Ian Anderson’s Country Blues Band – Stereo Death Breakdown
Ghosts From The Basement – 9 October 2018
A vinyl record can become rare, collectable and sought after for a wide variety of reasons. High on the list will be the label it’s released on, particularly if it’s an enterprise known to be run by music lovers and relied upon as a trademark of quality. Blue Note and Atlantic fall into this category as does the label that this record was originally set to be issued on in early 1969, Island Records. During this period, they sourced some of the most exciting and diverse music of the era, including the ground-breaking Folk-Rock of Fairport Convention and the Psychedelic progressions of Traffic and Jethro Tull. They also had Nick Drake on the books, which these days doesn’t look too bad at all. So, for a fledgeling Country-Blues aficionado like Ian Anderson, finding his feet as a singer/guitarist on this evolving British scene, to be snapped up and primed for a debut album release on Island was a fantastic achievement. And so, this album was recorded in November 1968. Early in 1969 Island issued a classic sampler LP called ‘You Can All Join In’ with the cover featuring a collective group photo taken in Hyde Park. You can see Ian Anderson prominently in the second row, suggesting that a track from his soon-to-be-released debut recording was going to appear on the LP. You can also see, in the back row, the other Ian Anderson from Jethro Tull. This transpired to be fatally problematic for the artist behind ‘Stereo Death Breakdown’, later to be known as Ian A. Anderson to avoid further confusion. Jethro Tull’s management were fearful that the identical names would be a major issue (quite ironic when you consider that most casual observers assumed the bands singer was called Jethro Tull) and so the country blues of Ian Anderson was hastily offered a label transfer.
Luckily the label Ian ended up on, Liberty Records, was far from undistinguished. Although I have to say its hard to imagine Island signing off on cover art like Liberty did with ‘Stereo Death Breakdown’. You see another factor in a record acquiring collectable value in later years is artwork and the packaging. That original album cover is so lacklustre, a dubious photo of Ian pasted on some awful generic horizontal fading lines, it looked hurried and not dissimilar to a bootleg record. That original sleeve is re-produced on this 50th anniversary re-issue, although it is wisely tucked away underneath the transparent CD tray inside the fold-out digipak. The actual cover that has been re-designed here is a massive improvement, using an unfussy bold design over a super cool large, period appropriate photo of Anderson. It should be noted however that even though I feel the cover design cannot take any credit, the original UK Liberty album has nevertheless become a collectable album and has even been known to fetch £100 in top condition. But that is all down to the music.
Recorded in what many believe to be the glory days of analogue, ‘Stereo Death Breakdown’ remains a fantastic piece of rootsy audio pleasure. Anderson had been coaxed into the Blues scene by some early Muddy Waters vinyl, some inspirational live work by Spider John Koerner and the bottleneck guitar playing of Mississippi Fred McDowell. He’d spent the ‘summer of love’ buried deep in dusty old 78s from the 1920s and 30s absorbing the music of Charley Patton, Sleepy John Estes, Son House and the like. Consequently, his own music was out of step with the technicolour, Psych-Blues sounds that had invaded the mainstream by 1968. Anderson was more about the authenticity, not just in details of sound and style but in that lonesome, bluesy feel too. He muses in the liner notes of this re-issue that it is hard to fathom why a teenager from Weston-Super-Mare should head down this path, although there was a slightly more retro scene emerging. Championed by the likes of John Peel and the Melody Maker, it became known as the Country Blues genre and as Ian added bass and harmonica players to his line up (Bob Rowe and Chris Turner), it naturally offered a name for his new-found band as well.
These album sessions were completed in five hours with the basic Ian Anderson’s Country Blues Band three-piece set up; also playing were Bob Hall on Piano and other members of the Panama Limited Jug Band. The spontaneity and spirit of love and devotion to this style of music comes bursting out of the speakers. These were apparently mostly first takes which does ring true, there’s an ownership to the playing, they really got a hold of these tracks. The track list covers a high percentage of Ian Anderson originals alongside some equally well selected traditional arrangements such as ‘Break ‘Em On Down’ (a tune that Led Zeppelin were soon to pounce upon) and a brave attempt at reverting ‘That’s Alright’ back from Elvis’s rocking treatment into something more akin to its original form. Anderson’s own songs all honour their roots in an honest, unpretentious way. Old blues songs from the early twentieth century had a curious obsession with their big legged women, but Anderson bought a quirky little twist to this type of lament with ‘Short Haired Woman Blues’. The tune firmly establishes that he does not want a woman whose hair is shorter than his own. You can allow yourself a little chuckle at this, some things age better than others!
Two bonus tracks close the album, both were recorded five months after the original album sessions and they mark the final Country Blues Band recordings. ‘Put It In A Frame’, with its meatier Rock drums, points to promising directions the band could have progressed to. It’s actually one of the stand out tracks on the set, sounding a little more assured and a little less restricted by its source materials. It wasn’t to be though, that record label switch caused a critical release delay which left Anderson feeling pipped to the Country Blues post by his contemporaries Mike Cooper and Jo-Ann Kelly. Momentum was so crucial back in the fast-evolving late sixties and they must have felt it had all rather stalled by the summer of 1969. And yet for Ian A. Anderson it was only the beginning of a music career that would see him record 15 more albums either solo or in various bands. These confident first steps do thoroughly deserve the collectable album status they acquired; they’re a good-time, feel-good snapshot of a fertile period in music history where great major label albums were recorded over a few hours on a Saturday, fuelled by nothing more than musical camaraderie and a few drinks. Ah wasn’t that a time!
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