10/13/2009

Procol Harum - A Salty Dog (1969) (40th Anniversary Remaster)


Digitally remastered and expanded edition of the British Progressive/Pop band's third album, originally released in 1969. Rightly lauded as Procol Harum's masterpiece, A Salty Dog is one of the high spots of late '60s Rock culture; an unmissable musical voyage, a brilliant example of how to fuse classical music with Rock and a tremendously rewarding experience, enhanced here with six bonus tracks selected by band leader Gary Brooker. When you listen to the album, it becomes clear - from the sweeping title track that opens the album, to the serene 'Pilgrims Progress', which brings it to a conclusion, that A Salty Dog is quite simply Procol's most rewarding album. 16 tracks. Salvo. 2009.

This album, the group's third, was where they showed just how far their talents extended across the musical landscape, from blues to R&B to classical rock. In contrast to their hastily recorded debut, or its successor, done to stretch their performance and composition range, A Salty Dog was recorded in a reasonable amount of time, giving the band a chance to fully develop their ideas. The title track is one of the finest songs ever to come from Procol Harum and one of the best pieces of progressive rock ever heard, and a very succinct example at that at under five minutes running time -- the lyric and the music combine to form a perfect mood piece, and the performance is bold and subtle at once, in the playing and the singing, respectively. The range of sounds on the rest includes "Juicy John Pink," a superb piece of pre-World War II-style country blues, while "Crucifiction Lane" is a killer Otis Redding-style soul piece, and "Pilgrim's Progress" is a virtuoso keyboard workout. [A Salty Dog was reissued by Repertoire Records in 1997 with enhanced sound and the lost B-side "Long Gone Geek," a Robin Trower guitar workout par excellence.]...B. Eder

320 @
155 MB
2000mustangs

Tracklist:

01 A Salty Dog 4:41
02 The Milk of Human Kindness 3:47
03 Too Much Between Us 3:45
04 The Devil Came from Kansas 4:38
05 Boredom 4:34
06 Juicy John Pink Mono Version 2:08
07 Wreck of the Hesperus 3:49
08 All This and More 3:52
09 Crucifiction Lane 5:03
10 Pilgrims Progress 4:32
11 Long Gone Geek 3:18
12 Goin' Down Slow (live in the USA, April 1969) 7:48
13 Juicy John Pink (live in the USA, April 1969) 2:39
14 Crucifiction Lane (live in the USA, April 1969) 4:35
15 Skip Softly (My Moonbeams) / Also Sprach Zarathustra 5:29
16 The Milk of Human Kindness (take 1; raw track) 3:47

2 comments:

Timbo said...

Thanks for this and other fine shares. Have all of Procol's work but haven't heard these Anniversary editions. Anxious to hear what they sound like.

Anonymous said...

Whole album in one track:
http://www.fileserve.com/file/EdYrzVr