The parachute isn’t the answer to everything because maybe the fucker isn’t going to open.

—Phil May, in the liner notes by Mike Stax from the 1999 release of Parachute

When I abandoned the United States for France in May 2013, I spent most of the time on the flight to Paris pondering an age-old question: “Am I running away from something or towards something?”

I had given up on the good ol’ USA following the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre, where instead of doing anything to rein in the madness, Americans flocked to gun shops in full support of their constitutional right to lock and load while the NRA-controlled Congress did absolutely nothing. I could no longer live in a society that treated the slaughter of innocents as just another item in the news cycle. Blessed with the fortune of dual citizenship, an employer with European operations and relatives in both Paris and Nice, I put on my parachute and left for La Belle France.

The transition was easier for me than most émigrés, as I spoke the language fluently and had spent a lot of time in France over the years. I ran into a few bumps along the road due to lingering Americanism—forgetting that shops close early and on Sundays, telling service people what I wanted before saying “Bonjour,” smiling too much—but nothing serious. Even though things went well, I think I would define those first three years as running away from something because I still held the hope that the United States would grow the fuck up. That hope was blasted to smithereens when Americans elected Trump. Going to the American consulate and handing in my passport the day after the election ended the running away period—I had passed the point of no return. I’d jumped out of the plane.

After returning from Marseilles that evening, I felt a strange sense of emptiness. After talking it over with my partner and my family at dinner, I realized that I had abandoned one country but hadn’t fully embraced the new country: I’d made the transition intellectually but not emotionally. I hadn’t defined what I was running toward. I felt like I was falling through mid-air, thinking, “Maybe my parachute isn’t going to open after all.”

Well, thank fucking whoever for Marine LePen, whose blatant racism and sheer stupidity awoke an undiscovered passion for French ideals and the European Union. The En Marche campaign turned out to be exactly what I needed to cement my relationship with my country (although I do wish Macron would lean a bit more to the left). Election night was the night my parachute landed, and when I hit the ground I rolled my body to make for a nice, soft landing.

Okay, I was on the ground because I was as drunk as a skunk after the celebration and my legs were perfectly fucking useless, but I had to complete the metaphor!

Released in the pivotal year of 1970, Parachute is an album about larger transitions than mine—the multi-layered transitions that replaced the Swinging Sixties with the Disco Era. The broad movement that had fought for civil rights and world peace while dancing to the music of rock and folk icons began to devolve into a melange of alternative lifestyles. Gay liberation took its place alongside women’s lib; spiritual and earthy types left cities and burbs and headed back to nature; social activists either found jobs in the government or joined radical underground movements; the majority thought it was time to grow up and seek employment within the Establishment. All kinds of people were strapping themselves into parachutes.

Music reflected the transitions taking place in the larger culture. The symbolic coup-de-grace to the Swinging ’60s came on April 10, 1970, when Paul McCartney announced his decision to leave The Beatles (a formality, really, since John had told the others back in September 1969 that he was done). The break-up of The Beatles was certainly a traumatic experience for a generation who grew up with them and saw them “change the world,” but their departure allowed artists whose work had been hidden in the Beatles’ shadow to come to the fore. This newly-discovered diversity eventually led to the destruction of the “Woodstock audience,” music fans who listened to all kinds of music. Rock splintered into its various sub-genres during the 70s in the same way the Baby Boomers fled into various cultural cul-de-sacs.

Despite critical validation, Parachute did not exactly turn The Pretty Things into household names or boost them to the forefront of those emerging from the Beatles’ shadow. However, I can’t think of another record that captured the transition from the 60’s to the 70’s as well as Parachute. The album features some of the best melodic rock on record (the style that would retrospectively earn the label, “baroque rock”) while integrating the heavier riff-based guitar rock that would dominate the early 70’s. The Pretties were unique in that they were exceptionally capable in both styles. Their second album, Get the Picture?, is a garage fan’s dream, and their magnum opus, the song cycle SF Sorrow, displayed their talents with more melodic and progressive styles. After some upheaval in the lineup in part due to the disappointing chart performance of SF Sorrow, creative force Phil May and bassist Wally Waller became the songwriting team, approaching their work through the shared realization that the musical and social assumptions of the 60’s no longer had any relevance. More importantly, they had the right temperament to take advantage of a rules-don’t-matter environment, experimenting with different ways to write songs and integrating creativity with daily life:

Sometimes Wally and I would get back at three or four in the morning, stoned out of our brains, and start writing, and write until 12 o’clock the next day, and then go out to a gig. The party was part of the writing. It wasn’t something you stopped working for to do, it just fused into it. It was all of one—the life was all about the music.

—Phil May, in liner notes referenced above

Recorded with Norman Smith of Beatles’ fame (as was SF Sorrow) at Abbey Road, the band brought the same spirit to the recording sessions, working long hours, experimenting and taking the time to get things right. The combination of excellent production, creative freedom and deep social insight is what makes Parachute such an amazing and horribly under-appreciated piece of art.

“Scene One” gets things rolling with an anxiety-inducing build combining Mellotron, rumbling piano and guitar feedback leading to an urgent guitar strum and a furious assault on the drum kit by Skip Alan. The song proper is almost Lizst-like in its dramatic intensity with sharp thrusts and stuttering rhythms. The poem supporting the music is brief, delivered in a wave of complex vocal harmony—an aural depiction of the ruthless energy of a great city:

Stone spires rise high, lacerate warmer skies
Iron laced populations, beneath molten fields

What follows is open to interpretation. In his liner notes for the album, Mike Stax describes the next five songs as two individual pieces and a three-part suite. What I hear is a five-part suite based on the experience of the protagonist in “The Good Mr. Square,” and this is coming from someone who didn’t read the liner notes for this edition until I prepared for this review. One of the themes in Parachute has to do with the migration of significant numbers of 60’s generation to rural areas—the “back-to-nature” movement. On Parachute, this conflict is manifested in the form of an unnamed woman who abandons city life for England’s pastures. The problem with the three-song suite concept is that you lose the conflict—the song that describes her as a city dweller (“She Was Tall, She Was High”) precedes those three songs. Add to that the fact that “The Good Mr. Square” segues seamlessly into “She Was Tall, She Was High”—so seamlessly that you have no idea you’ve moved to a new track—and the five-song suite makes much more sense.

Based on one of Phil May’s short stories, “The Good Mr. Square” is a stunning musical shift from the opener, a simple arrangement of acoustic guitar, bass and light drums containing a perfectly lovely melody spiced with luscious background harmonies. Wally Waller’s vocal is appropriately gentle, and I really love the way The Pretties change the shape of the vowels on those harmonies, moving from “aah” in the first line and “whoa-oh-oh” in the second. Our protagonist is a lonely fellow who allegedly “doesn’t have any hang-ups” and “spends his time looking through other people’s eyes.” The segue is crucial here, for the first four lines of the next song (“She Was Tall, She Was High”) are sung to the melody of “The Good Mr. Square,” which to me implies that Mr. Square is observing this young lass as she passes by his window. Even more evidence can be found in the way the last line of “The Good Mr. Square” is transcribed, ending with an ellipsis (“He spends his time . . .), indicating a continuous narrative.

The woman responsible for Mr. Square’s enchantment is a party chick with serious presence:

And as she weaves her way, through city streets,
The dawn arrives.
In concrete glades of metal grass,
Steel cords are woven tight.
But she is free, f . . . r . . . double e.

She was tall, she was high,
Lord she almost touched the sky,
Today, I said today,
She was tall, she was high,
Lord she almost made me cry.

Some fifteen years later this babe would reappear in Ian Anderson’s “Budapest” (“Yes, and her legs went on forever/Like staring up at infinity”). In response to her inspiring presence, the music becomes more libidinal, with sharp electric guitar cuts and a more intense vocal from keyboardist Jon Povey. The final words on the woman indicate either that the city is taking its toll (“Before the storm subsides, she’s flown/And leaves the body torn”) or that Mr. Square is experiencing deep anguish at her disappearance (or has a hard-on that will never probe her inner secrets).

Mr. Square then encounters the lady “In the Square,” perhaps having struck up some kind of casual friendship with her in the intervening days (“Hey,” she says to her friends, “I met this nice old chap in the square today.”) This is a perfectly sumptuous piece of music with clear baroque flavorings from Spanish guitar and electric harpsichord enhanced by a stunningly effective use of a sitar. The harmonies are once again absolutely gorgeous, sung gently and almost respectfully in support of the idyllic scene:

In the square, she came running,
I was lucky to be there.
In her hair, she wore flowers,
The scent it filled the air.

The flowers represent an important shift in the narrative: our hot city lady is about to go country on us. Mr. Square is appropriately devastated by her departure:

She must leave, not returning,
I was sadness standing there,
A silent square, bus of silver,
With my vision disappears.

Ah, but there’s always hope, even if it’s the terribly fragile hope of an unopened letter. Phil May finally gets a turn at the lead vocal spot in “The Letter,” a more upbeat number reflecting the delight Mr. Square experiences going through the post—the repetition of the line “She wrote me a letter,” with varied emotional emphasis on the part of Phil May, betrays his excitement and anticipation. Two aspects of the story are confirmed here: first, the pair did strike up a friendship with overtones of something more; and second, the girl describes her disillusionment with city life, clearly linking her identity to that tall drink of water in “She Was Tall, She Was High.”

She wrote me a letter
From the green fields it came
She wrote me a letter
Trying to explain
Now living came easy
In velvet valleys of sun
She wrote me a letter

She wrote me a letter
So many questions she asked
She knew, I just couldn’t answer
For they were all in my past
City life was too heavy
So she had run for the hills

A transitional passage highlighted by an intensely picked bass line segues into “Rain,” where the vocal tone shifts to one of anguish and loss:

When I got to our meeting place
I stared into empty space,
No-one here for me, oh no no no

The phrase, “No, no, no, nobody here for me” is repeated several times during the fade, soon replaced by the dreary sound of cold raindrops. Whether you go with the three or five-song suite, one thing is indisputable: these are magnificently crafted songs marked by poetic economy and performed with energy, professionalism and tremendous care.

But hold on there, we’re not done yet! Having given the 60s a beautiful send-off, The Pretties embrace the emerging hard rock movement of the 70s with the riff-driven ass-kicker, “Miss Fay Regrets.” The band is on fire throughout, bashing the shit out of everything they’ve got their hands on. The lead guitar duet in the break defines the word, “killer,” and as for the lyrics . . . well, you don’t know whether to laugh or cry in response to his story about an arrogant leading lady who peaked in the mid-40s and now finds herself on the skids. Phil May manages somehow to stoke your anger at this bitch while also making you feel a bit sorry for her . . . but not too sorry:

Well could I spare the fare,
‘Cause your cheque book isn’t there,
Could I take you to where your hotel is?
Oh yes I told them who you were,
But they said they would prefer it,
If you would find another place to crash in,
I know the streets are very cold,
And the shallow walls don’t hold,
The shelter and protection you’re seeking.
And as I walk away,
You turn to me and say,
You’d rather I forget about our meeting.

Although Phil May described himself as a man with feet firmly planted in the city, he was hardly oblivious to the darkness inherent in any great metropolis. “Cries from the Midnight Circus” paints a vivid picture of hookers flagging down drivers “with faces greased and mouth full of shine” (or is it “shite?”—both work). It all sounds both rather sad and harmless at first, but sex workers are always the most vulnerable human beings in any city, as misogyny, dehumanization and guilt infect too many of their customers:

You lie in the alley, with blood on your clothes.
As fingers round your throat they close.
Your cries of murder, splash on the walls
As you die, you think about the injustice of it all.

The music is sexy-sleazy, dominated by heavy bass and improvised bursts of guitar—a soundscape reflecting the sheer noisiness of the city with the ever-present rumble in the background. What strikes me most about this song is its heavy but powerful social message, a feature missing from too many hard rock songs of the early 70’s.

We flip over to Side Two and find “Grass,” a song that has nothing to do with marijuana and everything to do with the city-country contrast that dominates Parachute. The song deals with separated lovers—she in the country, he in the city—and it’s tempting to consider this an epilogue to the suite. Phil May described the song as “a pastoral hymn,” but the language he uses to describe the pain of separation is hardly pastoral:

As silver tears they weave and lace,
Sad patterns upon her face,
She waits for you.
So low below a laser sun,
Through velvet fields she runs,
Reaching for you.

And so you bleed now,
Your hand holds the knife
That is tearing your life apart.
Why don’t you leave now,
The city’s too heavy
And your dreams they melt in the sun.

The melodic progression is fascinating, moving from pure loveliness supporting the country scenes to a more complex pattern in the city scenes—a pattern that refuses to resolve on the root note but leaves the listener suspended in uncertainty. The guitar duets that separate the verses are steeped in blues patterns, synthesizing the aching on both sides of the divide. If I were to choose one song that synthesizes the music of the 60’s and 70’s, “Grass” would come to mind in a heartbeat. What’s remarkable is you hardly notice the synthesis: the song flows easily despite the disparate parts. Equally remarkable are the four-part harmonies, where Norman Smith joins in because apparently only three Pretties could sing.

Up to this point, the songs on Parachute have accepted the notion of the countryside as a soft landing for those fleeing the cacophony of urban existence. That notion is put to the test in “Sickle Clowns,” where the gruesome ending of the film Easy Rider is used to demolish the notion that rural areas are relatively free from hate. Shee-it, everybody in America knows that! That’s where the rednecks and the white supremacists hang! The “sickle” in the song is not the farm implement or communist symbol but is short for motor-CYCLE, and the chord pattern, a modified blues pattern where the emphasis of the root 7th chord is the flattened third and the expected IV (major) chord is iv (minor), would have fit beautifully into the Easy Rider soundtrack. The band is tight and the song definitely gets your hips in motion.

“She’s a Lover” is a more melodic rocker but still pretty beefy, with outstanding support from the rhythm section of Skip Alan and Wally Waller. The song also breaks pattern—twice—in the middle of the song, first with a gentle passage dominated by vocal harmony then by a fascinating instrumental passage that moves in unexpected directions away and towards the base melody. The extended fade features both superbly executed rhythmic shifts from the band and surprising variations to the expected vocal harmonies, enhanced by a call-and-response pattern. The imagery in the song is that of Earth Mother—a sexier, more sinuous version as opposed to those fat broads the archaeologists always dig up in our ancestors’ caves—but still the nurturing image in perfect sync with nature:

With warm breezes
She will wipe away the sigh.
In the green folds of her skirt
A tired traveller lies,
She’s a lover and you know she’s coming through

Later, “She sheds her summer dress/Fearing it displeases you,” indicating that the concept of the dominant female had not sufficiently penetrated male consciousness. Fuck that! When I strip, I choose to strip and I don’t give a fuck who it pleases or displeases . . . though I rather like the awe that stripping can inspire.

Speaking of fuck, I really wish The Pretties had lived in another age with limited censorship and could have titled the next song, “Aw, Fuck It.” As it is, we’ll have to accept “What’s the Use,” which I will admit is probably a more precise choice of words but lacks the emotional impact of surrender. We could compromise and call it “To Hell with It” and I would be mollified. Suppressing my tendency to meander any further, this is a very clever little piece that opens beautifully with a heavily reverbed piano playing a pattern similar to the gentle melodies you hear in old movies when the characters enter a bucolic town in China or Japan. The music shifts to a waltz for the verse proper, where vague hippie platitudes compete with nonsensical metaphors (“your smile was the wind” makes me think of someone with missing teeth). This absurdity is deliberate, for after the flower children admit they “can’t build to lines of a plan,” the pastoral harmonies and 3 /4 rhythm collapse into a poor-us repetition of “what’s the use, what’s the use.” The 12-string was a nice touch on this piece, a blast of folk-rock that fits the theme perfectly.

Norman Smith received co-writing credit for the lush album closer, “Parachute.” The exquisite harmonies are the work of Jon Povey, who took advantage of eight-track technology and layered eight different versions of himself to achieve the effect. In the liner notes, Jon describes how he pulled off the soprano parts, with Norman taking a more . . . assertive role:

The very, very high ones are very difficult to reach, so Norman used to come up behind me with a drumstick and stick it up my arse whenever I couldn’t reach the note. It was quite effective as well.

The lyrics are quite poetic; I’m not sure I agree with Mike Stax’s opinion that they evoke “The Waste Land,” but I do think they reinforce the themes of Parachute: the flight from city to nature and the uncertainty of a safe landing:

White ice towers, slow dissolving
Now fall.
Below savage moon
Iron cities soon to rust.
Warned first by the gathering shadows
They fled.
From wide vapor deserts
They turned, turned towards the sea.
Pale worn the walking, pass
Through concrete glades.
Torn shadows, slashed silence

The harmonies segue into an instrumental passage where Povey demonstrates considerable skill on the piano before the arrangement descends and fades into a rising, single synthesized note that sounds like a fading siren . . . a curious warning of what might lie ahead.

Parachute is a wonderful multi-layered listening experience filled with excellent musicianship, superb vocals and lyrics that teem with meaning. It is a tragedy that both SF Sorrow and Parachute wound up as chart failures due to poor support from EMI in the U.K. and the mind-blowing decision to sign a U.S. contract with a subsidiary of Motown. That is frustrating but I don’t think poor chart sales should minimize the extent of what The Pretties achieved here. Immersing myself in Parachute couldn’t have come at a better time in my life, for it encouraged deep self-reflection regarding a series of major life transitions that I had experienced as the blurry landscape that you experience when riding on a high-speed train. In the future, when I feel like reaching for a parachute, I know I will pause, reflect and think hard about whether I’m running away or running toward.

That’s what great art is supposed to do—get you to engage with your life, provide insight and raise questions—and Parachute does just that.