Balaklava (album)
| Balaklava | ||||
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| Studio album by Pearls Before Swine | ||||
| Released | November 1968 | |||
| Recorded | 1968 | |||
| Genre | Psychedelic folk, folk rock | |||
| Length | 29:49 | |||
| Label | ESP-Disk ESSP 1075 | |||
| Producer | Richard L. Alderson | |||
| Pearls Before Swine chronology | ||||
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| Allmusic |   |
Balaklava was the second album recorded and released by psychedelic folk group Pearls Before Swine in 1968.
For the album, original group members Tom Rapp, Wayne Harley and Lane Lederer were joined by Jim Bohannon, who replaced Roger Crissinger. Like the group’s previous LP recorded on ESP-Disk, entitled One Nation Underground, it was recorded at Impact Sound in New York City. Recordings took place sometime in early 1968, but no records exist of the sessions. Some CD reissues have stated that it was recorded in 1965, but this is an error. Lederer left the group during or shortly after the recordings, and the basic group was augmented by studio musicians.
Rapp has stated that he wanted to produce a themed anti-war album, and chose the Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava in 1854 as an example of the futility of war. The album was dedicated to Private Edward Slovik, the only United States soldier executed for desertion during the Second World War.
The front cover is a detail of The Triumph of Death by Pieter Brueghel the Elder, showing a grotesque allegorical depiction of the horrors of war, while the back cover showed a photograph of a young girl at an anti-war protest taken by Mel Zimmer. The cover also included the quote "Only the dead have seen the end of war" by George Santayana, together with surreal and horrific drawings by avant-garde artist Jean Cocteau. The cover contributed to the mystique surrounding the group: few if any photographs of its members were published, and Pearls Before Swine did not perform in concert until 1971.
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