Whipping Post (Swi) - So we are 1980

℗ & © 1978 Musik-Projekt / 1980 ORMA-Music -MP 805 / C.B. Busser (solo efforts) Switzerland

www.badcatrecords.com/Whipping Post
 

 

So We Are was Whipping Post (presumably named for the Allmans song)'s second album, after their eponymous debut, and, unsurprisingly, has quite a blues influence running through it. In fact, I'd go as far as to call it a late-period blues/prog album, a style that fell out of favour in the UK in the early '70s. It's not a bad record, but lacks anything to make it particularly stand out, apart, of course, from its Mellotron work. C.B. Busser goes absolutely hell-for-leather with the thing; in fact, I can't detect any other keys on the album, which rescue it somewhat from blues/rock anonymity.
Freedom In Me sounds like nothing less than a prog version of Neil Young's incomparable Like A Hurricane, with 'Tron strings replacing the original's Stringman; Christ, they even use the same guitar tricks! Saturday'n Sunday has some distant choirs, more strings on Preball, brass on Your Love, then back to the choirs for the title track and Gimme A Shine. Strings on Gonna Be Wild, finishing with choirs again on Pioneers, making for a ridiculously Mellotron-heavy record, although little of the use is that outstanding. If you want to hear OTT 'Tron laid over blues/rock, though, this is going to become your favourite album.

Band members:
Christoph Beck - drums, percussion
C.B. Busser - vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, percussion
Chico Klee - sax, flute, woodwinds, keyboards, percussion
Vogi Vogtle - bass