Renaissance Historian

  The self-titled debut album by Renaissance has 5 tracks. Two on side A: 'Kings and Queens', and 'Innocence'. Three on side B: 'Island', 'Wanderer', and 'Bullet'. When the album came to CD, it was often released with two bonus tracks: an edit of Island meant for the radio as a single, and the B-side of that single; a song called 'The Sea'. It's a pretty song, and I decided to try an experiment with it. I listened to the album, but with The Sea between Innocence and Island. The results? It fits very well. So well in fact, that I now believe it may have originally been intended to be on the album.  The Evidence Ok, hear me out. I have a few reasons why The Sea being included in that spot makes sense purely based on listening. Makes both sides have three tracks. Makes both sides nearly equal in length, whereas before side B was longer by a few minutes.  The Sea fades out. That means that side A now fades out, and Island, the beginning o...

For those who are just getting into Renaissance, the lineup changes in the early years of the band are pretty confusing. Not just because of the amount of lineup changes in a short period of time, but also because there's simply not a lot of information out there on the subject. The process by which the original lineup of the band transformed into the well known "classic lineup" is something of a mystery for new listeners. I began listening to Renaissance totally blind, not knowing anything about the band. So imagine my surprise when after listening to the first two albums, and getting to know the original lineup, I discover this video: Yup, that was definitely a Renaissance song, but... Turns out this is just the most well known of many transitional lineups of the band. And this wasn't the only video either, there is a whole playlist of this Renaissance playing on Belgian TV  here . Personally my favourites are the pretty (but too ...