Ignored           Obscured            Restored

The obituary page of the New York Times was filled with musicians this week.  Ray Sawyer of Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show was the first to draw me to the page.  Then I saw that Pegi Young, Neil’s long-time wife, passed away – as did Christine McGuire of the McGuire Sisters and “Honey” Lantree of the Honeycombs.

Finally, Dean Ford, singer in the Scottish group Marmalade died last Monday in LA.  He was only 72.

Marmalade’s most famous hit was “Reflections of My Life.”

Yeah, I know, it’s kind of sappy, but it brings back happy memories (for me) from a simpler time back in the early ‘70s.  Its harmony vocals and orchestration give the track an early Bee Gee’s sound.

Besides, it also has that “reverse” guitar solo by Junior Campbell.  Here’s how Wikipedia describes the solo (that begins at about 1:45):

The song is in the key of G major and the solo was recorded thus:

The first 4 bars were recorded as normal, with Campbell playing a long “G” note, tied over from the last beat of bar 3, through bar 4, with slight feedback sustaining the long note.

The eight track tape was then turned over, and Campbell played against the reverse sound of the track, including his initial first four bars ensuring that he played another long “G” near the same point which could be cross-faded against the original – the tape was then turned over to normal setup, and he selected just 4 bars from the reverse recording which are bars 4-7 inclusive – this was cross-faded with the original at bar 4 – he then picked up from bar 8 through to bar 16 as normal, so in fact, only 4 bars are actually “reversed”.

“Reflections…” reached #3 in the UK and #10 in the US.

Enjoy… until next week.