Picturesque Matchstickable Messages – STATUS QUO***

Black Veils Of Melancholy/When My Mind Is Not Live/Ice In The Sun/Elizabethan Dreams/Gentleman Joe’s Sidewalk Café/Paradise Flat/Technicolor Dreams/Spicks & Specks/Sheila/Sunny Cellophane Skies/Green Tambourine/Pictures Of Matchstick Men

Picturesque Matchstickable Messages was the debut album from the British boogie rock band Status Quo. However, this LP is pure pop, a musical genre not to the liking of the group. A change of direction in the early 1970s would result in decades of commercial success. Includes the top ten hits Pictures Of Matchstick Men and Ice In the Sun.

“I suspect that the only people really interested in this album are those looking to complete their Status Quo collection. On that basis, you probably wouldn't hate this album but you may not love it either. Most of the tunes are ones you can sing along to and quite enjoy, even if they do sound as though they're from a different era.”

“A fun, if slight album. Sound wise it's junk - tinny and wretchedly produced. But in terms of creativity, songwriting, melody, it's a triumph. Not the greatest thing I've ever heard but it makes for a fun listen, mostly due to the simplistic but melodic guitar lines which are amateurish and unpretentious in the best sense of those words.”

“Status Quo's debut is a far cry from the boogie rock that they have been synonymous with for the last forty years. Instead it's a psychedelic pop album that's bears almost no relation to their work post 1970. Everyone who has heard the group’s big single Pictures Of Matchstick Men will know that this is no boogie rock, but is it any good? Well the answer is yes and no. It's certainly not the classic that that single might suggest, but it's by no means an embarrassing skeleton in Quo's closet.”

“Twelve songs, and not all that much substance is to be found here. The album remains quite charming though and definitely has decent tunes in places. A period piece tied to the late sixties, very much of that era lyrically but still offering a catchy and endearing way with melody.”

“Barring Pictures Of Matchstick Men and Ice In The Sun, there is nothing exceptional about this album. As an artefact of its era it's as valid as any other, but in terms of listenability there are many better albums from this era that pull off this psych-pop stuff with much more successful results.”