Supersister - 1971 - To the Highest Bidder

Supersister

1971

To the Highest Bidder

01. A Girl Named You (10:08)
02. No Tree Will Grow (On Too High a Mountain) (7:40)
03. Energy (Out of Future) (14:55)
04. Higher (2:56)

Robert Jan Stips / keyboards, lead vocals, vibes
Ron van Eck / (bass) guitar, fuzzbass
Sacha van Geest / flutes, vocals
Marco Vrolijk / drums, percussion, vocals

Following in the same path as their debut album, Supersister achieved their definite masterpiece in the shape of 'To the Highe$t Bidder': in fact, Supersister proves to be one of the most prominent Dutch prog acts of the 70s, equalling to Focus and Finch in prowess, fire and excellence. In many ways, Supersister incarnates the Netherlands' response to Soft Machine, since their music is overtly inspired by Canterbury's jazziest self; they also have clear hints to Zappa's sophisticated absurdity and the distinctive dynamics of avant-garde free jazz (track 3 being the best example). Supersister's approach to humour in the context of jazz-oriented prog is a crucial component of their music, since it allows all four musicians to keep a light-hearted feel in their performancers, while exhibiting their own individual skills and challenging interplay. The flautist's role is certainly special, since van Geest's style has a remarkable tendecy towards the pastoral, yet in a strange way, it works effectively in the middle of the combined jazzy leaning of his other partners. The fact that two tracks are 10+ minute long allows the foursome to explore into their musical ideas and explore its potential variations: 'A Girl Named you' (a Supersister classic) is full of Latin-jazz colours, while 'Energy (Out of Future)' adds some exotic African-like beatings in the middle of the band's exhaustive musical and rhythmic travels. Both tracks portray obvious bombastic aspirations, but at the end of the day, the band manages not to take this impetus too far by keeping a sense of fun. As a result, there is a constant, unhidden touch of fun and freshness displaying all through these pieces; in thsi way, the friendly listener can rest assured that his senses won't get fed up at any point, since the pleasant flavour stays unpolluted. The remaining tracks are apparently more serene, but not less funny: 'No Tree Will Grow (On Too High a Mountain)' ends its reflective portrait with the sound of a crowd cynically laughing, while 'Higher', in contrast to the previous track's tour-de-force, is a bossanova theme, serving basically as a sweet frivolous closure. Together with Focus and Finch, Supersister is part of the Netherlands' Prog Holy Trinity, and they surely deserve to be as acknowledged as the others... at least.

Starting on a 10-minutes version of the single release a few months before, A Girl Named you explores Caravan territory and wits (or obsessions might be a better word, knowing Pye's tortuous mind) and brings out much Stips' electric piano, but he's also toying with a mellotron and harpsichord. The following No Tree Will Grow (also a single) is built on a drone evoking/reminiscing some of Robert Wyatt's most poignant later works. With Highe$t Bidder SS becomes groundbreakers rather than followers. Indeed this organ drone underlining Stips' piano and Van Geest's vocals is impressive. As the first side died out on severely demented laughs, nothing was to prepare us for the flipside.

A loud metronomic bass drums accompanied with a rare electric guitar (rather rare in SS), then Sacha's saturated flute, which would finally first hasten the bass drum and then liberate the tune from it with the help of Stip's organ then electric piano, finally leading into the first verse. The 15-miss Energy (Out Of The Future) is a killer track that hesitates between Egg, The Nice, Soft Machine, Caravan with Sacha's high perched flute and his dubbed filtered-though vocals talking much of the attention, but it's really bassist Van Eck and drummer Vrolijk's moment. The dronal final-section leads directly into the short closer Higher, a charming under 3-mins tidbit riding on a bass flute and distant piano.

The re-issue (with a great booklet featuring the history and pics) boast the first two tracks in shorter single edits, which we might have done without, but they shed a different light onto the said longer versions. Much more interesting is the Missing Link B-side, with the binary bass line dictating the beat and structure. The other B-side is a goofy fourth-degree Zappa-like track worrying about the Groupies Of The Band, which is neither interesting nor funny. The album was a hit with John Peel and he gave them an introduction on the British market, even releasing the album on his Dandelion label, adding the She Was Naked single to the album's track list (strangely not present in any form in this issue). The group would head out to a nearby European tour, later appearing in a German TV special with an orchestra (thus previewing some of their next album's works). TTHB sold quite a bit and was nominated to the Dutch-equivalent Grammy. Had for me to recommend just one of their first three albums, as all three have their own merits and none surpass each other.