Following the success of their second LP 'Next...' in 1973, The Sensational Alex Harvey Band entered the studio to record their third album with the legendary Shel Talmy sitting in the producer's chair. In spite of Talmy's spectacular track record in the 1960s with the likes of The Who and The Kinks, SAHB weren't happy with the results, scrapping the recordings and sacking Talmy from the project. After reuniting with their longtime producer David Batchelor, SAHB re-recorded most of the material, issuing it as 'The Impossible Dream' in 1974. The Shel Talmy sessions remained buried in the archives until the release of 'Hot City (The 1974 Unreleased Album)' in 2009. I'd owned 'The Impossible Dream' for 35 years by the time 'Hot City' appeared on the scene, so I'm obviously biased, but for me the majority of the Talmy recordings pale beside their officially issued counterparts, though there are a number of interesting compare and contrast moments. 'Last Train', for example, features a somewhat more aggressive vocal from Alex, a slightly different musical arrangement and is two minutes longer than what would ultimately become 'Anthem', the closing track on 'The Impossible Dream'.
The Sensational Alex Harvey Band - Last Train
The Sensational Alex Harvey Band - Anthem
1 comment:
Can't go wrong with a bit of SAHB. Never heard Anything from Hot City before. Alex Harvey was a good mate of a friend of mine's from school's dad who was also a journalist
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