Track Listing

1. Walking In The Park
2. Plenty Hard Luck
3. Mandarin
4. Debut
5. Beware The Ideas Of March
6. The Road She Walked Before
7. Backwater Blues
8. Those About To Die
9. I Can't Live Without You
10. A Whiter Spade Than Mayall
11. Walking In The Park
12. Beware The Ideas Of March
13. Plenty Hard Luck
14. Walking In The Park

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1512 in Music
• Released on: 2008-02-26
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks
• Dimensions: .21 pounds
• Running time: 63 minutes

Customer Reviews

Brilliant and timeless...
Featuring some of the best, road-honed musicians from the UK's mid/late 60's R&B scene, Colosseum's first release is one of the most interesting & exciting albums of its era. Why? Well first off it's underpinned throughout by some quite superb playing, including Dick Heckstall-Smith's wonderfully gutsy, brilliantly executed sax breaks, and a series of strong, unforgettable melodies that, on their own, make it a stand-out record. But what elevates it into a different league is the way it takes "standard" British Blues and shakes it up into something very different by incorporating large elements of modern jazz and the emerging progressive rock scene into the formula. Sure there are moments of self-indulgence, in particular on "Beware the Ides of March", but even these somehow fail to intrude on the incredibly powerful drive that just keeps pushing everything along. And on the way this self-evidently enthusiastic, highly ingenious and unfortunately short-lived combination deliver some quite stunning numbers, including the magnificent "Debut", "Walking in the Park", "Plenty Hard Luck", "Backwater Blues" and "The Road She Walked Before".

Brilliant and timeless "Those Who Are About to Die.." is a marvellous example of jazz-rock crashing head-on into the blues to produce an album that remains as effective and enjoyable today as it was all those years ago.

Well worth saluting
This debut album is all you would expect from a band featuring musicians, most of whom had served their apprenticeships with the likes of Graham Bond and John Mayall. Colosseum used this grounding to create a fusion of blues, rock and jazz which was often copied but NEVER bettered.

From the opener, Bond's "Walking in the park" to "Those about to die" which closes the original album Hiseman and co deliver a top quality set which while tight allows individuals room to experiment. Vocals were never to the forefront in early Colosseum music, four instrumentals on this album are, "Mandarin", "Beware the ides of march" and "The road she walked before" and "Those about to die".

The bonus tracks appear to have been lifted from BBC recordings, and with the exception of "I can't live without you" are all alternative versions.

Highly recommended, after all you can't go wrong at this price!

Romans alive!
I personally think this is the cornerstone of prog rock. It did not get much better than this gem! To buy without prejudice!