Customer Reviews

Snow Goose - England

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4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
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"Mirage" was a risk for me. I'm cautious about the music I buy, and I had never heard of Camel before purchasing "Mirage". This band deserves to be better known, I was spellbound by Mirage's entrancing melodies.
Now I have "The Snow Goose", equally deserving of Mirage's greatness. Camel is a band that can create just as much feeling as a band centered around a vocalist, displaying this ability superbly in "The Snow Goose". I get absorbed into Camel's compositions with every listen, I can't wait to hear "MoonMadness", Mirage's supposed close counter-part.

Welcome to Camel's third album, Snow Goose, a nice concept album based on---the same novel about how a woman who finds a wounded bird and takes it to Rhayader. The bird and he become friends, and the woman falls in love with the old hunchback. The climax of the book and the album is Rhayader's courageous (and tragic) act of courage at Dunkirk, as he rescues countless lives while the snow goose shows him the way amidst gunfire. Although I've never read the book, now that I have grasped the plot, Camel's album is all the more poignant. The Snow Goose is a true progressive album, as it embraces so many moods and musical styles, and still manages to retain a central theme. As a whole, the music is much wispier than Mirage or their debut. The one-two punch of Rhayader/Rhayader Goes To Town is the undisputed highlight. This is a song for every taste, be it balls-out guitar soloing or light bouncy flute-driven sequences. Another great song is Migration, a nice jazzy piece that has one of the only vocal parts (actually, it's more like laid back scatting) on the album. Flight of the Snow Goose, has some interesting guitar-play from Latimer, but it is never forefront; this is more a drum-keyboard song. Preparation/Dunkirk are also noteworthy just for the sheer moods they evoke. Bardens's keyboard and is very effective in creating an ominous tension in Preparation before the all-out bash of Dunkirk. La Princesse Perdue is an extended reworking of the theme of The Flight, with some majestic horns added Latimer's solo is a nice sort of farewell to the listener. The bonus tracks mostly show early stages of the Snow Goose, especially the Rhayader songs. The highlight is the live version of the Snow Goose song, and it's segue into Freefall. The liner notes describe how Camel had originally, before they settled on Snow Goose, wanted to do a concept album on Hesse's Siddhartha; they had actually recorded a song called Riverman for the album, but it never saw the light of day. That would have been a worthy addition for this CD. This, of course, is minor niggling over a masterpiece.

Camel are one of the most overlooked progressive bands in the world, probably because their music is mostly instrumental - this cd is a fair example, and their songs are not catchy. What a shame that most people ignore this great band. I've always preferred them to others from the progressive field like Yes (Jon Anderson's voice always grated on my nerves, sorry).

The Snow Goose is simply one of Camel's major achievements. The title had to be slightly changed to 'Music inspired by....' to prevent legal actions by Paul Gallico, who wrongly assumed Camel were involved with the tobacco company. The stuff here is based on this book though.

The songs (Most of them pretty short) follow the narrative, and none of them is a throwaway. The bonus tracks featured are nice too, even if it's hard sometimes to tell the differences with the former release. The songs taken from the Marquee are outstanding like in the other Camel reeditions.

This 1975 release is a fantastic album of synth heavy and soft instrumental music that saw Camel moving on from the harder rocking Mirage (1974) to create a more contemplative album. In fact, I personally feel that Camel reached an artistic and creative peak with The Snow Goose suite.

The musicians on this album comprise the "classic" Camel lineup and include Andrew Latimer (electric, acoustic, and slide guitars, flute, and (wordless) vocals); Pete Bardens (Hammond organ, electric piano, acoustic piano, pipe organ, mini-moog, ARP Odyssey, and (wordless) vocals); Doug Ferguson (electric bass); and Andy Ward (drums, vibes, and percussion). All of the musicians are very good but I feel compelled to single Andy Latimer out as an excellent guitar player - he has a very colorful style and utilizes a number of different tones and timbres on a range of instruments. With respect to the vocal department, The Snow Goose suite is largely instrumental although there are a few short passages that feature vocal harmonies (no lyrics). According to the liner notes, the decision to produce an instrumental album caused the record company some concern.

In addition to the core musicians an orchestra is used on The Snow Goose, which was directed by David Bedford. If I am not mistaken, I think this is the same David Bedford that released albums such as Star's End (1974) and worked with rock musicians including Mike Oldfield and Kevin Ayers etc.

Overall, the sound on this album is very soft and at times haunting and deeply reflective. In general, the Snow Goose suite alternates slightly heavier sections with delicate passages that feature acoustic instruments, clean-sounding guitar, and warm-toned synthesizers. I guess it's worth noting that the heavier sections are really not heavy at all, but just feature the full band. Stylistically, this album is classic progressive rock although there are subtle undertones of jazz-rock too. The brief orchestral passages are also very nice and add yet another textural property to the recording.

This remastered CD is pretty good and features restored artwork, a ton of band photos, and extensive liner notes. There are five bonus tracks including a series of singles and live versions of Rhayader Goes to Town and The Snow Goose/Freefall (from the Mirage album). Both of the live tracks were taken from an October 30, 1974 concert and feature decent sound quality. The performances are also quite good too.

The Snow Goose is highly recommended along with the excellent Rain Dances (1977), which features Richard Sinclair on bass and lead vocals.

I'm not a music reviewer, and I don't pretend to be. This CD was my introduction to Camel. I gave the samples on this page a listen because Amazon recommended Camel based on all my King Crimson purchases (and oh, how I love KC). Amazon got it right this time.

As a disaffected teenager I would have said a "rock" album (and I use the term loosely with this album) without words was boring, but I learned better when I discovered progressive rock. Yes, there are no words on this album, but it is PERFECT without words. Not many bands can pull this off. This is the kind of music that when you hear it, a smile comes to your lips. I am so genuinely happy listening to some of the songs on this album (try "Rhayader" and "Rhayader Goes to Town" first). Even the "darker songs" without the flute melody make me smile, they are just that amazing. No amount of rearrangement could make them any better.

When I listen to this album, my mind goes back to being a 10-year-old playing the Legend of Zelda, Secret of Mana, Final Fantasy, or Quest for Glory all summer long. You can imagine running through fields with your sword and shield, ready to fight off the monsters, on a quest to save the princess ("La Princesse Perdue"). If there was a soundtrack for an adventure, this would be it. Yes, there is a story behind the album, but you don't need to know it to genuinely enjoy these songs.

A note to the wise: Listen to the album all the way though. I honestly can't put my finger on which song I like best because they fit together so nicely - I feel like I'm ruining it trying to take it apart. A story is not as good when you only read one page (unless it was badly written to begin with).

What I wanted to get across in this review was, if you are a fan of talented musicians, progressive rock, folk, and adventure games, you WILL enjoy this album. Even friends who never even heard of prog-rock liked it, although they were less happy about the lack of lyrics. But who cares? Please, give this album a shot. It is *amazing* and you won't regret it.

The Snow Goose is one of the greatest achievements of 70s progressive rock. The members of Camel are very tasteful on their instruments; they aren't flashy but a few well-placed notes can go a long way. Andrew Latimer and the late Peter Bardens make use of great guitar and keyboard sounds respectively.

Much of Camel's music has a feeling of warmth and sincerity. Throughout this album the band creates some almost soul-crushingly beautiful music. There are no lyrics, but the suite works perfectly without them. The music ranges from mysterious and haunting to reflective to whimsical to somber to joyful with a nice ebb and flow. There is less of the edgier rocking material on here than was present on their earlier albums, except for the second half of "Dunkirk." At times I wonder if this album had an influence on classic RPG video game music, especially the peaceful "Fritha." The grand finale (well, almost the finale) of the album, "La Princesse Perdue," is one of the most beautiful pieces of music I've ever heard.

The Snow Goose is a unique and accessible album that offers a relaxing change of pace for when you get tired of the crazy instrumental passages and "excesses" of most other classic prog rock.

I am a huge fan of the progressive rock of the 1970s. In fact, if someone took away all the CDs in my collection, save for my progressive selections from 1970 to 1980, I could probably survive (although I admit there's plenty of great rock that I'd be bummed to lose). I've been a passionate fan of Yes, Genesis, King Crimson, ELP, Pink Floyd and all of the other great prog rock bands of this period since around 1978.

The thing is, though, is that in the early years of my progressive rock fan-dom, I was so focused on the aforementioned bands that I kind of missed out on a lot of other great stuff -- or I should say there was a lot of great music that never actually made it into my collection. So, for about the past decade, I've been making an effort to fill in a lot of the "missing pieces" in my progressive collection -- the stuff I always knew I should have, but for whatever reason never acquired.

Three bands which I have been re-discovering as of late are Camel, Gentle Giant and Gong. Each made its own significant contribution to the prog scene of the 1970s -- and if you haven't yet explored the work of these three groups, I suggest you do so. I had, of course, listened to most of the works by these bands before, just never bought their stuff (maybe taped it, or borrowed, it). Of these three, I am currently really enjoying Camel's work. So far I have the first three Camel releases, Camel, Mirage and Snow Goose -- all great albums (and I am also familiar with Moon Madness, which is equally superb), but Snow Goose is, in my view, Camel's crowning achievement. It is a rolling, flowing, majestic suite of tightly integrated instrumental passages which create a amazingly cohesive and satisfying whole. Superbly well-composed themes abound and are repeated throughout ... in fact, the album is so thematic that in a way it is like movie soundtrack, or even a rock opera, only without any lyrics (there are some occasional vocal harmonies, or "chanting," if you will, but it's blended in so unobtrusively that you almost don't realize it's there, it's just another part of the instrumentation). As another reviewer here pointed out, it is a somewhat quiet and reflective album -- in a way it's not very dynamic -- but the quality of the compositions is such that, much like the really good prog of this period, it grows on you tremendously as you move through repeated listening.

I remember the first few times I heard Camel, back in the early 80s, I wasn't too terribly impressed. They just didn't seem to have the technical prowess -- you know, the blazing guitar and keyboard work, the rapidly changing time and key signatures, etc. -- that was the hallmark of bands like Yes, Genesis and King Crimson. So, even though I liked the music, I guess I just never really broke through the surface. The thing to realize about Camel is that, while they might not be as technical as the other prog bands of their time, they did put an impressive amount of care and craftsmanship into their music -- and today I realize that it has a complexity all it's own. I have to say that Andy Latimer (the lone survivor of the band) is an absolutely amazing composer and a fabulous guitarist -- listening to his David Gilmour-esque solo on "Rhayader Goes to Town" gives me goose bumps every time I hear it, it's just one of those solos that has an ever-lasting impression, like Gilmour's solo on "Time" on "Dark Side." You see, that's the thing about Camel -- there's just this certain level of perfection to the composing and the playing -- you could successfully argue that it more than compensates for the lack of "flashiness." Latimer's playing on this album (and on all the Camel releases) is really, really impressive -- he proves once again that it's not how many notes you play, but the choice of notes, and how evocatively you play them. His playing is packed with so much emotion and passion, his solos are delivered with just such utter care and attention to detail, and with such precision, at times it leaves me practically breathless. Each note is placed right where it should be -- there's never too little, never too much, he strikes that perfect balance -- and it takes a while to soak in and appreciate the high level of technical skill he really does possess. Latimer also plays flute amazingly well and there is rich orchestration on this album which supports the whole thing very well and which also proves Latimer's capabilities as an arranger/composer. Peter Barden's (GRHS) organ and synthesizer work on this album is equally impressive, and bassist Doug Ferguson and drummer Andy Ward have some moments where they really shine as well.

I can't say enough good things about this band, an in particular, about this album. All I can say is, if you're a fan of 70s progressive, and you haven't yet checked out the Snow Goose, or any of Camel's music for that matter, you really should. I'm sure that if you do you'll find their releases sitting right there next to your other, classic prog rock favorites.

put out in 1975, this is an outstanding, all instrumental album of prog-rock. shades of emerson, lake & palmer, shades of pink floyd, a touch of jethro tull. camel has, however, very much there own sound. classical flourishes and music with an epic anthem feel to it emerge out of quieter space-filled passages to create perfect juxtapositions. three pieces, in particular, that blend together perfectly are: "santuary," a beautiful short guitar instumental seques into "fritha," another delicate acoustic instumental, which then seques into "the snow goose," a gorgeous electric guitar showcase, lyrical and aching. another highlight is "rhayader alone," a dreamy instumental which is stunning. a fantastic album all around, highly recommended.

Camel's delightful interpretation of Paul Galico's novel is a superb example of 1970's prog-rock at its most inventive.

Interspersing quiet, delicate, pseudo-classical passages with beautiful soaring guitar-work, the Snow Goose has a very different feel to the more visceral energy of Camel's previous album - Mirage. The charm of the Snow Goose lies in the very powerful and memorable themes merged and reprised throughout the work (most notably in the core of tracks 3 to 6) and in Andy Latimer's virtuoso performance. If you enjoyed Gilmour's guitar outro to Floyd's Comfortably Numb, you will *love* this!

Some of the bonus tracks (single edits and live versions) seem a tad surperfluous here, in particular, the final track - Freefall (taken from Mirage) reminds us why Camel were at their best when they skipped the vocals!

Still, this is a superb album that no prog-rock aficionado should be without.

I bought the Snow Goose at lunchtime. Listened to it on my long drive home after work, with a big smile on my face, and then woke up last night with the main theme of "Rhayader Goes to Town" stuck in my head.

Go on, treat yourself too!

This album is so good, I didn't even notice there were no vocals until after I had already finished listening to it for the first time. The guitar lines are perfectly woven in between the drums, keyboards, and bass. Although no lyrics are present, the instruments tell the story, and do a terrific job. Although Camel had a couple of ther five star albums, I can say with confidence that this is their best. Don't hesitate to buy this masterpiece of progressive rock.

P.S. It must be listened to as a single work, much like The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, The Wall, or Days of Future Passed. This is not to say that the tracks are weak on their own, but they work together to provide an overall product that is worth more than the sum of its parts.