Criminson Tide

Three CD set featuring all of the recordings by progressive rock band High Tide. Featuring the albums 'sea shanties', 'high tide' and an additional cd of demos and studio out-takes recorded in 1969 and 1970. Formed in London in 1969, High Tide featured the intense guitar playing of Tony Hill (formerly with The Misunderstood), the violin and keyboard skills of Simon House, bassist Peter Pavli and drummer Roger Hadden. The band was managed by Clearwater, also home to Hawkwind, Skin Alley and Cochise and were signed to Liberty Records soon after their formation. Their debut album, the stunning 'Sea Shanties' was recorded at Olympic studios and some of the heaviest gothic psychedelic rock record ever recorded. Issued in a striking sleeve designed by artist Paul Whitehead, the album is now regarded as a true classic of the era. Their second album, 'High Tide', was recorded in 1970 and was another wonderful work.

In 1969, Sea Shanties established High Tide as one of Britain's heaviest bands and the choice of George Chkiantz (who had previously worked with Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin) as co-producer for their second album seemed to signal the group's intention to continue in the same direction. In comparison with their hefty debut, however, the self-titled follow-up is a relatively subdued affair. The interplay of guitarist Tony Hill and violinist Simon House is still very much at the core of High Tide's distinctive hybrid of psychedelia, prog, and hard rock, but while Hill lays down his characteristically intricate, searing guitar lines, he forgoes the sort of weighty, molten riffage that made Sea Shanties such a behemoth.

2006 reissue with 4 previously unreleased bonus tracks. High Tide's self-titled second album from 1970 continues the great jamming heavy prog rock tradition that they initiated with Sea Shanties from 1969.
"High Tide" grafts violin (courtesy of future Hawkwind and Third Ear Band member Simon House), alongside little touches of organ, piano and more acoustic guitar flavours this time around, and the LP offers fleeting moments of folk, raga-rock and acid elements woven to the relentless mud-thick sludgy guitars.

High Tide is completely ahead of its time. On their first album, Sea Chanties, they combine their folkish influences with a more harsh, aggressive sound. Sometimes sounding jazzy, and one of the first, if not the first prog-metal album. The key here is the battle, the rivalry between the electric guitar of Tony Hill and the excellent playing of Simon House on his electric violin. From the first second we feel something is ahead of its time. A huge guitar riff starts off the album, and the great rythm section soon come along. The violin adds up to the unique sound and forms a melodic mess. Throughout the album, there are a lot of excellent guitar moment and as many violin ones. Diverse, but always true to their roots, High Tide delivers. The only problem may be the vocals, wich do not fit with the intensity of the music. Still, this is heavy stuff for the time and still today, it sounds like a ton of brick.

This compilation, released in 2000, is a nice collection of unreleased and new material from the masters of heavy prog, High Tide. While some of the tracks appear on their later albums, this one is mostly full of rarities which automatically makes this attractive to High Tide fans and people who like their prog with a distorted guitar. In terms of style, this is a mostly instrumental album wrought with heavy, distorted guitars and fast pacing.

High Tide was a highly underrated British band that played psychedelic progressive rock when the genre was in its infancy. "Precious Cargo" is seven tracks of live in the studio slices of hauntingly beautiful yet terrifying soundscapes. Their sound is one that should have been playing in the background of an Alfred Hitchcock film or more recently, a Wes Craven production comes to mind. What made their sound so eerie was the violin of Simon House. Much in the same way Jean Luc Ponty used his instrument, House used his violin as more of a lead instrument and the rest of the band fell in line to fill in the layers to make one impressive wall of sound that would wake up the spirit and startle the thought process; their music was very potent.