"Two robots screwing on an elevator ...": Sab's Technical Ecstasy Super Deluxe

[uwe]

This came out recently as a boxed set, four CDs (i) remaster (ii) Steven Wilson remix (iii) Outtakes & Alternatives (iv) live material from the Tech Ecs Tour.



I always had a soft spot for that album (I'm one of those weirdos that prefers everything from Master Of Reality onward to the first two albums) and if you appreciated its strengths like I did, then this new release is a treasure trove for you. The remaster is excellent, but the Steven Wilson remix dwarfs it, you've never heard the intricacies of Geezer's playing like on that recording and what Wilson has done is also bring out the keyboards prevalent on the album (but not very audible on the original mix). Believe it or not: Sabbath with keyboards sounds real good and all mighty, on Dirty Women even a bit like Deep Purple, never a bad thing! 

For some reason, the remix (CD2) cannot be found on YouTube though. But CD3 (also mixed by Steven Wilson) can be found and that contains alternative versions of some songs like you've never heard before. Such as All Moving Parts Stand Still with an early Sabbath style harmonica and a funky clavinet by Gerald Woodruffe (19:06) and She's Gone without the orchestral arrangement but with Ward's drums and Geezer's nifty bass playing plus Woodruffe's mellotron chorale (25:50). "Black Sabbath goes Deep Purple" version of Dirty Women is at 30:49. Très lovely all of it.

[4stringer77]

Good album but have you heard it on weed? It's even better then.

[uwe]

Wrong album!  The weed song was on an earlier one ...



That was actually the first Sabbath song I ever heard. A guy loaned me his Master of Reality tape at school, "listen to this here, heavier than Deep Purple".

He was right. I was actually taken aback a little when I first heard it, like lava coming out of  the speakers in all its raw, unpolished glory. Is this still music I thought? And of course that intro cannabis cough ... 



What can I say, it grew (no pun intended) on me!

[4stringer77]

Sweet leaf pointed out the obvious. I tend to associate everything they did with stoner music. By the time technical ecstasy came out, coke was probably the greater influence. The newer material was a further evolution of their sound which is more admirable than if they never took any chances and let things stagnate. I guess imagining Uwe hanging out listening to Sabbath and bobbing his head with spliff gives me a chuckle.  ;

[uwe]

I was never really averse to cannabis, but I never smoked it a lot either (or even regularly) for the simple reason that I just couldn't! Smoke I mean. I'm a lifelong non-smoker (not because of any health concerns, everyone in my family smoked and if I had wanted to so could I have done anytime and out in the open, but there was no point in doing it then, nothing counterculture or forbidden about it, shucks!), so I can't even inhale a cigarette, much less a joint/spliff without an immediate cough attack. That meant I was stuck with ingesting it via tea, but as you can imagine there are a lot less occasions to join in on that than in smoking. And also: Timewise, the delayed reaction from a cup of tea with cannabis is a lot harder to anticipate, it's much less immediate.

So that is why my drug career never really got off the ground. I would have been forced to learn how to smoke first and for that I didn't like the taste of nicotine enough. Moreover, my weekly allowance was invested to the hilt in buying records!

These days, when someone passes around a joint, I'll try to semi-inhale (as far as I get which is not very far) to be social, but it never really does anything.

My only other drug experiences were two sniffs of coke (at two different occasions) in the early to mid eighties. Other than a numbness to my gums, I felt nothing.

The only things that really give me a  drug-akin high are sex and good music. I do like the taste of alcohol in heavy red wine or an occasional beer with food, but I don't like being drunk, it depresses me. So after two or three glasses I just stop. I marvel how some people can get drunk from that same amount, I don't.

I guess I'm really more the uncool guy. No wonder that rock musician career didn't work out. 

[amptech]

I like Technical Ecstasy, but I have still not forgiven Steven for what he did to 'the lamb lies down on broadway' 

[uwe]

Did he ever do anything to it? Last I heard he said he would not remix it because he was never a Genesis fan in the first place. That is his prerogative - for the same reason he pulled out of the remixes of ELP material, saying the music just didn't speak to him.

If the 2004 remix is your grievance, Genesis boy  , (as it seems to be for most Genesis fans), that was Nick Davis, not Steven Wilson!

I've never heard a Steven Wilson remix that did not do justice to the source material even though I'm a fan of extreme panning and he is not. Whether all his remixes are vital is another matter, but he sees to it that the original mixes are always re-released as well with a new remastering sheen. So you have choice. That didn't happen with the Genesis "Platinum Collection" remixes where the original mixes were not released at the time which has Genesis fans up in arms to this day.

[gearHed289]

Speaking of Wilson, he surprisingly just remixed KISS' Destroyer. I have not heard it, but I do have Destroyer (Resurrected) which was remixed by Ezrin and it sounds fantastic. Great liner notes and the original "brown" album cover too. Anyway... back to robots doin it...

[uwe]

When it comes to the long term sustainable use of one and the same product over and over again, there is no better NGO than Kiss, that 'greenest' of rock bands!



AND I COMMAND YOU TO KNEEL  ... repackage, remaster, remix, reuse and - foremost - rebuy!!!
Needless to say, I've ordered it already  , at least the double CD version, whether I will also go for the - as usual: overpriced - boxed set, thereby enhancing Herr $immon$' pension fund further, remains to be seen. 

PS: Not so surprising at all, I think, Wilson is not just a PROG nerd, he also likes, say, ABBA. However disdainful one might be of KISS, Destroyer as a larger than life Bob Ezrin production piece + music + sleeve art is a rock classic. Rock'n'Roll Over (always a most silly title) sounded like a bunch of demos in contrast.

[gearHed289]

As I'm sure you know, Rock and and Roll Over was their "apology" for the over-production on Destroyer. Recorded "live" in an old theater with Eddie Kramer back at the helm. Actually my favorite studio album of theirs. But yeah, Destroyer was a complete experience, and probably exactly what they needed at the time.

[uwe]

Destroyer was the only time Kiss sounded "refined", even elegant and sleek. Otherwise, Kiss tended to sound a bit brutish and stiff. They lacked the natural groove and flow US bands generally have - think of Grand Funk Railroad or Aerosmith, even Ted Nugent. For me "Rock'n'Roll Over" was too overtly raw/abrasive (and the cover looked cheap!), even though Hard Luck Woman of course sounded great and is also a lovely composition. It's not that I'm against simplistic production jobs - among Kiss' studio albums, 'Dressed to Kill' is another favorite of mine and that album certainly isn't a lavish production.

But like many of Bob Ezrin's more iconic production jobs, Destroyer is essentially a Bob Ezrin album with Kiss playing along. To this day though, I can't find a weak track on it. There are not a lot of other Kiss albums that pass that test.

[Highlander]

... To this day though, I can't find a weak track on it...

For me... Beth...

[uwe]

Beth is gorgeous. Not a power ballad, but just a beautiful ballad. And Peter Criss sang it real well with emotion. Paul Stanley would have overdone it, but Peter was just right.

Being the perennial wimp I am, that track immediately struck a chord with me when I heard Destroyer for the first time. You could tell Ezrin had a hand in it, it could have been an Alice Cooper ballad.

[Highlander]

He sang it on the '76 tour, iirc...
Just not a fave for me...
Again, re Ezrin and Cooper... he'd always done the odd "ballad" here and there, or ballad-ic sections to songs... did it to good effect on the WTMN tour...
Re the original subjex... still got my original tour badges... used to have 2 pairs of them but one is missing...
Sadly, Uwe, I must also admit to switching over to Spurtify when driving... new van has no CD player... technology moves on, once again...