Robert Lawson’s Wheatfield Empire is subtitled The Listener’s Guide to the Guess Who, and after a non-stop start-to finish read, I simply quoted (the great) Kurt Vonnegut’s character Harrison Bergeron: “That one was a doozy.” Every fan of the Guess Who needs to devour this book.
Now, to get all literary (because this is a book review!), the poet Robert Frost wrote, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not travel both.” Well, sure, but that doesn’t exclude any two travelers — each walking down one of those “diverged roads” — from using Wheatfield Empire as one of those Rough Guide books to enhance the seasoned fan with incredible insight into the actual recordings.
At the same time, Lawson whets the appetite of a whole lot of people who are now fascinated with all the bands of the ’70s – whose music has, thankfully, been reissued in masse — with myriad bonus tracks to boot. Not only that, but all these reissued records allow graying music lovers to relive our youth and buy up records we couldn’t afford (or lost somewhere along the way of life) in our part-time jobbed teen years. As my friend Kilda Defnut always says, “Rock music is more about rolling rocks than rocking rolls.”
One question: How does Robert Larson know all this amazing stuff? I mean, the salvation of mankind isn’t entirely depending on knowing that the “Heartbroken Bopper” we know and love was “take two … and was recorded on January 27, 1972.” But to a rock ‘n’ roll pilgrim who made the journey to Winnipeg and drove up and down Bannatyne Avenue, playing the appropriate tune while wearing the newly acquired (from Wild Planet Records!) gray Sound by Garnet sweatshirt, this is manna from heaven that gives the music a human touch. And that’s the beauty of this book.
Wheatfield Empire covers the pre-Burton Cummings history with “Early Years 1958-1965” and more “Early Years-1966-68” with Cummings now a member. This is a welcome addition to the detailed history given in John Einarson’s American Woman: The Story of The Guess Who. I suppose it’s an obvious comment, but the two books (sort of) work with the very same synchronized respect as the “No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature” combo platter which John Einarson called, “the pinnacle achievement of the [Randy] Bachman-Cummings collaboration.”
The books complement each other — like the great Kurt Winter and Greg Leskiw guitar interplay that told us all to “Share” both the spotlight and “the Land.” But the heart of the book covers the period between Wheatfield Soul to Power in the Music. Each album is given a commentary (both fact and opinion) on Background, Album Overview, Release and Reception, and Reissues, Remasters. This is nice stuff.
And Lawson’s conversational tone makes the book into a used-record-store chat with some other guy who also went to Winnipeg, drove down Bannatyne Avenue, wears that gray Sound by Garnet Sweatshirt, and by the way, also possesses the limited-edition compact disc of Greg Leskiw’s Mood Jga Jga and a nice vinyl copy of Kilowatt’s first album!
Spoiler alert: The original title of “Sour Suite” was “This Morning,” the elaborate spoof packaging of Artificial Paradise was altered in Spain to “recycled concert photos from the Live at the Paramount sleeve cover (including Jim Kale),” and for anyone who casually heard ex-Raspberries Eric Carmon’s second album, Boats Against the Current, and heard a familiar voice — yup, that’s Burton Cummings on backing vocals and piano. Such minutia!
Now, a true confession: I seriously doubt if I have ever successfully looked into a microscope, but thankfully, Robert Larson has done the nuanced work and placed the Guess Who under a sympathetic magnifying glass – and, lo and behold(!) found quite a bit of new and really interesting “life in the bloodstream.” So, thank you for that!
And then (to get all literary again) there’s that other Robert Frost road — a grown-up path that is interested in the stuff that didn’t quite get spun on the turntable the first time around.
Case in point: My first purchased Kinks record was Preservation Act 1. I didn’t bother with Act 2. But John Mendelssohn’s book The Kinks Kronikles was a kickstart to the classic albums like Something Else (which included the sublime “Waterloo Sunset”), The Village Green Preservation Society, Arthur, Lola Versus Powerman and the Money-Go-Round Part One, and of course the quite lovable soundtrack, Percy. Then a biography about the Beach Boys did the very same thing. And I chased down Surf’s Up, Wild Honey, Sunflower, Friends, and 20/20.
Wheatfield Empire can be the roadmap to go beyond a remembered slow dance to “These Eyes” or a chanced glance at the Johnny Cash Show when Burton and the boys burned through “the rock’s steady” live cut of “Hand Me Down World.” For crying out loud: Episodes of The Curse of Oak Island come and go without a whiff of the (supposed) lost treasure. But there’s pop-rock gold in these Guess Who albums, because as Rolling Stone big-time critic Ken Barnes said of the brilliant Road Food record, it’s “free from filler” and “a first-class album from one of rock’s most consistently maverick bands.”
So, go to Muswell Hillbillies heights, where hit singles are long gone, but really great and clever rock albums just exist to be spun like beautiful Manitoba melodies, that still today, “sing out a prairie tune.”
The last third of Wheatfield Empire discusses post-Guess Who recordings, both chronicling the careers of Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings, with a glance at the several GW reunions. Once again, there’s minutia galore. The recent Randy Bachman documentary is mentioned, as is his album George, and the book is very current with Cummings’ Above the Ground and his Massey Hall live album — they’re all here.
Now, to be honest, these albums don’t quite get the microscopic examination as the proper Guess Who records. For example, in the review of Woman Love, no mention is made of the blissful (and my all-time fav Burton Cummings tune!) “Heavenly Blue.” Oh well, and to quote the song, “Dancin’ Fool”: “Ooh, but that’s okay.”
So, trust me — I’ve driven Bannatyne Avenue! This is a well-researched labor-of-love tome (that is certainly “takin’ care of business”!) with deep dedication to the true spirit of the real Guess Who. It’s gift to the all the music lovers who started with obvious pop music, and then were free – through an assortment of brilliant but always sort of strange albums that vibrated with cool rock ‘n’ roll-fueled humor in their tough grooves – to roam around a musical maze that did “funny things” to that darn frontal lobe, which always likes a lot of nice sounds. Those sounds did, indeed, just “get your ribbons on, honey,” because “we’re going to stomp, honey, all night long.”
Let’s just say Robert Lawson’s Wheatfield Empire wears those “ribbons” well, and it certainly understands that Canadian rock ‘n’ roll “stomp.”
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