Poco - Indian Summer/Legend
BGO Records BGOCD1128
I’ve been a ‘Poco-nut’ since 1969. That was the year the California-based band released PICKIN’ UP THE PIECES, their debut album. I’ve followed the band ever since, through 45 years of ups-and-downs, near misses, personnel changes and everything else in-between. So I apologise from the start if this review comes across as slightly biased, but surely we are all allowed our little personal indulgences. This is a pair of albums from the late 1970s, the first, something of a commercial failure, the second, possibly their most successful. Both worthy of your time and money if you are in any way hooked into country-rock or the edgier strains of mainstream country music.
Pioneers of the country-rock sound that soared out of California in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Poco was founded by Richie Furay, Jim Messina, and Rusty Young, a trio whose lifetime musical journey began while working on the Buffalo Springfield’s final album, THE LAST TIME AROUND. With the addition of George Grantham and Randy Meisner, the initial Poco line-up was set. Over the next few years the band went through several personnel changes including the addition of Timothy B. Schmit and Paul Cotton along with the departure of Jim Messina and Richie Furay, as well as when bassist Randy Meisner and later Timothy B. Schmit left to join The Eagles. Despite this, the band has hung in there, directed and driven by Rusty Young, a multi-instrumentalist, underrated vocalist, songwriter and possibly country-rock’s finest steel guitarist.
INDIAN SUMMER was Poco’s 12th album and was originally released in 1977. It was the band's last studio album before both Timothy B. Schmit and George Grantham left the group. An often over-looked album, to my ears this album was and remains a top quality Poco set with high-energy tracks like Twenty Years and Living In The Band sitting comfortably alongside the softer Me And You sung by Schmit and the acoustic-based title song featuring Paul Cotton on lead vocals. The album’s highlight, though, is the almost ten-minute four-part The Dance, conceived by Rusty Young and featuring alternative lead vocals by Schmit, Grantham and Cotton. It’s a magical swirl of music that is the very epitome of what Poco was all about in the 1970s. Though some have criticised it for being ‘clumsy and over-long,’ I loved it in 1977 and still do today … maybe even more so.
With the departure of Schmit to join the Eagles, ABC Records cancelled the release of Poco’s planned 13th album THE LAST ROUNDUP. George Grantham decided to take a break from touring, which left just Rusty Young and Paul Cotton to carry on. They recruited drummer Steve Chapman and bass player Charlie Harrison to create a new group called the Cotton-Young Band and recorded LEGEND as a duo. However, ABC acquired the album and then decided to continue to use the name ‘Poco’ for the band. It turned out to be a wise decision. Helped in no small way by the takeover of ABC Records by MCA, the promotion staff at ABC put all their efforts behind LEGEND in an effort to prove themselves to their new bosses. The result was Poco scoring their first ever American top 20 pop hits with Crazy Love and Heart Of The Night turning LEGEND into their first gold album.
The record did mark a slight change of musical direction away from the country-inflected sound into a more soulful, soft rock style typical of the late 1970s. Despite this, the songs, penned either by Young or Cotton—surprisingly none were collaborations—were really good with the Poco trademark harmonies still very much to the fore. The basic band was augmented at times by Jai Winding and Tom Stephenson on keyboards, Phil Kenzie’s saxophone and Michael Boddicker’s synthesiser with Rusty Young’s pedal steel often relegated to the back of the mix. Throughout, their vocal harmonies are strained but soulful and heard at their finest on Heart Of The Night and The Last Goodbye. But don’t just sit there reading this, if you have yet to discover the timeless magic of Poco, waste not a minute more, go out and get a hold of this 2on1 album set. I guarantee that you will not be disappointed.
www.bgo-records.com
I’ve been a ‘Poco-nut’ since 1969. That was the year the California-based band released PICKIN’ UP THE PIECES, their debut album. I’ve followed the band ever since, through 45 years of ups-and-downs, near misses, personnel changes and everything else in-between. So I apologise from the start if this review comes across as slightly biased, but surely we are all allowed our little personal indulgences. This is a pair of albums from the late 1970s, the first, something of a commercial failure, the second, possibly their most successful. Both worthy of your time and money if you are in any way hooked into country-rock or the edgier strains of mainstream country music.Pioneers of the country-rock sound that soared out of California in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Poco was founded by Richie Furay, Jim Messina, and Rusty Young, a trio whose lifetime musical journey began while working on the Buffalo Springfield’s final album, THE LAST TIME AROUND. With the addition of George Grantham and Randy Meisner, the initial Poco line-up was set. Over the next few years the band went through several personnel changes including the addition of Timothy B. Schmit and Paul Cotton along with the departure of Jim Messina and Richie Furay, as well as when bassist Randy Meisner and later Timothy B. Schmit left to join The Eagles. Despite this, the band has hung in there, directed and driven by Rusty Young, a multi-instrumentalist, underrated vocalist, songwriter and possibly country-rock’s finest steel guitarist.
INDIAN SUMMER was Poco’s 12th album and was originally released in 1977. It was the band's last studio album before both Timothy B. Schmit and George Grantham left the group. An often over-looked album, to my ears this album was and remains a top quality Poco set with high-energy tracks like Twenty Years and Living In The Band sitting comfortably alongside the softer Me And You sung by Schmit and the acoustic-based title song featuring Paul Cotton on lead vocals. The album’s highlight, though, is the almost ten-minute four-part The Dance, conceived by Rusty Young and featuring alternative lead vocals by Schmit, Grantham and Cotton. It’s a magical swirl of music that is the very epitome of what Poco was all about in the 1970s. Though some have criticised it for being ‘clumsy and over-long,’ I loved it in 1977 and still do today … maybe even more so.
With the departure of Schmit to join the Eagles, ABC Records cancelled the release of Poco’s planned 13th album THE LAST ROUNDUP. George Grantham decided to take a break from touring, which left just Rusty Young and Paul Cotton to carry on. They recruited drummer Steve Chapman and bass player Charlie Harrison to create a new group called the Cotton-Young Band and recorded LEGEND as a duo. However, ABC acquired the album and then decided to continue to use the name ‘Poco’ for the band. It turned out to be a wise decision. Helped in no small way by the takeover of ABC Records by MCA, the promotion staff at ABC put all their efforts behind LEGEND in an effort to prove themselves to their new bosses. The result was Poco scoring their first ever American top 20 pop hits with Crazy Love and Heart Of The Night turning LEGEND into their first gold album.
The record did mark a slight change of musical direction away from the country-inflected sound into a more soulful, soft rock style typical of the late 1970s. Despite this, the songs, penned either by Young or Cotton—surprisingly none were collaborations—were really good with the Poco trademark harmonies still very much to the fore. The basic band was augmented at times by Jai Winding and Tom Stephenson on keyboards, Phil Kenzie’s saxophone and Michael Boddicker’s synthesiser with Rusty Young’s pedal steel often relegated to the back of the mix. Throughout, their vocal harmonies are strained but soulful and heard at their finest on Heart Of The Night and The Last Goodbye. But don’t just sit there reading this, if you have yet to discover the timeless magic of Poco, waste not a minute more, go out and get a hold of this 2on1 album set. I guarantee that you will not be disappointed.
www.bgo-records.com