buffoonery's Full Review: Illusions on a Double Dimple by Triumvirat
Triumvirat was a much-beloved (at least in some quarters, like my bedroom) German progressive rock band of the early 1970's. Best known in the U.S. as an Emerson, Lake and Palmer look-alike group (many would say rip-off), Triumvirat released half-dozen or so albums of varying success. Under review here is one of their better albums, 1974's Illusions on a Double Dimple, which is a solid prog rock effort, as prog rock efforts go. (They are best known for 1975's concept album Spartacus<a>, which is a masterpiece of sorts.)
Not surprisingly given the name Triumvirat*, the band was composed of three members (a fourth left during the recording of Illusions). Jurgen Fritz was the guts of the band, playing a wide array of keyboard as well as backing vocals. Helmut Kollen was the bassist, guitarist and lead vocalist. (Kollen would later tragically tie of carbon monoxide poisoning in his garage.) Hans Bethelt was the Carl Palmer imitator on percussion. As with most prog rock bands, these were three talented musicians, at least technically. In other words, they were like lots of other guys with classical training who were wont to play lots of notes really fast and hit every one just right because they were better than you, dammit! Not surprisingly, they gravitated toward a genre that would appreciate their talents so they could impress all the gearheads who would beat them up.
They started out as a bar band in Cologne playing Nice covers (The Nice was Keith Emerson's first band, playing bits such as a revved up version of one of the Bach Brandenburg's and a psycho rendition of Leonard Bernstein's America. On a lark, they sent a demo to EMI records, and zounds!!! landed a contract that led to their debut album, Mediterranean Tales, a mildly entertaining keyboard pastiche. The album sold well enough to induce EMI to record this sophomore effort.
Prog rockers are nothing if not grandiose, and the first side of Illusions (the "Double Dimple" side, which, if you didn't know it, is a drink) is alternately grandiose faux classical music, alternately jazzy rock tunes wrapped around a loose concept about some half-failure who loses his job. Lots of synthesizers, drum rolls, back-round chick singers and even an appearance by the local symphony orchestra. If you like ELP's excellent Trilogy<a>, you'll feel right at home here. It's pretty entertaining prog rock.
The flip side is more of a pastiche entitled "Mr. Ten Percent", apparently about a greedy agent. For those of you who think that ELP is only tangentially related to these guys, there's a song called Lucky Girl. Case closed. The material is tangentially weaker than the first side but it's at least tolerable.
One thing about the album is the engineering. The whole thing sounds as if someone turned down the highs and removed all the reverb. The drums in particularly sound distant and rather flat. The improvement in sound on Spartacus is quite striking.
At any rate, the boys had enough ideas to keep their career going. A guy at Capitol records heard the album, liked what he heard, and before you know it Triumvirat was opening for Fleetwood Mac (pre-Stevie Nicks) and getting released in the U.S. The much stronger Spartacus would follow in 1975.
As you might expect, I was a big fan of these guys as a high school junior and clearly remember the advertisements for Illusions on Chicago's WXRT radio station, back when it was adventurous and weren't playing boring "adult" rock like the 1974 equivalent of Sheryl Crow or Dave Matthews. Everybody else was listening to Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd and Aerosmith and I was listening to Triumvirat and King Crimson. Yeah, I didn't have much of a social life.
Bottom line, Illusions on a Double Dimple is a pretty good exemplar of mid-1970s keyboard progressive rock. Men of a certain age who dug ELP and Yes and Jethro Tull will be find themselves happily skipping down memory lane, playing fake keyboards and drums and having a ball, especially on the terrific first side. Everybody else will find themselves reaching for the Vicodin bottle.
Four stars, just because they make me feel young again. A side ILLUSIONS ON A DOUBLE DIMPLE FLASHBACK (Fritz - Bathelt) :54 SCHOOLDAYS (Fritz- Bathelt) 3:20 TRIANGLE (Fritz) 6:55 ILLUSIONS (Fritz - Bathelt) 1:40 DIMPLICITY (Fritz - Bathelt) 5:28 LAST DANCE (Fritz) 4:42 B side MISTER TEN PERCENT MAZE (Fritz) 3:01 DAWNING (Fritz) 1:01 BAD DEAL (Fritz - Bathelt) 1:40 ROUNDABOUT (Fritz) 5:49 LUCKY GIRL (Köllen - Bathelt) 4:32 MILLION DOLLARS (Fritz - Bathelt) 5:19 * Latin for "three men". Classicists will recall the first Triumvirat was composed of Pompey, Marcus Crassus, and Julius Caesar. Ten bonus points to those who recall were in the second Triumvirat.
Recommended:
Yes
Great Music to Play While: Getting ready to go out
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