« Mad Shadows | Full Album Listing | Brain Capers »

Mott the Hoople albums:
Wildlife

Whisky Women (Mick Ralphs)
Angel of Eighth Avenue (Ian Hunter)
Wrong Side of the River (Mick Ralphs)
Waterlow (Ian Hunter)
Lay Down (Safka)
It Must be Love (Mick Ralphs)
Original Mixed-up Kid (Ian Hunter)
Home is Where I want to be (Mick Ralphs)
Keep a Knockin' (Penniman)

Bonus Tracks (on Angel Air re-release only)
It'll Be Me (Jack Clement)
Long Red (West/Pappalardi/Ventura/Landsberg)

Recorded by Line-up #1

Michael Gray: Strings arranger and conducter on 'Waterlow'
James Archer: Violin on 'Angel of Eightht Avenue'
Jerry Hogan: Pedal steel guitar on 'It Must Be Love'
and 'The Original Mixed-up Kid'
Jess Roden and Stan Tippins: Chorus on 'Lay Down'
with Mick and Ian.

Produced by Mott the Hoople
Engineered by Brian Humphries
Assisted by Richard Digby-Smith, Howard Kilgour
and Tony Platt
Recorded at Island Studios, London. November
and December 1970

except:
'Wrong Side of the River' recorded at
Olympic Studios 10th February 1970
Engineer: Andrew Johns.
Produced by: Guy Stevens.
'Lay Down' recorded at Island Studios
10th September 1970
Engineer: Philip Brown.
Produced by: Guy Stevens and Mott The Hoople.
'Keep a Knockin' recorded live at
Fairfield Halls, Croydon, London,
13th September 1970
Engineer: Andrew Johns.

Our thanks to Ritchie Anderson, John 'Da-ooh' Davies,
Stan Tippins and The Ladies for taking the strain and making the tea.
Special thanks to: Jeff Dexter, Peter Frame and Andy Dunkley.

Released in the UK February 1971 by Island Records ILPS 9144
Re-released in the UK September 2003 by Angel Air Records SJPCD159

SJPCD159 Available in all good record stores, or by mail order from Angel Air Records

Half Moon Bay says... Most people - band included - don't seem to like this record. But I do. Some of the tracks on here are absolute gems; 'Original Mixed-up Kid', 'Angel of Eighth Avenue' and 'Waterlow' could find their way onto my desert island disc. And although Ralphs put his country hat on for 'Home is Where I want to be' it often catches me unawares and I find myself singing it in the car even now. And when I first heard it, the live sequence - Keep a Knockin' - just knocked me out, as we used to say. Hunters brilliant audience manipulation skills are shown off to good effect during the 'when I shout, you shout back' bit.

Now remastered, attractively repackaged (with sleeve notes from 'Two Miles from Heaven' Editor Keith Smith) with bonus tracks and re-released by Angel Air.

OK, some additional comments: to say that these CDs are re-mastered is not doing the sound justice at all. As I write I am listening to "Keep a knockin'" and I have been transported back to my little old bedroom in Maidstone, playing this for the first time having bought "Rock n Roll Queen", the album, second hand from Douglas Coombes. Yet, its even better than that first time… the organ, the piano, the audience clapping… the clarity, the punch, the energy, that guitar, the power… wow… what a band… fantastic…

A truly wonderful piece of re-mastering. Sometimes when you're told a CD features Remastered Tracks, you wonder, on listening, just what the fuss is all about. Well, with these CDs on Angel Air, the Mott the Hoople experience happens all over again for the listener. If you always wanted to replace the vinyl with CDs, now is the time to do it. If you have the Atlantic CDs and you've just won a little bit of cash, by backing Alan Pardew to become the West Ham manager when the price was 33-1, then replace them with these Angel Air re-releases. You won't regret it. Honest.