Silver Pistol/Please Don't Ever Change

Performer: Brinsley Schwarz
Producer: Dave Robinson
Distributor: E1 Distribution (USA)

Notes: 2 LPs on 1 CD: SILVER PISTON (1972)/PLEASE DON'T EVER CHANGE (1973). Brinsley Schwarz: Brinsley Schwarz (guitar); Ian Gomm, Nick Lowe (vocals, guitar, bass guitar); Bob Andrews (vocals, keyboards); Billy Rankin (drums). This two-album-on-one-CD compilation captures Brinsley Schwarz at their musical peak on two levels. The material on Silver Pistol, arguably their best album, is remastered impeccably so that you can practically hear the action on the acoustic guitar strings on "Nightingale" and get just as close to the electric guitar on "Silver Pistol," while the electric bass on "The Last Time I Was Fooled" feels like it's in your lap. Those songs, along with "Unknown Number," "Merry-Go-Round," and "Egypt," were all authored by Nick Lowe, and alternating with some equally substantial contributions by Ian Gomm, they made Silver Pistol about the most dazzling body of American rock songwriting since the days when Neil Young, Stephen Stills, and Richie Furay were divvying up Buffalo Springfield's classic albums between them -- indeed, this CD makes one think of the artistic peak that the latter group never had a chance to reach, owing to personnel problems; and, in fact, Lowe's and Gomm's divergent yet not dissimilar roots-based styles call the Stills/Young pairing to mind on yet another level. And then there's the second half of the CD, the somewhat slapped-together contents of Please Don't Ever Change, any of which sounds like it could easily be among the best work of the band. And even that shows the levels of perfection Brinsley Schwarz were achieving on just the individual, one-off efforts they generated when they weren't shooting for any big targets. (And except for Showaddywaddy, what other group during the 1970s was covering the Cadillacs' "Speedo" as a serious number?). And all of it, off both albums, is presented in glittering state of the art digital audio and backed up with superb notes by Alan Robinson -- it's all a little bit of what one corner of rock & roll heaven should sound like. ~ Bruce Eder

With members that would go on to make up Graham Parker's backing band, the Rumour, and featuring English power-popper Nick Lowe on vocals, Brinsley Schwarz (named after the band's lead guitarist) not only defined the sound of early-1970s British pub rock, but were--in retrospect--something of a supergroup. Heavily influenced by the rootsier aspects of 1960s American rock, the band provided an alternative to the bombast of glam rock and the cerebral excess of prog rock that exemplified most British music at the time. The band had broken up by 1975, but left a song book that included early versions of Lowe's great "Cruel to Be Kind" and "Peace, Love and Understanding (What's so Funny 'Bout)," later made famous by Elvis Costello.

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