A recent discovery I've made, of the life-enhancing variety, involves the realisation that there are numerous videos of fairly early Procul Harum playing live. I'm talking about the line-up around 1971, about the time of the release of Broken Barricades, their fine fifth album and the first one I bought. I saw the band live in the same period at the Free Trade Hall, though when I watched them Robin Trower was still on board playing guitar, whereas the five piece version featured live on Beat-Club, playing classics like A Salty Dog and Simple Sister has got Dave Ball on guitar.
Anyway, this is all irrelevant to the point I want to make today, following yesterday's post on Paul Weller as a great soul singer, which is that Gary Brooker is in the same league even though what he's singing isn't exactly soul. Mind you, Simple Sister (I think a Trower composition, though I might be wrong) is steeped in the blues, so it's not so far off. But A Salty Dog is sui generis I reckon, though I suppose prog ballad might work as a ludicrous classification.
To think I had the great good fortune to grow up alongside this music. And now can blast it out through my ear-buds (as I think they're called) in well-earned tea-breaks.
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