Far from being an album catering for everyone`s taste and not so favourably reviewed by critics at the time it still went to number one on the UK Albums Chart, becoming the only album by the band to do so. It was a top 10 album worldwide, including the US, where it peaked at number 9.
Read on!
`Elp our eardrums
Emerson, Lake and Palmer: Tarkus (Island ILPS 9155; £2,15).
Album Review by Richard Green
The man from the National Council For Civil Liberties ought to be informed about this album that`s being unleashed upon a largely unsuspecting public. And if he`s not concerned, the Noise Abatement Society certainly will be. For rarely have I heard so many minutes of what is largely self-indulgent confused sound.
It is almost inexplicable how three talented musicians can turn out an album that seems to be about the adventures of a mechanised, gun-equipped armadillo of all things called Tarkus and include numbers of such variety that by the middle of the first side the listener is pretty hopelessly lost.
This is not just my opinion – one colleague was so “moved” by the album that he yelled: “Do you mind shutting the door if you’re going to play that?” It`s sad that the album had to turn out like this as there are some nice passages, but these are almost completely buried by the overall cacophonous ostentation.
The album begins with Eruption, a number not unlike the sounds of the Nice in its construction and presentation, and runs into Stones Of Years then Iconoclast, a rather weak rock piece saved only by some rather tasty keyboard/drum work.
The second part of side one becomes a mixture of sounds completely incomprehensible to any ear. Jeremy Bender – about a “man” who decides to become a nun introduces us to the second side and more or less sets the standard for the remaining tracks, with one notable exception. The exception is The Only Way (Hymn) which has Emerson playing St. Mark’s Church organ here and there and using Bach’s Toccata in F and Prelude VI for the intro and bridge.
It’s the best track by far on the whole album, musically highly praiseworthy and a pleasure to listen to.
It all ends with Are You Ready Eddy? a rock and roll ditty which I am told started off as a joke about engineer Eddy Offord. It finished up in the same way.
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