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Album Details

• Artist: Hawkwind
• Album: Weird Tapes 2 - Hawkwind Live And Hawklords Studio
• Label: Weird
• Year of Release: 1980
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: gwhill on 2013-02-27

In terms of number of albums released, Hawkwind is arguably the most prolific rock band in history. I once read a listing of all Hawkwind releases from the early 1990s and the number was somewhere over 80. It is by multiple releases of old material, such as this, that the number is so high. This disc, one of a series, contains previously unreleased material. The CD was produced by Dave Brock himself, so those two elements add a definite air of quality separating the disc from a lot of compilations.

Since the material on this disc is from two different years (all but the last three are from a 1978 concert, and the remainder were originally recorded in the studio a year later), the lineups on the songs do vary a bit. The lineup on the first set is Bob Calvert, Dave Brock, Simon King and Simon House. The last three tracks are performed by Dave Brock, Steve Swindells, Harvey Bainbridge and Simon King. Fortunately there are no duplicates amongst the bunch and it covers some more classic Hawkwind material, like “Quark Strangeness and Charm,” “Master of the Universe” and “Spirit of the Age” in the live performances. The sound quality and performances are both great. Perhaps the biggest draw for this, though, is the studio tracks.

“Valium 10” begins with a voice only segment. “I don’t want you to panic, just sit back and relax.” As we hear the sounds of a drill and a blocked mouth making painful sounds, a slight cringe hits at the realization that this is a dentist speaking. The actual song begins with a classic Hawk jam that really feels like the hypnotic sorts of jams that were a big part of the early sound of the band. This one has a great groove and lots of trademark Hawk whooshing keys overlaid. A great keyboard groove emerges and dominates for a time. Droning bass begins “Douglas in the Jungle,” and as distorted guitar joins, the two form the quirky and chaotic back drop on which the song is built. This makes for a rather freaky sort of Hawkjam. It is quite a weird, but rather fun number. A great hypnotic jam with some killer keyboard work makes up the early parts of “Time Of...” It starts to move toward chaos for a time, but still retains its groove. The keys get just a bit Emersonish (in his effects dominated style). Next, the cut starts speeding up, getting harder in texture, and this instrumental eventually fades out from there.

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