Theme From an Imaginary Western

Community Made With Ardour
#1

Hi,

Here’s a tune I did on my own in my fresh install of Ardour 9.2. I recently was doing some Video work on some old concert footage and I came across this song being performed by Mountain at the Midsummer Rock Festival in Cincinnati Ohio in 1970. *NOTE TO READER not only am I old… my taste in music is 20 years older than it should be… it’s my gift, it’s my curse… Anyway, this song was written by Jack Bruce of Cream fame and Eric Clapton allegedly didn’t want to record it so producer/bassist Felix Pappalardi who was the producer of Cream’s Disraeli Gears album recorded it with his band ‘Mountain’. Mountain is immortalized by their only big hit ‘Mississippi Queen’ which is a great slice of seismic blues rock but I always thought their more refined stuff like Theme and Nantucket Sleighride were rare gems that had been overlooked…

The guitars on this song were all recorded directly plugged in to an old Fender Hotrod DeVille that my son found on the cheap. I was pretty annoyed that he brought home such a big loud amp when we already have a few Fender tube amps but then I plugged into it and effortlessly reproduced Leslie West’s trademark delicious squonk… :exploding_head: In hindsight this song kind of has that well-worn melodic hard rock power ballad vibe but in truth Mountain was probably one of the first bands to mix heavy bluesy guitars with such a melodic song structure, it’s kind of the prototype for power ballads in a weird way.

OK enough history…
Theme From an Imaginary Western

4 Likes
#2

Thanks a lot for sharing this! The sound here is really excellent. I especially like how honest and direct the whole recording feels — no unnecessary polish, just the right amount of grit.

The guitar tone is spot on in my opinion. It has that old-school bite and dynamics that works perfectly for a song like this. The mix also leaves plenty of space for the instruments to breathe, which makes the whole thing feel natural and alive.

A lot of things were done really well in the past — in some ways maybe even better — but I still believe that this era will leave behind iconic recordings for future generations too. This could easily be one of those candidates.

And thanks again for sharing it — productions like this are always inspiring to listen to.