GLEN CAMPBELL:Southern Nights.Glen his audience who value intelligence see it job of making an album, too, by the way, in Campbell (vocals); instrumental accompani- while not flaunting it at those in his audience case you were wondering. It's Cash in good ment.Southern Nights; This Is Sarah's Song; who fear it. He's a mess of contradictions, form, something unique. There are noLook For Cryin' Out Loud; God Only Knows; Sun- Cash is, and appeals to the damnedest cross- at Them Beansexcesses in this one, just the flower;and five others.CAPITOLSW -11601 section of people. He's figured out how to lay- regular endearing excesses that make Cash $6.98, ® 8X0-11601 $7.98, © 4X0-11601 er his projections of himself so that each im- Cash. N .0 . $7.98. age can be appreciated on various levels. For this Columbia album, "The Last Gunfighter THE CENTRAL PARK SHEIKS: Honeysuckle Performance: Glen grows up Ballad,- he's written some wryly comical lin- Rose. JohnCaruso (bass); Matt Glaser (vi- Recording: Very good er notes, and the songs he wrote and chose in- olin); Bob Hipkens (dobro, trumpet, vocals); Glen Campbell's sixth release for Capitol clude something for just about every facet of Bert Lee (vocals, guitar); Richard Lieberson finds him still singing songs in praise of South- his audience. It's surprising to me how many (vocals, guitar); other musicians.Shipwrecked ern nights, sunflowers, and sexy women who facets I seem to fit into. The title song by Guy Man; I Was Doing All Right; The Prize; Way - love him, leave him, and sometimes practical- Clark,, for instance, can be taken as straight Down Yonder in New Orleans; Stomping at ly drive him to tears. He doesn't really need romantic drivel about cowboys or it can be the Savoy; San Antonio Rose;and six others. to be accompanied by anything more than his taken as black humor-and Cash teases the FLYING FISH026 $6.98. own adroitly self -strummed guitar, but of question a bit further with his album -jacket Performance: Cold course he's surrounded here by gigantic poses. There's a really fine song about his fa- Recording: Very good orchestral arrangements that unfold like the ther,Riding on the Cotton Belt,and there are petals of great plastic orchids in the climaxes all kinds of semi-hokey things and a few rath- Some songs probablycan'tbe done with feel- singers these days seem to think they have to er sophisticated ones. ing, and never could-considerSan Antonio achieve to impress upon us that they're in ex- So it goes. I wouldn't care to get into a po- Rose. Others on this record can be done with cellent form, thank you, and that rumors of ker game with this guy. He's also done a great feeling but aren't, as the Central Park Sheiks decline from the full vigor of their talents are premature if not downright false. Campbell's voice and his once unlined country -boy face have lately lost more than a little of their freshness and open innocence. What he offers now instead is a growing skill at handling the emotional content of a ballad, making even the moist humility of a song like God Only Richard Thompson'Live ! Knows sound more sincere than most country singers are ever able to manage with such contrived glop. And when he lowers his voice singers around, in any style, and Richard's to a hush to handle a less pretentious love 1 guitar work is slashing and innovative. De- song like Guide Me, it is obvious that Glen scribing his style is a bit difficult; the closest I Campbell knows how to transform the cheap can come is to say that he puts me in mind of a raw material of a popular ballad into heartfelt sixteenth -century Jeff Beck-if such a thing is music. It's reassuring. P.K. possible. He has done for English folk music and guitar playing what Roger McGuinn has VALERIE CARTER: Just a Stone's Throw done for their American counterparts-made Away.Valerie Carter (vocals); instrumental it electric, made it contemporary, and then accompaniment.City Lights; Cowboy Angel; used it as a transmission line for a unique, Face of Appalachia; So, So, Happy; Back to personal vision. Blue Some More;and four others. COLUMBIA The back-up band, all graduates of the Fair- PC 34155 $6.98, ® PCA-34155 $7.98. port Convention floating musical crap game, sound as if they've been playing together for Performance:Routine years; they're at least as good in their own Recording: Good way as the superb group Rod Stewart assem- Valerie Carter has a rather "in" air about bled for his first solo LP. The Stewart com- her-folks like Linda Ronstadt fill in as back- parison is actually quite apt; if his album was, ground vocalists while Jackson Browne and as many critics have asserted, the culmination John Sebastian, among other musicians, make of the British blues school, then this is cer- up the orchestra-but her album is thin, rou- tainly the English folk-rock equivalent in tine stuff. Faceof Appalachiais stylishly terms of both emotional impact and maturity. mournful, depleted -sounding, and very, very If you buy no other album this year, this is Tasteful. Things get a lot better inSo, So, the one you should invest in; it's as close to a Happy,in which she really swings out, but masterpiece as anything you'll ever have in then it's right back to sensitive murmurs in RICHARD THOMPSONLIVE! (MOM or your collection. And if you think that's mere CowboyAngel. Valerie Carter is one of those Less)" isthelong-awaitedUnited hyperbole, then you're going to be pleasantly girls whose friends seem a lot more interest- release of Richard and Linda Thompson's "I surprised. -Steve Simels ing than she does. P.R. Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight," one of the greatest pieces of recorded music since RICHARD THOMPSON:Richard Thompson . oh, the Crusades, at the very least. It isLive! (More or Less). Richard Thompson (gui- RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT padded out with some studio out -takes and tarand vocals); Linda Thompson (vocals); JOHNNY CASH: The Last Gunfighter Ballad. one complete side of live stuff (all quite com-Timi Donald (drums); Pat Donaldson (bass); Johnny Cash (vocals, guitar); instrumental ac- pelling), so if you're a Thompson fan salivat- other musicians. When .I Getto the Border; companiment.I Will Dance with You; The ing at the prospect of two solid discs of him Calvary Cross (two versions); Withered and Last Gunfighter Ballad; Far Side Banks of live, be advised that the "more or less" partDied; I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight; Jordan; Ridin' on the Cotton Belt; Give It of the title is accurate. Down Where the Drunkards Roll; We'll Sing Away; You're So Close to Me; City Jail; "Bright Lights," released in the U.K. inHallelujah; Has He Got a Friend for Me; The Cindy, I Love You; Ballad of Barbara; That 1974, is one of the finest things to come out of Little Beggar Girl; The End of the Rainbow; Silver -Haired Daddy of Mine. COLUMBIA the British folk movement, an honest excur- The Great Valerio; The Ballad of Easy Rider; PC -34314$6.98, ® CA -34314 $6.98, 0 sion into the depths of a tormented soul, Poor Will and the Jolly Hangman; A Heart CT -34314 $6.98. couched in some of the most beautifully tex- Needs a Home; The Dark End of the Street; tured,melodicallyrich,andexquisitely The Pitfall/The Excursion; Flee as a Bird: Performance: On target played rock-and-roll you will ever be privi- Night Comes In. ISLAND9421 two discs $7.9g, Recording: Very good leged to hear. Linda is one of the most moving ®Y81 9421 $7.98, ZC1 9421 $7.98. Talk about native intelligence. John R. Cash not only has it but knows how to let those in JUNE1977 95.