You Lying So Low In The Weeds

Long before I ever heard the album I can remember a retrospective magazine review of Heart Little Queen, which basically ran along the lines of, ooh barracuda, phwoarrr! the Wilson sisters and they bollocksed up the LP cover by showing the zip on Ann Wilson’s boot on the back cover*. The end.

What else is there I could possibly add to this?

You lying so low in the weeds
I bet you gonna ambush me
You'd have me down, down, down, down on my knees
Now wouldn't you, barracuda? Ohh...

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Little Queen is an album that has just welded itself to my turntable for a week now, I played the second side 3 times in a row last Thursday, so it isn’t all about the big angry fish song.

Made against the backdrop of some serious record label shithousery, Little Queen was released into the wild in 1977 and Heart had the distinction of having 3 LPs in the charts simultaneously. In Heart’s case the third time was very much the charm.

Spawned in the deeps of sexist advertising and assumptions there is a reason ‘Barracuda’ is a rock classic. It bites down hard. It is one of those songs that you hear so often you don’t actually listen to it, there are some really interesting melodies and unusual structures woven into it. Ann’s vocals are sharp and excellent but it is Steve Fossen’s bass and Roger Fisher’s lead break that really catch the ear. It is far sexier than any song about pondlife has a right to be.

My fave track on Little Queen is ‘Love Alive’, which is the most amazing Led Zeppelin track never actually recorded by them. I am a complete sucker for Nancy’s autoharp-age and again the melody is just gorgeous, the living embodiment of the LP cover. I think it is the performance that the LP captures so well, rendering it far more than the sum of its parts.

The instrumental ‘Sylvan Song’ is just that and far too short at only a gnat’s pube over 2 minutes long; I’m game for a lot more mandolin than that. It segues directly into ‘Dream Of The Archer’ which is as captivating and daft as the title suggests. This is a song born from the ribs of Sandy Denny’s turn on ‘The Battle Of Evermore’ and it is to Heart’s credit that this is a wonderfully good thing.

Side closer ‘Kick It Out’ is a decent enough track, but is a bit jarring being sequenced where it is, a bit like a cheapo rerelease adding a B-side to a classic album.

Little Queen is not a long LP** and the first side always seems to finish prematurely to me. Flipping the disc is worth every last mote of effort though for the title track.

‘Little Queen’ is a superbly funky hunk of strut, the guitar tone is very reminiscent of Bowie at his slinkiest, very danceable. I have listened to this cut at least 4.8 million times and it surprises me a touch with each play. When I make the lavish 3-hour Oscar winning film of my life ‘Little Queen’ will undoubtedly soundtrack an uncomfortably steamy scene in a Renault 5; fair warning.

The first Heart song I ever heard was the histrionic ‘Alone’^ which may be the absolute polar opposite of ‘Treat Me Well’ a gently understated, yet heartfelt plea that grows on me listen-by listen. The spring into the impossibly jaunty ‘Say Hello’ is a deft bit of sequencing.

Little Queen finishes with a surfeit of tears, no fewer than two tracks with ‘cry’ in the title. Firstly, we get the beautifully sung ‘Cry To Me’ where Ann almost gives her voice a country treatment, again this is really understated and more powerful for that. ‘Go On Cry’ closes the LP with more lovely harmonies, a loud bit in the middle and a bit of a strut.

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Little Queen is the only Heart LP I own and probably the only one I need. Overall it is an album of exquisitely judged performances, not the hard rock fest I thought it would be. Mike Flicker’s production is exemplary, clear and warm throughout.

Ann’s singing was no surprise to me, other than how gently she sings on a lot of the album but I was very surprised that Nancy only plays electric guitar on a pair of tracks here^*, her acoustic guitar and other instrumentation is absolutely key here. The other dudes^^ are uniformly excellent too.

I heart Heart, despite the zip.

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Sadly my copy of Little Queen is not a scuffed, aged copy which was used by a student, now presumably a High Court judge, to spliff up on in June 1977. Instead it is a spiffy new Vinyl Me Please edition on ed and cream vinyl, printed on cardboard thick enough to shelter behind in the event of a grizzly bear attack.

It sounds absolutely great although the quality of the cover printing is slightly bootleggy, not as crisp and clear as usual; a rare blip by their standards. Overall though, a very good repress.

1311 Down.

*I find this latter fact disturbing. If you cannot count on 70’s rock groups to uphold forensically strict historical accuracy at all times, especially when dealing with a vaguely renaissance-y gypsy fantasy, then what on Earth has all modern culture been built upon? what next, Bad Company lying to us about being badass cowboys? I simply won’t hear of it.

**39 minutes dead; equivalent to 2.37 Van Halens.

^my mum’s comment on hearing her son’s new purchase, ‘hmm, that was a bit dramatic‘.

^*two of the quieter ones on the LP.

^^stand up and be counted Howard Leese, Michael DeRosier, Roger Fisher and Steve Fossen.