Supertramp

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Crime of the Century is the third album by the progressive rock band Supertramp, released in 1974. Crime of the Century was their commercial breakthrough on both sides of the Atlantic, aided by the UK hit "Dreamer" and the U.S. hit "Bloody Well Right". It was a UK Top 10 album and a U.S. Top 40 album, eventually being certified Gold in the U.S. in 1977 after the release of Even in the Quietest Moments.... The album was Supertramp's first to feature drummer Bob C. Benberg, woodwinds player John Anthony Helliwell, bassist Dougie Thomson, and co-producer Ken Scott.

The album's dedication reads "To Sam", which is a nickname for Stanley August Miesegaes, the Dutch millionaire who supported the band financially from 1969-72.

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After the failure of their first two albums and an unsuccessful tour, the band broke up, and Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson recruited new members, drummer Bob C. Benberg, woodwinds player John Helliwell, and bassist Dougie Thomson. This new line-up were sent by their record label, A&M, to a seventeenth-century farm in Somerset in order to rehearse together and prepare the album.

The album was recorded at a number of studios including Ramport Studios (owned by The Who) and Trident Studios with co-producer Ken Scott. While recording the album, Davies and Hodgson recorded approximately 42 demo songs, from which only 8 were chosen to appear on the album. Several other tracks appeared on later albums (Crisis? What Crisis?, ...Famous Last Words...). Due to a contractual agreement, all the songs are credited jointly to the two writers, but their partnership as songwriters was dissolving and some of the songs were in fact written by one or the other individually. "Asylum" was written by Davies, "Hide in Your Shell" by Hodgson, and both "School" and "Crime of the Century" are actual Davies/Hodgson collaborations. Little is known about which of the two wrote the remaining songs; Hodgson recounted that "Dreamer" began as a home tape he recorded, but is vague as to whether or not Davies had a hand in the finalized composition.

The album was named after the final song, "Crime of the Century", which the band members felt was the strongest song on the album. Shortly after his departure from Supertramp, Hodgson commented, "I've had more people come up to me and say that that song touched them more deeply than any other. That song really came together when we were living together at Southcombe and just eating, sleeping, and breathing the ideas for the album. The song just bounced between Rick and I for so many weeks before it finally took form." For unknown reasons, in several interviews both before and since, Hodgson has attributed the song as being written solely by Davies. He describes "School" as "my song basically" but admits that Davies wrote both the piano solo and a good deal of the lyrics.

Hodgson and Davies both stated that communication within the group was at a peak during the recording of this album, while drummer Benberg stated that he thought it was this album on which the band hit its "artistic peak".

Crime of the Century deals loosely with themes of loneliness and mental stability, but is not a concept album. Davies consciously linked the opening track "School" to "Bloody Well Right" with the line "So you think your schooling is phoney", and according to Hodgson, any unifying thread beyond that was left to the listener's imagination.

The sound of the train in "Rudy" was recorded at Paddington station, while the crowd noises in the song were taken from Leicester Square.

Crime of the Century was Supertramp's first U.S. Top 40 album and was eventually certified Gold in the U.S. in 1977 after the release of Even in the Quietest Moments.... The album also marked the commercial breakthrough for the band in the United Kingdom; Crime of the Century peaked at number four in the album chart in March 1975, and "Dreamer" reached number thirteen on the singles chart in the same month.

In 1978, Crime of the Century was ranked 108th in The World Critic Lists, which recognised the 200 greatest albums of all time as voted for by notable rock critics and DJs. In the 1987 edition of the publication, CBC's Geoff Edwards ranked Crime of the Century the 10th greatest album of all time. A 1998 public poll, aggregating the votes of more than 200,000 music fans, saw Crime of the Century voted among the all-time top 1000 albums, and it was listed in the 2005 book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

Many of the songs on the album are still staples of the band's shows ("School", "Bloody Well Right", "Rudy", and the title song). Almost all of the album appears on the band's 1980 live album Paris although the tracks which featured orchestrations on the studio versions ("Asylum", "Rudy", and "Crime of the Century") were replaced by string synthesizers or Oberheim synthesizers, which were played mainly by John Helliwell with some help from Roger Hodgson.

All songs written by Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson.

Side one

1. "School" – 5:35 (Lead vocals: Roger Hodgson and Rick Davies)
2. "Bloody Well Right" – 4:32 (Lead vocals: Rick Davies)
3. "Hide in Your Shell" – 6:49 (Lead vocals: Roger Hodgson)
4. "Asylum" – 6:45 (Lead vocals: Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson)

Side two

1. "Dreamer" – 3:31 (Lead vocals: Roger Hodgson and Rick Davies)
2. "Rudy" – 7:17 (Lead vocals: Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson)
3. "If Everyone Was Listening" – 4:04 (Lead vocals: Roger Hodgson)
4. "Crime of the Century" – 5:32 (Lead vocals: Rick Davies)