St. Elmo's Fire - Live at the Cleveland Agora / Splitting Ions in the Ether. 1980 USA-Ohio

Live at the Cleveland Agora is St. Elmo's debut album from this fine progressive rock band from the namesake city. It would be their only album during their original tenure. Released privately, it was a 4 song instrumental EP that demonstrated a band with immense talent, captured live. Because of this, the sound quality isn't the best, and you get the feeling the band still needed a bit more time to work out the compositions. Since it's instrumental - but not a jam record - then melody and structure will need to carry the load. There are times here when one expects a vocal passage, or perhaps another theme break. It doesn't help that the tracks are fairly longish. Musically it's influenced by the usual UK suspects, just as every other progressive rock band from the Midwest were. St. Elmo's Fire incorporated a bit more King Crimson than usual, and one can also trace a bit of late 70s Rush in the grooves. Overall, Live at the Cleveland Agora is a fine EP, and worth seeking out on its own.

The band were to reform some 18 years later in Iowa (at least administratively), and rather than reissue the EP alone, they added the full concert plus 3 more tracks taken from two other shows in 1980. They also rechristened the album Splitting Ions in the Ether and added new artwork. The 9 tracks on display here are similar to the EP, but elongated even further since the 2 tracks left off were also the lengthiest. The odd thing about these two is they sound better than the 4 tracks from the EP, which have remained somewhat distorted even into the digital age. The other 3 songs are musically similar and 'Gone to Ground in the Khyber Pass' (left off from the EP) might be their best composition on here. Definitely the CD is the way to go if looking for ownership.

St. Elmo's Fire persevered for one more album, Artifacts of Passion, that is arguably an improvement over their original effort.

Ownership: LP: 1980 Corposant. Single sleeve. Had this in the early 90s and sold. Reacquired a sealed copy in 2017.

CD: 1998 Sprawling Productions. Fine reissue and archival release as noted above.

2//09; 9/18/17 (new entry)