The best 70s Giltrap prog tune you've never heard
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2015 8:44 pm
So you love the trilogy of prog albums that Gordon released in the 1970s (tetralogy if you include Peacock Party) but here is a Classic bit of Giltrap prog playing from that era that I'll bet you've never heard. The penny only dropped for me a few months ago when I suddenly realised that a tune I had loved for, well decades, was actually The Gordon Giltrap Band in disguise, but still chock full of his distinctive acoustic and electric playing. And if you like Inner Dream and the like you will love this... But a little story first...
Back as a teenager I sang in the choir backing a rock musical by a chap called Paul Field (not heard of him? He went on to pen Sir Cliff's Millennium Prayer, but you can't hold that against him). When I went to university I would check out for his gigs when they came up and go along. I had a few of his albums - including one by the Christian pop band he'd been in during the 70s, "The Best of Nutshell". The last track on that album was a cracker. An overblown, progtastic epic based on the book of Revelation called "Thief In The Night", I loved it. I never thought about who actually played on it. I just knew that it loved it. Tonally it was quite different from the Carly Simon meets Al Stewart sound of the rest of their pop songs. They were great. It was BRILLIANT!!!!!!!!
But being on cassette it has been some years (decades) since I'd actually listened to it. Then, while doing some nostalgia browsing I discovered that the Nutshell albums were now downloadable from Paul Field's website. I couldn't resist and soon they were on my iPod. The first two songs I listened to were my favourites, "Empty Page" and "Thief". When the latter came on I was gobsmacked... That bass, that guitar... It couldn't be, could it?
Straight on to Wikipedia and soon I realised it WAS. The album was recorded by Edwards, Hand and Miller and the backing band was GG and The GG Band. It was so obvious I was amazed I had never spotted it before! Here is a YouTube video of it. If you ignore the evangelical end times theme (if that isn't your thing) I'm sure you'll love it!
Thief in the night - Nutshell http://youtu.be/lVw24PNNSTs
Bandcamp download page: http://paulfield.bandcamp.com/album/believe-it-or-not
Back as a teenager I sang in the choir backing a rock musical by a chap called Paul Field (not heard of him? He went on to pen Sir Cliff's Millennium Prayer, but you can't hold that against him). When I went to university I would check out for his gigs when they came up and go along. I had a few of his albums - including one by the Christian pop band he'd been in during the 70s, "The Best of Nutshell". The last track on that album was a cracker. An overblown, progtastic epic based on the book of Revelation called "Thief In The Night", I loved it. I never thought about who actually played on it. I just knew that it loved it. Tonally it was quite different from the Carly Simon meets Al Stewart sound of the rest of their pop songs. They were great. It was BRILLIANT!!!!!!!!
But being on cassette it has been some years (decades) since I'd actually listened to it. Then, while doing some nostalgia browsing I discovered that the Nutshell albums were now downloadable from Paul Field's website. I couldn't resist and soon they were on my iPod. The first two songs I listened to were my favourites, "Empty Page" and "Thief". When the latter came on I was gobsmacked... That bass, that guitar... It couldn't be, could it?
Straight on to Wikipedia and soon I realised it WAS. The album was recorded by Edwards, Hand and Miller and the backing band was GG and The GG Band. It was so obvious I was amazed I had never spotted it before! Here is a YouTube video of it. If you ignore the evangelical end times theme (if that isn't your thing) I'm sure you'll love it!
Thief in the night - Nutshell http://youtu.be/lVw24PNNSTs
Bandcamp download page: http://paulfield.bandcamp.com/album/believe-it-or-not