As Your Mind Flies By

about this album

The legendary Charisma label's first signing was a Rare Bird indeed, a progressive rock band without a guitarist in sight. The quartet's 1970 debut eponymous album launched the label, while "Sympathy" gave it its first hit. As Your Mind Flies By soared into the shops later that year, sadly the original lineup's swan song. Boasting the rhythm section of lead singer/bassist Steve Gould and drummer Mark Ashton, and keyboardists Dave Kaffinetti and Graham Field on electric piano and organ, the group was far removed from the showboating likes of Yes and ELP. Obviously, however, the group were keyboard driven, and boasting a surprising diversity of sound and style. The gentle, dreamy "Down on the Floor," for instance, is offered up in Baroque fashion, with the keyboards imitating harpsichords. In contrast, the triumphant "Hammerhead" was a heavy hitting hard rocker, interlaced with airy flute passages and what sounds like, but isn't, wah-wah and soaring guitar solos. In places, "I'm Thinking" was almost pop-flecked, and slips around a number of styles, all of which perfectly dovetail Gould's blues belting vocals. The opening "What You Want to Know" even boasts a riff ripped straight from "Sympathy from the Devil," another power-packed bluesy number with a difference. But it was the epic, side-length "Flight" that really sent Rare Bird soaring. Here the band showcased its distinctiveness, as the almost-20-minute song courses along Gould and Ashton's driving rhythm. Divided into four

tracks

more from Rare Bird

Sympathy

Rare Bird

Epic Forest

Born Again

Late Night Tales: Röyksopp

Somebody's Watching