This album consists entirely of BBC studio sessions, all from "Top of the Pops" shows. But I also came across two BBC concerts he did. So I've made this "Volume 1." The concerts will make up the other two volumes.
Gilbert O'Sullivan moved to London in 1967 to pursue a music career. For a few years he was unsuccessful. But he had a surprise Top Ten hit in Britain in 1970 with the song "Nothing Rhymed." (It's unfortunate that I couldn't find a BBC studio session version of that song to include here, but there are versions on both of the BBC concerts I plan on posting.) He went on to have 13 Top Forty hits in Britain over the next ten years, including two Number One songs. He didn't do as well in the U.S., but he did have three big hits there too: "Alone Again (Naturally)," "Clair," and "Get Down." It helped that he understood the importance of branding. He changed his name from Raymond Sullivan to Gilbert O'Sullivan to play off people's memories of the Gilbert and Sullivan songwriting team. He also stuck with several distinctive looks, the first and best known being what Wikipedia called a "Depression-era street urchin" look.
Luckily for us, O'Sullivan's era of greatest popularity was about 1971 to 1973. That's lucky because the "Top of the Pops" radio show mostly transitioned from unique in-the-studio performances to simply playing the recorded versions in the early 1970s, but this album contains the vast majority of his big hits.
Here's his Wikipedia entry:
Gilbert O'Sullivan - Wikipedia
I must say I'm rather surprised there hasn't been an official BBC album of this stuff, or even just including some of them as bonus tracks or on archival releases or the like. As I mentioned above, the sound quality here is excellent for all the songs. The only snag was the usual problem of BBC DJ Brian Matthew talking over the beginnings and ends of songs. That's why so many song titles have "[Edit]" in them. As usual, I wiped the DJ talking while keeping the music using the UVR5 program. It seems someone must have told Matthew to cut it out around 1972, since the last ten songs are free of that problem.
This album is an hour and two minutes long.
01 Doing the Best I Can [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
02 Underneath the Blanket Go [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
03 Everybody Knows [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
04 Thunder and Lightning [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
05 Matrimony [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
06 Permissive Twit [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
07 We Will [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
08 Susan van Heusen [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
09 Too Much Attention [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
10 Who Was It [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
11 No Matter How I Try [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
12 If I Don't Get You Back Again [Edit] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
13 Alone Again [Naturally] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
14 Save It (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
15 Bye Bye (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
16 Came to See Me Yesterday [In the Merry Month Of] (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
17 Ooh Wakka Doo Wakka Day (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
18 But I'm Not (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
19 Clair (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
20 I Hope You'll Stay (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
21 Out of the Question (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
22 Get Down (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
https://pixeldrain.com/u/Pj1J2vXu
alternate:
https://bestfile.io/en/fKK0vMPyzsO8uzw/file
I don't know anything about the cover photo except that it's from 1971 or 1972, when O'Sullivan was still sporting his 1930s look.
Like you, I only know the hits, but I'm looking forward to learning more about his music. Thanks so much, G.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up in the ukay in the early seventies was an eye-and-ear opening experience, to say the least: in once corner was the glam and glitter of Bowie, Bolan, Roxy Music, Sweet, Mud etc; in another, the hairy, heavy heated atmosphere of bands like Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Hawkwind, Family, Free etc, all of whom had chart hits aplenty; across the room, 'serious' singer-songwriters like G O'S, Leo Sayer, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Melanie, America; and as usual the cheesy made-for-the-charts teenybop and MOR music, not to mention all the stuff designed to get parents buying records too. It was a wonderful, exhilarating, bewildering period for a 14yo lad like me. My catholic tastes were forged & tempered in that white-hot period from 68-75. And then along came punk. Phew!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I can imagine it was a weird time. The US basically skipped glam, and went light on the teenybopper stuff. I've been listening to a lot of the Top of the Pops shows from the time lately, and DJ Brian Matthew mixes it all up together and praises it all equally, which is extra weird. By the way, I'm sharing those Top of the Pops shows as I get them via SoulseekQT. Just search my account (albumsthatshouldexist) for Top of the Pops transcriptions.
DeleteIt was a bit incongruous, listening to all these plummy, Queen's English voices declaiming over the top of music they obviously weren't 'hip' to. What i found odd, too - though it has worked to our advantage, historically - is that, because of BBC regulations it was cheaper to get bands in to do sessions than it was to play the records themselves, which is why we now have this amazing resource of old live and session music.
DeleteYeah, that's what annoys me so much about DJ Brian Matthew, that he was so clearly faking being hip. I just looked it up, and he started his DJ career way back in 1948. So he was from a different generation, pretending to be hip to what the kids of the 1960s and 70s were into. Ugh. The difference between him and John Peel, who actually was hip and 11 years younger (though also with a "plummy, Queen's English voice!"), was like day and night.
Delete