Following his departure from 1960s baroque rockers Procol Harum, the exceptionally gifted guitarist Robin Trower set sail on forging a solo career and in doing so assembled a new band bringing in James Dewar on vocal and bass duty, and Reg Isidore on drums. The new power trio set the tone on Robin’s 1973 debut solo LP Twice Removed From Yesterday, but it was the follow up, 1974’s Bridge of Sighs that would catapult Trower into an international guitar hero.
Recorded in just over 2 weeks at Olympic and Air studios in London under the auspices of Trower’s former Procol bandmate, producer Matthew Fisher, Bridge of Sighs also benefited greatly from the presence of famed Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick who brought with him a whole array of recording techniques that greatly inspired Trower. “He came up with a way of recording the guitar I don’t think had been done before,” Trower says. “It was a big room and he had one mic in close, one mic set in the middle distance, and one mic set fifteen feet away to get the sound of the room. That was a very big factor in how the song and the whole album sounds.”
Bridge of Sighs is a titanic sounding rock album featuring some truly mesmerising guitar from Trower. The title track and gems such as ‘Day of the Eagle’, ‘Too Rolling Stoned’, ‘In This Place’ and ‘Little Bit of Sympathy’ and the exquisite ‘Lady Love’ are outstanding numbers with Trower’s guitar playing right up there with the most celebrated guitar gods of the era. Toto’s Steve Lukather observes “
Recorded in just over 2 weeks at Olympic and Air studios in London under the auspices of Trower’s former Procol bandmate, producer Matthew Fisher, Bridge of Sighs also benefited greatly from the presence of famed Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick who brought with him a whole array of recording techniques that greatly inspired Trower. “He came up with a way of recording the guitar I don’t think had been done before,” Trower says. “It was a big room and he had one mic in close, one mic set in the middle distance, and one mic set fifteen feet away to get the sound of the room. That was a very big factor in how the song and the whole album sounds.”
Bridge of Sighs is a titanic sounding rock album featuring some truly mesmerising guitar from Trower. The title track and gems such as ‘Day of the Eagle’, ‘Too Rolling Stoned’, ‘In This Place’ and ‘Little Bit of Sympathy’ and the exquisite ‘Lady Love’ are outstanding numbers with Trower’s guitar playing right up there with the most celebrated guitar gods of the era. Toto’s Steve Lukather observes “
