Review:

on 2011-02-20 CharlesMartel Said:

Packed with excellent musicians, Bad Company had the potential to be a great band. That they never lived up to that potential is, in my view, largely down to the fact that they took their particular brand of blues rock in a direction which had already been trodden by the greatest exponents of the genre. Bad Company thought they could out-Zeppelin Led Zeppelin. There was no need to try and no point either. Led Zeppelin were in a class of their own and Bad Company ultimately faded from view because they did not set themselves out to differ from Led Zeppelin significantly enough in terms of what they offered. It all ended up as if it was a simple copy of someone else but without the same degree of talent. Such a climb down from the days when two of the members were in Free.

It all went so well to begin with. This album was pure blues rock, recorded almost in a live setting in the studio. It has a raw feel, yet that rawness is what makes it interesting and different from most of what was emerging onto the music scene at the time. Just as the prog rockers started over-producing their albums to the point where you doubted they could ever re-create the sound live, along came Bad Company with this stripped down, no nonsense version of rock and roll. There was no question as to which one I preferred.

The result however was not necessarily one which might have been anticipated given the quality of musicians on display. Paul Rodgers' powerful yet sympathetic rock voice really missed the input of Paul Kossoff at this point. Mick Ralphs, however technically good he might have been, simply was not on the same playing field. Anyone hoping for some prog rock influence to be brought into the band by bassist Boz Burrell formerly of King Crimson would have been sadly mistaken.

If truth be told, there were only two truly good tracks on the album, "Can't Get Enough" and "Seagull". Everything else just sounded like someone else had done it before. It would not seem strange therefore that the classic rock staple, "Can't Get Enough", should have been penned by Ralphs whose work was not noted for its flair. Ironically, these were the first track on the first side and the last track on the second side, neatly sandwiching all the fillers in the middle.

And fillers they surely were. "Ready For Love" is another Mick Ralphs composition and had formerly been recorded by Mott the Hoople (from whence Ralphs sprang). The title track is a slowish, bluesy cowboy-riding-into-town sort of number which is neither as interesting or as original as that description sounds. The rest are neither particularly good nor bad and don't really take up much of your time as they pass you by.

Sadly, the interesting semi-live recording style adopted on this album was one Bad Company never stuck with. As a result, they tailed off pretty quickly. Their second album was, in many ways better, but was overproduced by comparison. However, in their eight-album or so career, the band set out to follow in Led Zeppelin's footsteps, metaphorically as well as literally. They trod the same stadia and the same classic rock radio stations. By the time their third album, which marked something of a departure from the formula, was released, they had gone as far as they were going to in terms of the market they had aimed for. In the end, Bad Company ran out of ideas about the same time I ran out of patience with them. Bad Company were one of the great could-have-been's of rock. That they never were was entirely down to their own failings.
Rating: 6/10