Roy Wood – Boulders

Roy Wood - BouldersOne of the best albums this listener’s ever heard. The idea behind Wood’s Boulders is much the same as the premise of Todd Rundgren’s A Capella – that one person is responsible for every sound on the album. Wood manages to turn out an incredible body of work with this limitation in mind, including the haunting “Dear Elaine”, with more tracks of overdubbed cellos than I can pick out providing an appropriately baroque backing to the heart-wrenching lyrics – Wood’s vocal range is unbelievable. The one irritation is the occasional silliness Wood had to stoop to in order to get lower or higher 4 out of 4voices for his backing vocals than even he is capable of reaching – the “choral” group heard in the background of “Songs of Praise” sounds like a few normal voices along with Jabba the Hutt and a treeful of chipmunks. On the other hand, the same trick works wonders on “Miss Clarke And The Computer”. All in all, very highly recommended…but sadly, very hard to find.

Order this CD

  1. Songs Of Praise (4:40)
  2. Wake Up (3:19)
  3. Rock Down Low (3:52)
  4. Nancy Sing Me A Song (3:28)
  5. Dear Elaine (4:09)
  6. All The Way Over The Hill / The Irish Loafer and His Hen (4:49)
  7. Miss Clarke and the Computer (4:20)
  8. When Gran’ma Plays The Banjo (3:13)
  9. Rock Medley (7:31)
    (Rockin’ Shoes / She’s Too Good For Me / Locomotive)

Released by: EMI
Release date: 1973
Total running time: 39:21