Six badly behaved ladies - I've Got the Music In Me Write-Off
Written: May 30 '02 (Updated May 30 '02)
Product Rating:
Pros: Melodies, variety, experimentation, concept, and how it was the start of a great career.
Cons: The lack of production shows up at certain points.
The Bottom Line: Way less bombastic than its two follow-ups, The Six Wives of Henry VIII is a very unusual yet digestible cd that anyone can (and should) get into.
vince006's Full Review: The Six Wives of Henry VIII: Live At Hampton Court...
This review is part of kristinafh’s “I’ve Got the Music in me” write-off, which is the third and last w/o of the May Music Madness . I chose this album simply because it is one of my absolute favorites, and I love it from the first second of track#1 to the grand finale in track#6. Hope this review finally awakes the sleeping Rick Wakeman fan that is inside of each one of you.
Lets start with a little history...
The Six Wives of Henry VIII (released in 1973) wasn’t Wakeman’s first LP, as most people think. It is really his second work, after the obscure Piano Vibrations recorded a few years before. It was, however, the album that brought Wakeman’s abilities to the spotlight. The comercially succesful Six Wives... got up to #7 in Billboard international lists, in spite of having no radio airplay due to the lenght of most of the songs. This record would eventually lead the path to the two other epic conceptual albums by Rick Wakeman: Journey to the Centre of the Earth and Myths and Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (whew!).
I dare to say this was the first rock album to take a given concept (in this case, the six spouses to the crazed Tudor king) and transform their history in music. The first album to “tell” the dramatic turns that took these women’s lives after their coronation with sounds (just remember, its ALL instrumental). It was, also, the first recording to have synthetized vocalizations (along with real ones), the first one to have the main musician playing 10 different keyboards and organs at the same time (no editing, they just recorded the whole thing in one sitting and left). At least, one can say that this was a quite daring experiment, that –fortunately– worked.
The six wives are arranged in an unusual way, since they are not in the historical order, except for the first (Catherine of Aragon) and last (Catherine Parr). Why did they put it like this? I’m not really sure, but it seems that it was the only way to make the songs fit in each side of the record.
I’ll give you a “brief” description about each of the wives:
1. Catherine of Aragon: the album’s intro kicks off with dramatic drumming, and aggresive bass riffs that accompany a piano melody with a dark but jazzy feeling to it. After this turbulent start settles down, we are left with a piano solo that leads us into a melancholic albeit accelerated melody that resumes well the sad fate of the first wive: how she was rejected by the King, and her desperate ways to try to gain back a love that never existed (at least from Henry’s side). The climax of this track consists of a series of crescendo of vocalizations that go from quietly weeping to screaming with anger and fear. All this portraits very well the recurrent theme of the song (and of Catherine’s life): enclaustration.
2. Anne of Cleves: although it is the longest of all the tracks, it pretty much goes straightforward (not lots of dramatic changes here). Many people say this is the weakest spot in The Six Wives... but it can be very enjoyable if you are open to the something this bizarre. It has some very violent moments... in fact, one can say the whole track is very aggresive, but when you get to the fourth minute of the song, the drums go really wild and everything starts to fall apart gradually, until the abrupt end. Quite ironical description of Anne of Cleves, the Prussian princess that got to be Henry’s fourth wife. Although she was quite pretty (Hans Holbein’s best known painting is a portrait of her), Henry found her so ugly that he set up the divorce a week after the wedding.
3. Catherine Howard: the only wife that dared to commit adultery has a great depiction of her personality in this song. After a calm piano intro, the drums make their appearance, giving way to an elegant but fun piano tune. After that, there are lots of changes to the song, that goes from sad to happy instantly. And with happy, I am referring to the wonderful electric banjo solo that opens the 3rd minute of the song (possibly representing the nastylittle things she made behind the King’s back)... After she gets caught, judged and sentenced to death, the sad outro starts with drums, violins (synthetized), bells, and piano, and then simplifies to being only a frantic piano in the background that gets slowly overriden by an brass-sounding organ (Catherine’s headless body lying on the floor?).
4. Jane Seymour: I guess if someone had played a church organ like this before Rick Wakeman. This was the only song that wasn’t recorded completely in the studio – the organ parts were recorded separately at St. Giles, and then overdubbed with the parts that feature guitar and drums. Although the quality of sound is not that great due to the rushed production, the organ sounds majestical, almost mystic. Not my favorite track, but it deserves its praise for being so innovative for its time (and I doubt anyone has done something similar since). It was a very brief marriage, but Jane was the only wife to give Henry a male son (his ultimate desire), but she died soon after the child’s baptism. The King considered her a martyr, and thus we get this haunting church organ melody.
5. Anne Boleyn: this song has certain structural similarity to Catherine Howard, as it also changes its mood very abruptly. It has a very jazzy sound, especially at the end of the second minute (the “happy” part of this song). The piano ability and speed of Wakeman has a lot of importance in throughout the song, as most piano solo’s have a feeling of pressure and stalking... same as this woman, whose sharp tongue and wit lead to her demise, despite being Henry’s most loved wife. At minute 5, the hymn The Day Thou Gavest Lord Hath Ended starts, bringing back the same haunting voices from the first track, giving this song an even more tragic ending than Catherine Howard.
6. Catherine Parr: the last wife (and song). This is the most passionate track of all the album, making uo for a great ending. Alan White makes a gret job on the drums (yes, much better than Bill Bruford on Anne Boleyn), which really add a lot of power to this song. After an almost childish “game” with the organ (don’t get me wrong, it sounds awesome), the song goes into a very dramatic part (featuring the novelty synthethized voices), that leads us back to a powerful tune, with RW’s synthetizer and bells. After it settles down, the song dives again into a deep drowsiness (possibly depicting Henry’s death) that includes some overdubbed rain sounds. Fortunately, Catherine Parr’s distinctive melody (the “playful” one) comes back and wanders around for a minute... to get interrupted by a magnificient, powerful and breath-taking grand finale (I have to be redundant, but the drums really give a lot of added spice to this song).
As you can see, the little quantity is made up by the great quality of each of the songs. The production, I admit it, gets very sloppy at some points (especially in the second and fourth tracks), but is very decent overall. The best thing that could happen now, is to have a remake of The Six Wives of Henry VIII... although it isn’t very likely (if interested, visit http://www.rwcc.com for more info).
Just Adding...
Many people compare the top three Wakeman works ( The Six Wives..., King Arthur, and the Journey...), with differing opinions about which one is the best. In my humble opinion, this one has much more merit, since I find it more challenging to make a supreme piece of work like this with a production that is not precisely plush, with no symphony, and with NO editing.
Way less bombastic than its two follow-ups, The Six Wives of Henry VIII is a very unusual yet digestible cd that anyone can (and should) get into. Want something similar to get an idea? Take a listen to Wakeman’s two other albums that I’ve been mentioning throughout all the review, but don’t expect a cleaner sound, since the production to those albums is much better than this. Want some more nice info? Check out the other great review of this album.
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