While it remains
Georgie Fame's closest brush with psychedelia,
Seventh Son nevertheless suffers from few of the more clichéd affectations of its era. Apart from sparing use of vocal effects and some fuzzed-out bass, the record is very much of a piece with
Fame's catalog as a whole, continuing his maturation from R&B-inspired amateur to jazz-influenced sophisticate. Recorded with an ace session band featuring trumpeter
Les Condon, trombonist
Chris Pyne, and percussionist
Frank Ricotti, the session boasts an intimacy somewhere between the blues and folk-pop, even if the overall approach appropriates from sources far more varied than either source. Soul and jazz still dominate, but their absorption into the overall approach is more seamless and organic than before. Songs like "Am I Wasting My Time?" and "Ho Ho Ho" cement
Fame as a storyteller as much as a singer, complete with a perfectly calibrated flair for the dramatic.