Airborne | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | 1976 | |||
Recorded | Spring 1976 | |||
Studio | Trident Studios (London) | |||
Genre | Progressive rock, folk rock | |||
Length | 39:40 | |||
Label | BTM | |||
Producer | Dennis MacKay, Curved Air | |||
Curved Air chronology | ||||
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Airborne is the sixth studio album by Curved Air and was recorded in 1976. Like their last few releases, it was not a significant commercial success. After a follow-up non-album single, "Baby Please Don't Go" b/w "Broken Lady", the group disbanded. Drummer Stewart Copeland went on to form The Police, while violinist Darryl Way and lead singer Sonja Kristina both pursued solo careers. Bassist Tony Reeves and guitarist Mick Jacques both later became members of the semiprofessional band Big Chief.
The Police covered "Kids to Blame" in early performances, using a stripped-down punk arrangement of the song. Stewart Copeland also reused a guitar riff from "Desiree" in his solo single as Klark Kent, "Don't Care".
The album sessions marked the debut of Stewart Copeland as a songwriter. Around the release of Midnight Wire , he was informed about publishing royalties for songwriters, and responded by churning out compositions until the band accepted a few of his contributions. [1]
Producer Dennis McKay quit the project midway through recording, leaving the remaining four tracks to be produced by Curved Air themselves.
Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
Allmusic | [2] |
Allmusic described Airborne as an overlooked record and "a strong summation of all that made the group so important in the first place." While appraising the album as a whole as weaker than their first three, claiming it veers towards generic 1970s rock, they regarded "Desiree" and "Heaven (Never Seemed So Far Away)" as equal to anything on the band's strongest releases. [2]
Music and lyrics credits per original issue on BTM records.
No. | Title | Lyrics | Music | Length |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. | "Desiree" | Stewart Copeland, Sonja Kristina | Mick Jacques, Stewart Copeland | 3:12 |
2. | "Kids to Blame" | Norma Tager | Copeland | 3:19 |
3. | "Broken Lady" | Kristina | Tony Reeves | 3:13 |
4. | "Juno" | Darryl Way | Darryl Way | 3:23 |
5. | "Touch of Tequila" | Kristina | Jacques, Reeves | 3:49 |
No. | Title | Lyrics | Music | Length |
---|---|---|---|---|
6. | "Moonshine" | Way | Way | 11:36 |
7. | "Heaven (Never Seemed So Far Away)" | Copeland, Stuart Lyons | Copeland | 3:18 |
8. | "Hot and Bothered" | Tager | Jacques | 2:53 |
9. | "Dazed" | Way | Way | 4:17 |
No. | Title | Lyrics | Music | Length |
---|---|---|---|---|
10. | "Baby Please Don't Go" | Big Joe Williams | Big Joe Williams | 2:31 |
Stewart Armstrong Copeland is an American musician and composer. He is best known for his work as the drummer of the English rock band the Police from 1977 to 1986, and again from 2007 to 2008. Before playing with the Police, he played drums with English rock band Curved Air from 1975 to 1976. As a composer, his work includes the films Wall Street (1987), Men At Work (1990), Good Burger (1997), and We Are Your Friends (2015); the television shows The Equalizer (1985–1989), The Amanda Show (1999–2002), and Dead Like Me (2003–2004); and video games such as the Spyro series (1998–present) and Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare (2001). He has also written various pieces of ballet, opera, and orchestral music.
Curved Air are an English progressive rock group formed in 1970 by musicians from mixed artistic backgrounds, including classical, folk and electronic sound. The resulting sound of the band is a mixture of progressive rock, folk rock, and fusion with classical elements. Curved Air released eight studio albums, the first three of which broke into the Top 20 in the UK Albums Chart, and had a hit single with "Back Street Luv" (1971) which reached number 4 in the UK Singles Chart.
Anthony Francis Keigwin Monkman was an English rock, classical and film score composer, and a founding member of both the progressive rock band Curved Air and the classical/rock fusion band Sky. He was the son of Kenneth Monkman, an authority on the writer Laurence Sterne and Vita née Duncombe Mann.
Sonja Kristina is an English singer and songwriter, best known for starring in the original London production of the seminal 1960s musical Hair, and for being the lead vocalist of the 1970s progressive rock band Curved Air.
Greenslade were an English progressive rock band, formed in the autumn of 1972 by keyboard player Dave Greenslade and bassist Tony Reeves, with keyboardist Dave Lawson and drummer Andrew McCulloch.
Richard Darryl Way is an English rock and classical musician who was a founding member of Curved Air and co-writer of their Progressive Rock seminal albums from 1970 to 1976. He is best known as a violinist although he also plays keyboards.
Phantasmagoria is the third studio album by Curved Air. Released in 1972, it reached No. 20 in the UK Charts and is notable for its early use of the EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer to process lead singer Sonja Kristina's voice on the second side. Unavailable for many years, the album was reissued on CD in April 2007.
Air Conditioning is the debut studio album by English progressive rock band Curved Air. It was released in November 1970 and reached number 8 in the UK albums chart in December 1970.
Second Album is the second studio album by English progressive rock band Curved Air, released in 1971. It reached No. 11 in the UK Charts on 9 October 1971, and "Back Street Luv" became a UK No. 4 chart hit on 7 August 1971.
Vampires Stole My Lunch Money is a 1978 album by the UK underground artist Mick Farren.
Curved Air – Live was the first official live album by the British progressive rock band Curved Air. It was recorded on the band's reunion tour in December 1974 and released in 1975. Though it failed to enter the charts, it made enough profit to pay off the tax bill which had compelled Curved Air to reunite, allowing Francis Monkman and Florian Pilkington-Miksa to again leave the group.
Air Cut is the fourth studio album by Curved Air and was recorded in 1973, following the departure of three of the band's founding members. Only Sonja Kristina and Mike Wedgwood remained in the band from their previous album and Air Cut took them in a more rock-oriented direction.
Midnight Wire is the fifth studio album by Curved Air and was recorded in 1975. It marked another line-up change in the band, with Darryl Way and Sonja Kristina recruiting new musicians after the end of the reunion tour marked by the Curved Air - Live album. Kristina's friend Norma Tager, who had helped design the costumes she wore on stage from Curved Air's reunion in 1974 to their breakup in 1976, contributed all the lyrics to the songs.
Lovechild is a studio album credited to progressive rock band Curved Air, though only half the tracks are actually performed by the group. The album consists of previously unreleased demos overseen by Clifford Adams in the early 1970s: one by John O'Hara, two by Eddie Jobson, one by Kirby Gregory, and four by Curved Air. Vocalist Sonja Kristina explained the album's origin:
Now that album was total piracy. Those were demo tapes I made for Warner Brothers, who had suddenly realized that I was the only original member — that it wasn't really Curved Air as it had been before. So Clifford Davis presented the tapes to Warners[sic] who decided for various reasons that they weren't going to continue with the contract.
Anthony Reeves is an English bass guitarist/contrabassist, noted for his "distinctive and complex bass sound" and use of electronic effects.
Live at the BBC is a compilation live album of the British progressive rock band Curved Air from sessions on:
Alive, 1990 is a recording from the Curved Air reunion concert 23 September 1990. The lineup reunited Sonja Kristina, Francis Monkman, Florian Pilkington-Miksa and Darryl Way, sixteen years after the last time all four of them played together.
"Back Street Luv" is a song by British rock band Curved Air, written by band members Ian Eyre, Sonja Kristina and Darryl Way. It was included on the Second Album and released as a single in July 1971 by Warner Bros. Records. It reached number 4 in the UK Singles Chart on 18 September. Warners also released it as a single in the Netherlands, Germany, France and Portugal. In 1975 a live version appeared on Curved Air – Live and was released as a single in the UK by Deram, but it failed to make any commercial impact.
North Star is the seventh studio album by Curved Air and was released on 17 March 2014. It was the first studio album of mostly new material since the band reformed in 2008, following 2008's Reborn, 2010's Retrospective and 2012's Live Atmosphere.
Robert Sargeant was a British musician and record producer.