Audience

One of the overlooked bands of the late sixties/early seventies but a band with a unique sound and their own approach to music it was almost inevitable that they would be part of the roster of Charisma along with Van Der Graaf Generator, Lindisfarne and Genesis.

These two albums both feature the vocals and guitar of Howard Werth – hard edged and in a similar vein to Steve Broughton (Edgar Broughton Band) or Captain Beefheart – alongside Keith Gemmel’s sax, flute, clarinet & recorder. Trevor Williams Blues tinged bass lines and Tony Connor’s drums & percussion. Werth was fairly unique in using nylon strings on an electric guitar and Connor’s drumming has far more subtlety than you might expect and Gemmel’s horns gave the band a very different flavour to most of the heavy bands of the time.

The first album – ‘Audience’ – was actually released originally on the Polydor label and withdrawn after a few weeks but ‘Friend’s Friend’s Friend’ was recorded and released after they were signed to Charisma and was more of a coherent set of songs (including the ‘hit’ ‘Belladonna Moonshine’) written largely after the band had quit working with the legendary Shel Talmy at Olympic Studios and went to record themselves at Willesden’s Morgan Studio.
The result was greater impetus, Gemmel’s flute and sax work more to the fore and, above all, a more developed sound that feels as though this is a band with its own ideas and form.

That having been said, there is a great deal of charm in the first album and it is easy to see just why their fans were so fanatical about the band – this was never a band of ordinary sensibilities and they set out from the start to put themselves into their music – as Werth himself says “I honestly can’t remember doing a bad gig you know? There was never a gig where we came offstage and said ‘well, that was rubbish’. We always seemed to get the crowd behind us”.
With a lot of reissues you do have to ask yourself “Why bother” – so much sounds dated and bland by modern standards – but these two albums are fresh and vibrant and remind you of bands that made the music they wanted to, not just what the label told them to make.

As usual from Esoteric, the packaging =is excellent and there are huge numbers of bonus tracks – well worth a listen.