Feature: GRTR! Greats – ROBIN TROWER
Photo: Paul Clampin
David Randall chatted to Robin Trower for Get Ready to ROCK! Radio. This feature includes some of Robin’s favourite tracks by other artists. First broadcast 1 March 2015.
GRTR!’s Blues Rock Editor Pete Feenstra believes that with such a high profile recording career behind him, it’s always tempting to dwell on Robin Trower’s early years, particularly with Procal Harum and of course his trio of classic album in the early 70′s.
Indeed last year saw the 50th anniversary re-issue of ‘Bridge of Sighs’, an album Robin was happy to talk about, though you get the feeling he’s far more interested in what he’s doing now.
And given the fact Trower’s new releases still lead to plenty of press coverage and live dates, perhaps its time to celebrate one of the UK’s mot enduring and original rock blues guitarists.
It’s probably due to the fact he enjoyed huge success in the US while still being badgered in the UK about being a Hendrix copyist, that his standing here is marginally less than it should be.
Put simply, if you are looking for a soulful guitarist with an expressive controlled vibrato and an exquisite tone, which he has consistently applied to a related musical arc spanning blues, rock, soul, R&B and psychedelia, then Robin Trower is your man.
Trower has always been about feel and ‘being in the moment’, and as he explains: “It’s impossible to play with as much feeling in a run as a single note. I’ve never been so much into runs as making a single notes cry.”
You might wrongly have surmised that the title of his 2022 ‘No More Worlds To Conquer’, was a hint as to his own shrinking musical ambitions.
In fact nothing could be further from the truth, as he bounced back with 2023′s ‘Joyful Sky’, a vibrant collaboration with Sari Schorr. And now he continues to tour both sides of The Atlantic behind the new ‘Come And Find Me’ album, which suggests he has unfinished business.
He teasingly plays with a number of themes and ideas and as always, makes his most direct emotional connection with his enduring tone.
The new album has a contented feel, as if the inquisitive songs flowed as easily as his use of sonic mastery, spun over interwoven grooves and aching tonal inflections.
There’s not a whiff of complacency, as evidenced by the opening ‘A Little Bit Of Freedom’, with its barely disguised mission statement of independence.
As I said in my review: “The reflective nature of the album isn’t simply a corollary of life experience, but rather his more pressing unease at the world around him.”
You might argue ‘Come And Find Me preaches to the converted, but while Hendrix will always a significant influence – starting with his own ‘Song For A Dreamer’ homage – the truth is Trower’s high standing has always been a function of his own recognisable style.
And if his career has been slightly hampered by the on-going problem of never really having replaced vocalist James Dewar, it ironically pushed him to sing himself on noticeably more personal songs with more lyrical depth.
What is curious is that having got by with his own barely passable vocals and then seemingly having found a new vocal level within a spiritual framework, he then moved away from that to work with Sari Schorr and more recently to renew his relationship with the husky vocalist and bassist Richard Watts.
Perhaps the real elephant in the room has always been that Trower found his essential voice through his guitar and amps, rather than his own vocal.
Prior to 2005 there was a lack of new albums and touring and whilst a November 2005 tour made some amends even though one gig was cancelled because the local council decreed the band were too loud!
Charlie Farrell provided our first live review, in April 2005, when he said Trower “gave a case study in the playing of a blues solo, grimacing his way through a series of harmonic and making ample use of the whammy bar on his Stratocaster.”
In May 2008 we reported that his gig was part of a “First Farewell Tour’: “If a Mars probe had dropped down on Pacific Road this evening it would have fed back that the year appears to be 1974 and there’s a shortage of hair.”
Nineteen years later, although tours have sometimes been stop/start, Robin has bucked that ill-advised farewell statement. The show goes on.
In 2024 the 50th anniversary of the classic Bridge Of Sighs was celebrated with a deluxe edition and this album still features prominently in the setlists although – when reviewing Trower in April 2006 – Robbie Kerrigan mentioned “The rehabilitation of ‘Victims Of The Fury’ (1980) is also proving popular with Robin’s fans.”
The eighties and nineties often get overlooked in coverage of Trower’s music (in the latter decade he stopped touring for five years) but there were a string of albums that often deviated from the ‘Bridge Of Sighs’ blues rock template in tune with the trends of the day.
As David Randall commented in 2005 reviewing the CD and DVD: “For many, including this scribe, Robin Trower seems frozen in the seventies and, to be specific, that post-Hendrix period which yielded his best-known albums.”
Randall further commented that one of the highlights of these 2005 releases was the realisation that Trower sings on one track. “Without wishing to be unkind to Davey Pattison, it makes you think that perhaps Trower should sing more often.”
Around this time Trower was collaborating with Jack Bruce who told us, in 2009: “…we were almost in ‘separate bands together’ for over several thousand years or whatever it is, but I’ve always had an affinity with what Robin does so there was common ground.”
Pete Feenstra reviewing the album 7 Moons Live noted “The interesting thing about this project is that 27 years after their last collaboration, Trower and Bruce are actually writing songs together. The material is solid if not spectacular and could probably have done with a bit more road testing before being recorded live.”
Robin is the king of tone, the prince of wah wah and the post Hendrix overseer of psychedelia Pete Feenstra (August 2009)
We’ve reviewed several reissues over the years including his debut Twice Removed From Yesterday in 2010 and a raft of releases in 2011.
These albums shone a light on a less familiar period including ‘20th Century Blues’ (1994) which to a large extent caught the early 1990s blues/rock zeitgeist following the popularity of artists like Jeff Healey and Gary Moore.
As Pete Feenstra pointed out on What Lies Beneath (2009): “Robin’s stylistic shift from blues rocker to introspective tone meister … reflected in his approach to ambience, mood, tone colour and feel.” This set the template for future forays.
Pete Feenstra called 2011′s Playful Heart “a very polished affair” and “a guitarist at ease with his consummate playing style full of soulful nuances and fluid phrasing. And crucial to this album is the way his playing acts as an essential catalyst for his lyrical spark. The lyrics are important as he continues the interrelationship between his music and dreamy word plays to be found on ‘What Lies Beneath’.”
Pete interviewed Robin in 2013 and provided a background to the album ‘Roots & Branches’ and two years later, reviewing Something’s About To Change wrote: “It’s the work of a mature artist and a sonic explorer who long ago embraced the blues and indulges himself in a dreamy languor to search out feel, tone and deeply wrought emotion.”
Photo: David Randall
Trower was 70 in the month that David Randall reviewed his gig at The Lowry, Salford. Whilst still very much rooted in the seventies, there was deeper groove in the septuagenarian’s setlist: “To the uninitiated Trower’s style may seem to be variations on a theme but he is one of the few guitarists who can really take the listener on a journey. Entrancing as well as emotional.”
And as Pete Feenstra wrote in 2016 ”You don’t so much listen to a Robin Trower album these days as simply immerse yourself in his grooves. His combination of guitar artistry, syrupy grooves, heartfelt vocals and a constant search for the emotional core in a song evokes Peter Green at his best.”
“In a world of instant downloads where albums are all but irrelevant, Trower is a timely reminder of the craft of recording a coherent body of work. He’s an enduring rock-blues guitarist who has reshaped his art into the kind of unique introspective style that makes ‘Where You Are Going To’ so damn good” This was the first of his albums where he handles all the vocals.
Photo: Mark Hughes/MHP Studios
Reviewing Robin at Islington Town Hall, Feenstra expanded on what for many was Trower’s earlier Hendrix fixation:
In many ways, Trower is an object lesson in what Jimi Hendrix might have become in the autumn of his career, had he survived. Trower is a tone master for who a solo is the equivalent of a painter’s brushstroke. He says more in one eloquent phrase and with his tonal subtlety than most guitarists manage in a lifetime.
2017′s Time And Emotion continued Trower’s journey of deep grooves and guitar: “While in general terms the album owes much to his conversational style of guitar playing – he shifts from one note messages to enveloping moods – it’s his choice of notes, tonal emphasis, the languid string bends and expressive vibrato that serves him well. His additional judicious use of wah-wah, makes for the understated, but very potent way in which he enhances a melody.”
On Trower’s early 2018 tour Andy Nathan described “Robin’s precise, controlled guitar tones in which each note conveys emotion and not a single one is wasted.” Special guest Sari Schorr would ultimately collaborate with Robin on the album Joyful Sky in 2023.
A year later Trower released Coming Closer To The Day when Pete Feenstra decreed: “Perhaps the biggest problem with this album is that of too many similarly paced songs and a rudimentary vocal style that doesn’t lend itself to the kind of dynamics needed to lift the album and give it a natural flow.”
Pete gave a more positive spin to the album released in 2020 with Maxi Priest and Livingstone Taylor (the guitarist’s one-time bass player and erstwhile producer). United State Of Mind was a natural extension of Trower’s more recent musical approach and “drips with retro cool, sophisticated funk and deep soul.”
Photo: Paul Clampin
Pete Feenstra chatted to Robin Trower for Get Ready to ROCK! Radio, to coincide with the 50th anniversary edition of ‘Bridge Of Sighs’. This feature includes tracks from that album plus 2023′s ‘Joyful Sky’ with Sari Schorr. First broadcast 30 June 2024.
Due to health issues Trower had to pull out of scheduled U.S. dates in late-2024 but earlier (in May) Andy Nathan was further impressed: “…not a moment was wasted with guitar playing so immaculate and precise. He is certainly playing as well as ever and there was a sense of being privileged to see a master craftsman at work.”
Pete Feenstra refers to Rolling Stone magazine in 1973 describing Trower’s music: “Trower wrenches from his axe, thick, luscious tones drenched with tremolo and sustain. But these effects aren’t sheer electronic gimmickry; rather they enable Trower to realize a guitarist’s dream, obtaining the maximum mileage from each note.”
And, as Pete continues, fast forward 52 odd years, and you’ll still find the same ethereal soundscapes, contrasting tonal colours and wah-wah inflections, a craft that gives Come And Find Me its substance.
Perhaps the album title provides the key to his current standing, as he throws down the gauntlet to suggest, he’s still out there on his own terms.
He may understandably be in a reflective mode, but he’s still forging an enduring career, fuelled by the kind of instantly recognisable style that a legion of contemporary guitarists can still only dream about.
More remarkably, at 80 years young he’s still talking about “the natural cycle” of songwriting and touring behind the new album.
He teasingly titled a 2009 album ‘What Lies Beneath’. It’s a question we may never fully know the answer to, but what we do know is that Robin Trower has made some great music finding out.
Album review (Come And Find Me, 2025)
UK Tour Dates 2025
14 May – Buxton, Opera House
15 May – Glasgow, Oran Mor
17 May – Holmfirth, The Picturedrome
18 May – Birmingham, Town Hall
20 May – Frome, Cheese & Grain
21 May – London, Shepherd’s Bush Empire
GRTR! Greats
Introduction & conclusion: Pete Feenstra
Main story: David Randall
Contributors: Charlie Farrell, Pete Feenstra, Robbie Kerrigan, Andy Nathan, David Randall
Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK
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