Emerson Lake & Palmer - The Barbarian (1970)

When I found that the 2016 box set of Emerson Lake & Palmer's first album included quite a bit of unreleased and alternative material, I felt that I wanted to do something with it. However, there wasn't a huge amount to play around with, just a couple of alternate takes of 'Lucky Man' and one short one of 'Take A Pebble', an extract from 'The Three Fates', a Carl Palmer drum solo, a studio take of 'Promenade' from 'Pictures At An Exhibition', and one unreleased out-take entitled 'Rave Up'. I thought the best way to make something of these was to splice them together and make longer tracks, so 'Take A Pebble' starts with the short alternate take, followed by Palmer's drum solo, leading into the finale taken from the 2012 remix of the original track. 'Promenade' segues into the alternate take of 'Lucky Man', and 'Rave Up' is sandwiched between 'Atropos' from 'The Three Fates'. I've used the live take of 'The Barbarian' from the previous post, as it's such a great recording, (and I've managed to improve the ending), and this take of 'Knife-Edge' is slightly longer, with an extended outro. By using a bit more of 'Take A Pebble' than my first attempt, I've managed to get a 37-minute album of alternate and un-issued recordings from ELP's classic debut album sessions, which I hope you'll enjoy as much as it's parent record.     

Track listing

01 The Barbarian
02 Take A Pebble
03 Knife-Edge
04 Promenade / Lucky Man
05 Atropos / Rave Up / Atropos (Conclusion)