Sir Army Suit

Sir Army Suit
Studio album by Klaatu
Released	August 1978
Recorded	1973–78
Genre	Pop[1] pop rock[2] rock[3]
Length	36:05
Label	Daffodil, Capitol
Producer	Terry Brown
Klaatu chronology
Hope (1977) Sir Army Suit (1978) Endangered Species (1980)

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	link

Sir Army Suit is the third album recorded by the Canadian rock band Klaatu. It was different from their two previous albums, 3:47 EST and Hope, adopting more of a pop feel.^[1] Many of these songs were hold-overs from early demos the band made pre-fame and were revived because band member John Woloschuk had spent a year writing and arranging the Hope album leaving him artistically drained. The band's other main songwriter, Dee Long, picked up the ball with many new compositions and ultimately co-produced and engineered the record while the band's regular producer, Terry Brown, was busy working with Rush and Max Webster.

Despite aggressive promotion by Capitol and the band, including bandmember interviews conducted by phone with live radio shows,^[4] the album suffered mediocre sales, because of fading popular interest in the band after the 1977 rumour was dispelled about the band being the Beatles recording anonymously. With Sir Army Suit, the band began to reveal their images to the public, first in the album's artwork, then in March 1979 with an animated music video depicting the musicians in caricature. The video was broadcast on 10 March 1979 on Don Kirshner's Rock Concert.^[5]

This is the only original Klaatu album whose cover was not painted by Ted Jones; the cover of Sir Army Suit was painted by Ian Thomas Band keyboardist Hugh Syme, mainly known for album cover work with Rush. The cover represented the first crack in the group's notorious anonymity since all three members appeared on the back cover (the front cover features a self-portrait of Hugh Syme and, ironically, Klaatu's previous graphic artist Ted Jones). Other people featured in the back cover are Queen Elizabeth II, Linda and Terry Brown and Francis W. Davies.

A newly remastered deluxe edition of the album was released on 31 October 2013 via the band's own independent record label "Klaatunes". This re-issue includes a bonus DVD containing animated music videos for "A Routine Day", "Everybody Took A Holiday", "Tokeymor Field" and "Perpetual Motion Machine", plus an hour-long interview with the three band members Terry Draper, Dee Long, and John Woloschuk.^[6]

Musical style

Musically, the album is a pop-inflected homage to the British Invasion, but musical styles include disco, heavy metal, progressive rock, and 1960s-style pop and psychedelic music.^[7][1] A reviewer for Julian Cope's Head Heritage wrote that the album seemed "more of a Beatle-soundalike record" than Klaatu's debut, as if the Beatles had continued in "a parallel universe where Ringo dropped out in the early '70s and the remaining three continued to peaceably work together right through glam and metal and on up to disco (though in the Klaatu universe apparently punk never happened.)"^[8]

Track listing

1. "A Routine Day" (John Woloschuk)
2. "Juicy Luicy" (Woloschuk)
3. "Everybody Took a Holiday" (Dee Long)
4. "Older" (Long)
5. "Dear Christine" (Woloschuk)
6. "Mister Manson" (Long)
7. "Tokeymor Field" (Woloschuk)
8. "Perpetual Motion Machine" (Long)
9. "Chérie" (Long)
10. "Silly Boys" (Long)

Personnel

• Dee Long - vocals, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, drum programming, synthesizer
• John Woloschuk - vocals, piano, organ, bass guitar, acoustic guitar, bells, mellotron, synthesizer, clavinet, percussion
• Terry Draper - drums, percussion, vocals, tambourine, triangle, gong, anvil, bell tree

^{[9] [10]}

References