Bob Stanley presents ’76 In The Shade
What with the pandemic and all, the 2020s, as decades go, have been one hell of a long century. One of the things I’ve sought refuge in has been music. Soundtracks, of course, but also rolling back the clock and reacquainting myself with old favorites like Parliament (of which more later), and somehow, an Amazon search brought me to this compilation, curated by Bob Stanley of Saint Etienne. It’s not the only such compilation that’s been assembled by one or more members of Saint Etienne, but if they’re all as good as this one, that’s a collection I need to expand upon, because ’76 In The Shade is nothing short of amazing.
As the well-written liner notes point out, Stanley is trying to recreate what was being heard in England’s sweltering summer of 1976. But that doesn’t mean just what was on the radio. It means what random instrumentals were being played under the BBC’s pre-sign-on TV test cards in the morning. It means what pieces of production music were heard under other things, be they commercials or radio interstitials. And then, yes, there’s also what was on the radio, but even here, Stanley reaches deep into the playlists he remembers and rescues some true gems from undeserved obscurity, so while there are a few well-worn radio staples here – 10cc’s “I’m Mandy, Fly Me”, Jefferson Starship’s “Miracles”, Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds’ “Fallin In’ Love” – there is much here that has either been forgotten, or just seemed new to my ears on this side of the Atlantic.
The most obvious quality of all of it, aside from being really good music, is that it’s so mellow. This compilation is so laid-back that the hardest-rocking thing to be found is a Cliff Richard song (!), but even that selection is so sweetened by its production that it fits alongside the rest of the album without seeming jarring.
Some of the real gems are the instrumental tracks, many of them from production music library LPs that would’ve been in circulation at radio and television stations at the time. On the non-instrumental side, there are gems like the Motown-style “You’re The Song (That I Can’t Stop singing)”, credited to Hollywood Freeway although it was basically the songwriter’s demo of his new song. It was later covered by Frankie Valli, though I find myself preferring what turns out to be the original version of the song with its lush instrumentation and falsetto vocals. Other tracks by Liverpool Express, Sylvia, and Blue Mink make it seem like their producers had only just discovered reverb and were determined to drench these entire songs in reverb. It’s not unpleasant, but boy, are the results sometimes a bit on the trippy side.
Some of the songs here I remember from my childhood, and the rest I’m delighted to make their acquaintance here. Various artist collections are sometimes a bit of a crap shoot, engaged in a tug-of-war between what the issuing label can afford to license from other labels, or for that matter what’s even available at the time the compilation is assembled. But ’76 In The Shade is remarkably well-curated, and since I discovered it in 2021, it has gotten a lot of repeat listening time over these past couple of sweltering 21st century summers. It’s a nicely selected, relaxing album that, even though it contains only a handful of songs I recognized from my childhood, managed to take me back to that time.
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- Walking So Free – Spike Janson (3:33)
- Sugar Shuffle – Lynsey De Paul (4:00)
- Miracles (Single Version) – Jefferson Starship (3:29)
- Get Out Of Town – Smokey Robinson (4:49)
- I’m Mandy, Fly Me (Album Version) – 10cc (5:20)
- Stoned Out – Simon Park (2:17)
- Nothing To Remind Me – Cliff Richard (2:59)
- Discover Me – David Ruffin (4:12)
- You’re The Song (That I Can’t Stop Singing) – Hollywood Freeway (3:10)
- You Are My Love – Liverpool Express (3:15)
- Liquid Sunshine – John Cameron (3:00)
- Not On The Outside – Sylvia (3:03)
- Stay With Me – Blue Mink (3:17)
- Wild Mountain Honey – Steve Miller Band (4:50)
- Fallin’ In Love – Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds (3:12)
- Flowers – The Emotions (4:28)
- Montreal City – Azimuth (3:18)
- Rock ‘n’ Roll Star – Barclay James Harvest (5:18)
- Miss My Love Today – Gilbert O’Sullivan (3:46)
- Music – Carmen McRae (3:29)
Released by: Ace Records
Release date: August 11, 2020
Total running time: 74:45
It wasn’t a concept album, although it just as well could’ve been. 11 songs about the dark, seedy underbelly of Los Angeles and its inhabitants make up this eponymous album by Warren Zevon, his first release for a major label (although he released his first album, 1969’s Wanted Dead Or Alive prior to this). Not only does the album recall California lyrically, but the sidemen and guest vocalists read like a who’s who of the music scene in that area: Jackson Browne, Lindsey Buckingham, Don Henley and Glenn Frey, Bonnie Raitt and Carl Wilson just to name a few.
Also known as The Tomita Planets, this is Japanese synth whiz Isao Tomita’s rendition of Gustav Holst’s The Planets. Tomita used no traditional acoustic instruments, but did lean somewhat on the traditional arrangement. Opening with a bit of vocoder-and-synth “babble” to set the mood, Tomita launches into an energetic “Mars, The Bringer Of War” which appropriately now sounds like it belongs to the space age.
Overall, Tomita’s rendition of The Planets is interesting, a fascinating listen, but I can’t help but feel that there one could go further “out there” with arrangements and instrumentation, further afield from the orchestral arrangements that we’re all so used to. Other interpretations by folks like Rick Wakeman and Jeff (Musucal Version of War Of The Worlds) Wayne have also failed to break out of the orbit of the orchestral Planets. I know that there’s only so far one can go without actually changing the music itself, but within that limitation, I don’t think all the possibilities have been fully explored. Tomita does a good job, but The Planets could probably stand up to more intense, offbeat exploration.
Formed by former Zombies frontman Rod Argent (and named after himself), Argent is one of those bands who carved its niche in rock history with a tiny handful of hits. Two of those songs, “Time Of The Season” and “Hold Your Head Up”, are common reference points for fans and musicians on the modern-day power pop scene. The latter of those two is a true pop anthem, and that song alone is worth the price of the entire CD (which I suppose is easy enough for me to say, since it’s really a bit of a budget release). Argent’s music is heavy on the electric organ fetish that a lot of early 1970s power pop seemed to have, as well as many a funky bass line. Sometimes that works, and other times it doesn’t. I love “Hold Your Head Up”, and even though I’ve heard “Time Of The Season” so many times that I’m positively sick of it, I’ll give it points for being an excellent arrangement and decent song. I don’t remember “Tragedy” getting a great deal of airplay, 
This classic concert recording, only recently given its own CD release, certainly humbles me a bit. Some time back, in my review of ELO Part II’s One Night live album, I asserted my belief that the original ELO – limited by the number of musicians and the technology available to them at the time – could never hold a candle to ELO Part II on stage. Now, after hearing this concert recording from the early stages of ELO’s superstardom – well over a year before Out Of The Blue was released, and not long after the album containing “Strange Magic” and “Evil Woman” debuted – I have to admit that this isn’t necessarily true.
It all started here. This was the first ELO album – in fact, the first rock album – ever given to me; my older brother introduced me to this one on 8-track when I was around five or six years old, and it pretty much set the pattern. Having only heard some of my mother’s easy listening records and the only album I truly had to my own name – John Williams’ 
of aliens observing life on Earth. Most people will be more familiar with this album’s singles, “Telephone Line”, “Livin’ Thing”, “Rockaria!” (another favorite, a humorous hard rocker that pays tribute to several classical composers) and “Do Ya”. This is my favorite ELO release from the 70s, and my favorite rock album, period. I just haven’t heard it get much better than this.
The band’s second album curiously rehashed several songs from their first, but beefed up and fine-tuned the group’s sound considerably and, including some new gems (many of them actually new recordings of the Enz’s earliest singles and live favorites), created a vastly superior album. The vocals are more straightforward than the old-man-telling-a-story approach used by Phil Judd on Mental Notes, and the entire group is in fine form, consistently cohesive for what would be the last time in 