Search - Focus :: Focus III

Get it before it vanishes (again)

Gavin Wilson | 08/11/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Focus have been overlooked by several rock historians who should know better. For instance, the band fails to get its own entry in Donald Clarke's 'Penguin Encyclopedia of Popular Music. The band has also been very poorly served on CD: there have been no re-masters until recently (only 'Moving Waves' has undergone the treatment, and I haven't yet heard it); some track listings have been re-sequenced; worse still, some tracks have been entirely omitted; across the EMI edition which I own, producer Mike Vernon's sleevenotes are identical on each CD. Availability of these Focus CDs is extremely erratic, so when they appear on Amazon's catalogue, you should snap up the good ones as quickly as you can.To my ear, 'Focus III' and (sometimes) 'Hamburger Concerto' are the band's really outstanding albums, though 'Moving Waves' also some real highs. 'Focus III' was a double LP, which meant it needed four manual interventions to play in its entirety. It's better suited to CD -- you can play it from start to finish with one loading, and there's the additional benefit that the classic 'Anonymous II' no longer spans two discs. For some bizarre reason which only Mike Vernon will know, 'Elspeth of Nottingham' now appears before 'Anonymous II'. And even more bizarre, the beautiful 'House of the King' (2:23 minutes) has been left off this 68-minute CD. Don't some CDs stretch to 79+ minutes these days?I still have the LP, which I played alongside the CD yesterday. The good news is that the CD sounds better, but the album is still crying out for a proper remastering treatment with a new focussed set of sleevenotes -- pardon the pun. Sometimes the drums sound boxy; at other times, they are pumping the air from the speakers so much that I feel my ear drums will burst. Similarly Bert Ruiter's wonderful bass is always there, thick in the background, each note delivered without a percussive attack. The bass solo and subsequent climax on 'Anonymous II' remains one of the outstanding moments of 70s rock.Focus as a group was launched onto the British market fully formed early in 1973. They had already recorded at least three decent albums, and had two cracking singles in 'Hocus Pocus' and Focus 3's 'Sylvia' to win over the Brits. Indeed, given the simultaneous onslaught by another band from the Polydor stable, Golden Earring, with their excellent 'Moontan' LP, we felt the Dutch might overrun the country. But whereas Golden Earring could be classified as a straight-ahead Stones-like band with a bit of moog and flute thrown in, Focus were harder to place: part-jazz, part-rock, part-classical. Perhaps they sit closest to some of the other jazz-rock bands of the time, but they had their own highly distinctive niche and sound.'Focus III' is undoubtedly the band at their best. Jan Akkerman had been living in England in 1972 and become enamoured of renaissance lute music, as exmplified on the gorgeous 'Elspeth of Nottingham' here. There is not a single duff track here. There is no yodelling. But Van Leer squeezes in some singing ... in Latin. Any prog-rock album that quotes liberally from Virgil's 'Aeneid' gets my vote! The MOJO guide calls this a 'luxuriant double set brimming with energy, improvisational brilliance, catchy tunes and exquisite taste'. In the absence of a proper CD remaster -- and there is no sign of one on the horizon -- this is the best CD by one of the 70s' finest rock-jazz bands...."

The best electric rock guitar you will ever hear

Music-lover | UK | 05/30/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Recorded effectivley "live" in the studio, this is one of Focus' defining moments. It was not originally intended to be a "double lp" but the recording sessions produced such a wealth of quality music and musicianship that plans were hastily changed. Highlights are Focus III, Answers? Questions! Questions! Answers!, Anonymous II and the worldwide hit single Sylvia. Earlier vinyl verions also contained House of the King now sadly deleted from the CD version. The guitar solos in Answers? Questions! and Anonymous are the best I have ever heard and even now, 26 years later, few guitarists (if any) can match Akkerman for improvisation, feeling and melody. Pure joy !"