Customer Reviews

Music in a Doll's House

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This may have actually been a concept album. The concept would have been "We're doing drugs and, although we like them, they are really confusing us." Music In a Doll's House is a raging slab of psychedelia run through a blender. It is an astonishing piece of work filled with paranoia, minor keys, and snippets of themes that recur in drastically altered forms listed as "Variations On A Theme of ..." Acid flashbacks, perhaps.

This would all be so much hippie marginalia but for the fact that Family's musicianship, songwriting and vision were incomparable. Although unmistakably a product of the '60's, Music In A Doll's House doesn't sound retro -- it still sounds visionary. This album would sound cutting-edge-original if it were released today, tomorrow or next year. There is nothing else like it, and probably never will be. Family never attempted to repeat this, although one could say the same of any other album they released.

Sometimes you need to go back and experience what was to wonder what could have been. No other debut album from a band can match the force of this one from Family, and for more than 30 years, this work has remained a testimony to what rock music should be about: creative, mind-bending, pulsing, twisting, strange, engaging, and even failing.

The CD is full of gems, but the crowning glory may be "Old Songs, New Songs." Chappo's unearthly delivery of the main vocals contrasted with the falsetto of reedman Jim King's vocal on the chorus could stop traffic. Charlie Whitney offers up one of the coolest wah-wah pedal-powered solos toward the last minute of the song against the rock solid drums of the great Rob Townsend and the bass line of the late Rick Grech.

Be warned, however, if you cut your teeth on what has been on commercial FM radio for the past 20 years, you may experience osmotic shock when listening to Family. Had Family achieved the popularity it so deserved, then maybe today folks would know that the first and best rock band to ever feature violin, saxophone, guitar, bass, drums, and vocals may very well have been Family, not the Dave Matthews Band.

All the compositions on Music Of A Doll's House are great. They are organic, and have a English Folk feel. Listening to the whole album, it is like heariang post-Acqualung Jethro Tull but better: no epics or mellow-dramatics. Just well arranged accustic music with a middle ages spice.

Lead singer Roger Chapman has a great, goat like voice. That is in no way insult: his pitch and use of vibrato produce this effect, and there no other singer like him in rock. He also has the pipes to thrust forth extremely powerfully.

The only problem with the album is the production. Dave Mason, then in Traffic, produced. The whole album has a flanged eccho and badly superimposed effects that don't serve this music well. Understood, this was 1968, and musicians were learning how to make music in a post-Sgt. Pepper era. But the writing here is so good and the woody guitar work so warm, it would have worked better to have the clean production of the second Traffic album.

That said, this is worth buying both for the music and to understand English rock during 1968.


PS: I have this on a See For Miles CD from the 1990s. Has the sound improved on reissues? Please Comment.

This one is a true time-travel piece. 1968. Mellotrons, phasing, sitar, wah wah, horns, violin, cello, kitchen sink--everything going. Early progressive. An ambitious and fabulous debut that even got up the chart. Not bad. The prolific writing partnership of Roger Chapman and Charlie Whitney started here. Produced by Dave Mason who also has a song--Never Like This. The Chase starts it all. There are excellent transitions from song to song throughout. I like the whole thing so it's hard to pick high points, but I think Me My Friend, Old Songs For New Songs, See Through Windows, and 3 x Time are the ones. 3 x Time is hilariously perfect and pours into a rambling God Save the Queen. Family pursued a unique path. Though they had songs and albums on the charts they didn't capitalize and commercialize enough for the big fame--or we'd known more about them. This is a Now album. It was created a while back, but it is reliably current. This is crazy good. Wildly great. A permanent fave. It's so good I wish they'd made two. Music in a Doll's House Two.

I stumbled on this gem almost four years after it was first issued, having come across it in the music library of the college radio station I was working at. I was smitten right away and nothing has changed in the 35 years since. It sounded like nothing I was listening to at the time and it's overt psychedelic nature should have instantly dated it, but that's not the case, then and now. It's a completely unique mix of violin, sax, a propulsive rhythm section and a powerful roaring, bleating vocalist (Roger Chapman) who sounds like nobody else. Like a lot of albums from this era, it as a concept album with a theme, though I'll be damned if I can tell you what it is. Produced to perfection by Traffic guitarist Dave Mason (who also contributes a wonderful song that he himself never recorded), this is one of the top 3 psychedelic albums of 1967, sitting comfortably up there with Syd's "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" and Traffic's "Mr. Fantasy". Yes, it's better than "Sgt. Pepper". Don't believe me? Try it for yourself.

Like I said in the title, this album is just perfect in every way. The wide variety of musical instrumentation, the wonderful mixture of both singers (two totally different voices that just complement each other greatly). It is impossible to pick a favorite song because the album as whole is just complete - each song as good as the next. The last few songs all blend into each other and take your mind on a wonderful trip that you don't want to come back from (which is the kind of music I absolutely love). This album has risen to the top of my favorites and I have to break it out and listen to it on a constant basis. None of the songs ever get old and they sound fresh with every listen. Love, love, love this album, it is a must have for anyone who has good taste in music-it has it all and so much more!

Family first album "Music In A Doll's House" is one of the albums, which must not be ignored. With Traffic guitarist Dave Mason as producer, the group recorded a very exciting album which is both innovative, melodic and bearing Mason's obvious Traffic imprint.

The group's original line-up included, besides the three regular Family members Roger Chapman, John Whitney and Rob King, also bassist and violinist Rick Grech and saxophonist Jim King. The line-up allowed a diverse instrumentation and the group took great advantage of this oportunity. Moreover, the songwriter-team Chapman / Whitney shines, with many fine compositions.

"Pscychedlia" is probably what you first think when you hear the opening track "The Chase"; the number has a fine melody and an instrumentation that can lead the mind towards both the Move and King Crimson.

The acoustic melodic approach is also found on the album, not least the beautiful "Mellowing Grey" and the airy "The Breeze" - both fine examples of this. "Never Like This" was written by Dave Mason and it clearly shows - sounds almost like a "Hole in My Shoe - 2". The grandiose of the opening number returns with "Me My Friend" - interesting change on lead vocals with Chapman taking care of the chorus while Jim King takes care of the verse. More pscychedelia on "Winter" - sounds almost like Creation.

The group's roots in R & B are revealed on "Hey Mr. Policeman" and "Old Songs, New Songs" - both tracks could have been Yardbirds numbers. The intro of "Peace of Mind" was later reused by David Bowie; the song is one of the major highlights of the album and a number that would become one of the group's live favorites.

At no time in this very seamless album, one senses idling, and you may easily find yourself subsequently go humming some of the fine melodic themes.

The original Family line-up released the year after another album "Family Entertainment" on which they actually managed to surpass themselves. Both albums by two great classics of the period.

I've had many friends over the years recommend Music in a Doll's House to me, a supposed classic by a late 60's pop band called Family. Supposedly this is the ultimate example of pop songwriting written as close to perfection as humanly possible.

I have to question how much of a classic this album is though, seeing as how less than 10 people on amazon know about it. WHAT a shame too!

This album seriously does everything right, and I really mean it when I say EVERYTHING. Some of the prettiest and most carefully created pop songs you will ever hear from a late 60's album. This album stands among the very best of them, including Love's Forever Changes, the Rolling Stones Between the Buttons, the Who's Tommy, the Beatles Abbey Road, the Moody Blues Days of Future Passed, etc.

Seriously, this album IS just as chock-full of extremely melodic pop songs similar to any Stones, Who, Kinks or Beatles album, I totally kid you not! If there's a weak point on this album I honestly can't find it. This music sounds enchanted most of the time thanks to the choice of delicate and beautifully played instrumentation.

Now, what's really amazing to me is the lead singer who goes by the name of Roger Chapman. He closely resembles SEVERAL other singers out there such as Peter Gabriel, Roger Wootton of the folk-rock cult favorite Comus, and there's even an Italian progressive rock band that was popular in their home country during the 70's with a lead singer *identical* to Roger Chapman named Premiata Forneria Marconi (check out an album of theirs called Chocolate Kings for an *incredible* resemblance between the two singers- you won't be able to tell them apart I guarantee it!)

Chapman has a very good singing voice and a talent for expanding his range in all the right places to express any and all emotions to you, the listener. What a splendid display of vocal talent.

Another highlight is the way the album was produced. This does NOT sound like an album from 1968. The entire album sounds amazingly crystal clear and just beautiful. Every instrument sounds like it could have been recorded using todays technology. This is the complete opposite of most albums recorded in 1968 where you know immediately what period in time they were made, such as a certain Iron Butterfly classic for instance.

Want me to pick a favorite song? I guess "3 x Time" would be my pick. Those vocals are so sincere, beautiful, and just a perfect example why late 60's rock continues to touch me on such a personal level. I love the melodic horn riff too, along with those rather ominous Moody Blues-sounding chants before the song shifts back to the horns. Weird, but lovely.

Why Music in a Doll's House hasn't gone on to become a popular lost classic the same way Love's Forever Changes has is something we'll never know. You just have to trust me when I say you will immediately fall in love with this album if you share the same love as I do for late 60's pop music.

Not to age myself but I heard this when it was first released and loved it! Chapman has the best voice in rock and roll and it is a sin that not enough people are aware of it. Fearless is my favorite Family album but Music in a Doll's House is superb. While rooted in the 60's it stands the test of time.