LOST TREASURES

SPLINTER

“The Place I Love”

By Peter Marston

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My formative years in record collecting revolved around the Beatles. I had grown up on my older brother’s Capitol LPs and once I had mastered those (and once I got my driver’s license), I began making forays to my local underground record store to buy bootlegs, often on the Trademark of Quality label. After a year or so of that, I had pretty much exhausted the available Beatles material so I moved on to Beatles-related bands, including everything on Apple Records—and later on, Dark Horse and even’s Ringo’s short-lived (and horribly-named) label Ring O’Records. One of the very best albums in this latter category is Splinter’s The Place I Love, originally released on Dark Horse Records in 1974 (it was, in fact the first album released on the label).

Splinter was a duo consisting of two Englishmen, Bill Elliot and Bobby Purvis. Beatle fans might be familiar with Elliot’s lead vocal on the Elastic Oz Band’s “God Save Us” single, penned by John Lennon and co-produced by Mal Evans in support of Oz magazine, which at the time was fighting obscenity charges. It was also Mal Evans who brought Splinter to the attention of George Harrison who brought the band into Apple Studios in 1973 to tracks some songs (with Pete Ham contributing to some of the sessions as well). Well, of course Apple was falling apart and George decided to sign Splinter to his new Dark Horse label. The backing band is a virtual who’s who of Beatle associates: Harrison himself does most of the guitar work, Klaus Voorman and Willie Weeks provide the bass tracks and Billy Preston and Gary Wright contribute keyboards. The album took an unusually long time to complete—well over a year—and it shows. Harrison’s production and Elliot and Purvis’ vocals are meticulous, landing closer to the sheen of All Things Must Pass than the rather loose feel of Harrison’s own Dark Horse album, recorded at roughly the same time.

The album opens with the rollicking blues-boogie, “Gravy Train.” It sounds a little like Stealers Wheel doing a Chas and Dave cover and, if you’re not familiar with Chas and Dave, that’s a compliment! “Drink All Day (Gotta Find Your Own Way Home)” is a simple but charming slice of British folk, with Harrison playing unusually rootsy slide guitar. “China Light” is a beautiful ballad that opens with a “Be My Baby” beat and features an instrumental and vocal arrangement that recalls both Living in the Material World and Badfinger’s “Day After Day.” It’s probably the strongest track on the album. “Somebody’s City” is a slow and dramatic number featuring great harmonies and a long searing solo by Harrison during the fade-out. It, too, is reminiscent of peak-period Badfinger. Side two opens with “Costafine Town,” a track that reminds me a little of Klaatu circa Sir Army Suit. It’s another highlight with great chord changes and outstanding vocals (and a fab key change!). The title track is next, combining simple folk verses with (also simple) pop choruses. Mainstream ’70s AM top-40 pop (think Lobo, Christie, etc.). “Situation Vacant” is another track that strongly recalls Badfinger and features a fair dose of Harrison’s characteristic slide guitar sound. “Haven’t Got the Time” closes the album just as it began, with some good old British boogie.

Two singles were pulled from the album: “Costafine Town” and “China Light.” Neither hit big, but the creative team was not discouraged. Two more albums were released on Dark Horse, followed by a Japan-only album on Columbia and a UK-only album on Bellaphon. The duo finally called it quits in 1984.

The Place I Love has never been reissued on CD and is not available in the legit digital domain. Used copies are fairly easy to find, though—I picked up a NM copy at Hello Records in Detroit a couple years ago for $1.99 to replace the well-worn copy I purchased back in the day. It can also be readily located through file-sharing sites. Beatle, Badfinger and George Harrison fans should not miss this one—it’s a true classic!

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Pop Pioneer and “Lost Treasures” writer, Peter Marston is the leader of long-running power pop band, Shplang, whose most recent album, “My Big Three Wheeler” has been described as “the Beatles meet Zappa in pop-psych Sumo match.”  Peter has a new project in 2015 under the name MARSTON.   They will have a track on the upcoming “Power Pop Planet – Volume 5” compilation shipping end of December, 2015.

You check it out at this link:  http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/shplang

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LINKS:

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Place_I_Love

AMG:  http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-place-i-love-mw0000850665

Fan Site: http://rarebird9.net/splinter.html

Fan Site #2:  http://www.splinterlibrary.com/

VIDEO:

  “THE PLACE I LOVE”

“SOMEBODY’S CITY”

“CHINA LOVE”