Apparently, my desk has become a clearinghouse for covers albums this week. Today\u2019s offering is the new one by prog-rock fourth-stringers Nektar, who built up a cult following in Germany, England and among four people in America in 1973.<\/p>\n
Somehow, the trio (augmented by Yes-man Billy Sherwood on bass and keyboards, at times) was able to rope an all-star list of prog-rock stars who were big 30 years ago to appear on this disc. Fans of that era of music will be delighted to see Yes alums Rick Wakeman and Patrick Moraz, Ginger Baker of Cream, Geoff Downes, Ian Paice of Deep Purple, King Crimson alums David Cross and Mel Collins, and even Rod Argent make an appearance. <\/p>\n
All 14 tracks are covers of classic rock radio staples, but not \u201cprogressive rock\u201d staples. Songs by Steve Miller, the O\u2019Jays, The Rolling Stones, The Doors, and Neil Young sit next to Rush, Toto, Pink Floyd, Traffic, Manfred Mann, and \u201cDream Weaver.\u201d This creates an album with no cohesion; it\u2019s simply a jam session with a bunch of musicians playing the music they love.<\/p>\n
An inherent danger in covering songs so well known is the lack of originality, something that renders \u201cWish You Were Here\u201d and \u201cFly Like An Eagle\u201d unnecessary because nothing new is brought to the table. Others, like the plodding \u201cRiders On The Storm,\u201d \u201cSirius\u201d and \u201cSpirit Of The Radio\u201d (sic), don\u2019t go out of their way enough to better the originals; when a song makes you want to listen to something else, that song hasn\u2019t done its job. Same goes for \u201cBlinded By The Light,\u201d although Ginger Baker\u2019s appearance on drums lends the tune more gravity than the original.<\/p>\n
As I\u2019ve said on other reviews of this type, a cover has to take the original in a new direction but keep the original\u2019s spirit to be truly successful. The Motown track \u201cFor The Love Of Money\u201d does such a thing and is a true highlight, nearly eight minutes of funky jamming with some excellent sax work (Nik Turner of Hawkwind). The Stones\u2019 \u201c2,000 Light Years From Home\u201d is a solid take on a forgotten tune, as is Roxy Music\u2019s \u201cOut Of The Blue.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are no serious missteps \u2013 Roye Albrighton is too good a singer and guitarist to let that happen \u2013 and only the cover of \u201cAfrica\u201d is a goofy choice; thankfully, it is tacked on to the end, where you can skip it after the lush six minute \u201cI\u2019m Not In Love\u201d finishes (an odd choice for Rick Wakeman\u2019s appearance, but he does a fine job all the same). Points deducted for the terrible cover art and overall cheesiness of the CD packaging, though.<\/p>\n
Your tolerance for this disc depends on how much you love these songs or guest artists, or if you are one of the people who have followed Nektar all these years. A Spoonful Of Time <\/i>ends up being engaging, occasionally interesting, and ultimately unnecessary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":31184,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7059],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-42876","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-nektar","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42876"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}