Compilation Albert Lee - "Hiding/Albert Lee" [2 for 1]
Label: Raven Records, Australia - released 2004 -
First release 1979 respectively 1982. Digitally remastered. 2 classic solo albums on one.
A review by David Kidney:
Albert Lee is a guitar player's guitar player. The guy is amazing. No, ALBERT LEE, not Alvin!!! He's not the over-indulgent Woodstock guy, from Ten Years After, flashing through "Goin' Home." No-sir-ee! This is Albert Lee. He has played with Eric Clapton, with Emmylou Harris, Joan Armatrading, and more. He admits to some confusion himself, in the liner notes to this compilation of two albums from 1979 and 1982. Jerry Moss, of A&M, had signed Albert to do a record in 1975 . . . "Jerry wasn't impressed at the time; he thought it a bit too country and I honestly believe he may have thought he'd signed Alvin and not Albert." Well, eventually the tracks came out, and this "twofer" from Raven Records is a treasure trove of British country music.
Lee spent his formative years playing in Chris Farlowe's back-up group, The Thunderbirds, where his fretwork influenced future stars Jimmy Page and Steve Howe. He recorded three albums with Head, Hands & Feet; he backed up Jerry Lee Lewis on his The Session LP. In 1973 he joined a reformed Crickets, who were still playing Buddy Holly's tunes; then there were sessions with Joe Cocker, and before you know it he became part of Emmylou Harris's Hot Band. He signed his solo deal in '75, but it was 1979 before Hiding first appeared. Listening to it now, you can understand Jerry Moss's concern. While the Byrds and Graham Parsons had made it possible to bring country music to a rock crowd, it was an acquired taste.
Hiding shows a fairly advanced understanding of the country idiom. There are Everly Brothers' harmonies, and plenty of that popping, sizzling Telecaster sound. Lee has played behind the Everlys, appearing with them for their comeback night at the Royal Albert Hall in 1983. The Everly sound is apparent on a Rodney Crowell song "On a Real Good Night" on Hiding. Crowell's songwriting is represented by three tracks on Hiding (and two more on the second album included here)! Dire Straits frontman, Mark Knopfler, wrote "Setting Me Up," which Lee covers in a fiery version. He covers the Louvin Brothers' "Are You Wasting My Time," and shows off his high country harmonies on "Ain't Livin' Long Like This."
Backup musicians on Hiding include Emmylou Harris, Mickey Raphael, Buddy Emmons, Ricky Skaggs and Don Everly. Production is handled by Brian Ahern.
The second album included on this twofer is 1982's Albert Lee. The musicians are reduced to basically Lee's touring band, drummer Larry Londin, bassist Emory Gordy and guitarist Vince Gill. Bill Payne and John Hobbs share keyboard duties. The sound stays pretty much the same. Albert Lee is the leader. It's his reedy voice and stunning guitar work that are the stars. That and his impeccable taste in songs! John Hiatt provides a couple, "Radio Girl" and "Pink Bedroom." Crowell's pair are "The Best I Can" and "One Way Rider." Stir in a handful of tunes by Hank DeVito and one by Don Everly, and you've got a tune-filled countrified session.
Albert Lee's guitar solos are not self indulgent timewasters, but rather intense, subdued, melodic bursts of magic that punctuate the choruses. Very tasteful. And the professional backing on both albums is always supportive. Lee is the star, but he allows the song to be the thing. It's a good mix. No sense of ego at all. The liner notes highlight this. They are brief, self-effacing, and funny. Lee says, "You have to realize that I was just a sideman when I made these albums and didn't have the confidence or vocal chops I have now . . . I still really like the records." You know what? I do too. (By David Kidney)
Back side with track list.
From the album's booklet.
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A comment from Colin on my old fansite:
I found the LP Albert Lee in a second hand record shop in Camden, North London when i was 19. I didn't really know much about him, but the record was cheap so I thought it was worth the risk. I'm so glad i bought that record that day! That was the start of my love affair with Albert. I wore out the grooves of the vinyl, as i played it so often. I still love the album today, but now can listen too it without the scratches on CD hehe. Albert's version of Sweet Little Lisa on the album is one of my all time favourite tracks. I hope he starts doing it again in his live sets!
My reply:
I like these albums, too, and heard SWEET LITTLE LISA live when they played in Germany some years back. It wasn't on the playlist but our good friend, bass player Georg Grimm joined them to jam a bit, and his wife's name is Lisa. So they played the song for her, it was great and the audience went mad. Georg and the band he's in (Rolling Drunks) will support Albert at the Blues Garage in March so there is hope that they might play the song again ......
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A better-late-than-never review. Came across it when Albert & Hogan's Heroes included the song "Your boys" into their set and got round only now to post it
All Music Guide Review
From: Artist's Direct.
Rating given by the author: 4 1/2 stars.
This reissue is both welcome and irritating. The welcome part is that this brilliant music, by one of those more ubiquitous if under-recognized session guitarists of the 1970s and 1980s, is finally available in a remastered edition on CD, thanks to Australia's Raven label.
Albert Lee's A&M session Hiding was recorded in two different stages. The first was with Lee playing virtually everything but bass and drums with old friends Dave Peacock and Chas Hodges. The second and definitive stage was when he became a touring member of Emmylou Harris' Hot Band, enlisting her then-husband, Brian Ahern, and the entire band (which included Ricky Skaggs, Hank DeVito, Emory Gordy, Rodney Crowell, and Glen D. Hardin) with session cats like Buddy Emmons and Mickey Raphael. The standard issue from Hiding was the tune "Country Boy," which has been covered by a dozen artists since. The sound of the record was close to the bone, full of fiddles, acoustic guitars, mandolins, funky bass and piano lines, and Lee's trademark electric blistering licks. Covers of the Louvins' "Are You Wasting My Time," John Reid's "Now and Then It's Gonna Rain," and three Crowell tunes -- including "Ain't Living Long Like This" -- rounded out the album. While Lee's singing leaves a bit to be desired here, it doesn't detract, either.
But the masterpiece in this set is Lee's self-titled album from 1982. Producer Crowell, who was riding high with productions for Harris, his then-wife Rosanne Cash, and his own album, put together a band and helped Lee choose ten smoking tracks that showcased his abilities not only as a guitarist but as a frontman. The album opens with DeVito's pub rocker "Sweet Little Lisa" (this version is second only to Dave Edmunds' read of it) and slides right into John Hiatt's "Radio Girl" -- a version even better than the original. Lee contributed the slippery cruiser "Your Boys," and Crowell gave him another pair of tunes to balance the equation with one more each by Hiatt and DeVito.
The songs serve to offer a more rock & roll side of Lee. His first love may have been country, but Crowell heard in him what he heard in Nick Lowe and Edmunds, a British rocker whose love for American roots music translated into something entirely new. There isn't a substandard second on the latter album and it continues to be the high point in Lee's catalog as a solo artist. As for the irritating element of this release: why does it take a non-American label to reissue the finest gems from the North American labels that birthed them? Given that both of these records appeared on labels now owned by Universal, there is no excuse that they haven't been issued stateside. Perhaps Universal is so busy putting out its no-brainer, no-passion, mediocre Millennium Collections to notice the treasures in its own vault. It's shameful.
~ Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
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