American Gothic I have heard of this, one of those classic lost albums that come up on lists frequently, but I’ve never actually listened. The first track didn’t make me hopeful though, the vaudevillian theatricality really not to my taste. Love’s Enough on the other hand is actually rather lovely, a tender and affecting piano ballad. Then Ballad of the Ship of State goes back to the musical theatre of the first song and it’s not good at all. One Night Stand then goes back to the style of Love’s Enough and it feels like a genuine 70s singer songwriter lost classic, with a charming melancholic melody. Starting to see a pattern with Oh California! I think someone should revoke his access to a horn section on the theatre numbers, its quite irritating. Another Friday Night, another pleasant ballad after another vaguely irritating musical number. Family Band feels like a secondary school music teacher leading the cast through one of the songs he’s written for the school musical. A bit more listenable than some of the others but still not great. Midnight Carousel Waiting for the Moving Van is another of the very pleasant singer songwriter style ballads, the section with the oboe is particularly nice. More Mr G vibes with Blues for Mr Whitecloud. Montana is the whole album writ large (or small, whichever is right), some lovely melancholic moments combined with some hand fisted musical theatre. I get a lot of Neil Diamond and a lot of Harry Nilsson, but without being as good or as interesting as either. So a bit of an oddity, some really great stuff, but a lot of really not very good stuff too, and I can see why it never found an audience. I guess there is a market for the musical songs but I can see there would be a market for the ballads also, but it falls between the two stools and is a bit of a frustrating listen as a result. 2 👵👴 Playlist submission: One Night Stand