Genre: pop
Rating: 3 stars ***
Title: Sympathy
Company: Artista
Catalog: AB
4261
Year: 1980
Country/State: Jarrow, UK
Grade (cover/record): VG / VG
Comments: cut lower right corner
Available: 1
GEMM catalog ID: 5560
Price: $8.00
I remember first hearing John Miles as a teenager on Radio Caroline between a Clash track and some weird slice of Britpop and thinking the guy was dynamite. Next time I heard him he was working as a hired gun for The Alan Parsons Project ... he was still pretty friggin' impressive !
Continuing his partnership with producer Alan Parsons 1979 saw Decca release "More Miles per Hour". I've never understood the rationale behind the decision, but the album never saw an American release. Instead, having signed a multi-million dollar deal with Arista the company inexplicably elected to cannibalize the earlier album, combining five of that set's songs with three new Gary Lyon produced studio efforts ('Sympathy', 'Do It All Again', and 'Where Would I Be without You'). Given new artwork and entitled "Sympathy" the album marked a return to a more pop oriented sound similar to Miles debut with "Rebel". Like the debut, the combination of Miles' great voice, a great backing band and his knack for crafting killer melodies with insidiously catchy hooks made this a wonderful album. Simply first class pop-rock, material like 'Where Would I Be without You', the rock edged title track, and 'Do It All Again' was the kind of stuff most power-pop bands would have killed to have at their disposal. Ironically that commercial edge may have proven the album's downfall. With audiences embracing punk, new wave and disco, good old fashioned pop was sooooo yesterday !!! How unfortunate, though Miles occasionally went too bubblegummy - C'est La Via'' could have passed for an Elton John outtake ... (Hopefully Miles gave up the tobacco habit ...) Elsewhere the two albums were tapped for a series of three singles:
- 1979's 'Can't Keep a Good Man Down' b/w 'Sweet Lorraine' (Arista catalog number )
- 1980's 'Where Would I Be without You' b/w 'Fella In the Cellar' (Arista catalog number AS 0504)
- 1980's 'C'est La Vie' b/w 'Sympathy' (Arista catalog number AB 4261)
Backed by an extensive English tour "More Miles Per Hour" hit # 46 in the UK. "Sympathy" did nothing on the US charts.
"Sympathy" track listing:
(side 1)
1.) Where Would I Be without You (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
2.) It's Not Called Angel (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
3.) Sympathy (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
4.) We All Fall Down (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
(side
2)
1.) C'est La Via (John Miles -
Bob Marshall) -
2.) Do It All Again (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
3.) Can't Keep a Good man Down (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
4.) Fella In the Cellar (John Miles - Bob Marshall) -
YouTube has a couple of nifty live performances of material from the LPs:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXDTUO09F5U
'Don't Give Me Your Sympathy'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk9MajJZdFI
'Do It All Again'
There's a great John Miles website at: