 19:39
…As your mind flies by
…Vacuum
…New York
…Central Park
6. What you want to know (Bonus track, Mono single version) - 3:34
7. Hammerhead (Bonus track, Mono single version) - 3:23
8. Red man (Bonus track) - 3:29

Rare Bird

*Mark Ashton - Drums, Vocals
*Graham Field - Organ, Assorted Keyboards
*Steve Gould - Lead Vocals, Bass Guitar
*Dave Kaffinetti - Electric Piano, Assorted Keyboards

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