High Tide - Sea shanties (full album) 1969
© TO THE OWNERS AND COPYRIGHT HOLDERS:
I want to clarify that all the music used in the uploaded videos belongs to their respective owners: my channel does not monetize and it is not my intention to violate copyright, but if the copyright holders (label or musicians) want one of my videos to be removed, first to take any action, please contact me (via comments or personal messages) so that I can delete it immediately.
*****
Probably few will remember the name High Tide, indeed, perhaps even very few.
The same luck will probably touch their first album, Sea Shanties, released in 1969.
A case of poor luck, unfortunately, certainly not of poor quality.
If in that year a record was released, the one destined to irrevocably settle in the memory of every rock fan, that is the first Led Zeppelin, the High Tide exceeded in power and ferocity that even very rocky masterpiece, proposing a hot mixture of jazz, blues , hard rock and folk with some vague psychedelic touch that in some ways anticipates prog metal.
The line-up consisting of Tony Hill (vocals, keyboards, guitar) Simon House (violin and keyboards) Pete Pavli (bass) and Roger Hadden (drums) is a monster of power that is anything but second to the most famous hard formations of the time.
In particular, the intertwining between Hill’s voice, Morrisonian and cavernous, his very dirty and burning guitar and House’s sinister and stunning violin is impressive.
The album starts off with a war footing, and hardly stops to catch his breath along the six tracks of which it is composed.
“Futilist’s Lament“ opens the dances, with a monstrous guitar riff: Hill’s solemn voice and apocalyptic melodies blend to create one of the most dramatic pieces of the album, while the subsequent “Death Warmed Up“, an instrumental of over nine minutes , it rolls up on itself in a hell based on violin and guitar, roars and quivers in a succession of hard rock thrills that find no peace for the duration of the song.
Peace that comes, only partially, in the subsequent “Pushed, But Not Forgotten”, in which the guitar seems to fade into sweet psychedelic melodies and Hill’s voice becomes melancholy and dreamy, all this alternating with robust discharges of red-hot electricity.
The B side of the album (or “Walking Down Their Outlook“, “Missing Out“ and “Nowhere“) continues precisely on the most robust and wild directives of their sound, on the line drawn by the first two, torrential tracks.
In an overflowing electric fluid “Sea Shanties“, unlike the aforementioned debut by Led Zeppelin, it is an album that you have to go looking for, which does not shine like a star in the firmament of the most classic rock, it is something else, more like a diamond at the bottom of a coal mine.
In 1970 it will be the turn of High Tide II, even more sinister and psychotic, largely instrumental, before the last Precious Cargo (recorded live) and an absolutely negligible Interesting Times.
Recovering Sea Shanties, however, means discovering almost a second side of the hard rock experience of the glorious 60s, a pearl to be combined with the well-known classics of the time, while also being sure that no mistake will be made.
A forgotten masterpiece, absolutely to be rediscovered!
00:00 Futilist’s lament
05:19 Death warmed up
14:31 Pushed, but not forgotten
19:18 Walking down their outlook
24:18 Missing out
34:00 Nowhere
Tony Hill - guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
Simon House - violin, organ
Peter Pavli - bass
Roger Hadden - drums