Mirage

Mirage wastes little time proving that progressive rock need not mean immobility. Camel’s second album contains only five tracks, but its longer pieces are constantly in motion, moving between tightly written themes, open instrumental passages and changes of texture that feel driven by melody rather than by technical display. Released in 1974, it is the sound of a young band discovering how much narrative can be created without relying heavily on lyrics.

The record was made after Camel signed to Decca’s Deram label and represented a significant step up in studio resources from their debut. Sessions took place in November 1973 at Island, Decca and AIR studios in London, with David Hitchcock producing. Hitchcock had worked with groups including Caravan and Genesis, and Mirage benefits from production that gives each musician room: Andrew Latimer’s guitar and flute, Peter Bardens’s keyboards, Doug Ferguson’s bass and Andy Ward’s drums remain distinct even when the arrangements become dense.

“Supertwister” puts Latimer’s flute at the centre, giving the album a lighter instrumental interlude before the larger constructions around it. “Nimrodel/The Procession/The White Rider” draws on The Lord of the Rings and unfolds across several connected sections rather than forcing its ideas into verse and chorus. The closing “Lady Fantasy”, also split into named parts, lasts more than nine minutes and shows the band’s strengths particularly clearly. Guitar and organ trade emphasis, the rhythm section changes the ground underneath them, and recurring themes give the piece shape without making it predictable.

What makes Mirage accessible is that the complexity is always attached to a strong melodic instinct. Camel can shift metre, instrumentation or intensity without making the listener feel as though the point is to admire the difficulty. The extended forms simply give ideas longer to develop. For somebody cautious about progressive rock, that makes this an especially persuasive record: technically assured, certainly, but also warm, lyrical and capable of leaving a tune behind after the final solo has ended.