Album title: H to He Who Am the Only One
Artist: Van der Graaf Generator
Nationality: English
Label: Charisma
Chronology: Third
Grade: A
Landmark value:
Tracklisting: Killer/House With No Door/The Emperor in His War Room (a) The Emperor (b) The Room /Lost (a) The Dance in Sand and Sea (b) The Dance in Frost/ Pioneers over c
Comments: I’ve always wondered about the title to this album, which is very weird indeed. I think I read somewhere that the “H” refers to hydrogen and the “He” to helium, and it’s some sort of description of the chemical change in a reaction or something, but I can’t recall where I read that, or even if I dreamed it. The album kicks off with “Killer”, the tale of how lonely it can be to be a shark, and it’s got a very hard rock feel, reminds me of very early Sabbath or Purple, with a riff that’s very familiar but which I can’t pin down. It’s a good song, and became a favourite in live settings, indeed it’s on the first VDGG album I ever bought, which was a collection of their greatest hits (though calling them that might be overstating the case ever so slightly, as they were never a band to trouble the charts). It’s quite a dark song, with thankfully the minimum of screeching horn, and Hammill is on form as ever, crowing maniacally in his desperate isolation at the bottom of the sea.
Oddly enough, I read that this was composed specifically so that the band would have a commercial song they could put on the album, yet when the label approached them to release it as a single they refused, considering it not proggy enough and therefore not representative of them as a band. In the event, it was the only choice and so no singles were taken from the album. The shortest track on the disc, just over six and a half minutes long, “House With No Door”, sounds to me like it would have been a better selection for a single, but it wasn’t considered. Hammill dials it way down here, the song mostly driven on his piano with some very soft and gentle flute, and I’d have to say so far this album is to me a huge improvement on the last one.
“The Emperor in His War Room” is a mini-suite, one of two on the album, the first part at least of which allow Hammill to unleash his bitter, acerbic side, but also includes a really nice vocal chorus and attendant flute. This time it’s Hammond that mostly takes the tune, another slow song though not in any way a ballad, speeding up and getting tougher in the second part, bringing in the by-now-familiar snarling saxes which seem to be VDGG’s trademark. Also some fine guitar, as ever, from guesting Robert Fripp. Very much a carnival, calliope feel to “Lost”, Hammill’s voice in almost nursery-rhyme style following the melody before breaking down into a lament attended by darker sax, and though this is an eleven-minute song it’s not a suite. But it certainly goes through some changes. For a song of its length it goes by pretty quickly, which I always find a good sign. Weirdly frenetic ending which fades out. Hmm. No complaints though.
That leaves, believe it or not, the longest track to close, and “Pioneers Over c” opens with what sounds like an early synth effect, and tackles - not for the first time, but among the first - the idea of science fiction in music, particularly faster than light travel. It has some strong sax work, unsurprising as it was written between Hammill and the band’s horn player David Jackson. Sort of a churchy choral section in it too, nice soft Hammond work, some of the sax is a little too jumpy for me, and I’d have preferred a better closer but still not bad.
Favourite track(s): Pretty much everything, despite some small caveats above
Least favourite track(s):
Overall impression: A big improvement over
The Least We Can Do Is Wave To Each Other; this is an album I could listen to all the way through. Odd that it was so commercially unsuccessful, though there are to be fair some very long tracks on it. Good stuff though.
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