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K PageContents: Carole King, King Crimson, Klaatu, Mark Kozelek, KraftwerkCarole KingTapestry(1971)It is difficult to find an album not by The Beatles that compares with Tapestry for boasting so large a number of well-loved and popular original songs. For Tapestry King reinterprets '(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman' and 'Will You Love Me Tomorrow?', hit songs she composed as a professional songwriter in the Brill Building in the sixties, and resurrects 'You've Got a Friend' from drowning in James Taylor's stream of sentimentality. High profile new songs 'I Feel The Earth Move' and 'It's Too Late' are just as memorable, while there is no reason why 'So Far Away', 'Home Again' and the gospel-tinged 'Way Over Yonder' don't merit the same attention. The descriptive title track is my favourite piece on the album, with a particularly nice melody and a sense of drama. The rest of the album is slight in comparison - 'Beautiful' is embarrasingly dated hippie ramblings, while 'Smackwater Jack' is more abrasive than befits King - but it's of little consequence when the other two thirds is so memorable. King's voice is also thin, and not particularly pleasant. Still, the best songs on Tapestry are exceptionally good, making it an essential recording of its era. Because of its high profile, Tapestry seems to have limited King's subsequent career. It is difficult to find any of her other studio albums in the stores, although one King product that is totally unrecommended is her 1993 concert with guest guitarist Slash. I watched the video and was horrified at King's sassy stage image; she was surprisingly trim for a fifty year old, but I would have enjoyed it more if she'd sat at her piano nicely. 
 King Crimson have their own pageKlaatuHope(1977)I have slightly different expectations for my CD collection than for my record collection. While I expect my CD collection to provide me with value for money and solid entertainment, I'm just as happy for my LPs to be kitschy period pieces by semi-obscure groups. Klaatu, a Canadian trio who briefly gained a measure of fame when the media started rumours that they were in fact a secret reformation of The Beatles, certainly fit in this latter category. No matter how accomplished they are, any group who write a song entitled 'Anus From Uranus' (from their debut) are automatically classified as kitschy. Although the epically nonsensical concepts of their sophomore effort Hope are enough to place Klaatu squarely into the progressive rock category, they have their own distinctive classical obsession that separates them from their predecessors. While other progressive groups such as Yes and Emerson, Lake and Palmer demonstrated a classical influence and incorporated classical pieces into their albums and live setlists, no one before Klaatu managed to include such flaky self-composed orchestrations in the middle of their albums. In the end, it's their classical excursions that are the most memorable aspect of the album, and make it an enjoyably kitschy period piece. The extreme eclecticism demonstrated on Hope also works against taking the group seriously. The album begins with 'We're Off You Know', a McCartneyesque pop song that demonstrates why The Beatles reformation rumours weren't without justification, before switching into the dissonant hard rock 'The Madmen'. The vocals are reminiscent of The Beatles as well; various members sound like John and Paul at different times. The album's story is some nonsense about a journey through space to a lost civilisation; in other words, it's sub Peter Sinfield and Jon Anderson, and not worth worrying about. The classical interludes don't really kick in until the nine minutes of 'Long Live Politzania', a song that also incorporates an anthropologist's report. 'The Loneliest Creatures' is like a wacky rock aria, while 'Prelude' adds some loopy rock guitar to the mix. While these classical diversions could be incongruous and dull in the wrong hands, Klaatu do have a knack for this stuff; it's cheesy, but it's also extremely catchy. It's not until the closing ballad 'Hope' that the album settles back down into normal pop territory. It's hard to know exactly what to make of this album; it's difficult to take seriously, but it's immensely entertaining while it's on. Seems like I'll have to track down a CD copy of it sometime.
Mark Kozelek can be found on the Red House Painters pageKraftwerkTrans-Europe Express(1977)Kraftwerk had the skill to coax pioneering sounds from instruments that looked as fragile as Dr. Who props. My friend rudely dismissed Trans-Europe Express as "more German crap" (along with Kruder and Dorfmeister) within ten seconds, yet every other critic seems to love Trans-Europe Express, so it is my duty to provide a balanced perspective. The most enjoyable tracks ('Europe Endless' and 'Trans-Europe Express/Metal on Metal') couple heavy dance beats with catchy synthesisers that overpower the mechanical vocals and lyrics. But these are counteracted by two tracks that are so unlistenable that they undo much of the good work; 'The Hall of Mirrors' and 'Showroom Dummies' run for a total of fourteen minutes and are as dull as a New Year's Eve spent playing Scrabble. There are two more tracks, named 'Franz Schubert' and 'Endless Endless', but they are so short they don't count. While aspects of Kraftwerk's music are of value, other commentators have correctly noted that the more accessible New Order managed to incorporate these into a richer tapestry of sound.
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Written 2001-2009, Graham Fyfe
