Cathedral, USA (archival)

Cathedral - Epilogue. 1979

One type of album I haven't featured on the CDRWL in the past are archival works (studio / professional live recordings) that have yet to be issued on CD. I don't have too many of these, but the few I do have are mostly excellent. And perhaps other than Tortilla Flat's "1973 SWF Session", Cathedral's follow up to "Stained Glass Stories" is the best of the lot. The sad tale here is that the album was set for release, and then the band backed out. Both Rockadelic and Syn-Phonic had designs for a LP/CD release as far back as 1990. And this was when I was fed an advance copy on cassette (no track titles or album cover). To be clear, what I do have is definitely demo quality (including some rough live material from "Stained Glass Stories"), and maybe that was the issue from the band's perspective. Or perhaps there were higher quality tapes that I wasn't privy too. In either case, the album's release fell though, and I'm forever grateful to have received the crumbs, if that is indeed what this copy is. Musically, one can hear the band tighten the ship a bit from their debut, though it's still what one would call all-out progressive. Sort of like taking Yes' "Close to the Edge" and handing it to Gentle Giant for further arrangement. When the band reformed in 2007, I pointedly asked about this release on a public chat forum. Their response? None. They purposely ignored me. I tried again, but they had no intention of engaging on the topic, so I gave up my quest. I've heard varying accounts as to why the album never saw the light of day, but as you might suspect, it's all of a personal nature. The tragedy in all this is that the music is absolutely brilliant. One does wish they'd all have a few beers, and reconcile. It appears that won't happen though. Tragic, I think, is the appropriate word to apply here.

Priority: 1