Humble Pie As Safe As Yesterday Is

Formed in January 1969, Humble Pie soon became one of the best-loved, hardest-rocking live acts of the 1970s. In Steve Marriott, the one-time Small Faces frontman, "The Pie" had the best showman & biggest voice in the business. Peter Frampton, the "Face of '68" with The Herd had a new role - guitar hero extraordinaire. And with hard-hitting powerhouse drummer Jerry Shirley & ex-Spooky Tooth bassist supreme Greg Ridley, Humble Pie quickly developed into a sophisticated studio unit where tough riffs, rustic rock & bursts of blissed-out psychedelia earned the band instant chart success & critical acclaim. 'As Safe As Yesterday Is' was their debut album for Immediate Records on 1 August 1969, reaching no. 32 in the UK charts. Recorded at Olympic & Morgan studios with top engineer Andy Johns, the album featured a ground-breaking blend of heavy blues, hard rock, pastoral folk & acoustic songs, all superbly produced. Unknown at the time was the controversy surrounding the disappearance of the master tape enroute from Olympic Studios in London to the mastering studio in New York. Panicked phone calls for a replacement only yielded a much-played listening copy tape, not intended for production & certainly not to the quality needed to cut an LP. The band were horrified when they heard the finished LP with it's flat, muffled sound. Despite Andrew Oldham's wholehearted support of Humble Pie above the other artists on his label, Immediate Records were in financial difficulties & could not afford to withdraw the LP. By March 1970, Immediate Records were in liquidation, with it's master tapes lost or stolen. Immediate LPs, including 'As Safe As Yesterday Is', soon disappeared from record store racks, it's master tape never found.. Later CD & LP reissues were copied from old vinyl, with labels not realising or caring the sound quality was poor. Until now. For many years, Kenney Jones with reissue producer Rob Caiger had searched archives around the world for missing Immediate tapes for the Small Faces. As part of that search, tapes for Kenney's fellow-artists had been found, including a safety master for Humble Pie. Now, over 50 years later, 'As Safe As Yesterday Is' can be heard as it should have been experienced in 1969 - & now with even more power & clarity! Peter and Jerry have also restored debut hit single 'Natural Born Bugie' to where it should have been on the original UK LP. The newly remastered CD adds UK LP track 'Growing Closer', four outtakes from Olympic & Morgan studios recorded during June & July 1969 and b-side 'Wrist Job', one of the last tracks to be recorded alongside 'Natural Born Bugie' in sessions for the first album during Spring 1969. All remastered LP & CD formats will be released on Kenney Jones' Nice Records.