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Burn The World
Awareness AWCD 1018 (1990)

Burn The World

Album available as:-
(Science Friction HUCD0013)

I used to think that 'Burn the World' was the worst album that I had made. Upon having to reflect enough to put pen to paper it isn't that at all. It just falls a long way short of my ambition for it.

The great god Hindsight tells me that in order to maximize the potential of the piece, that it would have been necessary to have done a big production number with it; and written various parts for different voices. The music would also have to be more accessible and less diverse, less experimental.

There would also have to be more parts that pulled the listener in, more pieces that the listener was able to identify with. The lyrics are good. Not as good as my best perhaps, but on a par with most.

Tony Franklin's guitar solo is the musical highlight. Upon further reflection, the concept is great, but I shouldn't have made such a long piece out of something that was essentially based in a minor key. It would take a grandiose version in a new age to bring the best out of what is there, to build it into what it really could be.

- Roy Harper

Harper's Burn the World consists of two versions of the title track, one studio, the other live (recorded at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London). Written in 1984-85, this poetic composition is comprised of several distinct movements and timely lyrics. The studio cut is the original demo Harper presented to EMI records; they rejected it, stating it lacked commercial appeal. It includes a brief but attractive guitar solo by the "Unknown Space Cadet," also known as Dave Gilmour. The live track, a solo performance that Roy terms the "more cultured" version, has an immediacy and vibrancy not found in the demo. Energetic and driving (so much so that he breaks a string during the song), Harper's guitar work and vocals are superior to the studio take. Jacqui Turner, Roy's companion of nine years, engineered the album. Their relationship ended the following year, when Awareness Records picked up the recordings (and Harper). Before folding, the label released several of his albums, including the superb Once (1990) and Death or Glory? (1992).

- David Ross Smith (AMG)

 

Track Listing:

1. Burn The World (Stuido)
2. Burn The World (Live)



Roy Harper - Guitar & Vocals

 


 

 
 

 
 

 

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