Trapeze (1976)

Before starting here, let it be known this is the second self-titled album by Trapeze, not the eponymous debut album from 1970. This isn't a unique occurrence, but when a band isn't well known outside of Texas, it frequently leads to mass confusion over which album is which. Don't be surprised to find the first album being sold with this album's cover art, or vice-versa. Caveat emptor, I suppose. A good rule of thumb is the price, as this album has been out of print for years and still commands a fairly high price compared to the old debut album, which goes in and out of print from time to time and is therefore more common. While I don't think I paid extortion prices to get the decidedly non-remastered One Way Records reissue, it wasn't a bargain either. Actually, there must have been a breakthrough and this album is now readily available in mp3 format for a reasonable price via your preferred e-tailer. The CD is still pretty bonkers-expensive, though.

Trapeze is one of those bands I've previously described as "living organ donors", gradually giving up their members to other, larger bands until nothing remains. In some ways, the band is the rock music version of the Giving Tree, feeding Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Uriah Heep, Whitesnake, and Judas Priest with their alumni. It is the curse of being a band of good musicians: while you aren't doomed to languish in obscurity, you don't get the chance to shine in your own right either.

The original Trapeze was a quintet, formed by the merger of a 1960's pop group The Montanas with three younger musicians on the rise in an outfit called Finders Keepers. The debut was released by the new Moody Blues label Threshold and produced by MB bassist John Lodge. Although label and producer were retained for the next album, Medusa, the band shed down to a classic power trio. Following the third album, You Are the Music, We're Just the Band, bassist/singer Glenn Hughes was poached by Deep Purple, forcing guitarist Mel Galley and drummer Dave Holland to make some quick changes. Toward the end of the Hughes era, they had been planning on expanding to a two-guitar quartet. The original plan was to switch Hughes to rhythm guitar and hire a new bassist. They partly went ahead with this and brought aboard Pete Wright on bass, while Rob Kendrick was named the new guitarist. Since, as far as I know, neither were singers, Galley assumed vocal duties himself, and this was the lineup featured on their fourth album, Hot Wire.

In the early days of the recording of their next album (this one), Deep Purple split and Hughes made the snap decision to return to his old band. Unfortunately it amounted to only a short tour and a couple recordings before Hughes left again to focus on a solo career. Post-Purple Hughes was a drug-addled, aimless person according to some accounts, not the same guy from the early 1970's This may have short-circuited any real trio-era reunion. Apparently Wright and Kendrick must not have been too put out by the interruption as they are back again for most of this album. In fact, they are such nice guys that two of the ten tracks here ("Chances" and "Nothin' for Nothing") are from that brief reunion and feature Hughes on vocals. Also on board for this album (as well as Hot Wire) is original keyboard player Terry Rowley, from all the way back in the quintet era, though he plays as a session guest here.

On the whole, however, the album picks up where Hot Wire leaves off, sporting the same lineup and roles as before. You've got to hand it to Mel Galley, the guy refused to give up on this band. He's a halfway decent vocalist, but aside from a single song on Medusa and third-string work on the debut album, he hadn't really embraced the role until Hughes's departure. He doesn't have anywhere near the range of Hughes, but carries on nonetheless and never seemed to shy away from singing the Glenn's parts live. His style is more suited to the open-ended jam songs, which dominate this album. Galley, who usually co-wrote with brother Tom, had always trended toward writing in this style, leaving the more structured songs and ballads to Glenn Hughes on the early albums. So it's no surprise that as at least a co-writer of every song save the cover of "On the Sunny Side of the Street" the jams abound here. The Galley songs tend to play very well live on stage, going all the way back to the days of "Black Cloud" from the second album and most of them were expanded generously on stage. In fact, at least three of these songs on this album had been road tested already, as they appear on the 1975 live album Live at the Boat Club, which I'm fairly sure is the only legitimate release featuring Rob Kendrick. The only problem with this approach is it tends to create fairly flat studio performances. Even though I can nod my head happily through every song, there aren't any real standout moments. It's one jam followed by another, and songs like "Star Breaker", "Monkey, "Soul Stealer", and "Gimme Good Love" all sort of bleed into one another. You don't get anything like a "Medusa", "Jury", or "Seafull", songs that plumbed the darkest depths of their second album and were distinct and special.

Sadly, Trapeze probably peaked somewhere during the last days of Glenn Hughes. Although Hot Wire enjoyed the highest chart position of any of their albums, scraping the Top 200, Trapeze was clearly on the downhill side of the band's fortunes. Following the album, Galley and Holland would be reduced to session men for albums ranging from Glenn Hughes's Play Me Out to Justin Hayward's Songwriter. Meanwhile, Rob Kendrick formed a "new" (read: illegitimate) Trapeze that was a local sensation around Texas. In 1979 they brought back the "real" Trapeze (minus Kendrick) with a new vocalist, Pete Goalby, and new song-based (rather than jam-based) approach, exhibited on their sole studio album, Hold On. Success remained elusive, however, and eventually Holland went to Judas Priest, Goalby to Uriah Heep, and finally Galley to Whitesnake, laying Trapeze to rest for the last time. The band that once had ZZ Top open for them (not a typo), has been relegated to a curiosity, primarily of interest to die-hard Deep Purple fans.

There was a little flicker of a reunion around 1991, but it only yielded two new songs performed live in London with Geoff Downes from Asia. Complicating any reunion were a lot of things. Mel Galley had seriously injured his arm while in Whitesnake and never really recovered his guitar-playing skills. Also Glenn Hughes, who was still a few years away settling into a much more professional career, was still pretty erratic. A few years later, Dave Holland would get into serious legal distress (Google it) and Mel Galley died of cancer well before his scheduled release date from prison, making any reunion of any lineup impossible. These days the best way to hear live Trapeze music is to track down Glenn Hughes in concert, though don't expect any songs from this album!