Goose Pimples - Tommy Ladnier

Advantages: No lyrics to get stuck in your head
Disadvantages: One for the serious listener.

...Music inspired by The Snow Goose (to be precise, more later) - is in my opinion the Magnum Opus of Camel. Whilst lacking lyrics, and the musical variety of albums such as MoonMadness and Mirage, this epic showcases the band's talent and skill, and is also a perfect lazy Sunday track to listen to. As concept albums go, it has to be one of the more focused attempts ever performed. Released in 1975, and following the acclaim of Mirage's White Rider Suite (based on the fall and subsequent rise of Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings), and their eponymous Debut, Camel wanted to purse more conceptual suites - in particular novel themes. This album is based on the short story The Snow Goose, by Paul Gallico. The album title was changed to include the 'Music inspired by...' tag due to legal protest by Gallico, a vehement anti-smoker, who mistook... Read review

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Advantages: a milestone in musical history
Disadvantages: Kieth Moon sings

...The CD revolutionised the music industry, but there was a downside. Millions of great records were lost because they were only on vinyl. Once my wife threw out my crackly old record deck I lost access to lots of quality music. Thankfully the back catalogues of many great names are being reissued in CD form. And as a bonus they usually cost less then you paid for them first time around! Such is the case with the seminal rock record Tommy. Originally released at the very end of the 60s Tommy encapsulates the mood of the time. To quote the sleeve notes, it is an everyday story of murder, trauma, bullying, child molesting, sex, drugs, illusion, delusion, altered conciousness, spiritual awakening, religion, charlatanism, succes, superstardom, faith, betrayal, rejection and pinball. Not bad in 70 minutes, eh? The storyline... Read review

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Advantages: hear an Acoustic guitar genius!
Disadvantages: some of the tracks become a little 'samey'

...As a guitarist myself i consider Tommy emmanuel to be one of, if not the greatest acoustic guitar player around at the moment. He has the extrodinary ability of playing a guitar and producing the sound of 4 people playing! The cd has a range of styles from jazz to blues to ragtime! For me the downfall is that there is no vocals or even any other instruments on the cd to keep things fresh and interesting, just one man and his guitar. My advice is to 100% buy this album if you are a guitar player yourself because you will be absolutely blown away by this guys ability. However if you do not play guitar the album will probably become extremely old and tired (and dusty!) after a few listens to it.... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful