Poco

“The Last Roundup”

Futuedge/UME

“Indian Summer”

Lemon Recordings

By 1977, the legendary country rock pioneers Poco had seemingly weathered the loss of founder Richie Furay, and, having built on their sterling reputation as one of the hottest live acts around, the band had released, in order, three of their strongest, yet ironically comparatively different albums, “Cantamos,” “Head Over Heels,” and “Rose of Cimarron.”

“Indian Summer,” released that year and now remastered and re-released on Lemon, a UK company, was the fourth and final album by the now powerful Poco quartet of multi-instrumentalist Rusty Young, guitarist Paul Cotton, bassist Timothy B. Schmit and drummer George Grantham. Boasting a guest appearance by Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen on two tracks, the album continued the band’s strong, yet quite eclectic, recording vein with Cotton’s title track; his group biography, “Living In the Band;” and the rocking “Twenty Years;” as well as Young’s daring trilogy “The Dance,” the latter of which simultaneously included a bit of everything and nothing the band had recorded prior that time.

Tragically, within months of its release, “Indian Summer” looked like it would be the band’s swan song as Schmit left to join the Eagles and Grantham to explore other musical opportunities, leaving Cotton and Young to talk about possibly forming another group. In its wake, Poco left their record company one more album, the live “ The Last Roundup,” recorded at the Santa Monica, California Civic Auditorium, and, accompanied by a symphony orchestra, at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colorado in July 1977. Due to contractual problems, the album went unreleased and sat in the vaults until earlier this year, when Futuredge, an independent California-based company, having listened to the many requests of Poco fans for this “Holy Grail” of recorded Poco music, many copies of which had leaked out over the years, teamed with UME, the successor to Poco’s label at the time, ABC Records, to finally work out its commercial release.

It’s well worth the wait. Ironically for a band that had seemingly imploded at the time of the originally scheduled release, “Roundup” contains several of Cotton’s best songs, including the aforementioned ones from “Summer,” and the other recent releases, as well as Young’s incredible prowess on steel guitar, banjo, mandolin and dobro. Founding member Furay also makes a guest appearance on two tracks. And, in a fit of brilliance, the incredible drumming of Grantham, long the literal and figurative backbone of the group, is way up front in the mix, allowing listeners to experience his incredible work.

Within a year, Cotton and Young decided to continue Poco, resulting in the recording of “Legend,” still their most popular album to date, which contained their chart-topping hits “Crazy Love and “Heart of the Night.” Some 25 years later, the band, including Young, Cotton, Grantham and bassist Jack Sundrud, is still touring and recording, with a live DVD expected this fall, clearly showing that the promise and expectations of these two releases did not go unfulfilled.

- Mark T. Gould

Both:

****1/2