Customer Reviews

High Land Hard Rain

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this album (on vinyl, of course) when it was first released and today, 15 years later, own it on CD and it's in my car's CD player. It's beautiful. If you're a fan of Beatles/Crowded House/Squeeze et al. then you will love this tender, noble and oftentimes naive record. Roddy Frame's lyrics and fine guitar playing were never better.

This is one of the best pop releases of the early 80's. Great chord structures, melodies, and arrangements - but most of all, songs. I can't believe no one has mentioned my favorite track, "We Could Send Letters" - What a powerful and regal tune. This needs to be in your collection.

With a penchant for word-play that I dare to call Morrissey-esque, Roddy Frame exhibits a maturity beyond his years on this early effort. Vocally, Frame sounds like many of the Brit-indie-rockers of the era (although he hails from Scotland), with his understated, yet emotive style. And Camera creates the fine, melodic landscape for Frame's expression. The music recalls a synth-ier version of the early efforts of their contemporary, Everything But the Girl. Add Morrissey-type lyricism (without the wailing gloom) and you get mature, romantic, poetic music at it's 80's best...

It is a crime that this album is over looked when the music press bore us with their all time top 100 album lists each year. It is a classic that sounds as good if not better today than on it's original release. Highland Hard Rain came on like a breath of fresh air in the early eighties - a truly dire time in mainstream pop music. The hit single Oblivious may have appeared light weight and throw away to some, but to anyone who'd ever picked up a twelve string the depth of talent Aztec Camera possesed was plain to see. The cord structures and truly amazing lyrics seemed more the work of a middleage Dylan than a callow youth of 19. Roddy Frame was a natural. He was to the guitar what Eddie Gray was to football: the sweet left foot, the icing on the cake, the last waltz. If you listern to High Land Hard Rain and don't think this album is a classic, pray that The Lord will make you deaf for you have no futher use for your ears.

If you enjoy this album try tracking down The Bathers- Unusual Places To Die, Shack- Waterpistol, Zilch, Pale Fountains Paciffic Street,L Cole & The Comotions- Rattlesnakes, Orange Juice- You Carn't Hide Your Love Forever and World Party- Goodbye Jumbo.

I have to join all the others in rating this recording 5 stars. I, too, bought it in vinyl (!!!) when it was first released, and I have never tired of it. The songs are beautiful, well-written, and fit every mood. Even if you have never heard of this group, you won't regret buying this CD - it's guaranteed that you will play it over and over for years to come.

And, I am still totally in love with it. It has real staying power, and I never get sick of it. Some of his more recent CD's have left me cold, but this is probably my favorite album of all time. Take a chance on it--you won't regret it.

Aztec Camera's "High Land, Hard Rain" is one of many albums I own that took a LONG time to like. I bought it with the knowledge that it was a monumental and thus historically influential album in the 80's - it was very unique and well-produced at the time. The other interesting fact is that it was all done by a seventeen year-old! Every song here is good, but the problem with most of them is that Roddy Frame's voice isn't all that appealing - it has a boyish nature to it and it just isn't all that good (this is the reason I didn't like it at first). However, it DOES grow on you, I think the lyrics and the musicianship are essentially where the album excels. Every song here has great lyrics (even if they're hard to make out sometimes), and the musicianship is very well done and definitely unique - I'm not sure how to describe it! I suppose the closest sounding album to this is XTC's "Skylarking" (it's relatively similar). It's definitely 80's pop rock, but it has odd instruments and noises attached to it that I really can't describe. I guess you'll just have to listen to it for yourself. Overall, though, it's incredibly well-produced - it's on par with a Jackson Browne album, I'd say. I would argue that the first two songs, its creativity, its influence and its production make up for any minor grievances. All in all I don't think it's for everyone, but for those who like 80's pop rock and can get used to Robby's voice then this is a fantastic purchase (trust me, you will probably HATE his voice for a while, except on the first two songs)! Absolutely recommended!

Highlights include:

"Oblivious"

"The Boy Wonders"

the rest are good, too

Fantastic songs with some of the best lyrics on any album, bar none. Elvis Costello rightly praised Roddy Frame's first-rate compositions. The musicianship is superb, and at times majestic, highlighted by Frame's exceptional guitar work.

But unfortunately for the listener, Frame sung the songs himself, and his often flat, nasal vocals were not up to the stellar level of the material, particularly on the poppier tunes, though I did get used to them.

Still, a part of me wishes someone would take the tracks, bring in singers as great as these songs to dub new vocals, and re-release the album. I wonder if Frame might have been a Burt Bacharach / Hal David for the 80s with even better lyrics, had he equally great mouthpieces as Bacharach/David.

Still, the quality of the tunes, musicianship, arrangements, and especially the lyrics, are so great beyond the ability of words to describe it would be totally wrong not to give it 5 stars. Get it and enjoy!

Roddy Frame drew comparisons to Elvis Costello when he first landed, but the comparisons aren't that apt: true, they both mask gentler and lovelier affections with wry and sarcastic statements and their vocals can be something of a contentious issue among some, but Frame is a) not nearly as talented, b) unburdened by the weight of demands, c) rarely stretches beyond his niche, and d) didn't have a respectable career. Apparently, everything after Aztec Camera's debut landed dead with the weight of bloated water, and no one (outside of hardcore fans) heard from him again.

"High Land" is an overrated effort, but one with enough good moments to make it worth hearing. Gets off to a bang with the hooky leadoff, "Oblivious," and closes on the punchy rocker, "Queen's Tattoos." In between is a hodgepodge of the good and the forgettable. While "We Could Send Letters" breathes across the space while building its simple attack, "Down the Dip" and "Orchid Girl" arrive with all the enthusiasm of a corpse. Luckily, the bright moments outshine that dark spots, and tracks like "The Bugle Sounds Again," "Lost Outside the Tunnel," and "Pillar to Post" make it a worthy release, if not one that demands endless acclaim.

Best cuts: "The Bugle Sounds Again," "Oblivious," "Pillar to Post," "Lost Outside the Tunnel," "We Could Send Letters," "Queen's Tattoos," "Haywire," "The Boy Wonders"

Amazing. Better now than when I first bought it in '83. On cassette. The songwriting, the singing, the guitar, it is absolutely remarkable Roddy Frame was only 17. A prodigious talent.