Jeremy Spencer - Jeremy Spencer and The Children (Reissue) (1972/2007)

This 1972 release by ex-Fleetwood Mac guitarist Jeremy Spencer with his religious group the Children is as consistently good as the work by other members of that venerable band: Danny Kirwan's 1979 effort Hello There Big Boy, Christine McVie's 1969 recordings re-released in 1976 as The Legendary Christine Perfect Album, Bob Welch's Man Overboard from 1980, and In the Skies by Peter Green. These enormous talents should have somehow been able to shuffle a new combination/working relationship, or subbed with the real deal when Mick Fleetwood put a tour together sans Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, and McVie; listening to these amazing discs it becomes clear that the public needed the trademark in order to hear what's in these grooves -- none of these albums garnering success on the same level as Fleetwood Mac. The album that may have suffered the worst fate is Jeremy Spencer & the Children -- this elegant "psychedelic Christian music," which in itself is a paradox. Phil Ham and Spencer's guitar playing is superb, the instruments singing with melodies and fragrances that are at some points breathtaking. The record works better than the band live, containing power that didn't translate well in the downstairs of Boston's Kenmore Club in the early '70s. It shimmers from the vinyl decades later, "Beauty for Ashes" a sweeping and precise essay with folk guitars embellished by the electric guitarists' immaculate leads. Did the religious overtones stunt the potential popularity, or was the presentation a little too "out there" for the record-buying public to grasp? The cover has a figure of death surrounded by material goods: television, guitar, amplifer, a swank car, tons of "things." This is so much like a Jefferson Airplane doppelgänger that it is frightening -- or amazing. Ham adds lead guitar, flute, and sitar, while it is Spencer on slide guitar, piano, and vocals. "War Horse" is powerful: "Another young man dead/But who gives a damn/Those generals on Wall Street/Got control of our land." Paul Kantner must have approved of this big-time, the song sounding like latter-day Airplane musically veering off into Jethro Tull territory. The album is a combination of British and American styles, but its psychedelic/folk leanings are the dominant sound, with remarkable harmonies and a pristine production, as well-crafted as it was badly marketed. It is an impressive work, and possibly the most forgotten solo recording from a member of Fleetwood Mac.