(((O))) Review: Peter Hammill – The Charisma & Virgin Recordings: 1971-1986

Among its champions ranging from Stephen Morris, John Lydon, Bruce Dickinson, Mark E. Smith, The Mars Volta, Marc Almond, Julian Cope, and of course the late, great David Bowie, Peter Hammill is a true singer-songwriter in the progressive genre when it comes to his arranging and composition. Since he founded Van der Graaf Generator nearly 59 years ago, they were the band that it was okay for the punks to dig. There are some naysayers, which is quite true. His voice may not be everyone’s cup of tea per se, but you can’t deny the quintessential lyrical boundaries he brings to the table.

That and this 18-CD / 2 Blu-Ray box set which consists of his solo work ranging from his time from Tony Stratton Smith’s Charisma label to Richard Branson’s Virgin label from 1971 to 1986. Starting with 1971’s Fool’s Mate towards 1986’s And Close as This, it’s a semi-sequel to where the Van der Graaf 2021 box set had left off.

Not only that, but it contains sessions he did with John Peel, a live recording at the All Souls Unitarian Church in Kansas City on February 16th, 1978, and a rare live recording at the Montreal University Sports Centre on April 21st, 1974 where he opened for Genesis during the Selling England by the Pound tour (known as The Black Show which was named for its dark, elaborate stage production using black drapes, costumes, and creating that shadowy-like effect.) where Peter Gabriel introduced him to Quebec audiences in French.

Not to mention two new stereo mixes done by Stephen W. Tayler which contains; pH7 and The Future Now. Tayler is no stranger to remixing classics, he had done the VDGG albums (Pawn Hearts, Still Life, H to He, World Record, and Godbluff), Camel, Be-Bop Deluxe, Renaissance, and Hawkwind. For him to step back into the world of Hammill’s lyrical world, it was like re-visiting an old friend he hadn’t seen for a very long time.

They are an enrichment from the 2006 remasters that was put out nearly 20 years ago, and he takes listeners into the deeper caverns and witness the foot-stompin Bowie-like approach which speaks of the Hunky Dory period by ‘Pushing Thirty’ as he brings the Nadir character with a double-tracked vocal line in Peter’s arrangements. But its ‘The Second Hand’ where the electronic drums, bass, and David Jackson’s sax rumbles through the passageway.

When I think of the ‘Energy Vampires’ I think of the time of Peter returning back to The Silent Corner-era, continuing where he left off with ‘Modern’. But adding in that free-jazz sax David handles in the styles of Captain Beefheart during his Trout Mask Replica years. I could tell maybe that David and Peter were admirers of Beefheart’s music and the challenges he brought to the table with his complexion.

It can be uncomfortable at times, but Hammill’s vocals with his Manchester background, can strike daggers at you in a nano second. Listening to Tayler’s mix on ‘Careering’ from pH7, you can tell he and Lydon were taking notes with each other between his solo career and John’s approach with Public Image Ltd. Listen to ‘Chant’ from the Metal Box album and you can tell that Hammill was appreciated in the punk community with his avant-punk, dubbing approach.

Not to mention John Foxx’s approach during his time with Ultravox and soon his 1980 solo debut, Metamatic. pH7 is the ultimate post-punk album that Hammill unleashed in this time frame in the Spring of ’79, and the last album to be on the Charisma label. And with the blast of Jackson’s solo on ‘Porter Down’ it becomes this Hawkwind-like attack that send shivers down your spine.

You are thrown inside the mind of a mental institute where the maniacs and crazy people are getting ready to take over the loony bin, thinking at any second they’ll be free from the chaos they’ve endured and rule the city with an iron fist. Peter brings it down to the forefront, and he doesn’t shy away from it, he nails down to a T.

He brings to mind at times the sound of Captain Beefheart where he brought the essence of free jazz, proto-punk, and avant-rock between Trout Mask Replica, Safe as Milk, Ice Cream for Crow,and The Spotlight Kid. But for Peter, he is like a twisted storyteller that is going to haunt your life, for a very long time in this box set.

Starting with Fool’s Mate, which is a reference between chess and tarot, he used the songs to record compositions that were shorter and straight than the Van der Graaf sound from what he was known for.

From the Italian-like dance for the ‘Candle’ to burn, grabbing your bags for the joy ride that’s about to occur on the opening track with ‘Imperial Zeppelin’, the darker forests inside your ‘Solitude’ featuring Lindisfarne’s Ray Jackson’s harmonica will send shivers down your spine as Peter brings his dalek-like voice for a brief moment. Robert Fripp always lends Hammill a helping hand whenever it comes to the Van der Graaf sound and on Fool’s Mate in his nod to the Small Faces, The Kinks, and T. Rex with ‘Sunshine’.

But then it gets even darker between his next three albums; Chameleon in the Shadow of the Night, The Silent Corner and the Empty Stage, and In Camera where he
returns to the Van der Graaf sound. If you think this is all aerie faerie nonsense, you’re in the wrong leagues here, my friend.

The hypnotic wonder of ‘(In The) Black Room (Including ‘The Tower’)’, the insanity turned nervous breakdown with mellotrons spinning back and forth in the midsection behind ‘Modern’, going into his Bowie-sque arrangements for that good ol ‘Rock and Role’, Spirit’s Randy California lending Hammill a helping hand behind the ‘Red Shift’ that’s coming across the horizon, and the imaginative horror movie inside your head on the 12-minute epic ‘A Louse is Not a Home’.

When you get to In Camera, which would later be championed by The Book of Seth from Julian Cope’s Head Heritage’s website, which he considers it to be a “highly engaging album of sheer fuck intensity”. Can’t go wrong with that, can’t go wrong with that. It is a sheer fuck intensity in which Peter delves into the punch with a challenging confession on the brink of collapse.

From the pounding punch of ‘Tapeworm’, the gothic mellotrons in an Edgar Allen Poe twist on ‘Faint-Heart and the Sermon’, and the dark acoustics for ‘The Comet, The Course, the Tail’, and the one-man opera by using the ARP synthesiser as it pays tribute to Oscar Wilde’s story of the Picture of Dorian Gray on ‘(No More) The Sub Mariner’. But nothing will get you prepared for the last two tracks in which Chris Judge Smith lends Hammill a helping hand between the gods beaming down on him as he screams “WILL YOU NOT RUN FROM THIS AND LOVE ME FOR ONE MORE LIFE?!”

Guy Evans is pounding the shit out of those drums like a motherfucker as Hammill is going nuts on the reed organ to create this massive earthquake and causing havoc with feedback as it segues into the 10-minute epic ‘Magog (in Bromine Chambers).’ I can vision Peter was listening to the Berlin School of Music tackling the sounds from Cluster, Stockhausen, CAN’s Tago Mago, Faust, and the Zeit-era of Tangerine Dream to capture the terror that’s about to unfold.

Something that completely caught me by surprise on disc four, with a rare live recording of Peter performing at the Montreal University Sports Centre where he opened for Genesis during their Selling England by the Pound tour on April 21st, 1974. This live recording has been bootlegged and was originally broadcasted live on CHOM-FM.

After being introduced by Peter Gabriel speaking to the audience in French, you can feel an unease with the audience as Hammill plays his acoustic guitar and the piano doing six compositions, one of which is Judge Smith’s ‘Time for a Change’ which would later be on his eighth solo album pH7 in 1979. Back to the venue, you can feel an unease with audiences in this recording because after each song, some were cheering, some were booing which is heard after ‘Out of my Book’ because they wanted the main event which was Genesis.

My take is that they just weren’t ready for him. He was so ahead of his time and to hear his voice, can take a mixed opinion. Whether you get it or you don’t, you have to appreciate the bravery it took for him to open for his fellow comrades in Montreal. What was lacking something, it was without his bandmates from Van der Graaf Generator. But it takes courage to do something like this.

But on discs nine and ten, we have the almost complete live performance at The All Souls Unitarian Church recorded on February 16th, 1978 in Kansas City, Missouri. It was originally released as a 2-CD set called Skeletons of Songs back in 1991. It’s just him playing guitar and piano at the venue where audiences approve his compositions between his solo work and with VDGG.

From the nightmarish medley between ‘A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers’ and ‘The Sleepwalkers’, to a sombering, mournful take of ‘Still Life’ and ‘Easy to Slip Away’ to a Kurt Weill-like approach which speaks of The Threepenny Opera in a maddening capitalist world between ‘The Lie’, ‘This Side of the Looking Glass’ and the darkening waltz behind ‘In The End’, you can feel a chill inside the church as each of the compositions sends shivers down your spine.

Once we get into his alter ego of Rikki Nadir, which was where I first became aware of Peter, thanks to the MOJO compilation The Roots of the Sex Pistols 20 years ago, Hammill puts on his punk-like outfit when he gets down and dirty on the title-track ‘Nadir’s Big Chance’. Even John Lydon who would play two tracks on Tommy Vance’s radio show back in 1977 described “Peter Hammill’s great. A true original. I’ve just liked him for years. If you listen to him, his solo albums, I’m damn sure Bowie copied a lot out of that geezer”.

Not to mention a picture of him in attendance at the Marquee club on January 16th, 1978 seeing the band perform for the last time when they were recording the live album, Vital. As we get into the 1980s at the peak of the New Wave movement from A Black Box, Sitting Targets, The Love Songs, Skin to And Close as This, it was proving that he can march forward to delve into deeper emotions which is revealed on ‘Just Good Friends’, and into a raunchy electro-punk attitude nearly bringing his Nadir character back to life at the ‘Central Hotel’ with a Who-like approach, and into this medieval Genesis nod to the Duke years as he starts ‘Painting by Numbers’.

More detailed and more ideas flowing in, this box set brings in a continuation of the fearlessness and dauntless to come towards listeners who might be new to both Van der Graaf Generator’s music or Peter’s work. Yes, it may take time, yes, it may take repeatable listens, but we have to embrace the challenge that awaits us for Rikki Nadir’s chance to return with vengeance.