Initially released in 2007, Nomad Poets was recorded three years before at, respectively, Worpswede’s Music Halle and Hamburg’s Rock & Blues Im Park. These were shows on English rockers Spooky Tooth’s reunion tour of Europe, when the band featured original dual/duelling vocalist-keyboardists Gary Wright and Mike Harrison, and drummer Mike Kellie alongside new members Joey Albrecht (guitar, backing vocals) and Michael “Bexi” Becker (bass, backing vocals). Out of print for several years, the reissue of this two-disc affair now comprises an audio disc that features 10 tracks relying heavily on material from the band’s classic 1969 album, Spooky Two, and also a DVD film of the same performances. The latter also contains footage of Gary Wright recorded live in San Diego, California, back in 1976 performing Love Is Alive and Are You Weepin’, plus an interview with Wright and a slide show of Spooky photos.
Completing the package is a booklet that includes new liner notes. Which “just” leaves the music by one of the few prog – or quasi-prog, anyway – outfits to be fronted by two singing keyboard players (see also Procol Harum and Supertramp). Much of Spooky Tooth’s prog reputation rests on the fact that in 1969 they recorded an album, Ceremony, with musique concrète pioneer Pierre Henry, but really, there is little actual prog here. Blues rock steeped in the late-60s/early-70s progressive boom, yes, but there is little in the way of virtuoso technoflash, fiddly curlicues
or complex tempo shifts. Sunshine Help Me finds the missing link between Cream and Humble Pie, the band that Spooky Tooth member Greg Ridley left to form. The Wrong Time is blue-eyed funk with rasping vocals – not
quite the full Marriott but hoarse enough. Tobacco Road is Eric Clapton-esque while Evil Woman (not the
Electric Light Orchestra one) is 10 minutes of heavy rockin’ blues with ample opportunities for guitar pyrotechnics.
