Humble Pie – The Light of Love

Following his departure from the Small Faces, the late Steve Marriott formed hard/blues-rock combo and supergroup of sorts, Humble Pie.

Although known primarily as practitioners of no-nonsense blues-rock boogie, Humble Pie’s second album, Town and Country, did depart to greener pastures, with an almost entirely acoustic and altogether more pastoral sound demonstrated thereon.

It yielded this psychedelic gem, ‘The Light of Love’, easily the best thing Steve Marriot recorded post Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake.

Written by bassist and former Spooky Tooth member, Greg Ridley, ‘The Light of Love’ resonates with the sound we at HFoS love. The sitar that permeates throughout gives it that Eastern-tinged mysticism prevalent within a certain brand of acid rock. It captures the essence of a 1960′s bedsit and sitting cross-legged on the floor around a Dansette record player, toking on Moroccan black as joss sticks burn off-camera.

Arriving in 1969, when the shift towards progressive rock had already rendered psychedelia a spent force, ‘The Light of Love’ provides a decorous farewell.

‘The Light of Love’ appears on Town and Country by Humble Pie, available from Amazon.co.uk

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music vid, psychedelic rock, song reviews