BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST : BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST (THEIR FIRST ALBUM)

  1. Taking Some Time On
  2. Mother Dear
  3. The Sun Will Never Shine
  4. When the World Was Woken
  5. Good Love Child
  6. The Iron Maiden
  7. Dark Now My Sky
    Bonus :
  8. Early Morning
  9. Mister Sunshine
  10. So Tomorrow
  11. Eden Unobtainable
  12. Night
  13. Pools of Blue
  14. Need You Oh So Bad
  15. Small Time Town
  16. Dark Now My Sky
  17. I Can't Go On Without You
  18. Eden Unobtainable
  19. Poor Wages
  20. Brother Thrush

Label : Harvest / EMI

Length : 76:41

Released : 1970 / May 27, 2002 (reissue)

Review (AllMusic) : Barclay James Harvest's sensibly titled debut album was one of the unsung classics of the late '60s, a post-psychedelic pop album that posits a peculiar collision between the Bee Gees' vision of classic grandeur and the heftier sounds leaking out of the rock underground. Add Norman Smith's epic production and one cannot help thinking that if the Pretty Things had ever looked elsewhere for their follow-up to S.F. Sorrow, Barclay James Harvest could have handed it to them on a plate. The opening "Taking Some Time On" is absolutely phenomenal, churning and riffing on the one hand, positively hymnal on the other - and poised, during its chorus, to plunge into a virtual dry run for R.E.M.'s "Talk About the Weather." Elsewhere, "When the World Was Woken" is unmistakably daubed in a whiter shade of Procol Harum, while the 12-minute closer, "Dark Now My Sky," is simply spellbinding. Barclay James Harvest ranks among the finest albums of the entire early prog boom.

Review (AllMusic) for the reissue : It is churlish to complain, but this bonus-track-stacked remaster of Their First Album is one of those examples where one really does get too much of a good thing. In its original, seven-track form, Barclay James Harvest's sensibly titled debut album was one of the unsung classics of the late '60s, a post-psychedelic pop album that posits a peculiar collision between the Bee Gees' vision of classic grandeur and the heftier sounds leaking out of the rock underground. Add Norman Smith's epic production and one cannot help thinking that if the Pretty Things had ever looked elsewhere for their follow-up to S.F. Sorrow, Barclay James Harvest could have handed it to them on a plate. The opening "Taking Some Time On" is absolutely phenomenal, churning and riffing on the one hand, positively hymnal on the other - and poised, during its chorus, to plunge into a virtual dry run for R.E.M.'s "Talk About the Weather." Elsewhere, "When the World Was Woken" is unmistakably daubed in a whiter shade of Procol Harum, while the 12-minute closer, "Dark Now My Sky," is simply spellbinding. Indeed, Their First Album so ranks among the finest albums of the entire early prog boom that the mere prospect of 13 more tracks should leave the connoisseur salivating with anticipation. And so they do, although you need to take short steps as you make your way through them. The feast opens with "Early Morning" and "Mister Sunshine," BJH's debut single from April 1968, and captures the bandmembers in a distinctly pop-psychier mood than they would eventually grasp. From there, the listener moves into the fruit of two sessions recorded for DJ John Peel in April and July 1968, seven songs that include an early (and distinctly uncertain) stab at the album's "Dark Now My Sky." Two more tracks, "I Can't Go on Without You" and "Eden Unobtainable," date from an abandoned session aimed at recording a follow-up single later in 1968, all adding up to a sterling history lesson - but all built so resolutely around foundations that the group would soon be departing that, not until the final two tracks, the 1969 single "Brother Thrush" and "Poor Wages," is one actually reminded again of exactly who is being heard, and the sheer majesty of Their First Album is again rekindled. None of which is to say that you're better off simply picking up an unadorned reissue of Their First Album - this really is one of the year's better collections, from both a musical and a collectors' point of view. If it could have been presented as a two-CD package, however, it would have been even better.

Review (Wikipedia) : Barclay James Harvest is the first album released by Barclay James Harvest. The album was remastered and reissued by Harvest in 2002 as "Their First Album" with several bonus tracks. The original gatefold cover was designed by Ian Latimer, with photography by Richard Dunkley.