Sunbeam Rec.
Roger Rodier : Upon Velveatur (CAN,1972)***°°
Sunbeam Records keeps on surprising me with their good taste of reissues. This one and only LP by Roger Rodier is another such a surprise of a, well remastered, reissue. The style on the album varies a bit with the songs fitting well together, from more inspired songs to a thoroughly evolution to somewhat easier softrock or even soft soulrock, always well arranged. One of the favourite songs is “My Spirit's Calling”, eternal and melancholic (acoustic guitar & violin, touches of analogue electronic sounds). Personally I like the kind of ballad-type soft gentleness as well as the softrock songs with lush background orchestra. The tensions can grow emotionally in voice and acoustic guitar (like on “While My Castle's Burning”), or with additional choir arrangements and in strong dialogue of electric guitars with the orchestrations (like on “Am I supposed to let it by again?”). Only “Just Fine” is lead by piano instead of guitars.
Other unreleased songs recorded during that period seem to be lost now. Only "The Key" from a single which came with the LP, -but which was left out from the album-, could still be added. Other bonuses are the mostly equally interesting early singles (from 1968 and 1969) –only “Easy Song” I like a bit less- which were released as a duo with Germaine Gauthier as 'Rodier-Gauthier', from which the first single is sung in French. These additional songs make the album, perhaps also musically, more complete. "Overseer" for instance has really original arranged guitar rhythms to the song.
Unless extremely good critics, the album disappeared into the unknown pretty quickly, partly perhaps because Roger wanted to remain modestly on the background, outside any hip fashion stimulation, which the label first intended to blow him into that direction. When the next year he started to work on a second album for Columbia, no efforts were done any more to make that really work. This exceeded in a slow withdrawal from the musical scene.
Other reviews :
"Sole album from this French Canadian songsmith sung entirely in English. Think of a mellow All Things Must Pass era George Harrison on a heavy Jesus kick and you might have it. Stoned is the way of Velveatur's walk and the odd lash of stinging guitar is sure to keep you on your toes. All who hear this album fall under its charm." Soulstrut
"This French-Canadian singer/songwriter (who sings in English) has often been compared to Nick Drake, and the folky style with creepy orchestration does somewhat resemble Drake, though there’s nowhere near the same level of loneliness and despair here. A few songs have some effective fuzz guitar, though mostly it’s fragile folk-rock of the highest order. It’s got the same kind of wonderful dreamy feel of the well-known orchestrated 60s Capitol psych monsters, though through the mouth and mind of a gentle, wistful soul. This is really an excellent album, one of the finest acid folk items, and certainly a record that deserves more attention. Original copies came with an 18-page lyric booklet." [AM]
"Major label soft folk/pop with a very appealing surface, well-written and skillfully arranged. The moody folk tracks are excellent but only make up a minority of the album, which also goes into more ambitious domains with a European cabaret vibe a la Bowie, and some truly gentle musings that are too close to sugary 1970s soft rock for my tastes. The Nick Drake comparisons are indeed inaccurate, and I would expect this to appeal mainly to fans of soft femme vocal folkpop a la Margo Guryan. There is a certain kinship to the "Chris Lucey" LP as well. "My spirit's calling" is the standout track to me." [PL] Lysergia (Lamaarchive)
"Upon Velveatur is a dreamy French-Canadian psych-folk pop suite that varies from hushed mystical songs lushly orchestrated with strings and theremin to more rock-oriented numbers featuring stinging electric guitar. Lazy comparisons to Nick Drake are inevitable, and if we must go there, Upon Velveatur is closest to Bryter Later in terms of feel and production value. But Rodier can also sound like John Lennon with Cream as the band, Fleetwood Mac on backing vocals,and produced by Roger Nichols and his Small Circle of Friends all on one song! We get the feeling that maybe some folks like Neil Halstead were onto the sounds of Rodier as we were listening to some Mojave 3 and could totally hear Rodier's voice and stylings being transmitted by Mr. Halstead." Aquarius records
The bookversion of "Dreams, Fantasies & Nightmares" (Vernon Joynson) only lists the single "Listen to these words" (Columbia c4-3058) from 1972, and says this made the Canadian top 50).
