Gencon 1994

Perhaps realizing that The Juliet Letters was one step too far, especially after the willfully eclectic pair of Spike and Mighty Like a Rose, Elvis Costello set out to make a straight-ahead rock & roll record with Brutal Youth, reuniting with the Attractions (though Bruce Thomas appears on only five tracks) and Nick Lowe (who plays bass on most of the rest). Unfortunately, all this nostalgia and good intentions are cancelled by the retention of producer Mitchell Froom, whose junkyard, hazily cerebral productions stand in direct contrast to the Attractions' best work. Likely, Froom's self-conscious production appealed to Costello, since it makes Brutal Youth look less like a retreat, but it severely undercuts the effectiveness of the music, since it lacks guts, no matter how smugly secure it is in its tempered "experimentation."

This surprisingly consistent collection of unreleased material compiles a series of demos and outtakes recorded by Ken Hensley, a singer and songwriter best known for his work with Uriah Heep, between 1971 and 1982. Odds and sods compilations are often a dicey proposition, but From Time to Time manages to beat the odds with an effective combination of polished songcraft and inspired performances: The studio outtakes all boast fully realized productions (some even including a string section) and the demos aspire to studio quality thanks to tight arrangements that often differ from the released versions ("If I Had the Time" forsakes the space rock excesses of the Uriah Heep version for a lovely, country-flavored mid-tempo pace).

This surprisingly consistent collection of unreleased material compiles a series of demos and outtakes recorded by Ken Hensley, a singer and songwriter best known for his work with Uriah Heep, between 1971 and 1982. Odds and sods compilations are often a dicey proposition, but From Time to Time manages to beat the odds with an effective combination of polished songcraft and inspired performances: The studio outtakes all boast fully realized productions (some even including a string section) and the demos aspire to studio quality thanks to tight arrangements that often differ from the released versions ("If I Had the Time" forsakes the space rock excesses of the Uriah Heep version for a lovely, country-flavored mid-tempo pace).