Lucifers Friend Where the Groupies Killed the Blues

Gatot
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR
Honorary Collaborator

Well well well ..... I knew this band from this album long time ago, dated back 1973. It was my brother, Henky, who bought the cassette of this band. Unfortunately, it was put at the B-side of URIAH HEEP's "Demons and Wizards" (Ooops .. it was not an official cassette as at that time we could not afford to buy an original LP. But don't worry, I have an original CD now at my hand, a Repertoire release). Being a B side of URIAH HEEP then I preconceived this band was a URIAH HEEP alike. I was wrong, LUCIFER's FRIEND music is much more complex and proggier.

This one is definitely a PROG album. Every single track in this album is a progressive rock track! In fact, this album has its own identity .If I look the whole content of this album, musically it's an original one. The music is hardly influenced by any band in the world. But of course the rock component is definitely influenced by its predecessors of rock'n'roll pioneers. But musically (composition-wise) this album is original.

Two reasons why I categorize this album as a prog one. First, the music composition has a blend of jazz, rock and blues crafted nicely to form a well structured music. You may notice this through, for example, the opening track "Hobo". The way drum is played at the intro part is not a typical rock drumming at all. When it enters in the body of the music, this track indicates a rock kind of music. It happens in other tracks as well, like "Rose on The Vine", "Mother", "..Where The Groupies .", "Prince of Darkness". There are nice inclusion of strings and brass arrangement by Peter Hecht (the group's keyboard player).

Second, the way vocal part is composed demonstrates the band's intention to challenge traditional singing style. The vocal by John Lawton that sings perfectly in this album does not seem to go along with the music. But interestingly, it even creates a great music. Indeed, it makes this album enjoyable. This is original.

I won't go over track by track as all tracks are wonderful and very rich in terms of composition. I just want to take one track "Mother" as an example. Opened nicely with piano and slow vocal part, the music then flows nicely to more upbeat tempo. The unique thing is on violin sound and orchestration in the middle of the track. It's an excellent composition here and it's a masterpiece! The lyric is rocking as well:

Pull down the blinds and turn on the music You gotta roll off - I'm gonna roll on Turn off your mind and roll to the music I'm gonna go pop before it's begun.

The musicianship of Peter Hesslein (gtr), Peter Hecht (keys), John Lawton (vox), Dieter Horns (bass) and Joachim Rietenbach (drums) are all excellent! Each contributes their part at their fullest, I think.

To conclude this album, it's not an exaggeration to give this album a FIVE STAR. I don't even feel na�ve to give this rating. In fact, I'm ready to take any challenge if any of the readers who have listened to this album thoroughly think this album the other way around. This album is definitely 100% PROG and a MASTERPIECE! BUY IT!

What do you think? - Gatot Widayanto, Indonesia.

This, the second album from classic progg-metal group Lucifer's Friend is even better than their self-titled debut album. This album is more progressive while still maintaining heavy guitar riffs. The second track "Rose On The Wine" is fantastic, it starts of with a beautiful piano intro that evolves and gives way to a heavy guitar riff. This song also has a long acoustic guitar solo in the middle and at the end complex backward riffs and tempo changes, great! It must also be said that even the art cover and the lyrics are very tasteful indeed (something that rarely can be said about classic metal albums) and John Lawton's vocals are strong and beautiful. This album is highly recommended for both 70's metal fans and progg fans. But if you are strictly a prog fan you should perhaps start with the excellent "Banquet" album instead.

This second album is IMHO a bit more un-even than the debut but holds also a few more peaks of brilliance. Apart from the idiotic album name and poor artwork to fit it, the music developed here is a little more adventurous but stays between Wallenstein's first two albums and Uriah Heep

The first two tracks take off where the heaviest ones of the debut album had left off , but they are hardly my favorites. In general the album is representative of early hard rock with solid prog overtones that was so popular during those years! IMHO , Mother and Summerdream (the latter being a thre part suite containing Delerium and No Reason Or Rhyme) are the highlights!

Not really anymore essential than their debut album, it still deserves a few spins in your deck/turntable and if you are into this early hard-prog then this album can be for you!

Lucifer's Friend were an interesting band. They had cut their teeth in the 1960s, made tons of great exploito rock/psych albums before and after they'd formed, and created a uniquely Anglo/Teutonic brand of hard edged progressive rock on this masterpiece. John Lawton has such a great voice.... His ability to go from soothing to absolutely ripping your ears out and back again is astonishing and he and he alone can tackle the maze of mood, time, and bizarre chord changes that are this album. Starting off as a straight forward hard hitting band with a bit of prog and psych on their fantastic self titled debut, for this album Lucifer's Friend went more progressive, more psychedelic, more jazzy, and even heavier. The sound is unique here as it draws from extremely diverse musical styles with everything from jazz to classical to proto metal thrown into the mix. Dieter Horns gets my vote as THE BASS PLAYER, you can spend the whole album just listening to how good he is. Peter Hesslein's sometimes blazing Blackmore sometimes arcane Hackett/Fripp guitar is astonishing as are the songs that he writes. "Rose On The Vine" is a real epic, and a song that leaves you in shock after you hear it even about 8 or 10 times (and I have), but perhaps in progressive terms the highlight here is the Genesis inspired "Mother" which is one of the most complex tracks ever recorded in this era. The lyrics written by John O'Brien Docker remind me of a gone mad Keith Reid who wrote for Procol Harum and was already crazy enough. The title track is proof of this, but it does tell the story of the obnoxious Israeli invasion of Palestine and questions whose Holy Land it really is. The whole song attacks religion, war, and politics, without doing it in a pretentious manner. "Summerdream" has a bombastic string and brass segment written by keyboardist Peter Hecht called "Delirium" before reverting back to the doom ladened yet melodic track. "Prince Of Darkness" and "Hobo" are both scorching rockers with Lawton in top form, Hesslein and the band cooking, and some great harmony work. Queen come to mind often when I play this, as do Uriah Heep and Deep Purple, but I shouldn't be name dropping so much as Lucifer's are a unique band. "Burning Ships" is both beautiful and mind blowing when Lawton goes from his gentlest performance into high pitched raving at the end much like Stonehouse/Asgard. I have to admit this is my favourite era, a time when so much exploration was going on and there was no fear shown by the musicians who made these records. It isn't sad at all, in fact to listen to the bands and artists who took so many gambles and won back then is fun. Lucifer's Friend wouldn't reach the level of this album or the also great first again, but both albums are essential for a collection of not just hard prog rock, but German rock music in general, or rock in general for that matter. Lucifer's Friend hit their peak on this one, and Lawton would go on to make 3 fantastic albums with Uriah Heap. This is a fantastic album, strongly reccommended to anyone with an open mind.

Where The Groupies Killed The Blues is one of the greatest heavy prog records of all time, rivaling Italian masterpieces ala Balletto Do Bronzo's Ys and Cervello's Melos, but often still grounded in a more hard rock sound. This album features some of most amazing musicianship I have ever heard, and I mean all around! From the freak of nature vocals of John Lawton to the amazing guitar work of Peter Hesslein to the extremely original and fantastic keyboard work of Peter Hecht. Toss in Dieter Horns on bass and Joachim Rietenbach on drums and you have a rhythm section that could rival any you're likely to encounter.

Where The Groupies Killed The Blues is almost like a rock opera for experienced rock music listeners. The album has everything from driving hard rock to treated piano with Fripp-like guitar soaring through space to Zeppelin gone Sabbathy riffing to acoustic guitars with mellotrons floating through your brain. Top that off with some songwriting that is sometimes so original that I can only imagine music desisgned as some type of soundtrack to a silent horror movie from the 20s as a comparison and you have an album that is simply incomparable.

Easily in my top twenty albums of all time, and though quite legendary, still criminally underrated based on the fact it really is up there with the very best and most sophistacated stuff that Sabbath and Zeppelin ever did.

Did Lucifer's Friend create Heavy Metal with their debut and Prog Metal with this follow-up?

Lucifer's Friend is a really interesting German/British band based in Germany. They basically created Heavy Metal pretty much simultaneously (and independently?) of the major bands based in Britain like Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Uriah Heep (for which Lucifer's Friend vocalist John Lawton would later sing). And here, already with their second album they go on to a fully progressive approach. Indeed, this album is more sophisticated both musically and lyrically than anything Uriah Heep has ever done. Too bad they remain virtually unknown till this day.

The opening number, Hobo, is great but it is basically a clone of Ride The Sky from the debut. The second and third tracks are nothing short of brilliant, however. The piano intro to Rose On The Vine being particularly excellent as well as the fantastic acoustic guitar solo. The keyboards are very well played and varied. We find lots of piano, organ, electric piano, Moog synthesizer and Mellotron. Some of the piano-heavy passages remind me of early Queen (first two albums). We also find lots of acoustic guitars and even string arrangements. The guitarist is also very skilled and the electric and acoustic guitar solos are often very short and snappy. No long mindless jam sessions here!

The closer Burning Ships should have been a radio Prog Rock classic like Emerson Lake & Palmer's Lucky Man or Kansas' Dust In The Wind. It would have deserved that!

It should be pointed out that John Lawton is a native Brit and there is nothing of that horrible German accent (sorry all Germans! I have my own accent to tackle) in his vocals at all. And his vocals here are terrific - almost like a young Freddie Mercury at times! Also, there is no sign at all of the fact that this band is German; this music has nothing to do with the Krautrock genre. Lucifer's Friend could indeed have been a fully British band judging from the sound (perhaps they should have been a British band in order to get more attention?)

One sad thing, though, is that the sound quality of this album is not very good. It is decent, but not even slightly better than the debut album. Many Prog Rock fans might prefer to start with the album Banquet, but for Metal fans Where The Groupies Killed The Blues is the best and, in my opinion, Lucifer's Friend's masterpiece.

An extremely underrated masterpiece!

I quite liked their debut album (four stars) but this sophomore album is not on par, I 'm afraid.

The opening number is a funky piece of music with little flavor to my taste. Things change with 'Rose in the Vine' who is quite diversified: piano intro, heavy / bluesy part with strong vocals, dynamic but totally loose instrumental sections (almost eclectic and a bit noisy). It is very difficult to get into this track. Very complex indeed.

The same complex mood prevails during the excellent 'Mother'. Some sort of jewel made of symphonic prog (mellotron), powerful vocals, and heavy passages. It sounds as if it was a mini-opera on its own. Brilliant, really.

Keys are extensively used throughout this album (mainly piano), but during the title track there is even sweet and delicate fluting displayed. This is truly a great combination and again some eclectic accents are felt IMHHO. This is the second highlight from this album. Great rhythm changes, solid beat (great drumming by the way) are ingredients which are peppering this excellent track.

The other highlight is the long 'Summerdream'. It is a scary and dark track full of violin, macabre mood and musical maestria. It could have been named 'Summer Nightmare'! There are long instrumental passages, with piano again and some orchestrations as well. Another mini rock opera actually! Not as excellent as 'Mother', but still very good.

Two to three average songs prevent me to rate this album with four stars: 'Hobo', 'Prince Of Darkness' and 'Burning Ships'.

Still, this is quite a good album. Seven out of ten. It really deserves more reviews.

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