DON'T FORGET TO REMEMBER: The Official ILM Track-By-Track BEE GEES 1968-1981 Listening Thread

ah wait here it is! It's awesome
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsMsrR5ttMg

we're entering a period where these guys were on TV *a lot* so get prepared for some fun clips

Barry perfecting and premiering the classic Barry Gibb Look there

Track No. 101: We Lost the Road ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7eCGNn8ml0

This 3/4 tune follows a familiar sequence - Barry with the first verse, Robin on the second, drums and strings come bounding in on the choruses as the vocals gradually split from singing in unison into impeccable multi-part harmonies. While Robin and Barry both indulge a bit of their favorite vocal techniques (heavy vibrato and semi-hoarse soul-shouting, respectively) they at least reign it in a bit more than they did on the previous record. Lyrics seem to invite an at least semi-autobiographical interpretation, e.g., the band reflecting on the current state of heir career, much like the album title. Perhaps some credit should be given to them for attempting to sound more contemporary: instead of the Beatles, this sounds more like a Wings song.

Not bad, but awfully repetitive. Robin is good on this, Barry not so much.

I think this album features the last gasps of some of their less successful stylistic tics.

They certainly never did anything like "Paper Mache, Cabbages and Kings" again

I almost get the impression on this album they'd loosened the corsets a bit and decided to do what they like and to hell with the commercial implications - it's more likely though they just didn't know what they were doing and how to move on.

Track No. 101: I've Never Been Alone ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meDuUQwm-d4

I have to say, while Robin's typical lyrical sentiments are readily detectable, this song makes even less sense than usual, eventually devolving into lines that violate rudimentary rules of logic and grammar ("I've never rode a plane/and I never will again"? ok) The arrangement is kind of interesting as a baroque country exercise not entirely out of line with something that Gene Clark might have penned around the same time, just a couple of 12-string guitar parts and a small string section and, perhaps most oddly, an oboe. Robin's delivery also shows some craft, the melody gradually ascending and descending throughout the song as he varies his phrasing. As Robin solo songs go this one isn't bad, he largely restrains his worst impulses.

I agree, this song is quite nice but the lyrics are complete cobblers. This was also the last solo Robin Gibb composition on a Bee Gees album.

huh interesting detail about the solo credit

Yes, retired at age 22!

hey he did make those solo albums in the 80s. Let's not forget "How Old Are You?" or "Boys DO Fall in Love"

He did carry writing songs but only in collaboration with his brothers. Maybe he was less miserable than he used to be.

it is weird that he never got a lone solo vocal on a record again though. Barry definitely did.

He got solo vocals, just not solo compositions. I suppose the idea was that his voice didn't really work for their later material.

looks like his next solo vocal isn't until Living Eyes

He's definitely lead vocalist, if not sole vocalist, on songs before that - "Country Lanes" on "Main Course", for instance.

right, yeah which was why I had thought he might have written some of those. I forgot that Barry sings the second verse of Mr. Natural, for ex., which I would otherwise totally think of as a strictly Robin song.

There's a few songs where Barry sings a verse when I'd have much preferred hearing Robin sing the whole thing - "Mr. Natural" for one!

Track No. 102: Paper Mache, Cabbages and Kings ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfactctWP3I

I'd be hard-pressed to name anything else from 1972 that bears more than a passing resemblance to this song. Maybe something from Sparks or some other vaguely proggy art-pop band? But even then most of those bands would have included a section in the song where the band rocks out, and rocking out is something the Bee Gees almost never did. Instead what we get is some bizarre Frankenstein of childlike oompah band psych, a quite pretty 4/4 chorus section that seems flown in from one of the other soft-rock opuses from the previous LP, then a drumless, free floating section where Barry and Robin take turns emoting over eerie piano and organ accompaniment (with some guitar fluorishes here and there), and finally a reprise of the oompah section that gradually speeds up as the boys go into an anti-war(?) chant. By any measure, this song is bizarrely schizophrenic. The lyrics from one section to the next do not appear to bare any relation to each other, veering from random lists of objects to equating heartbreak with smashed paper mache to the closing "Jimmy had a bomb and the bomb went bang/Jimmy was everywhere". There's still some good moments throughout - the vocals that transition from the oompah verses to the choruses are great, and when the drums drop out entirely for Barry and Robin's vocal spotlight the odd chord progression and dreamy atmospherics sound great. Robin's vocal kind of ruins that part though, unfortunately. They never did anything like this again, as far as I know.

The start of this song with that nice bass part surely belongs to another song doesn't it? This is very psychedelic for 1972, particularly the chorus, I have no idea what people would have made of this at the time. The middle section is great, Robin sounds exactly like Roger Chapman of Family! I don't know why it's 5 minutes long though.

haha yeah that intro feels like something else entirely. Maurice's bass playing always adds so much.

agree about the chorus as well, the "don't be scared" transitions into the chorus are fantastically ghostly

The start of this song with that nice bass part surely belongs to another song doesn't it?

belongs on pearl jam's first album. "jeremy," perhaps.

Track No. 103: I Can Bring Love ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsnLtPX4TBQ

This album is such a random grab bag. Here we get what is essentially a Barry solo tune, just him and his 12-string and a small string section, delivering a plaintive dose of syrupy soft-focus folk-pop. Unusually minimalist and compact, it's pleasant-ness can't entirely override the suspicion that this was some tossed off filler. Again showcases his penchant for juxtaposing sweet major key melodies over suspended chords.

I feel like this thread has devolved into me and Tom D doing some version of "On Bee Gees At The Bee Gees"

I give this song three bags of popcorn and a large hairbrush for Barry's coiffure

I was going to say Barry can write memorable melodies in his sleep, and he probably did here, but then I remembered the entirety of the "2 Years On" album.

maybe he just wasn't getting enough sleep during those 2 years

Track No. 104: I Held a Party ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r64vSUVTzPk

Having listened to all 60+ tracks of "Saved by the Bell: The Collected Works of Robin Gibb 1968-1970)", I can attest that, surprisingly, this song was *not* an outtake or leftover from that period. It sure doesn't sound like much else from the contemporaneous rock scene of 1972. Robin holds a party, no one comes, he gets drunk and goes to sleep, is sad, all to the tune of Maurice's waltzing harpsichords and some great vocals, particularly at the end of each verse. I think this is possibly the *only* song in the catalog that's in 3/4...? Interestingly, there's very little of Shepherd's orchestral arrangement; for the most part, the boys substitute harmonies in the place of strings, which works very well, particularly in the later verses and on the gregorian chant-like coda (which recalls Robin's vocals on "Every Christian Lionhearted Man").

Yes, it's very old school Bee Gees - ca. 67/68 - so I like it! Robin is on good form on this album and there's a lot of him, he'd never be heard as often on a Bee Gees album again :(

while it's a very psych-period song stylistically, I think it actually benefits from the higher quality 70s-production and performances (no fumbling drumming, the harpsichord is double-tracked, more low end to it etc.)

Track No. 105: Please Don't Turn Out the Lights ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH0oaeKLKu8

Another fairly minimally arranged song, this time oriented around a fantastic set of vocal harmonies that are as rich as chocolate cake. Just piano, some restrained strings, bass and the three brothers harmonizing for two verses and two choruses. I am a sucker for anything that sounds this sumptuous, no matter how banal the lyrics or simple the chord changes. By this point, the quality of their throwaway material had increased dramatically from just a couple albums prior. While this album is all over the map stylistically and feels pretty aimless as a collection, they at least managed to deliver high caliber performances.

also love the vocal melody on the verses of this, and the way Robin and Barry were getting very adept at trading off

one thing that listening through this period has made me think about is how the dynamics in the band shifted over time - after the breakup neither Robin nor the Barry/Maurice combo did as well as they would have expected, and when they reunited things *still* didn't get better. It's at this point (right after To Whom It May Concern) that Robin and Maurice both take more of a backseat: Robin doesn't get any solo songs, Maurice increasingly restricted to bass, etc. It's like once Barry and Maurice accepted that whatever they were doing wasn't working, they ceded more of the creative direction to Barry.

It's like once Barry Robin and Maurice

fixed

Track No. 106: Sea of Smiling Faces ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqUVpaCUncA&list=PLDSjAKM-kw0h_kfson0Gcogv6DMwOtshX&index=7

This song is so meticulously constructed and feels of such a piece with "Run to Me" I'm surprised it wasn't released as the follow-up single. Very much in the ballad style of the tracks on "Trafalgar", it follows a familiar pattern of Barry and Robin trading off verses, Maurice providing the instrumental muscle, and Shepherd adding in the orchestral countermelodies. And again this feels like one of their 60s psych period songs just updated with 70s recording technology and performed by a more sure-footed band. Song also features one of my favorite songwriting tricks where the final chord in the verse shifts from minor to major, leading into a key change for the chorus. Hard not to read the lyrics as an ode to their vanishing audience.

I think it's Maurice's staccato pipe organ on the verses - plus all those ridiculous bass runs - that really make it feel like a 60s leftover

Yes, I love this song and it is very 60s. I think the second verse is one of the quintessential Robin vocals, I look forward to it every time I hear this song, those flat Northern vowels!

Track No. 107: Bad Bad Dreams ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bh1bEMX5328

Despite opening the song with "I've got a notion/to live in an ocean", which scans like a throwaway Fred Schneider lyric, this is certainly the band's most credible attempt at "rocking" to-date. Recently added lead guitarist Alan Kendall steps to the fore with a guitar sound borrowed from the Beatles "Revolution" (or maybe "Savoy Truffle"?), supported by a brassy horn section and some unusually fluid drumming courtesy of Clem Cattini, providing the Gibb bros with the necessary muscle. Cattini seems a little too fond of bashing away on his open high hat, but that's a minor quibble. This is another one of those songs on the album that feels like a 60s psych tune updated with 70s recording technology and style. Not bad.

Feels like they're getting the last of the Beatles out of their system on this album, including this track which is like "Day Tripper" played by the Move in their heavy rock mode.

omg you're right the melody totally bites "Day Tripper" in a couple spots!

Track No. 108: You Know It's For You ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EA0gXxwwxfg

Maurice's last turn in the spotlight, which sounds like he's playing and singing everything apart from the drums. After this album, Maurice was increasingly relegated to a strictly bass-playing/backup singing role, which is perhaps a bit unfortunate given what a stellar team-player and accompanist he was over the years. While this isn't on the level of "Trafalgar" it's still a nicely done little slice of AM pop with some interesting touches - the heavily reverbed mellotron flutes, the ghostly and wordless two-chord middle eight, a gentle drumbreak. He never penned a hit, but generally his songs were entertaining detours on these early 70s albums.

Having done a more than credible Lennon on the title track of the last album, here he attempts McCartney - will the real Maurice stand up? Too late for that now :( Nice track, Maurice seemed like a mellow chap.

this does feel v much like a Wings deep cut or something

I'll have to take your word for that!

I'm sure Turrican would love to weigh in on this issue

Track No. 109: Alive ("To Whom It May Concern", 1972)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReVM6N0akl8

Once again someone in the camp (Stigwood? Barry?) makes an inexplicably poor decision and pushes for this as the second and final single from the album. Surely "Sea of Smiling Faces" or hell even "Road to Alaska" would have been a better choice. Reportedly, Barry doesn't even remember writing it, which I guess goes some way to explaining why I could barely recall a thing about it after listening to it. It's not bad per se, the performances and delivery and production are all fine, it's just very unmemorable; it seems like an attempt to go for a grand gesture and builds from a whisper to a shout, but it never delivers on a hook or memorable chorus or lyric line or anything. Feel bad for Robin having to pretend like he has anything to do on this song during this TV clip (also not sure who's miming along to Maurice's bass playing, suppose it must be Kendall). The last song to feature Bridgford behind the kit.

Barry reportedly does not remember writing this song

oops sorry for the repeat of that last line, c+p error