Gentle Giant - Giant in a Box - Live on TV 1974 - Part 1
Gentle Giant - Giant in a Box - Live on TV 1974 - Part 2
Gentle Giant was formed at the tail end of the 1960s by the Shulman brothers—Phil, Derek and Ray, all of whom sang and played multiple instruments—after their previous band, the psych/soul/pop troupe Simon Dupree and the Big Sound, proved marginally successful but artistically unfulfilling.
Between 1970 and 1972, the trio (alongside guitarist Gary Green, keyboardist/vocalist Kerry Minnear and various drummers) issued four immensely distinctive, extraordinary and influential LPs whose standout characteristics—namely, charmingly complex interlocking vocal and instrumental patterns born from wide-ranging influences like folk, classical, jazz, hard rock and more—rubbed off on countless other genre acts over the years. (To name a few: Spock’s Beard, Echolyn, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, The Flower Kings, Beardfish, Sky Architect, and perhaps even Jethro Tull via Songs From the Wood.)
Beyond that, the release of 1972’s Octopus saw the arrival of permanent percussionist John Weathers and the subsequent departure of Phil Shulman (due to various stressors and incompatibilities); naturally, this led to the remaining two brothers and company pushing themselves especially hard to prove how well they could carry on without him. Fortunately, the result—1973’s In a Glass House—exceeded expectations and is considered by many to be their peak up to this point.
That brings us to Gentle Giant’s sixth record, 1974’s The Power and the Glory. It’s their third overt thematic sequence in as many years (after 1972’s Three Friends and the aforementioned In a Glass House). In a 2014 interview with Ultimate Classic Rock, Derek Shulman explains: “The concept for the album was based on the corruption of power and how people on the bottom are affected by the people on top. Money and power will win no matter what and the people that are hoping for the best won’t usually get the best.” (Obviously, then, it has no connection to Graham Greene’s 1940 novel of the same name.)
Pressured by their UK label—Vertigo/WWA—to be more commercial (as was the case with many of their peers at the time), they released an eponymous non-album single—which they despised—to appease them. Ironically, though, it actually foreshadows the direction they’d take on their last two or three outings.
As for The Power and the Glory proper, it’s more or less a perfect melding of the virtuosic, musicianship-for-musicians approach of its predecessors with the increasingly more mainstream and warm sheen that’d truly begin with its follow-up, 1975’s Free Hand (a damn fine effort in its own right, of course). Filled with the sophisticated quirkiness and inventiveness fans have come to expect, The Power and the Glory also leaned closer toward hospitable hard rock than, say, the relatively cold, sparse, and bizarre In a Glass House.
In that same interview, Shulman looks back on the full-length as follows: “A band is born, has a childhood and then goes into adulthood. I think we became an adult on The Power and the Glory. It was . . . the culmination of the best of our musicianship coming together as a band; it was a golden period for the band.” Forty-five years later, it’s hard to disagree. From: https://rockandrollglobe.com/rock/progressive-rock/they-got-the-power-got-the-glory-gentle-giant-in-1974/
Between 1970 and 1972, the trio (alongside guitarist Gary Green, keyboardist/vocalist Kerry Minnear and various drummers) issued four immensely distinctive, extraordinary and influential LPs whose standout characteristics—namely, charmingly complex interlocking vocal and instrumental patterns born from wide-ranging influences like folk, classical, jazz, hard rock and more—rubbed off on countless other genre acts over the years. (To name a few: Spock’s Beard, Echolyn, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, The Flower Kings, Beardfish, Sky Architect, and perhaps even Jethro Tull via Songs From the Wood.)
Beyond that, the release of 1972’s Octopus saw the arrival of permanent percussionist John Weathers and the subsequent departure of Phil Shulman (due to various stressors and incompatibilities); naturally, this led to the remaining two brothers and company pushing themselves especially hard to prove how well they could carry on without him. Fortunately, the result—1973’s In a Glass House—exceeded expectations and is considered by many to be their peak up to this point.
That brings us to Gentle Giant’s sixth record, 1974’s The Power and the Glory. It’s their third overt thematic sequence in as many years (after 1972’s Three Friends and the aforementioned In a Glass House). In a 2014 interview with Ultimate Classic Rock, Derek Shulman explains: “The concept for the album was based on the corruption of power and how people on the bottom are affected by the people on top. Money and power will win no matter what and the people that are hoping for the best won’t usually get the best.” (Obviously, then, it has no connection to Graham Greene’s 1940 novel of the same name.)
Pressured by their UK label—Vertigo/WWA—to be more commercial (as was the case with many of their peers at the time), they released an eponymous non-album single—which they despised—to appease them. Ironically, though, it actually foreshadows the direction they’d take on their last two or three outings.
As for The Power and the Glory proper, it’s more or less a perfect melding of the virtuosic, musicianship-for-musicians approach of its predecessors with the increasingly more mainstream and warm sheen that’d truly begin with its follow-up, 1975’s Free Hand (a damn fine effort in its own right, of course). Filled with the sophisticated quirkiness and inventiveness fans have come to expect, The Power and the Glory also leaned closer toward hospitable hard rock than, say, the relatively cold, sparse, and bizarre In a Glass House.
In that same interview, Shulman looks back on the full-length as follows: “A band is born, has a childhood and then goes into adulthood. I think we became an adult on The Power and the Glory. It was . . . the culmination of the best of our musicianship coming together as a band; it was a golden period for the band.” Forty-five years later, it’s hard to disagree. From: https://rockandrollglobe.com/rock/progressive-rock/they-got-the-power-got-the-glory-gentle-giant-in-1974/
