Air Conditioning

Artist: Curved Air
Label: Collector's Choice
Category: Music

Average customer rating:

Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1

UPC: 617742014822
EAN: 0617742014822
ASIN: B00004W5KY

Release Date: 2000-08-08

Air Conditioning

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Tracks:

It Happened Today
Stretch
Screw
Blind Man
Vivaldi
Hide And Seek
Propositions
Rob One
Situations
Vivaldi With Cannons

Similar Items:

Second Album
Phantasmagoria
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Product Description

1. It Happened Today
2. Stretch
3. Screw
4. Blind Man
5. Vivaldi
6. Hide And Seek
7. Propositions
8. Rob One
9. Situations
10. Vivaldi With Cannons

Format: CD

Customer Reviews:

How's the sound quality?.......2007-02-13

Released in 1970, this is Curved Air's first album. It is 44 minutes long. The original album came as picture disc (the picture on the cover was actually printed on the record). It was supposedly the first rock picture disc in history. It was also the first release by Warner Brothers of a British rock act.

There are two versions of this CD. I have the Warner Brother's version and the sound quality is fair. It is flat and muted. I was debating to give this a 4 or a 5 star rating but settled on 4 stars because fo the sound quality. This version is from Collector's Choice Music. I don't know if the sound quality is any better. I remember not being impressed with other CCM releases.

Curved Air was one of those groups that added "art rock" to "progressive rock", like Yes, the Nice and Emerson, Lake and Palmer. There were many progressive rock bands that did not have that art rock sound, like Caravan and Camel.

This might be Curved Air's best stuido album. It has a number of very good songs on it. None of the go bombastically overboard (like Marie Antoinetted on a later album).

Curved Air's sound and Sonja Kristina vocals could be harsh at times, but then the band could break into some wonderfully beautiful music. The first track, It Happened Today, is a prime example. It starts out with a hard driving, punchy vocal and ends up with a mellow violin solo. It sounds like Disneyland stole it for the theme music to the ride Soaring Over California.

Curved Air was a volatile group of some amazing musicians. There was never a steady bassist. Francis Monkman (keyboards and guitar), Darryl Way (violin) and Florian Pilkington-Miska (drums) left after the third album and would could back every once in awhile. Sonja Kristina was Sonja Linwood for the first two albums. Mike Wedgewood would play bass on a couple of ablums before moving on to Caravan. Eddie Jobson would join later before going on to Roxy Music, UK, Jethro Tull and Frank Zappa. And this was Stewart Copeland's first band before forming the Police.

Francis Monkman has a great album of instrumentals called Jam that were recorded during one of the later Curved Air reunion sessions.

The Classical Rock of the 70's.......2007-01-05

Curved Air were described by Sting as the most under-rated band of the 70's. The music has a classical music feel both in content and arrangement but there is undoubtably an element of folk-rock in the mix. The band members are a who's who of talent, Darryl Way on electric violin, the multi-talented Francis Monkmann on lead guitar and keyboards, plus the erotic mysticism and haunting voice of Sonja Kristina Linwood. This is, and always will be, a great album!

The air is always curved if you choose to see it.......2005-09-15

Born from the British group Sisyphus in 1968, the core of Frances Monkman (Guitar), Florian Pilkington-Miksa (Drums) and Rob Martin (Bass) met up with another visionary, Darryl Way (Violin, Keyboards) to form Curved Air. Very shortly, they were joined by Acoustic Guitarist/Singer Sonja Kristina. A milestone in the Progressive/Folk Rock genre was surfacing from the psychedelic mold, as Curved Air made mega-leaps in song construction and complexity. An impressive first effort. Song by song description is not necessary. They are all cutting edge for 1970. Highly recommended. It is unfortunate that this band didn't get the recognition it deserved in the U.S. The same fate as Gentle Giant. Look for the 4th album, AIR CUT. You can find it on CD elsewhere on the internet. Personnel change brought Eddie Jobson (from Roxy Music) on Keyboards and Violin. The tune Metamorphosis is well worth a listen.

3stars,1/2,is righter:better things had to come afterwards!.......2003-03-13

Better things had to come afterwards,nevertheless this debut album is not bad ... first of all the excellent female vocal by Sonia Kristina is a true Curved Air trademark and, despite of the bad arrangement of a famous track by Vivaldi, the opening track "It happened Today" already shows the several sides of Curved Air's music!! A mixture of experimental folk music, with the support of a tasteful violin and such an emotional playing !! The best track of the album is the instrumental "Rob one", a true Darryl Way's imprinting, with a great feeling,under the same characteristics as the best stuff within this debut album...including the already mentioned opener.

Not completely essential, but very interesting debut album-folk prog oriented!!

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