Here’s a little piece of Crim history that nobody knew existed until Mr. Stormy took a deep breath and dived in.
First we had Gordon Haskell singing it on In The Wake Of Poseidon. Then in 1991 Adrian Belew dropped by to give his sensitive interpretation of this fetching ballad in the Frame By Frame box set remix. And that was it as far we knew.
During my research for the Crimbiog, the common consensus from talking to all of the players involved was that Cadence and Cascade had not been attempted by the time Greg moved on to ELP. Well, it turns out we were all wrong.
It now seems likely that this was recorded in those early sessions for Poseidon, probably at the same time the team recorded Cat Food.
Greg’s singing is a touch tentative and it seems they were probably guide vocals only with the intention of coming back to it at a later session. Though it sounds a straight forward enough song, Greg wasn’t the only one who had problems with it. It’s interesting to note that the “finished” version on Poseidon by Gordon was actually recorded a semi-tone lower and sped up to the correct pitch.
There’s no flute solo here because of course Mel Collins hadn’t yet been recruited to the band and Robert’s celeste overdubs would be added much later in the recording sessions at Wessex.
The careful listener will note that although the Giles Brother’s parts appear to be the same there are some significant differences in the guitar parts and Tippett’s piano near the end. Thus it seems likely that the backing tracks for Gordon Haskell’s rendition (which are the same as the Belew remix from 1991) were a remake recorded near the completion of the Poseidon sessions.
It’s likely that this version, taken from a quarter inch reel to reel, was run off as a listening / reference copy for Fripp at the time. Forgotten about for nearly 37 years, it’s good to have this intriguing little gem made available.
This track is now available for download as part of a bumper collection of Mr Stormy's Monday Selections - his first year of random romps through the murky, cavernous DGM archives, torch in hand, fedora upon his head.
