Customer Reviews

Cool Water

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Released in 1994, containing songs that were supposed to come out in the late 1970's when they were considered to have lost it, or pressured into writing song with new wave pop influence in order to sell records.

These would have be considered tracks too lousy to make it then.

In 1994 there are tired renditions of them by a band that seemed to be making a record to support themselves and their family.

Track listing

1. "Cool Water" (Hastings) - 4:07
2. "Just The Way You Are" (Hastings) - 3:43
3. "Tuesday Is Rock And Roll Nite" (Hastings) - 4:21
4. "The Crack Of The Willow" (Hastings) - 5:35
5. "Ansaphone" (Hastings) - 4:59
6. "Cold Fright" (Hastings) - 5:21
7. "Side By Side" (Hastings) - 4:40
8. "You Won't Get Me Up In One Of Those" (Hastings) - 3:54
9. "To The Land Of My Fathers" (Hastings) - 4:56
10. "Poor Molly" (Hastings) - 5:54
11. "Send Reinforcements" (Hastings) - 4:48


Musicians

* Richard Sinclair - bass guitar (track 1-7)
* Richard Coughlan - drums, percussion
* Geoff Richardson - guitars, flute, violin, vocals, soloist
* Pye Hastings - acoustic guitar, guitars, vocals
* Jan Scheelhaas - organ, piano, keyboards, Minimoog

I stumbled upon Caravan in the late 80s by way of Gong and Soft Machine, and got into their first few albums (1968 - 1974 period), then around '91 I found their Canterbury Collection compilation of '80s material which was pretty soft by my tastes but still worth listening to for a couple of good songs.

Well this CD, Cool Water, along with recent siblings All Over You and The Unauthorized Breakfast Item, really show what the band has been up to in the last decade, namely that they still have outstanding songwriting. Performance and production values are also top notch. If you are feeling down and need some uplifting, positive music with finely honed ideas, lyrics and polished sounds look no further than this or any of the above mentioned titles.

Listening to Caravan will make you feel better.

Released in 1994, this is a collection of songs originally recorded in 1977 to be a follow up album to Better by Far. The album was not completed, the tracks were in storage and Caravan did not release another studio album until 3 years later (The Album). Cool Water is about 50 minutes long and the sound quality is fairly good, but there are tape noises on some of the later tracks.

My copy of the CD does not list who is on it (other than that Pye Hastings wrote all of the songs). Some others have listed the album personnel, but I don't know where they got the information. I have seen incorrect information about albums floating around on the internet, so I am not sure I would believe what others have written.

This is an album of mostly droning Hastings songs, along the lines of songs on Better By Far, Front to Back and the very bad Battle of Hastings. However, there are some good songs on the album that feature some interesting keyboards.

The last great Caravan album was Cunning Stunts, but the follow up, Blind Dog was fairly good (although many of the songs were reworked and are much better on All Over, Too). The Album, which came between Better By Far and Back to Front is pretty good, but that is because most of the songs were not written by Pye Hastings.

I like early Caravan's albums. But this CD is not CARAVAN that I like. It contains some of popish music. I don't know why it was issued... One star! Sorry...