The long-awaited remastering of the
Peter Hammill/
Van Der Graaf Generator catalog got off to a powerful start, almost overloading the team's earliest albums with spicy bonus tracks, unreleased gems, and unimagined treasures. Unfortunately, fans' expectations might have been overloaded as well.
Chameleon in the Shadow of the Night,
Hammill's second solo album, still stands among his most archetypal collections, with the schizophrenic duel between his most tender instincts and the apocalyptic trauma that was the best of
Van Der Graaf. And this remastering polishes all of that to its very greatest advantage before exploding across the album's finale, the epic twinning of "(In The) Black Room"/"The Tower."
Hammill's liner notes remind us that, had
VDGG not split up following their most recent tour, this number would have made it onto their next album, and his solo version adheres closely to the band's own prototype. The wide open spaces opened up in the remastering, however, bring new dimensions to the listening experience, and the few seconds respite between the medley's close and the first of the bonus tracks come as a welcome relief. Ah, yes. The bonus tracks. Things get off to a fine start with the previously unissued "Rain 3AM," recorded by
Hammill and
Hugh Banton around the same time as (but not necessarily for)
Chameleon. But two further cuts, reprises of the album's "Easy to Slip Away" and "In the End," are horribly out of time and place -- solo recordings, taken from a Kansas City concert five long years later. The performances themselves are exquisite (as is the rest of the concert they were excised from). But how much more exquisite would it have been, to be given bonus tracks that reflect on the album itself? ~ Dave Thompson