Love "Out Here"

Arthur Lee goes country. Arthur Lee goes folk. Arthur Lee goes heavy rock. Nice playing over genteel songs, if this was put together by a group of college age kids any time over the last 25 years or so it would probably sound pretty good. Even now, it is a tolerable listen.

However, it was written by the man most responsible for one of the greatest lps of all time. After recording the "Forever Changes" masterpiece, Arthur Lee broke up his group and a couple of years later put together a new line up that recorded three lps worth of material released as this double album plus a single lp ("Four Sail"). Gone are the baroque writing and arrangements of the earlier lp. Lee attempts nothing as ambitious. Perhaps having released an lp that is nearly as good as "Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band" Lee felt he should go back to producing more basic material or perhaps he did not want to repeat himself. The overall impact is that this record pales in comparison with its extraordinary predecessor.

The weirdest moment on the record is when the pretty little tune of "Doggone" gives way to a 10 minute drum solo. Although it is a good and enjoyable solo, it does not fit in with the rest of the song. Usually groups use their more dynamic material for punctuation by a drum solo rather than a featherlight piece of tenderness, and there is some heavier style material on this record which could have stood in for this. For instance, another song on the album features a 10 minute guitar solo and they could well have stuck the drum solo in this. This highlights part of the problem with the album - it all feels a bit random. Epic 12 minute guitar pieces could form a dramatic finale to a set of coherent songs. But here it just occurs in the middle of side three surrounded by OK but not great supporting material.

Timing is everything, after all. If Arthur Lee had recorded this on the way to making "Forever Changes" it would be a fascinating example of his desire to experiment and create unique and inspiring music. Recording it after his masterpiece means it only serves as an example of how his talent could not sustain itself, and of it being too diverse and too ambitious. Perhaps if he had been given a group of musicians able to keep up with the sounds in his head he could have kept making extraordinary music. Or perhaps if he could have kept his sparring partner Bryan MacLean in the group inspiring him to produce more challenging and innovative material - Lee seems someone for whom writing quirky pop comes too easily. Perhaps he needed to be pushed to achieve greatness.

 

The songs on the album mine furrows such as blues, country, folk and more usual rock and pop. A couple are exceptional - "Listen to my Song" and "Willow Willow". The latter in particular sounds like something an 80s indie band would record - extraordinary for someone writing in the late sixties and a later taste of how far ahead of his time Lee was. Ultimately, "Out Here" does nothing to advance the double album form. It could have been released as a single lp with no appreciable difference in terms of quality and impact. Occasionally, Lee's writing becomes self-referential like the best of his material on "Forever Changes". In "Doggone", he sings "Once I had a singing group, singing group been gone. Now I've got another group, didn't take too long" in reference to his abandonment of the previous incarnation of Love and his establishing of a new group of that name. In "Gather 'Round" he sings "If you don't like my story then don't buy my songs" which shows a lot of front given that this song lifts its melody from Dylan's "The Times They are a-Changin'". Poor Arthur, sadly people did not like his story.