National Health
Missing Pieces

Often and willingly, posthumous releases of unreleased tracks are mere commercial moves, implemented by record companies to exploit as much as possible the names of bands that have already said all they had to say. Thus, it happens that demo tapes, b-sides, and discarded or even incomplete pieces find their way onto CDs that, in the end, do not hold all the value they would like to suggest. But this is not the case...

In 1996, what should have been the natural debut of National Health is released, and it bears a name as significant as it is predictable: "Missing Pieces". The tracks that compose it date back to the period when the band boasted the presence of seven members, as per the original idea of founders Alan Gowen and Dave Stewart. Besides the aforementioned keyboardists, we find the two guitarists Phil Miller and Phil Lee, drummer Bill Bruford, bassist Mont Campbell, and vocalist Amanda Parsons. Despite this being the core line-up, Steve Hillage, Neil Murray, Pip Pyle, John Greaves, and Barbara Gaskin also appear on the record, confirming that the tracks were recorded at different times during the band's brief history.

The great protagonist of this work is Mont, who signs most of the compositions and comes out victorious in the challenge with Dave (also the author of many pieces) over who managed to create the most complex track. The scepter goes, in fact, to "Zabaglione", a virtually indescribable track that, despite its complexity, manages to remain lively and interesting without falling into overly cerebral and intricate passages that are an end in themselves. The excellent "Agrippa" and "Paracelsus" follow the same wavelength, where Bill, with his subtle touch, guides the other musicians through musical territories bordering jazz but still illuminated by a warm gray and pink reflection, as if the drummer had always had the sound of Canterbury in his blood.

"The Lethargy Shuffle & The Mind-Your-Backs Tango" and "The Lethargy Shuffle Part 2" give space to the two guitars of the two Phils (Miller and Lee) alongside the omnipresent keyboards of Alan and Dave, which also dominate in "Croquette For Electronic Beating Group", with Mont's bass prominently featured, and in "The Towplane & The Gilder", which closely recalls the delicate and elegant sonorities of Gilgamesh (not surprisingly, the track is credited to Alan). The stunning "Clocks and Clouds", sung by Amanda, is not only one of the highest points of the album, but it is also one of the very few tracks to have lyrics, along with the decidedly more modest "Starlight on Seaweed", performed only by Dave and his wife Barbara and recorded many years after the others. There are also amusing interludes such as the terribly out-of-tune "Bourée", an excerpt from "Phlakaton" in which the audience diligently attempts, not without considerable effort, to sing Pip's abstract lyrics, and a final farewell from "Walking the Dog".

It seems truly extraordinary how this band, in its fleeting existence, managed to fashion masterpiece after masterpiece without ever putting a foot wrong. The album in question cannot really be considered a studio recording, since almost all the tracks are taken from live performances or radio sessions (the audio clearly suffers a bit), but this only makes this work even more exceptional and worthy of attention, at least for lovers of this little-known musical current.