Status Quo - To Home Page Quo Records
Status Quo - The Pye Re-issues. (Page 3)
Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon was Quo's third album, now re-issued on Castle Communications.

As with the other re-issues the CD has been re-mastered and also includes four extra tracks that are previously unreleased alternative mixes.


Read Dr Lee's Review of this CD.
Castle Re-issues:

Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon (This Page)

On Other Pages:

Picturesque Matchstickable Messages From The Status Quo

Spare Parts

Dog Of Two Head

Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon (Castle ESM CD 621)
Originally released in October 1970. (Pye NSPL 18344)
  1. Spinning Wheel Blues (Rossi/Young)
  2. Daughter (Lancaster)
  3. Everything (Rossi/Parfitt)
  4. Shy Fly (Rossi/Young)
  5. Spring Summer and Wednesdays (Rossi/Young)
  6. Junior's Wailing (White/Pugh)
  7. Lakky Lady (Rossi/Parfitt)
  8. Need Your Love (Rossi/Young)
  9. Lazy Poker Blues (Green/Adams)
  10. a) Is It Really Me (Lancaster)
    b) Gotta Go Home (Lancaster)

    Bonus Tracks
  11. In My Chair (Rossi/Young) (Alternative Mix)
  12. Gerdundula (Manston/James) (Alternative Mix)
  13. Down The Dustpipe(Grossman)(Alternative Mix)
  14. Junior's Wailing (White/Pugh)(Alternative Mix)
Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon
 

The album which more than any other signalled a change of direction for late 60s boy band Status Quo, "Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon", was released in October 1970 (with Pye catalogue number NSPL18344). Heralded by the wonderful single "Down The Dustpipe", the album featured none of the psychedelic restraint of their previous offerings and saw them break free of their record company's shackles to produce the first of many albums showing their true colours.

The original album consisted of ten tracks, more bluesy and rock oriented than anything previously seen on Status Quo albums. From the mournful ballad "Everything" to the raucous "Shy Fly", from the blues numbers "Spinning Wheel Blues" and "Lazy Poker Blues" to the now classic "Junior's Wailing" and "Is It Really Me/Gotta Go Home". None of the tracks from the album made A-side singles in the UK, but "Everything" and "Lakky Lady" made the B-sides of "Mean Girl" and "Gerdundula" respectively. "Spinning Wheel Blues" was released as a single in Europe though. If the album was not a great source of singles, it provided the standards of early Quo live sets, with "Junior's Wailing" being a permanent feature and the combo of "Is It Really Me" and "Gotta Go Home" being the first of Quo's mammoth live pieces, only surpassed perhaps in later years by "Forty Five Hundred Times".

The reissue CD combines the familiar ten tracks of the original release of "Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon" with four previously unreleased versions of known tracks. The first of these is an alternate mix of "In My Chair", a song which was to be a great success for Quo following its release in October 1970 to coincide with the album release, both as a single and a live track which the fans took to their hearts. Still cropping up every few years in the live set even today, "In My Chair" shows Quo can be something more than a hard-hitting rock act and the song marks another turning point for Quo - as Francis notes on the "Live!" album recorded in 1976, this is a song "which did a lot to get us where we possibly are" !! The alternate mix on offer here sounds like it was recorded in a shoe box, with terrible echo on Francis' vocals but musically as solid as the released version - at least until the incomplete ending. Another live favourite, which made a welcome reappearance to the live set in 1994, comes next with an alternative mix of "Gerdundula" - an untypical Quo song perhaps, but one which again demonstrated their ability to turn their hand to the slower, more restrained numbers along with the brain-busting heavy rock tracks. This mix sees Francis' vocals being very distant and echoey again, with very prominent guitar and a different take on the climax to the song. The next new version is of "Down The Dustpipe", the single which introduced "Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon" and set the tone for all the Quo which was to come. Gone were the ridiculous psychedelic offerings and out came the unmistakable boogie, so long stifled by commercial pressures from Pye. This alternate mix is fantastic, all two and a bit minutes of it - the vocals are in your face and there's a different guitar fill all through the vocals, plus alternative guitar solos. The song is again unfinished. The CD is rounded off in style with an alternate mix of "Junior's Wailing", but the vocals are so distant that it almost becomes an instrumental and much of the guitar work is muffled as well.

Well packaged and with good liner notes, the reissue of "Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon" is an excellent archive piece and should form part of every fan's collection. Not the first time this album has been put out onto CD, but this time the effort is much better and the additional four unreleased mixes are historical pieces which should not be missed.

Review by Dr Lee Hawkins  



back www.statusquo.co.uk home