Rainbow Theatre’s groundbreaking debut album, The Armada was originally released in 1975. Reissued here officially for the first time - this is the real deal, in digitally remastered splendour and with a bonus track to boot! Influences as diverse as classical composers Stravinsky and Wagner to King Crimson and the Mahavishnu Orchestra came into play. With composer, arranger, guitarist and mellotron player Julian Browning at the helm, the band was never going to be easily pigeonholed. Browning set about creating the unique music he had formulated in his mind. His classical influences began to emerge and in the meantime he’d also fallen in thrall of adventurous guitarists like King Crimson’s Robert Fripp and John McLaughlin. The King Crimson influence was certainly a key factor in the band’s development because, as well as the complex arrangements that Browning was forging, the other aspect that stood RainbowTheatre apart from the pack was the extensive use of the mellotron. Very few other Australian bands of the day even possessed, let alone knew how to incorporate the mellotron into their sound. Browning: “It is hard to describe our sound on record. To describe Rainbow Theatre as a jazz-classical-rock band, it sounds like an awful hybrid concoction of something or other. It’s like a fish milkshake! It’s hard to put it into words, but I don’t mind if you call it a jazz-classical-rock band, or a classically influenced jazz rock band. Probably progressive rock is as good a term as any to describe what we did.” As displayed on The Armada the music oscillates between nimble jazz rock (‘The Darkness Overture’), classical and operatic themes (‘Petworth House’, ‘The Armada’) and several points beyond. It’s one of the most idiosyncratic albums of the period, closer in spirit to King Crimson circa In the Court of the Crimson King/In the Wake of Poseidon/Lizard than anything else, and very accessible besides. Rainbow Theatre went on to record a second album, Fantasy of Horses before eventually breaking up in 1977. Digitally remastered from the original tapes, with a bonus symphonic excerpt by Julian Browning ( Performed by the Melbourne Grammar Symphony Orchestra conducted by Martin Rutherford).
Track Listing: 1. The Darkness Motive (a) Flourish (b) Overture (c) First Theme (d) Second Theme 2. Song (Guerdon...) 3. Petworth House 4. Song (Shall...) 5. The Armada (a) Scene at Sea (b) Dominion (c) Centuries Deep (d) Bolero (e) Last Picture Bonus Track by Julian Browning 6. Icarus (From Symphony No. 8) (a) Icarus and Daedalus (b) Ascension (c) Labyrinth Gothica (d) Icarian Sea