Search - Incredible String Band :: Wee Tam / Big Huge

Wee Tam and the Big Huge

Mr. Pollard M. Blakeley | Devon, UK | 08/10/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I had not heard this for thirty years. Many of the songs have stayed with me. The best recordings they ever did - before they got too self conscious. Still a classic - modern bands are just too cautious. They all want to be cool."

TISB-Wee Tam/Big Huge

Vincent | New York | 02/22/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The other reviews correctly describe the richness and beauty of these albums. Mystical yet fun, fascinating musical concepts, still fresh after so many years. Highest rating...BUT...while wonderful on the ears, terrible on the eyes. Bad job on the lyrics insert, which are truly microscopic to the point of being unreadable. I'm lucky to have the original vinyl for reading. Otherwise, get a high-powered microscope. Still, a gorgeous recording, as are all their early releases."

SOME OF ISB'S BEST MADE BETTER STILL

Kerry Leimer | Makawao, Hawaii United States | 08/06/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"While the remastering is expert and reveals even more of the human warmth of this work, it's difficult to write about the music of Robin Williamson and Mike Heron for the simple reason that they pretty much created their own genre. Who will we compare to the Incredible String Band? The sources and reference points of and in their music are many and widespread. Typically filed under "FOLK", the music of The Incredible String Band was and is much more. A few years after the band broke up, Robin wrote of his interest in creating a "fusion" of different musical cultures, traditions and styles. Seen from this perspective, "Wee Tam / Big Huge" must be one of the first fully-realized examples of that fusion.



In a seemingly simple, quiet framework, ISB delivers a dazzling array of ideas about music and about humankind and our perceptions of the worlds in and around us -- what are we and what we are -- with diverse and complete musical authority. How else could you possibly pull off a song titled "Puppies" without being accused of creating kitsch? This is profoundly ambitious stuff. "Wee Tam / Big Huge" allows us to witness nothing less than the patchwork creation of a being in "Maya" who is comprised of the many archetypes of the human race: "businessmen his nervous system, no-hustle men his stomach" and, my personal favorite, "opinions are his fingernails". Here, as throughout this record, small metaphors create greater metaphors, leading to saturated meanings. Throughout, the lyrical content matches the musical innovation. Always poetic and illuminating, I'd question the typical "psychedelic" conclusion: this stuff is too aware and well worked out. Remember: "At bath time the hippies, in chains, they are crossing the hall..."



As a contrast to the long and almost tone-poem-like pieces such as "Maya" and "Job's Tears" and rollicking fiddle tunes like "Log Cabin Home", there are a pair of very short, haiku-like pieces that are as pure as they are beautiful. "Son of Noah's Brother" and the more remarkable, myth-imbued "Yellow Snake" demonstrate that condensed and concise poetry can be as powerful as the more elaborate and extended work.



There is also a sense of the sacred throughout, from the every day in "Air" and the wonderfully inventive "Duck's on a Pond" to the collage of religious and literary phrases that comprise the lyrics of "The Mountain of God". Through a rich mix of musical and cultural ideas, "Wee Tam / Big Huge" makes the monumental accessible, and the miniature profound without ever resorting to cloying sentimentality, cliche or the dead ends of blind faith. This is music of approachable, constant and everyday beauty. Music as easy to love today as it was when the world was new."