Then Play On (remastered)
 

Today, I received my copy. I comes with a 12 page booklet, written by David Frocke (of Rolling Stone). There are a few nice pictures of vinyl singles.

Both parts of 'Oh well' are in mono and sound just as good as the version on 'The Best of Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac' does.
It's nice to finally hear the original version of 'World in harmony' without scratches!

I haven't compared the sound quality of the remastered songs to the original CD I already had, but during this first-time-listening I think the quality has improved.

There's some expected Fleetwood Mac sloppyness: there aren't any composer credits and some titles are spelled with capitals and some are not (it's 'One Sunny Day' and 'My Dream' but at the same time 'Closing my eyes' and 'Without you').
'Under Way' is spelled this way, like it did on the original LP, my old CD says 'Underway'.

GJK

Thanks for the report, GJK. According to Amazon, the remastered CD is supposed to be released in the US next Tuesday, and I'm looking forward to it.

Exciting! Thanks for sharing.

I'm looking forward to hearing the other CDs in the early 1970s catalog too. I wonder why they're getting released in Japan first.

David Fricke likes Then Play On? This helps redeem Rolling Stone a little I suppose. :D

I will get this eventually, I hope they still have some left later.

My father grew up in Arnhem and we still have family there! They used to send us Pussycat and BZN records...

If he grew up in Arnhem, he probably learned how to swim in the building opposite my apartment.

The lead singer of Pussycat had a great voice but I never cared for BZN...

GJK

Thanks for that GJK. Hits UK shores on Monday apparently. I'm in London all day so I shall head to HMV Oxford Circus as soon as 16.30 comes around.

I liked BZN's Rockin' The Trolls for some reason. :D

me too
 

Hopefully they will send them out right on time!

with great anticipation

vinnie

And currently, it's in their top 100 chart.

The CD arrived in the mail on Tuesday. The sound is great. :thumbsup: World in Harmony is quite a treat, wow!

I can't wait to hear how the rest of the CDs in the pre-75 sound. The reissues coming from Warner Japan come in cardboard slipcases. Hopefully there will be an accompanying booklet.

It arrived yesterday
 

I am listening to the recording in my studio monitors. The sound is good. They did a good remastering job
Closing my Eyes and Although the Sun is shining are especially good.

Great to read good reports on the CD sound quality! I am thinking I am in for this one for sure now too, though I have to save up for the 2CD edition of Gene Clark's Two Sides as well...

Still waiting for my CD to arrive, so I thought I'd ask a question for those of you who have already received yours. Is "Underway" slightly longer than on the earlier CD release? It ran a little bit longer on the original UK vinyl of Then Play On and I always enjoyed those few extra seconds - thought they added something significant to the end of the piece before the fade-out. Hoping that longer version of "Underway" is on the new CD.

Back to the original
 

Dear Ken,

I remember you asking about my version of the Vinyl and now I know why
I had the earlier version (US) and then in college the vinyl got switched to the version with Oh Well. Underway as shorter. I guess because Oh Well was so long due to the limitations of vinyl.
It is mentioned in the liner notes
the new remaster comes in at 3:04 which is 15 seconds longer than the second US release and the original crappy CD

I love the uncut studio version on "The Vaudville Years. ( October Jam #1 and #2) There you get the studio versions of both Underway and the two madges. Still though the spliced Then Play On versions are what hooked me onto jamming. It was like "The Greatful Dead "only with better players (my apologies to dead fans of which I am also one)

vinnie

'Underway', now spelled 'Under Way', is indeed a bit longer but ends rather abruptly, in the middle of a drum roll by Mick...

'October Jam #1 & 2' are completely other jams than the Madge jams but maybe I am misunderstanding you.

The dead fans obviously won't bother, but Dead fans might.

GJK

Thanks for the info, Vinnie and GJK! Good to hear that those 15 seconds have been restored.

I do like the full jams from The Vaudeville Years, but the final version of "Underway" (or "Under Way" ;) ) features such a different mix from what's on the full jam that it changes the piece a lot IMHO. Most notably to me, Danny's guitar is mixed lower in the final version.

You did understand
 

I think that #2 is the one that searching for madge and fighting for madge are derived.
My impression was that someone had a mixing field day.
I could argue for #1 and underway too. Is martin Birch still alive? or did peter do it?

Agreed. It almost sounds like they didn't fade it. I guess I just expected more of a fade like what we got on the shorter Underway.

John

A question... Bear in mind, the entire pre-Nicks era of Fleetwood Mac is pretty much foreign to me, although I'm familiar with a few songs, and know some of the history.

I'm listening to this new reissue of Then Play On, and in the booklet there is a write-up by David Fricke of Rolling Stone in it, and he says in the third paragraph "Then Play On was Fleetwood Mac's third studio album - and the only LP made in that lineup's supernova lifetime."

Who was new to this lineup, and thus I presume, only appeared on this album before departing?

Or was something else meant by that statement?

This is a great album so far. I'm only to Underway/Under Way (whichever is correct), and each track has been great except for When You Say, which I really didn't care for.

I'm glad you're enjoying it! It's one of my favorite Mac albums. Funny that you didn't care for "When You Say" either, as that seems to be many fans' least favorite from 'TPO.'

To answer your question -- it was the first studio album that Danny Kirwan appeared on, and the last with Peter Green.

Rhino did a fantastic job with the remastering. I'm really thrilled with how much better it sounds than the original CD.

third lineup
 

the two singles which preceded this also had this lineup

Man of the World
and Albatross

Yeah it's fab. You do feel the live rawness of the tracks more - especially on Coming Your Way and some of the more depressive Greenie songs.

I defiantly need to pick this up soon after reading the positive reviews of it.

This is my favorite album so I feel obliged to post my thoughts about the new re-master. The sound is much more full and the EQ sounds great. There is still hiss, which to me means the master tapes have been neglected (obviously). There is definitely sonic improvement and I am very happy with the definitive version of this classic album.

This album flows like a storybook in this form.

On the original record it goes straight into One Sunny Day without skipping a beat.

Birch and Green did a lot of live panning/mixing on the original album, which is still preserved.

The October Jams were recordings done after Then Play On was released. Underway was one jam, Madge was another. Both are on The Vaudeville Years without the Then Play On mix down.

October Jam after Then Play On release
 

If this is true, then there maybe yet more audio in someones vault out there from then play on.

My cousin was producer of Pusssycat, including their hitsingle "Mississippi" :cool:

Dat hest mie noeit verteld!

GJK

Check your e-mail!;)

Eddy Hilberts? Those 1970s LPs sound good, while they had a full band. Eddy also wrote and arranged 'Nothing To Hide' from Souvenirs.

My old Pussycat web page: http://www.oocities.org/rebjan_ca/pussycat.html

:wavey:

Liner notes to Vaudeville Years where I got the info: http://discog.fleetwoodmac.net/discog.php?pid=645

I think FM recorded and released most everything they had that they thought was decent, apart from a few anomalies like Like It This Way. I hope you're right though. I have read Green did some recordings for a more commercial solo album before scrapping the idea in favor of End of the Game. If true, I'd love to hear those.

Finally got my copy of the remastered Then Play On today! I'm really pleased with the sound quality- I was a bit worried about some of the comments re this but maybe my ears aren't the best!

Just a couple or three random thoughts:

I wish they had left a longer run-off from Before the Beginning to the start of the bonus tracks, just to leave a bit longer to let the original album sink in (solvable, I know, just not on my ancient player).

Danny , we love you and worry about you, but nothing can really be done to make When you say any better, can it? I suppose it's the only real flaw in the diamond...

I found myself actually enjoying the Madge jams for the first time! I've always wondered what that bit of classical music is that interlopes into Searching for Madge. Can anyone enlighten me?

My copy finally arrived today too. Wonderful to have the album back in its intended form, with the correct song sequence. It's like listening to an entirely different album than the earlier CD version. And nice to have the single version of "World In Harmony" - though I found all the echo on that track a bit disconcerting.

"When You Say" does stand out as easily the weakest track on the album, though I can't help but thinking how much it might have been improved by leaving out all the "la-la" vocals and just letting Danny's guitar do the talking. That's the main reason I prefer the Christine Perfect version, even though I'm not crazy about the strings on it.

Overall I thought the sound quality was certainly improved but perhaps not as much as I'd hoped. It would be interesting to hear how everything was remastered - what the source material was and who was involved in the process, for example.

The essay in the booklet was very nice, and I learned a thing or two in there. But even though we've all seen plenty of photos of the band from that period, it would have been nice to have included some in the booklet. Surely there must be other photos that have either not been published before or have not been widely circulated.

Reading through the booklet made me realize again how odd it is that for a band with as long and interesting a history as Fleetwood Mac, there really has not been a good in-depth book written about them. Peter Green deserves a better biography than the Celmins one, too.

Anyway, great to finally be able to listen to this, and I'm sure it will take a few more listens for it all to sink in.

Another random thought-

From what I had read before (Mick's occasionally reliable autobiography?), I had assumed that Peter played all the guitars, drums and bass on Oh Well or have I imagined that? The essay with the CD suggested otherwise. I would have also liked to have had some closure on who played the piano on Coming your way, too. Jeremy said on the forum he had no idea who played it. Was it Chris? We'll never know, I suspect. Everyone seems to have forgotten by know.

The sound is great!!! :]

I've never heard the last 15 secs of "Under Way". :D

Nice to have the studio version of "World In Harmony" - though the Boston Tea Party does have a far better guitar solo, and will always be the definitive version for me. Btw that is one weird (dis-)harmony at the end ... full of echo... :p

Good to have some info on the cover paiting. Maybe I'm weird, but I've always loved that rider going from autumns to spring. But then I am a fan of art nouveau. Maxwell Armfield is indeed great! I also learned that Mick owns the painting. I would like to have had it on my living room wall! :nod:

I still wonder about the classical part in "Searching for Madge" - with a (Peter's, I guess) guitar plucking in the background. Was it composed spesifically for the album? By who? Or is it a fragment of some other classical work? :shrug:
Btw those two Madge jams do indeed have corny titles. "Under Way" is far better titlewise.

It's ok to include "One Sunny Day" and "Without You", since they appeared on the original UK release. But I dunno... they seem to have more of a Blue Horizon feel... don't quite fit together with the rest. I prefer them on "English Rose" instead... :sorry:

Nice to have the bonus tracks!
Hope they do the same job with Kiln House etc...

Yes, overall it is really good and a huge improvement over the old CD. I have to admit that my first listen to the remastered CD was on headphones, and not the greatest headphones at that. I'll see what the sound is like through my speakers next time - might sound much better still!

I can understand that point of view, although for me they sound right being on Then Play On. Part of that is because that's actually where I first heard them, on a UK version of Then Play On (the one with the black cover that's mentioned in the booklet of the new CD) that I had before I'd gotten English Rose.

It sounds very much Vaughan Williams to me, a british composer whom Peter seems to have been very fond of in the late sixties. Very nice harmonies with a slight disharmony feeling to it.

Yes, I guess it depends on where you first hear the songs. I heard those two songs first on English Rose. :) And by including them, the album represents better how their live sets where, i.e. jamming, pop songs and blues.

Good point! :nod: Yes, Peter was inspired by Vaughan-Williams. He's a marvellous composer. I have his symphonies, so I'll put them on and og looking for Madge inspirations, hahaha.

That must've been sampled, I can't imagine they'd get someone to put together just that snippet. Having said that, I've never heard of anyone saying they've come across it on another record over all these years so who knows. It's that heavy guitar right before it I'd like to find the master tape of. Peter (or Danny?) sounding like Toni Iommi!

John

I think its Danny on Madge
 

The vibrato on the guitar of the solo phrase before the orchestral interlude , to me sounds like Danny's trademark wrenching tone. Peter's playing is impromptu and fierce but Danny almost seems to calculate what he will play note by note