Sean Trane
Well if the Promises album, released three years earlier was a bit of a deception (for moi, anyway), Black Marigolds held more Promises as it included the same line-up, but this time with the whole RCQ team on board. Released in the spring of 66 on the small Argo label, the album presents three or four facets of Garrick’s musical realm, but not the one he develops with the RCQ on their albums proper. But IMHO, Harriot’s presence on BM sort of gives it an handicap in the adventurous department. . The septet pieces are generally relatively standard jazz, like Webster’s Mood, Good Times or Ursula (maybe the best of that kind of jazz on the present album), but we’re definitely not in the Dusk Fire soundscapes, despite the full RCQ line-up present. As for the poetry-laden tracks, like the almost 9-mins Jazz For Five (piano, bass and percussions and sax) plus poet John Smith (can’t invent that!!), but it’s nothing fascinating either, despite the music being a tad more dissonant than usual (but nothing to scare you off). Little more can be said of Jazz Nativity, which is less adventurous than its longer brother.
Other tracks are a bit unsettling like when Garrick jumps behind the harpsichord and play some baroque-sounding short Spiders piece, or the much-more impressive title track that features a cool raga… Quite inventive and when Garrick will bring that track in the RCQ (in Phase III), it will take on its real dimension. Little Girls is a trio piece where Garrick plays the celeste, but in itself, it can be associated with the harpsichord tracks of the flipside. The Closing Carolling is similar to its predecessor, but with that keyboard change.
Well BM sounds like quite a pot-pourri, right? In a way, it is, but it’s not as bad as you could imagine so. While the A-side might be of little surprise, because of a standard-septet dominance, the flipside is much more interesting, thus making BM a real schizophrenic album, with its four or five different formulas, but can be reduced to three different personalities. Certainly an interesting listen, but enough to actually find space for it in your shelves?