It is more than five months since I last posted in my occasional A Classic Album series: the previous three were all within three months of each other so I think follow up is long overdue! I teased that I would be doing this in this week’s Tuesday Tunes post, and mentioned several acts that I wouldn’t be featuring. One of those was Whitney Houston, and having watched Clive Davis: The Soundtrack Of Our Lives on Tuesday evening I’m doubling down on that: it’s a fascinating documentary but I’ve now had more than enough of her to last a lifetime!
I think my header picture gives a very good clue to the album I’m playing today! Yes, it is the fourth album by Cat Stevens, Tea For The Tillerman, which was released in November 1970. This was his second album of the year, following on from Mona Bone Jakon which came out in April. After early pop success with hits like I Love My Dog and Matthew And Son he toured with many other popular acts of the time, but was admitted to hospital in 1969 with a collapsed lung and tuberculosis, and was reportedly near death. During his year-long recuperation and recovery he began questioning the meaning of his life, and wrote many songs which reflected this. He had already given us The First Cut Is The Deepest, a big UK hit for P.P. Arnold, and was keen to show his new found maturity in his songwriting as he returned. The album reached #2 in Australia, #8 in the US, #11 in Canada but only #20 here in the UK. It has since gone on to Triple Platinum status in the US, for 3m sales, and Gold in the UK for 100k. To commemorate its 50th anniversary Cat/Yusuf recorded new versions of the songs, which were released as Tea For The Tillerman 2 in September 2020, this time attaining a much fairer chart placing of #4 in the UK: in my view it deserved that the first time round!
Given the nature of the music business nowadays, there were of course a number of videos especially made for the new recordings, and I am drawing on those as well as the original album for this piece. The opening track is one for which a new video was made, and it is absolutely brilliant:
See what I mean? I’ve always loved the whole album and this song in particular. I saw him in concert in 2009 and he opened with one of his new songs, which was lovely, and then played this. You could hear a pin drop, apart from the audience singing very quietly along with him. A magical moment, and I’m not ashamed to admit that it brought a tear to my eye. The gig was part of a week celebrating the 50th anniversary of Island Records and quite by chance I ended up in the company of a number of the label’s staff. After this song finished one of them looked at my face and asked if I was alright. I thanked her and replied that I was, and that this song had so much meaning for me. She smiled, and said it did for her too. If you want to hear the original album version you will find it here.
The full album contains eleven tracks, which are too many for one post, so I’ll be playing a selection and providing links to the others. This was the second track:
I suspect that you will know the third:
That was one of the tracks which received a very different treatment and a new video for the 2020 update. I’m not sure about it, though – see what you think:
A bit different eh?
The next track is one of the saddest songs I know: Sad Lisa
A beautiful little song, in keeping with the album as a whole. The fifth and closing track on Side One was this one:
I’ve always felt that Miles From Nowhere was a stirring way to close one side of an album, and hearing it again today hasn’t chanced my opinion.
if you don’t already know the album I hope that by now you are beginning to realise why I love it so much, and we haven’t even got to its best-known song yet! It has been more than 54 years since I bought the record, and it is one to which I still return several times a year. Someone once said that the best music is timeless, and that is certainly true for me of this album.
The opening track on Side Two apparently featured as the backing to the opening and closing scenes of a 1970 movie which has since become something of a cult classic: Deep End. Have you seen it? I haven’t! I tried to find a scene to show you but could only find a trailer, so I’m linking to the track instead:
Side Two Track Two was Longer Boats, here in a live performance from 1971:
And Track Three was a delicate little song called Into White.
The final three songs all received updates and new videos for the 2020 release, and as I like them I’m going to be self-indulgent and play them all! This was Track Four, On The Road to Find Out:
That was another where the new version offered a marked change from the original. Both are good, but I chose to play this one for its powerful video. If you want to hear how it was on the 1970 album, you can find it here.
I mentioned just now that the album’s best known song was yet to come. That time is now, with a stunning new version and video of Father And Son, in which Yusuf 2020 sings with Cat 1970:
They don’t come much better than that. Ronan who? If you want to hear the original album version you can find it here.
The album closed with its title track. This was only a minute and a second long, but it is a lovely way to end. Here is that reworked version:
And here is the original album version of Tea For The Tillerman.
In November 2003, Rolling Stone magazine included Tea For The Tillerman in its 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list at #206, and it was at #208 in their 2012 revised list, and currently stands at #205 on their latest list, which was published in 2020. That doesn’t sound all that high to me, but to be included in the list at all is impressive, and for me that validates how much the album means to me and why I still love it after all this time. I hope you do, too.
