Robert Wyatt has appeared on this list before, as a member of the jazz-fusion outfit Soft Machine. This solo album is another jazz/folk/rock kind of fusion, but with less jazz than the Soft Machine album Third.
The album was recorded after Wyatt was paralysed from the waist down following a fall from a window, and it can be dark and unsettling at times – the songs, however, were largely written before his fall. There are only six tracks; artsy compositions that pass through movements, and a lot more coherent compared to the tracks on Third, which I recall at the time felt a bit disjointed.
Little Red Riding Hood Hit The Road (Side One) feels like a montage of vocal samples, prefiguring mixing groups like Art of Noise or The Avalanches. Jazz/samba trumpet runs up and down in background over snippets of vocal utterances. On Side Two, the track Alifib is a stripped down drone-like track that leads into Alifie over which Wyatt utters beat poetry style vocals - “I can’t forsake you, or forsqueak you”.
It’s produced by Pink Floyd’s Nick Mason, and has some early Floyd elements (especially A Last Straw). Ivor Cutler appears with his distinctive harmonium and droning poetry; I likened The Incredible String Band to his performances, and there are hints of that kind of experimentalist music on this album too. Mike Oldfield plays guitar on Little Red Riding Hood Hit The Road (Side Two), and there’s a bit of a Tubular Bells feel to it.
But all of these different elements that sound vaguely like other things add up a unique and interesting sound. It’s not party music, but it’s definitely interesting.
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