Status Quo - the next round of deluxe editions

The once so mighty Quo had taken a mighty fall at the end of the 1980s. While drug and money issues had taken their toll and led to the slow break-up of the classic line-up (in 1982, drummer John Coghlan had left; a combination of internal tension and management manipulation led to the 1986 reformation without bassist and singer Alan Lancaster, who subsequently went to court over the issue), they had enjoyed considerable success with the albums "In the Army Now" (which spawned four hit singles) and "Ain't Complaining" (which was less strong, but still yielded a huge smash with "Burning Bridges"). And the new line-up, consisting of singer/lead guitarist Francis Rossi, singer/rhythm guitarist Rick Parfitt, keyboardist/multi-instrumentalist Andy Bown, bassist John "Rhino" Edwards and drummer Jeff Rich grew into a live force to be reckoned with, even if it didn't match the heaviness of the classic 70s formation, which later became nicknamed "The Frantic Four".

However, 1989 would prove to be a problematic year, as you can read in Francis Rossi's autobiography "I Talk Too Much". For once, Rossi had finally ended his relationship with cocaine, which in the long run helped him immensely, of course, and also gave way to a relationship that lasts to this day (after years of private turmoil). The band also finally realized that they had been ripped off by people from the management – all the money went into someone's pocket, but not the musicians'. And the third album of the "new" band, "Perfect Remedy", again produced by Pip Williams, completely failed to repeat the success of the two previous albums; the singles "Not at All" and "Little Dreamer" sank without a trace. In walked Walker, first name David, a cunning marketing expert who knew how the band could (ahem) remedy the situation, hence the reinvention of Status Quo as a family-friendly outfit essentially consisting of two people, Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt. Miles away from the dangerous, shaggy, long-haired hard rock monster that had driven audiences into a frenzy in the 1970s. Even the album covers show this. And after a while, their music started to sound watered-down too.

But that's not to say there aren't any good songs on those "wilderness years" albums. "Perfect Remedy" did try, in some ways, to return to the tried and tested Quo guitar sound where "Army" and especially "Complaining" had sounded very technological (some of the more Quo-sounding tracks from those sessions ended up as b-sides to the respective singles instead!). The six-minute, multi-part "The Power of Rock", an anthem about The Troubles in Northern Ireland (a subject Quo had already tackled years before in "Someone's Learning") is generally noted as a high point of the later Quo. It was a conscious attempt to return to the formula of the classic Quo epics á la "Forty-Five Hundred Times", "Slow Train", "Mystery Song" or "Breaking Away", and probably the last new Quo track in that vein unless you count "Bad News" from 2007's "In Search of the Fourth Chord". The seminal "Forty-Five Hundred Times" (4500x for Quo buffs) itself got an update on 1991's "Rock 'Til You Drop" that, like the live arrangement, incorporates the riff from "Gotta Go Home" (which was the Quo's first vehicle for long jam sessions in the early 1970s), although it "only" runs for 12 minutes as opposed to some 80s live recordings that could take over 20 minutes!

The re-recording of 4500x was one of six tracks that only appeared on the CD edition of "Rock 'Til You Drop". The LP only included the first ten tracks, and as far as I know, the CD's bonus tracks never appeared on vinyl. The album was a sort of compromise between the band's plans (all-new material) and David Walker's ideas (covers and re-recordings, including a song that fits both categories, the ancient "Price of Love"), and it marked a return to the classic values: The production was handled by Rossi himself, and the recording was mostly done live on a stage with the aid of a mobile studio. The resulting album isn't consistently amazing, but contains more than enough good music for one LP and packs much more of a punch; all in all, I'd say it's the best album released under the Quo name since 1979's "Whatever You Want". I'm especially fond of the opener "Like a Zombie" (sung by Rossi) and the LP closer "No Problems" (sung by Parfitt), both of which are as good as anything Quo have ever done. The album didn't contain a big hit single (although the very good re-recording of 1977's "Can't Give You More" fared rather well), but riding the crest of the previous year's "Anniversary Waltz" (a medley of rock'n'roll classics done by Quo in full-flight) and no doubt also benefitting from the publicity surrounding the "four gigs in one day" world record, it returned Quo to the LP charts.

This was followed up by a live album and another Rossi-produced opus. 1994's "Thirsty Work" was moderately successful, but the band felt unfairly ignored by Great Britains BBC Radio 1 who insisted on not playing acts as old as this anymore, no matter how many chart hits they could still come up with. At the same time, fans were largely unimpressed, and Parfitt (who does not have any writing credits on the album and only sings one song, "Queenie") also expressed dissatisfaction. Rossi, who had been convinced he'd discovered a viable new direction for the band, was so disillusioned that he didn't write any new songs for a while (but still released a solo album – but that's another story), hence the release of a full covers album. 1999's "Under the Influence" and 2002's "Heavy Traffic" did put Quo back on track, though, even if there have been ups and downs after that, too.

In the next posts, we will take a closer look at the three albums that will be reissued in March 2020 and examine what's there and why it is there (after all, I helped to compile these sets)... stay tuned. Till then.