''Sea Shanties'' is the debut album of English
rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
band
High Tide. It was one of the first albums to use violin as a rock instrument. The cover artwork was drawn by
Paul Whitehead
Paul Whitehead is a British painter and graphic artist known for his surrealistic album covers for artists on the Charisma Records label in the 1970s, such as Genesis and Van der Graaf Generator.
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Life and work England: Liberty Records ...
.
Production
Denny Gerrard (of
Warm Sounds
Warm Sounds was an English musical duo, consisting of Denver Gerrard and Barry Younghusband, and later adding John Carr. They are considered a one hit wonder for their hit single, "Birds and Bees", from 1967. However they had an "airplay hit" foll ...
) produced ''Sea Shanties'' in return for High Tide acting as the backing band on his solo album ''Sinister Morning''. The recording sessions for the two albums overlapped, with ''Sinister Morning'' being finished in late June 1969,
[(1970). In ''Sinister Morning'' leeve notes] and ''Sea Shanties'' being started on the 2nd of that month.
Reception
Though it met with a scathing review in ''
Melody Maker
''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born ...
'',
[Shaw, Adrian. (2000]
"Tony Hill interview"
''Perfect Sound Forever magazine''. reviews in the underground press were universally positive, and sales were just enough to convince Liberty to give the green light to a second album.
[Powell, Mark (2006). "High Tide - Sea Shanties". In ''Sea Shanties'' (pp.8-10) ]D booklet
D, or d, is the fourth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''dee'' (pronounced ), plural ''dees''.
History
The ...
London: Eclectic Entertainment Ltd.
The
AllMusic retrospective review by Wilson Neate stated "On Sea Shanties, there's nothing fey and flowery in Hill's bleak lyrics or his doomy
Jim Morrison-like delivery, and psychedelia's melodic whimsy is supplanted by a physicality more in line with the visceral heft of metal progenitors...High Tide weren't a power trio, though, and it was the interplay of Hill's guitar with Simon House's violin that created the band's unique signature. Showing that
rock violin
Rock violin is rock music that includes violin in its instrumental lineup. This includes rock music only and does not include classical style music using melodic Motif (music), motifs from rock.
Rock music and rock and roll bands typically use el ...
needn't be a marginal adornment, House whips up an aggressive edge that rivals the guitar... High Tide had the muscularity of a no-nonsense proto-metal band, but they also ventured into prog territory with changing time signatures and tempos, soft-hard dynamics, multi-part arrangements, and even some ornate faux-Baroque interludes... Far from the collection of nautical ditties its name suggests, Sea Shanties is an overlooked gem encapsulating the shifting musical currents in late-'60s British rock."
[Neate, W.]
Allmusic Review
accessed February 2, 2011
It was voted number 5 in the All-Time 50 Long Forgotten Gems from
Colin Larkin
Colin Larkin (born 1949) is a British writer and entrepreneur. He founded, and was the editor-in-chief of, the ''Encyclopedia of Popular Music'', described by ''The Times'' as "the standard against which all others must be judged".
Along wit ...
's ''
All Time Top 1000 Albums''.
Track listing
All tracks written by Tony Hill except where noted.
2006 Remaster Bonus Tracks
Personnel
;High Tide
*Roger Hadden - drums
*Tony Hill - guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
*
Simon House - violin, organ
*Peter Pavli - bass
References
{{Authority control
1969 debut albums
High Tide (band) albums
Liberty Records albums
albums recorded at Olympic Sound Studios