Neptune Research

Blue Afternoon is one of Tim Buckley’s least highly regarded records. Trite, record-company-appeasing, lightweight kack from an otherwise genius. He had to record Blue Afternoon to fulfill a contract, so he could get on with making the album he wanted to make. That is the story.

(It is also the story of his last two records, Sefronia and Look At The Fool. People tend to accept Sefronia before Fool, but I can’t see it. Look At The Fool is brilliantly offhand where Sefronia is competently, cloyingly produced, if sometimes more digestibly concise in the song construction. “Honeyman,” “Sally Go Round The Roses” and “Stone In Love,” all from Sefronia, are probably more effective songwriting than any one tune on Look At The Fool. But Look At The Fool wins out by miles in terms of mood, feel and funk, even if it is desperate.)

I have also read interviews in which members of Tim’s band referred to Blue Afternoon as the logical follow-up to their previous record, Happy/Sad. Happy/Sad is a loose and stretched-out post-folk passive-fusion set wherein songs with simple but unusual forms are elaborated upon… Slowly.

There are six tunes on Happy/Sad. The first, “Strange Feeling,” is in Miles-ian Kind Of Blue territory, as played by 12-string acoustic guitar, upright bass, mellow electric guitar, congas and vibraphone and Tim’s awe-some voice. Then there’s a quick fake to the left, the almost-a-pop-song “Buzzin’ Fly,” beautiful like autumn sunlight on your windowsill. Then things get REALLY slow, and, with the exception of the frantic and premonitory “Gypsy Woman,” they STAY that way.

You could almost not notice that you were listening to Happy/Sad. You could think, ‘Gee, I should put some music on!’ Then you’d go to the turntable and, whoops, Happy/Sad is playing!

That is not a complaint. Happy/Sad is an amazing record. If you haven’t heard it, you should. I like the vinyl, but whatever you can get will do. I also suggest you play it in late September or early to mid October. Play it in the afternoon. When you are feeling. Very. Relaxed.

Blue Afternoon was Tim Buckley’s next, fourth, album.

Lorca came out at about the same time as Blue Afternoon. The two records can be seen as equally logical motions in diverse directions from Happy/Sad. It has been suggested that the near-simultaneous release (record company bullshit) of two such different discs by the same artist led to the commercial downfall of both.

So. Lorca. Side one consists of two jarringly odd compositions. The first is based mainly around a HUGE, dry, odd-metered organ theme. (Everything on this side of this album is very dry. I am used to such strange music being steeped in reverb to ease it down the auditory throat. No such.) The vocals croon and wail, sometimes at once.

The second tune is equally weird, but shorter.

The tones are not especially jarring in themselves, but the composition and performance are strange. Well done, but alien. Listen to it. You’ll see.

I like this music, but I don’t play it much. It isn’t even one of the sides I pull out to show what a nutball Tim Buckley was. I use Starsailor for that, or parts of Greetings From L.A. or that live one from 1970s radio called Honeyman. Buddy Helm plays drums on Honeyman, which is another good reason to listen to it.

Lorca, side two, consists of two lovely acoustic ballads and a rave-up, “Nobody Walkin,” along the lines of “Gypsy Woman”. A more fully-developed performance of “Nobody Walkin” can be heard on the amazing Live At The Troubador 1969 disc. The ballads are on that album, too. I would suggest Troubador ahead of Lorca, for most people’s sensibilities.

Lorca is remembered as the experimental prequel to Starsailor. Blue Afternoon got the dis. It was not weird enough to be legendary and not really experimental at all, except in its historic relativity to what everyone everyone everyone else was doing then or even now.

Blue Afternoon might be the only session in Buckley’s entire career where he and the band did what they did, and did it well, without exercising their need to document their process of continual forward motion. They just made a good record. The songs are tight and affecting and haunting and pleasant, the instrumentation (same as Happy/Sad but with the addition of a drum kit) is very cool and enveloping. Buckley’s voice is in great shape, always on. Those moments that pepper his every disc where he tries for something great and wild and just misses it? There aren’t any.

He was clearly moving forward, as each record evolved from the last. He didn’t need to show us the exact extent of his reach and limits of his grasp, every time out. It is good to know that an artist is working to extend his or her abilities, but it is also good to hear one working comfortably and effectively within that extended reach.

Every tune on Blue Afternoon is a lost classic. Every one. It starts with “Happy Time,” a jaunty and yet blue-toned (duh - what was the album called again?) song about writing a song. Or about the joy that a song feels when it gets written? Not sure. But it’s great.

Next up is “Chase The Blues Away,” a Lorca-styled ballad also heard on the Live At The Troubador 1969 disc. This is one of my favorite songs. Ever.

Then comes the equally beautiful and somewhat more pained and ethereal “I Must Have Been Blind.” That’s a phrase that feels great to say or to sing, like “I’d rather be blind than to see you go,” can’t remember just where that line comes from but all I mean to say is how can you go wrong with a phrase like “I Must Have Been Blind,” and he doesn’t blow it, the sound just builds and builds and peaks and washes back down into

a song that is called “The River,” a haunting and meditative and somewhat obliquely droning minor epic, like Astral Weeks-ian Van Morrison with a higher, rounder voice and a quite different sense of space, time, and blue tonality.

That is side one.

Side two begins with “So Lonely.” This sounds to me like one of Fred Neil’s totally brilliant throw-away filler tunes, like “It Happens Every Time” or (really) “Everybody’s Talkin’.” “So Lonely” is just a quick, upbeat and lovely little sad song. “So lonely… Mama, you don’t know how.”

Next is “Cafe,” and I honestly don’t offhand remember this one, though I have heard it at least four times this week. Even a quick online glance at the lyric isn’t bringing it back. Hmm… I will have to listen to it again. No problem! Any excuse!

“Blue Melody” is third, another perfect ballad from Troubador 1969.

Blue Afternoon concludes with “The Train,” a chugging (what else?) 7-minute sprawl wherein the raving-but-drowning promise of Happy/Sad’s “Gypsy Woman” and Lorca’s “Nobody Walkin” is entirely and at long last fulfilled. The glory is no longer ragged. It is just. There. Solid and indomitable. You can not argue with “The Train.”

There is not a thing wrong with Blue Afternoon. That, oddly enough, has been the key to its obscure doom. Surrounded by such strange, striking and painfully forward-looking discs as Happy/Sad, Lorca, Starsailor, the pop promise of Buckley’s early career and the bizarre twists of its end…

Blue Afternoon - a polished-but-still-rough, more-skill-than-accident, flashing river’s eddy of a record - didn’t have a chance.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 11:44 am and is filed under Strictly Mythical, Music Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.