Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Gentle Giant
Release: 1977
Runtime: 38:09
Rating: 3/5
“The Missing Piece” marked the beginning of the end for Gentle Giant as a constructive progressive rock outfit, the band that once wowed everyone with unique, unpredictable sonic experiments that blew past and fused all kinds of genre boundaries. In a turbulent time for rock music, with prog losing popularity and new styles like punk, disco and new wave on the rise, their label Chrysalis trapped them with a demand for tighter songs, if not outright radio hits. Going against their experimentalist musical philosophy, which was never short on sarcasm aimed at the music industry, the members decided to keep up with the “new times” and turned into a melodic hard rock/pop band with only rare reminders of their experimental past. Gentle Giant were always phenomenal musicians, able to play whatever they felt like, whatever the genre, but they felt incredibly boxed in by their new “pop” band role, and you can feel it across the entire album.
On “The Missing Piece” they delivered only half of their usual artistic firepower. The result of this dramatic change in sound was tighter songs with a heavy emphasis on melody and catchy choruses. Their trademark troubadour arrangements, jazzy-avant-garde improvisations, dissonant vocal harmonies and mischievous rhythmic patterns all had to bow to simpler, more direct melodies on “The Missing Piece”. With a bunch of melodic rock and ballad-ish moments they did reach out to less demanding listeners, but for most of the album you get the sense that not everyone in the band had their whole heart in it. Still, in the lyrics they held on to their typical rascally humor and above all a sense of unabashed self-irony. Even at the expense of a forced artistic “lobotomy”.
Artistic self-restraint has never produced dazzling results. Still, they managed to pull off a few good ones in which their old prog magic and unbridled experimentalism flare up for a moment. The first half of the album has a lot of average songs, well below their usual artistic norms, while the second half brings a noticeable improvement and in places stirs memories of the golden years. A lot of the time the arrangements feel half-baked, which the rather sterile production only makes worse. The opening hard rock experiment “Two Weeks in Spain” falls squarely into this category, the very embodiment of holy simplicity and lack of inspiration by their usual compositional and instrumental standards. Their priceless virtuoso talents are present the whole time, from Derek’s charismatic vocals and Green’s punchy guitar phrases to Ray’s versatile bass work, Minnear’s bouncy keyboards and Weathers’ varied percussion, but they just can’t build a convincing atmosphere.
One of the better moments comes with “I’m Turning Around”, a solid power ballad where Derek’s excellent singing takes center stage, backed by mighty guitar phrases and hypnotic Hammond organ accompaniment. The title and message of the song are a thinly veiled sarcastic jab at the change of musical style. As for the bizarre punk experiment “Betcha Thought We Couldn’t Do It”, which they probably thought was hugely fun while making it, it’s best forgotten. At least the title is more than fitting, since nobody could have imagined they’d ever create such a self-parody. “Who Do You Think You Are?” is an extremely average hard rocker with a sleepy central melody built from Green’s recognizable blues passages and funky rhythms. “Mountain Time” is in a similarly dull vein, again leaning on clichéd blues mannerisms on piano and guitar and coming off rather forced. Well, at least Derek proved he wouldn’t be a bad blues singer… sad.
Things get noticeably better in the second half of the album with “As Old As You’re Young”. This interesting track revives some of the old Gentle Giant magic, with the good old rascally rhythmic quirks, troubadour arrangements and the “angel” Minnear on lead vocals. They even manage to work a neat folk rock motif into the middle section, and the handoff between Kerry’s and Derek’s vocals is nailed too. The romantic-nostalgic folk rock epic “Memories Of Old Days” is easily the best thing on the whole album, one that can still bring a tear to the eye of any sincere fan of the band. With Derek’s melancholic singing and majestic pastoral-Celtic arrangements on acoustic guitar and keyboards, they conjure up a magical atmosphere in which the legend of the gentle giant briefly comes back to life. On “Winning”, full of avant-garde rhythmic inserts, their experimental side suddenly erupts at full strength. The refined closing passage into an ethereal oriental motif is especially impressive. The closing “For Nobody”, with its rambunctious harmonies and scattered rhythms, could sit on any classic Gentle Giant record, which says plenty about how great it is.
As the opening act of a painful pop era, during which Gentle Giant slowly fell apart and lost their artistic identity, “The Missing Piece” doesn’t come off badly as a whole, but it sits well below their usual artistic standards. Contrary to the label’s wishes, it brought them no hits, which, given the all-around compositional and instrumental straitjacket, was hardly a surprise. Artistic self-restraint and a forced transformation into a pop band seem at odds with common sense these days. Back then, though, they sadly didn’t have much choice if they didn’t want to sink into total obscurity. Devoted fans will know how to appreciate the album’s rare bright spots, and this is not yet where Gentle Giant hit rock bottom, but everyone else is better off steering clear, since it could give them a completely wrong picture of what this legendary band is really about.
Lineup
Derek Shulman – vocals, keyboards
Gary Green – electric and acoustic guitar, backing vocals
Kerry Minnear – keyboards, backing vocals
Ray Shulman – bass guitar, violin, backing vocals
John Weathers – drums, percussion
Production
Gentle Giant
Tracklist
1. Two Weeks In Spain
2. I’m Turning Around
3. Betcha Thought We Couldn’t Do It
4. Who Do You Think You Are?
5. Mountain Time
6. As Old As You’re Young
7. Memories Of Old Days
8. Winning
9. For Nobody
