Hawkwind

• Quark, Strangeness and Charm [Sire, 1976] B+

Consumer Guide Reviews:

Quark, Strangeness and Charm [Sire, 1976]
In the old days, this likable British band played more benefits than Joan Baez and helped give psychedelic rock its bad name--when you repeat three chords in 4/4 for forty-five minutes, it's politic to change riffs once in a while. Yet they're still around, and good for them. Here they manage to spread six songs over eight cuts--a trick accomplished by granting two rather ponderous jams names and numbers of their own--as well as introducing more substantial innovations: for every song there's a good new riff, and by now the old sci-fi/counterculture themes mean something, probably because lyricist Robert Calvert has gained wit and wisdom since the time of zonk. Irresistible: the title cut, which suggests that Einstein had trouble with girls because he didn't dig subatomic physics. B+

Further Notes:

Everything Rocks and Nothing Ever Dies [1990s]