Camberwell Now
All’s Well
(ReR)
It could be said they were the most innovative, meticulous, and communicative
group among those who appeared in the United Kingdom during
the "New Wave" era (and yes, it could be said that, as a compliment,
this doesn’t really mean much). A group whose music, about a quarter of
a century later, still sounds as a successful mix of composition, improvisation,
studio work, playing skills, and songs whose
"political"
lyrics were never banal (this is a much better compliment). Despite their being
somewhat well-known, This Heat were always too difficult to be appreciated
even by a niche (not to mention a mini-mass) audience. But it’s thanks to their mini-celebrity, their being perceived as being part of that era’s "zeitgeist",
that some of their best albums – such as the more experimental
This Heat (1980), or Deceit (1981), where those charming
"English Melodies" are given more space – have been re-released
more than once. And let’s not forget the "box with everything",
released just last year.
Camberwell Now could be defined as being a logical consequence of the more
melodic (but not at all serene!) Deceit. They were just as meticulous,
courageous, fascinating, and lucid as their predecessors, but in the end
they were killed by the "friendly fire" that gave extra points
(such as "Structuralism", "Derrida", and the like)
to ZTT’s 8bit samples. Hence, their work being perennially undervalued,
then and now. Which is terribly unfair for a group that spent those terrible
years of the Thatcher administration, from the Falklands war to the Miners’ strike (maybe the episode
that signalled the end of the "class struggle" in the United Kingdom),
as an active witness.
It would be absurd, obviously, to think about the work done by Camberwell Now, of their use of an instrumental ability which had
not been exactly overexposed in This Heat, in the pejorative terms of "prog".
This is because every single musical gesture by the group is a
function of the whole, never a sign of sterile virtuosity.
It’s also true that Charles Hayward’s drumming style was quite original, and
a distinctive part of their sound (Hayward was maybe the last specimen
of "Excellent UK drummer", alongside the
very different-sounding Simon Phillips). Quite differently
from This Heat – which were always knotty, with a high vertical density of sound – Camberwell Now’s musical approach favoured a development process that’s more
linear, where the drums’ dry, highly dramatic performance is one of the
key elements.
Released in 1983, the Meridian EP presented a melodic dimension that could
be said to be not that far from Robert Wyatt’s, alongside instrumental
tracks that were quite different from the work done by This Heat. Besides
Hayward’s drums, vocals and keyboards, the group featured multi-instrumentalist
Trefor Goronwy and tape wizard Stephen Rickard.
The "tape switchboard" built by Peter Keene and played by Rickard
was the new element that, starting with The Ghost Trade (1986), played such a big part in Camberwell Now’s sound, both live and
in the studio, greatly enhancing the group’s musical vistas. Destined to
remain the group’s only album, The Ghost Trade is one of the most beautiful
pages in the chapter called "English Music". Many things stay
in one’s memory, from the urgent drums in Working Nights to the fractured
development of Sitcom, with its excellent use of vocals (by Hayward, Goronwy
and, as a guest vocalist in the final portion of the piece, by Mary Philips),
to the solemn start and the thumping percussion at the end of Wheat Futures. Let’s
not forget the 11-minute-long, and absolutely perfect, The Ghost Trade, with
its intelligent use of two different vocal timbres and an instrumental
coda whose fascinating tension has lost none of its appeal.
Released the following year, Greenfingers was in a way a let-down. The EP’s
title-track is a gem, but the group sounded undecided about whether
to cultivate the patient sound they had adopted for their previous works,
or to go in the direction of an instrumental work more "in real
time" – this could be the real sense of the addition of a fourth member,
Maria Lamburn, here on saxophones and viola. Then the group split up. Survive The Gesture
(1987), the not-really-so-well-known solo album released by Hayward,
is an appropriate P.S. to the history of Camberwell Now.
Fans of the group greeted with open arms the release of the CD All’s Well,
which featured all the material by the group which had previously appeared
on vinyl: released in 1992, this version by (Swiss)
RecRec had been digitally remastered by Barry Woodward in the famous Townhouse
studios, London. I still preferred the vinyl sound of Meridian, but I had
to admit that the new version of The Ghost Trade sounded more 3D, more
lively, more colourful.
And so we now have a new re-release: the same material, again
the booklet featuring the lyrics, but we have a nice surprise in the
form of a useful and interesting article about the mysterious
"tape switchboard" – an article that, having appeared about twenty
years ago in an issue of the ReR Quarterly magazine, is otherwise impossible
to get. It goes without saying that the CD is a must. For what could go wrong
with an edition that has been re-remastered by the group themselves? (Maybe
the re-remastering?)
Big surprise, the CD stinks. Already the opening tracks, off Meridian, sounded
to me as being a bit too harsh, too clean; the opening notes of the first track on The Ghost Trade terrorized me.
In a nutshell: the sound is overcompressed, ugly, vulgar, flat, monotonous, fatigueing, inexpressive; it works against the material, robbing it of all its attractiveness and mystery. A sound that’s almost techno
– but this is not techno! Plus metallic-sounding drums, all the record
nuances shown in full light (like the Mona Lisa shown in broad daylight
in the open air!), while the attentive ear, which once went forward, trying
to capture those subtleties, is now replaced by an arm that, fast-as-the-light,
tries to reach the volume knob in order to decrease sound pressure.
(What about now? Will everybody have to buy second-hand copies of the old
RecRec CD on the Web?)
Beppe Colli
© Beppe Colli 2007
CloudsandClocks.net | Mar. 19, 2007