Parachute (The Pretty Things album)

Parachute is the fifth studio album by the English rock band Pretty Things, released in 1970. It is their first album without guitarist Dick Taylor.

Parachute
Studio album by
Pretty Things
ReleasedJune 1970 (1970-06)
RecordedSeptember 1969 – April 1970
StudioAbbey Road Studios, London
Genre
Length40:58
LabelHarvest
ProducerNorman Smith
Pretty Things chronology
S.F. Sorrow
(1968)		 Parachute
(1970)		 Freeway Madness
(1972)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[4]
Record Collector[5]

Reviews at the time of release were very positive, with Billboard calling it "another top-flight album" for the band.[6] In 1975, Rolling Stone critic Steve Turner wrote that it had been "a Rolling Stone 'album of the year',"[7] though in fact Parachute did not place among the magazine's Albums of the Year for 1970[8] or 1971,[9] and indeed was not mentioned in Rolling Stone until Stephen Holden called it an "obscure underground classic" in his review of Freeway Madness.[10]

The band's lineup at this point was Phil May, Wally Waller, John Povey, Vic Unitt, and Skip Alan.

In 1975, the record was packaged as a double LP with their previous album S.F. Sorrow titled S.F. Sorrow and Parachute and issued on the UK label Harvest on the Harvest Heritage series. In 1976, the record was again packaged as a double LP with their previous album S.F. Sorrow titled Real Pretty. In Canada, this album was on Motown Records.

Snapper Records released a 40th anniversary double CD in September 2010 which included acoustic reworkings of various tracks recorded in May 2010 by Wally Waller and Phil May.

Track listing

All songs by Phil May and Wally Waller, except where noted. Adapted from original UK pressing.[11]

Side A
No.TitleLength
1."Scene One"
  • "Scene One"
  • "The Good Mr. Square"
  • "She Was Tall, She Was High"
4:54
1:51

1:27 1:36

2."In the Square / The Letter / Rain"6:03
1:55

1:39 2:29

3."Miss Fay Regrets"3:28
4."Cries from the Midnight Circus"6:28
Side B
No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Grass" 4:20
2."Sickle Clowns" 6:36
3."She's a Lover" 3:32
4."What's the Use" 1:45
5."Parachute"May, Norman Smith3:52
Total length:40:58

Bonus tracks on 2000 reissue
  1. "Blue Serge Blues" (May, Waller, Jon Povey) – 3:55
  2. "October 26" – 4:57
  3. "Cold Stone" (May, Waller, Pete Tolson) – 3:11
  4. "Stone–Hearted Mama" – 3:29
  5. "Summer Time" (May, Waller, Tolson) – 4:29
  6. "Circus Mind" (May, Tolson) – 2:00
  • Note: many subsequent pressings of the album separated the medleys on Side A into three tracks each.

Personnel

Pretty Things

  • Phil May – vocals
  • Vic Unitt – guitars [album tracks only]
  • Wally Waller – bass, guitar, vocals
  • Jon Povey – keyboards, vocals
  • Skip Alan – drums
  • Pete Tolson – guitars [bonus tracks only]

Technical

  • Tony Clark – engineer
  • Nick Webb – assistant engineer
  • Hipgnosis – cover design, photography

References
  1. Fricke, David (17 March 2015). "Bouquets From a Cloudy Sky". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on 26 February 2021. Retrieved 7 June 2023. But the Pretties were impatient modernists, carrying that blues zeal to psychedelia (1967's "Defecting Grey"), rock opera (ahead of the Who, on 1968's S.F. Sorrow) and progressive rock (1970's Parachute) with spectacular if commercially dire results.
  2. Nicholas Schaffner (October 1982). The British Invasion: From the First Wave to the New Wave. McGraw-Hill. p. 251. ISBN 9780070550896.
  3. Dylan (9 January 2016). "The Pretty Things – Parachute (1970)". Beardfood. Archived from the original on 18 September 2017. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  4. Rabid, Jack. Parachute at AllMusic. Retrieved September 5, 2015.
  5. Rossi, Marco (December 2010). Parachute, Record Collector. Retrieved September 5, 2015.
  6. "Special Merit Picks," Billboard, Jan. 23, 1971.
  7. Turner, Steve. "New Pretty Things Get a Led Zep Airlift," Rolling Stone, Apr. 10, 1975.
  8. "It Happened in 1970," Rolling Stone, Feb. 4, 1971.
  9. "1971 Vanishes Under Innocuous Circumstances," Rolling Stone, Feb. 3, 1972.
  10. Holden, Stephen (13 September 1973). "Freeway Madness". Rolling Stone.
  11. "Update Images". Discogs. Retrieved 20 May 2021.
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