Van der Graaf Generator: Pawn Hearts (1971) by:
It’s really interesting to hear how Van der Graaf Generator progressed over four albums from the folky psychedelic proto-progressive sound of The Aerosol Grey Machine (1969) right up to the far more aggressive and hard-edge sounds of Pawn Hearts, their fourth album released late in 1971. Pawn Hearts is regarded by many as their high point, and I have no argument about that. Bassist Nic Potter was gone for good, so obviously, the bass is not as emphasized. This left the band with Peter Hammill, David Jackson, Guy Evans, and Hugh Banton. King Crimson’s Robert Fripp also makes a guest here.
The album opens with “Lemmings”, an incredible epic cut that shows just how aggressive VdGG had became up to that point. The lyrics seem to be about how people act like “lemmings” and how that behavior can be self-destructive. In fact a lot of Hammill’s lyrics tended to address social problems, or they simply had apocalyptic overtones (like “After the Flood” off 1970’s The Least We Can Do is Wave to Each Other). I especially dig the spacey organ near the end.
The next cut is “Man-Erg” which is a bit more mellow, but even here, there are some rather aggressive passages. Check out the sax work of David Jackson. Jackson often had a habit of playing more than one sax at the same time (he wasn’t the only one doing it, Roland Kirk was the first to do it, and Colosseum’s Dick Heckstall-Smith was also known to do that as well, and if you’re well informed on the Italian prog scene, so did Osanna’s Elio D’anna).
The last cut, “A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers” is the VdGG sound to the extreme. It’s a side-length epic and it’s just plane bizarre. There are some mellow parts, and there are some really dissonant parts, and some of it simply sounds insane. Synthesizer and even a little Mellotron happens to be used here, two keyboards that were not used very often on any VdGG album. And if any of you have owned the LP and got the CD and wonder why the killer instrumental “Theme One” is not included, here’s the reason why: that song was never included on the original British LP. That song was released only as a single over there in 1972. It was only the American LP that featured “Theme One”.
After Pawn Hearts, the band broke up, leaving Peter Hammill to release a handful of solo albums until 1975 when the band reunited and gave us albums like Godbluff (1975), Still Life (1976) and World Record (1976). 1977’s The Quiet Zone/The Pleasure Dome was actually recorded when the band shortened its name to Van der Graaf because of a change in the lineup and the legality of the Van der Graaf Generator name was in question. Regardless, Pawn Hearts, as well as H to He Who Am The Only One, are two excellent and essential prog rock albums you should own.