Repeat Performance - Van der Graaf Generator

Credit Charisma with a compilation that serves the collector as well as the non-christened pregnant with inchoate expectations of Van Der Graaf Generator. Released in the U.K., Repeat Performance might cost a little extra for U.S. collectors to acquire, but for their trouble they'll get two non-album B-sides, "W" and "Boat of Millions of Years." Far from afterthoughts, these flip sides are a fair match for their album material at the time, more psychedelic and precious than their heavier epics, but stately nevertheless. Any single-album compilation of an act prone to side-length epics is likely to slight some masterwork, but Repeat Performance does draw out some indelible moments of prog rock majesty all the same: "White Hammer," "The Emperor in His War-Room," and "Man-Erg." It's on these tracks that Van Der Graaf Generator grapples with King Crimson for the crown of the beserker king, unleashing the howling jinn of a musical apocalypse only to artfully trap them in some ornate musical box minutes later. For a band who had little commercial success themselves, their music influenced a range of more successful musicians, from David Bowie (whose interest in science fiction, from "The Supermen" to "Sweet Thing," neatly follows VDGG's own evolution) to the punk movement (for who could argue that, in "Man-Erg" especially, Peter Hammill had given an unpronounceable rage one of its earliest voices?). Anyone who has slogged through the work of Nektar or Barclay James Harvest looking for a supplement to their diet of King Crimson and Hawkwind has been feeding at the wrong trough. Better to sample the works of VDGG first, for which Repeat Performance is a tasteful introduction. ~ Dave Connolly, All Music Guide