Track Listing

1. Genesis
2. Everybody's Next One
3. Knocking Nails In My House
4. Roach Daddy
5. Ain't Got No Heart
6. Pity The Mother
7. Mad Dog Cole
8. Fly Me High
9. If This World Were Mine
10. Martha
11. Born To Be Wild
12. Journey To The Centre Of Your Mind
13. Raven
14. See Us Here
15. Dapple Rose
16. Could I
17. One Way Hotel
18. Shape Of Things To Come
19. Know Who You Are
20. I Remember
21. Pouk Hill
22. Angelina
23. Dirty Joker
24. Sweet Box
25. Wild Winds Are Blowing
26. Get Down And Get With It

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #24422 in Music
• Released on: 2006-08-21
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Extra tracks, Original recording remastered
• Dimensions: .25 pounds

Customer Reviews

Casual Listeners beware...
Dont get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with this release, its a competent well put together album with good playing all round.

However this release has "ENTHUSIASTS ONLY" pompoms waving on all sides. This is Slade at their earliest, and it is obvious to the listener that there was a great deal of experimentation going on during recording, as if the band were still trying to define their own personal style. There is none of the lighthearted stomp along pop rock that most people associate with slade (apart from the bonus tracks "Get Down And Get With It" and "Wild Winds Are Blowing".)

Much of the material on the disc isn't origionally slade's either (13 out of 26 of the songs were written by the band... although this does give an interesting take on some songs we all know and love, John Lennons "Martha my dear" for example)

However for the enthusiastic Slade fan (Like Myself) this compilation is an interesting insight into very early slade. Showing how the band developed from humble "beginings" (hahaha... not really funny is it...) to monsters of the 70's charts. As you listen through the albums you can hear their sound improving (its particulary cool to hear Noddy's singing develope from a rather restrained style to that sandpaper and napalm rasp we all know and love)

It also comes with a 10 page booklet with an arsenal of pictures and facts about early Slade.

In Conclusion

Casual listeners... Dont bother get one of the many greatest hits compilations

Fans... go for it!

In the beginning...........
The album (two albums plus bonus tracks on one CD) is attractively packaged in a glossy slipcase featuring both original album covers on the front. Inside is the CD with a 12 page booklet (like the others reviewed on this site) featuring many unseen Gered Mankowitz portaits of the group from the period, along with a good number of contemporary singles sleeves. The informative sleeve notes covering the Slade story at this point are written by Dave Ling, who is no stranger to Slade.

Comments from the band members cheerfully recount what was going on at the time. The CD label features the portrait photo from the rear of the 'Beginnings' album.

'Beginnings':

Listening to this, the first in the series of the reissues, the difference in sound quality from the Polydor remaster (performed by Jim Lea) is quite noticeable. The sound on the opening song 'Genesis' is certainly very 'live' by comparison. An 'A/B comparison' between this disc and the Polydor version show a marked improvement to the overall sound.... something I wouldn't have believed possible, given the age of the master tapes and the possibility of not being able to actually remix the sound. It's louder and cleaner. The difference is immediately noticeable.

The best way to hear a recording is always at a decent volume through the huge studio speakers when the track has just been mixed. Tim Turan has done a miraculous job in upgrading the end result, so that you get closer to that unique experience.

'Knocking Nails Into My House' just sounds ferocious - a young band with brilliant players let loose in a studio, having a great time and letting rip. The treble is sharpened, giving Noddy Holder's impossibly powerful voice that extra edge and Jim's plummy-sounding Gibson EB3 bass throbs away wonderfully, clear as a bell. Dave's guitar and Don's drums have far more attack than we've heard before. Their version is very faithful to the quite rare and scarcely-heard original by Jeff Lynne's band, The Idle Race.

'Pity the mother' now sounds like the listener is in the room with the band. 'Mad dog Cole' just thumps its way out of the speakers, in a way it hasn't before. The album now sounds far more like a SLADE album, bursting with energy. Tim Turan must have had fun re-mastering this one. 'If this world were mine' - a really soulful moment for Ambrose Slade, is cleaned up significantly and the subtlety and quality of the band's playing comes through loud and clear.

A cleaner, clearer recording always makes for a more lively sound and the remaining tracks sound quite sprightly and less 'dated' than they normally would on an album recorded in 1969. A special mention has to be made of how Don's snare drum on 'Martha My Dear' cracks away like never before.


'Play it loud':

'Play it loud' was the first album recorded as Slade and the first recorded with Chas Chadler at the helm. The production values were much improved on those at the stage of the 'Beginnings album' and the remastering enhances the good work that had gone before. All the tracks sound louder, crisper and cleaner. Drums and percussion come through far more positively than before. You can pick out Don keeping time by clicking sticks together. I hadn't ever noticed that since I picked the original vinyl album up. Handclaps 'crack' rather than 'slap'. cool.

The intricacy of the band's playing is again far more audible. The loud bits are loud, the quiet bits are quieter. Everything seems to have 'more room to breathe'. It's just better than I've heard it before.

The two bonus tracks, 'Wild winds are blowing' and 'Get down and get with it' round off the first in the set of reissues and 'Get down and get with it' in particular leaps out of the speakers and grabs you by the ears and thumps them hard. Hype? No.

I was amazed by what Tim Turan has done to the first album, but nothing on the CD benefits more than this particular track. I have never been that keen on the studio (single) version as it was lacking in comparison to the live version. There is so much energy and presence to the remastered version that I am just astonished.

Slade at their weirdest and arguably their best
We have two completely different Slades here: as Ambrose Slade they are the hippy-ish, pre-Chas Chandler sixties group. Noddy sings out of tune on occasion. But all is forgiven: the songs ooze a special energy that eventually got transformed into the boot stomping Slade of the '70's. Although Beginnings is no classic, it is worth buying just for the novelty of hearing Slade cover The Beatles.

Q magazine once described Slade as the missing link between The Beatles and Oasis. In my opinion, the Beatles were just the warm up act to Slade, and Oasis were the drunks who hung around after the gig.

This is proved by the second offering on this two-album CD, Slade's first proper LP: Play it Loud. Just typing the title sends shivers down my backbone. What an album. Songs like Dapple Rose, about an old retired race-horse, might be sentimental and a bit strange, but Slade managed to get away with their former hippy-ness because the melodies and arrangements are so good. The songs are short and to the point. Three minute classics, the early seventies equivalent of The Ramones.

Slade always have been a no-nonsense, good time band. Music for pleasure. These two albums are at once interesting for Slade fans and awesome for everybody else.