Olympic Olympic 4 1973 Czechoslovakia, Progressive Rock

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Olympic - Olympic 4 (1973) (Czechoslovakia, Progressive Rock)

The four-piece band OLYMPIC was released in 1974, but its birth was accompanied by major problems. Leaving aside the normalization of the staff, which was inevitable for everyone at the time, the band was teetering on the edge of existence in the early 1970s. In 1971, the band's first era finally ended with the departure of drummer Antonín Sorry Pacák. Pacák wanted to devote himself mainly to visual art, but his musical heart also belonged to jazz, especially dixiland. They didn't mention that his only kindred spirit left the band in 1969 - bassist and lyricist Pavel Chrastina, who did not want to become a professional and considered big beat to be his entertainment. Pacák was replaced by a new drummer, Petr Hejduk. On the third album, Jedem jedem, Jan Hauser from Apollobeat plays bass, a short episode that was later joined by Jiří Korn from Rebels. However, he also started a career as a solo pop singer, so Olympic often played in the GDR, but they considered them Korn's backing band there. Which of course was very upsetting to Petr Janda. Just before Korn arrived, Janda fired backing guitarist Ladislav Klein because, according to him, at that time backing guitars were no longer worn and all the world's bands played without them. In 1972, Olympic played in a four-piece line-up. Well, they played - not much. There were few concerts, the communists had beaten up the rock scene, and musicians from rock bands were hired to accompany pop stars... In 1973, the band recorded most of the songs for their 4th album, but by then Korn was also leaving and his place was taken by Ladislav Chvalkovský (Skupina Šesti strýců etc.), an excellent universal musician, but not a big-bíť player. That one didn't last long either, the important thing is that he also appears on several songs in the "four". Olympic 4 was intended as an anniversary album for the band's 10th anniversary, and was planned for release in 1973. Somehow the boys forgot about Supraphon's production deadlines... and so with great difficulty the album was released in 1974. But Olympic almost didn't exist anymore. The last bass player in the roulette of changes was Pavel Petráš (1974-1975), about whom Petr Janda does not speak very enthusiastically (I never found out the reason), moreover, in the band's biography on the current release of the Olympic 4 album there is no mention of Petráš - he did not exist... Janda wanted to disband the band, but wonder of the world, miracles do happen - a miraculous bassist came, a generation younger than him, Milan Broum (who, among other things, had previously tried it with Etc after Vladimír Parůňek left) and Olympic set off again towards a joyful future. I saw a concert with bassist Petráš at the time, Olympic showed signs of considerable fatigue and I think it did not matter who played bass there... What can I say about the album's repertoire. Some songs have changed the lyrics and title compared to the live performances at the time - for example, Ssem szczęślą was originally Vzducholoď, it also had different lyrics. Musically, the album is marked by the trends of the time. Just like e.g. Syncopations '61 and Olympic 4 bear traces of the influence of the then very popular Uriah Heep. Melodies led by chord strokes are the main feature of Únos, Karneval, Konec konců and Vůně benzinu. Fortunately, the songs remained melodic and typical for Olympic - Stará láhev, Blázen, Kánon and Jsem zprávní s rozjezdem do improvizace. We can only ask why the original comic book was not used, my conspiracy suspicions turn again to the prejudice of the publishing officials, who were certainly somewhat uneasy about the American style of the cover. Too bad - Janis Joplin would not have been alone then.... At least now we have it in the new edition. The audio version was prepared from analog tapes to high digital Hi-Res resolution 192kH/24bit, which is currently considered the optimal basis for producing analog media. So the resulting record sounds correct "English" sound, nothing mushy - and hardcore hi-fi enthusiasts will get their money's worth...

Tracks:
01. Karneval (Petr Hejduk / Václav Fischer) - 0:00

02. Stará láhev (Petr Janda / Václav Fischer) - 3:54

03. Konec konců (Petr Hejduk / Libor Křístek) - 7:22

04. Blázen (Petr Janda / Michal Prostějovský) - 10:59

05. Únos (Petr Janda / Zdeněk Rytíř) - 14:02

06. Harém (Petr Janda / Václav Fischer) - 19:10

07. Jsem zvláštní (Petr Janda / Miroslav Černý) - 24:04

08. Vůně benzínu (Petr Janda / Václav Fischer) - 29:33

09. Kánon (Petr Janda / Zdeněk Rytíř) - 33:56

Personnel:
- Petr Janda - lead guitar, lead vocals (02,05-08), soprano saxophone
- Miroslav Berka - keyboards, vocals
- Ladislav Chvalkovský - bass (01,03,07), lead vocals (01)
- Jiří Korn - bass (02,04-06,08,09), lead vocals (04-06)
- Petr Hejduk - drums, lead vocals (01,03)