Medicine Head - One & One Is One (1973) [Vinyl]

Review by Dave Thompson

Riding on the back of two successive U.K. hit singles, the jerkily insistent "Rising Sun" and the quietly lazy "One and One Is One," Medicine Head's fourth album captures the duo expanding and electrifying with maniacal zeal. Without sacrificing the understated joys which were Medicine Head's traditional calling cards, One and One Is One is littered with unexpected flourishes and accents, bass and keyboards (courtesy of producer Tony Asheton) underpinning the sparseness with a warm, subtle flair: the traffic sounds which wrap up the opening "Out on the Street," the slinky bassline bleeding through "Another Lay," the jabbing guitar and squelching organ which propel "Rising Sun." Of course it's business as usual around these highlights. The skiffle/jug jollity of "How Does It Feel" could have slipped on or off any past Medicine Head album, while the gentle acoustics of "Morning Light" and "Instant Karma Kid" are potent reminders of Fiddler's songwriting genius at its most naked. But if Medicine Head once hid their lights beneath a bushel of eclectic solitude, One and One Is One is the sound of them inching into a wider world -- and a weirder one. The closing "All the Fallen Teenangels" is archetypal Medicine Head. But it also has a reggae beat. And if that doesn't leave you feeling absolutely dislocated, nothing will.