Back in the early Eighties Rog Patterson went to Nottingham University to study Philosophy, and as luck would have it he soon made the acquaintance of a large hairy person by the name of Greg Smith, a fellow twelve-string player and Ant Phillips fan. They were finally convinced to
leave the halls of residency and play some proper gigs, and made their live debut in a church hall in Billericay, as Twice Bitten. The ensuing sequence of lucky breaks saw them playing their fourth gig in front of a thousand people, supporting Roy Harper; and their fifth, seventh and eighth at the Marquee in London. Although they were playing acoustic twelve strings with nary a keyboard between them they were soon accepted into the then-thriving progressive rock scene, supporting Twelfth Night, Solstice, Pendragon and others. They released some cassettes, played numerous gigs with Haze, but by 1986 enough was enough. (If you haven’t heard any of their music then you should seek out ‘Late Cut’, which was released on Bad Elephant last year).
Rog decided to keep performing as a solo artist, touring and playing in other bands as well, and even released some material. Of course, by being on tour so much it made sense that he became involved in the other side of proceedings, so in 1988 was asked to join Pendragon’s crew, as a favour, for one gig: he soon became tour manager and sound engineer, as he didn’t have enough to do. He released this album in 1989, and was soon on the road again, in Britain, Holland, France and Germany supporting Pendragon. I first met Rog in 1994, as somehow, he had got himself involved with Mark Colton and his new band Credo. By this time, he had almost given up on ever recording another solo album, as now he had a strong reputation as sound engineer and tour manager for bands such as Murder Inc., L7, Lawnmower Deth, Mordred, and Rage Against The Machine. But, he was still incredibly pleased and proud of his album and gave me a copy, which I still have, to this day. So, some twenty-eight years after it was released, and some twenty-three years since I first heard it, yet again I am reviewing the album, which has just been reissued by Bad Elephant on CD.
The album features just Rog on mostly acoustic guitar, and conjures up thoughts of Ian Anderson, Roy Harper and Jay Turner. Some people think that an acoustic guitar means no power or vitality, but they ought to listen to Rog belt his way through “Ergo Sum”. A twelve-string guitar has never suffered so much punishment. He is an outstanding guitarist and can play in many styles, so “Ergo Sum” manages to convey many different passions and emotions, just with different styles of playing. Double tracking enables him to harmonise vocals with himself on “Party Piece” to good effect, and this is an incredibly impressive piece, although part of the music was “borrowed” from Jethro Tull’s “Up To Me”. I bumped into Rog at a gig not long after I had written the original review and sent it to him, and I was more than a little nervous about what he would say regarding that comment. But, he told me that I had it bang to rights as he had been playing Tull while searching for inspiration one night and it just happened! What was originally the second side of the album featured just two songs, “Conclusion” and the title cut. The latter is more than twelve minutes long, and is lyrically the strongest, as Rog opens himself up for examination.
But wait, there’s more! To quote Rog himself: “In a last-ditch attempt to avoid recording my ‘new’ solo album, I have somehow persuaded those fine but rather silly folk at Bad Elephant Music to release the old one again, including demo versions of three tracks which would have been on the next album had I ever got around to recording it. That’s still imminent, though as ’30 years late’ is intrinsically funnier than ’28 years late’, I wouldn’t hold your breath.” So, we have three additional numbers, “Alien”, “Couldn’t Happen Here” and “The Name of the Rose”, which feel both slightly drier and more polished than the rest of the album. But, they fit in well with the overall feel of this album, and it will be interesting to hear what they sound like if they appear on the new one! Although Rog and I haven’t met up for probably fifteen years or so, we have been in email contact quite a bit recently, and he tells me that it is possible that we could be having a pint together in NZ next year talking about the new CD. I do hope that is the case as a) it will be great to meet up with him again after all this time and b) it has been far too long since he last released any music, let alone a solo album. If he does release a second, then it will have taken even more time than it did Credo, and that’s saying something. I love this album, have done so for many years, and I urge all fans of Antony Phillips and Roy Harper to seek this out at once, if not sooner.
