Argent-Encore: Live In Concert (1974)

Argent's sixth album, the double live album "Encore", was recorded on the tour following the album "Nexus" and officially released in late 1974 by Epic Records. The band, led by the ingenious Rod Argent (keyboards and vocals) and Russ Ballard (guitar and vocals), featured a repertoire drawn from various concerts across the UK during the first months of 1974. The band's lineup was completed by drummer Robert Henrit and bassist Jim Rodford. This double album showcases Rod Argent's symphonic and progressive tendencies, which contrast sharply with Ballard's more accessible and commercial style. This double album reveals Rod Argent's symphonic and progressive approach, a clear contrast to Ballard's more accessible and commercial side. Composed of lengthy instrumental passages like the opening “The Coming Of Kohoutek”, or the progressive “God Gave Rock and Roll to You” and “Music From The Spheres”, all featuring Rod Argent’s keyboards and organ as the main protagonists, the album also showcases Ballard’s more accessible side, as demonstrated in the hard rock tracks “It’s Only Money (Parts 1 and 2)” and “Thunder and Lightning”. The remaining tracks maintain an exceptionally high standard, as evidenced by the bluesy, progressive-tinged “I Am The Dance Of Ages”, the carefree rock and roll “Keep On Rollin’ ”, with its irresistible, fast-paced boogie-rock style, and its two great classics, the immeasurable “Hold Your Head Up” and the infectious “Time Of The Seasons”. All of this underscores the inexhaustible talent of two of the greatest geniuses British music has ever produced, both creatively and instrumentally.

Argent-Nexus (1974)

Argent's fifth album, "Nexus", represented their most progressive offering, a departure from the mainstream rock indulgences of the monumental hits "Hold Your Head Up" (1972) and "God Gave Rock and Roll to You" (1973). While the band had already begun to steer their music toward a more complex style with their previous album, "In Deep" (1973), on "Nexus" Rod Argent takes the reins of much of the songwriting, dominated by keyboards, as demonstrated in the album's first three instrumental tracks: "The Coming of Kohoutek", "Once Around the Sun", and "Infinite Wanderer". In these songs, Argent unleashes his organ solos, frenetic keyboards, and stellar contributions from a resurgent Russ Ballard on guitar. The progressive epic "Music From the Spheres" follows a similar path, with the simple ballad "Love" completing the first part. The second side of the album is entirely dominated by Russ Ballard's compositions, all of them predominantly heavy and powerful hard rock tracks like "Thunder and Lightning" and "Keeper of the Flame", as well as songs closer to pom-pom rock such as "Man for All Reasons" and blues rock like "Gonna Meet My Maker". After this album, internal disputes between Rod Argent and Russ Ballard regarding the musical direction they should take led to Ballard's departure, and the band entered a creative crisis, releasing several more albums without much impact, such as "Circus" and "Counterpoints" (1975), both of which served as epitaphs for this legendary band.

Argent-Circus (1975)

The departure of Russ Ballard from the British band Argent meant losing not only one of their best songwriters, but also their lead singer and guitarist. However, desperate times call for desperate measures, and this loss led the band's other leader, Rod Argent, to take the reins musically and steer the band in a direction and sound more in line with his preferences and musical tastes. To begin with, he recruited not just one singer and guitarist, but two at the same time: John Verity and John Grimaldi. This substantial transformation considerably changed Argent's style. "Circus" was the perfect excuse for Rod Argent to delve into more jazz-influenced atmospheres, while simultaneously crafting an album far more progressive and balanced than all their previous releases, completely abandoning the hard rock of their early records. Here, the Hammond organ (omnipresent on all previous albums) practically disappears in favor of the Mellotron, the mini Moog, and Fender Rhodes pianos, as demonstrated in the atmospheric "Clown". All these changes are also reflected in the great sense of dynamics and brilliant rhythmic shifts, as in the exuberant symphonic title track, the fiery progressive "Highwire", and the jazz-rock "Trapeze", which represent the album's most avant-garde moments. Meanwhile, the accessible sounds of yesteryear are present in the melodic "Shine On Sunshine" and the cheerful boogie-jazz "The Jester".

Argent-All Together Now (1972)

By the time the progressive rock band Argent released the album "All Together now" (1972), they already had two other albums ("Argent" and "Ring of hands") behind them, which had made them one of the leading groups of the first half of the year decade of 70's.
In this work, the band leaves behind the lines that it had drawn in the first two albums, deriving its style in more forcefulness, sound and depth in its compositions. However, it is not a work of great progressive purity.
The ego of its two leaders Rod Argent and Russ Ballard are present in this album in an obvious way, while Argent wants prominence for his keyboard as demonstrated in "Hold your head up" which is the hit of this album or in "Pure love" where he performs An introduction of more than 3 minutes only of keyboards, Ballard unleashes the creativity that he carries and that he had not been able to express in all its dimensions until then distilling blues, funky and rock and roll through his fresh guitar style, restless and dynamic that makes the songs acquire commercial overtones, some of them even danceable.