Long lost Yachts LP finally gets a release in a great CD/LP package.

Release Date: 19th December 2024

Label: 4BE Records

Format: LP / CD

Last year I celebrated my 40th birthday. One of the evenings following it I was reflecting wistfully on my move to London back in 2012 and all the great new music I had discovered at the time and all the great musicians I had managed to see while living there.

PRIESTMAN & GLOVER – THE DEADLY DUO…

One of the favourite venues I used to go to was The Green Note in Camden. Almost every month I would go to a gig there having never listened to the artist previously. One of the best gigs I attended there was Henry Priestman and Les Glover. They proved to be such a hoot musically (and comedic) that I wrote a review for my old writing abode of Louder Than War enthusing about them. This lead me to discover Henry’s career in a backwards manner starting with his solo recordings and then going all the way back to his work with Yachts. Their two albums recorded at the tail end of the seventies were conveniently reissued by Cherry Red in a nice little box set.

Henry moved houses back in 2021 and in the process rediscovered demo tapes Yachts had made for a third album that was never recorded due to them disbanding. After some conversations between former band members and some reassurances from former associates that the quality of the tracks warranted a release, a label was found, old arts designer Malcolm Garrett came into fold and hey presto we now have this wonderful package. All songs were carefully remastered to try to bring the best out of the tapes and the outcome is a rather splendid album that shows that the band could have carried on if the record buying public (and a label) had been more interested.

A MORE THAN ABLE SUCCESSOR

What we have a here is a more than able successor to Yachts and Without Radar. The 17 songs included on this release display the same flair the band ever had for tunes, intricate lyrics and out of the box arrangements. The bouncy I Know penned by guitar player Martin Watson is the perfect opening track and would have been worthy candidate for a single at the time. Break it Up also proves to be a strong song with its gentler couplets contrasting nicely with its anthemic chorus.

The atmospheric Tommy Go Home and the frantic Missing in Action (another great chorus) both highlight Priestman’s talent for a keyboard hook. The stabs of analogue synths and Farfisa are a vital part of Yachts sound and these recordings feature them heavily! The band stay close to the snappy 3 minutes song format on most of the tracks but stretch themselves on Dirty Work. An extended coda channelling a Yardbirds rave-up with a new wave flavour.

BACK TO THE SIXTIES

We are back in sixties nuggets territory with the winning triplet of Four Bright Examples, Count to Three and A Fool Like You, three slices of sixties inspired songcraft.  The Merseybeat pastiche of Mystery To Me proves to be one of the albums highlights while Everyone Trying Too Hard sees the band toward a more XTC-ish territory. Growing Up Young and Still He Lives sees the band move back towards the class of 77 (think The Jam with keyboards). Hey There Goes Another Man closes the release on a high note with some killer work on keyboards by Priestman.

Signed copies (by Henry) of the Yachts boxset, and his solo albums, can be bought from his official website: www.henrypriestman.com.

He’s also on Facebook and Twitter.

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