🎵 AotW AOTW: Procol Harum LIVE (A&M SP 4335)

[LPJim]

Procol Harum
LIVE WITH THE EDMONTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
A&M SP4335

(Note: SP 4334 was assigned to Jimmy Cliff (self-titled) but this was unreleased)

Gary Brooker - vocals and piano/ B.J. Wilson - drums/ Alan Cartwright - bass/ Chris Copping - organ & harpsichord/ Dave Ball - guitar/ Keith Reid - words.

Side One: Conquistador 4:16/ Whaling Stories 7:41/ A Salty Dog 5:37/ All This and More 4:23.

Side Two: In Held Twas In I 19:11 comprising: Glimpses of Nirvana, "Twas Teatime at the Circus, In the Autumn of My Madness, Look to Your Soul, and Grand Finale.

Recorded live at Jubilee Auditorium, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada on November 18, 1971.
Concert coordination: Derek Sutton
Recorded on Wally Heider's Mobile Studio, engineered by Wally Heider and Ray Thompson. Remixed by John Punter. Chris Thomas supervised and produced.
Special thanks to Bruce Meek for the cover and Jim Parker for help with orchestrations.
All songs by Brooker/ Reid except side two (Brooker/ Reid/ Matthew Fisher).

JB

SP 4335 entered the Billboard Top 200 on May 13, 1972, peaked at # 5 and charted for 28 weeks, according to Whitburn's "Top Pop Albums"

 

[W.B.]

This appears to have been released after April, 1972, since on copies pressed by Columbia's Pitman, N.J. plant, their typesetting department had already "broken in" a small narrow font emanating from Italy called 6 point Permanent Bold Condensed. This text font was used by Pitman predominantly between then and late September, 1972, with some "minor" use on Columbia and its subsidiary and distributed labels (on the "Circle P" credits) through late January, 1973. The last known use of this typeface was on a Bobby Goldsboro single released around the very end of 1973, "Marlena" (United Artists UA-XW374W).

Another interesting point is that on the 45 release of "Conquistador" (AM-1347-S), Pitman copies somehow inexplicably left out the "STEREO" credit, even though it was. Monarch, however, blared it out in a large condensed serif font.

And of course, this live version of "Conquistador" became perhaps the Harum's second best-known tune (to, of course, "A Whiter Shade Of Pale," previously released on Deram 7507 and re-issued later in '72 on AM-1389; and then there's "Homburg" . . . ).

And correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't this one of the last albums they put out on A&M before U.S. Chrysalis (which was being set up at this point) started putting out their (later) works? I know that the Chrysalis logo graces the back cover of this album.