Humble Pie - As Safe As Yesterday Is (Remastered Expanded Edition) (1969/2025)

This remastered 60th anniversary version of "As Safe As Yesterday Is" has been lovingly curated and overseen by surviving Humble Pie members Peter Frampton & Jerry Shirley. 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 Humble Pie’s debut album for Immediate Records, originally released on 1 August 1969 and reaching No.32 in the UK charts. Recorded at Olympic & Morgan Studios with top engineer Andy Johns, the album featured a 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, 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 its flat, muffled sound. Despite Immediate label boss Andrew Loog Oldham’s wholehearted support of Humble Pie above the other artists on his label, Immediate Records were in financial difficulties and could not afford to withdraw the LP. By March 1970, Immediate Records were in liquidation, with its master tapes either lost or stolen. Immediate LPs soon disappeared from record store racks, including ‘As Safe As Yesterday Is’ – its master tape never found. Later CD & LP reissues were all copied from old vinyl, with labels seemingly not realising (or not caring) that the sound quality was poor. Until now that is…

For many years, Nice Records owner Kenney Jones along with Immediate Records reissue producer Rob Caiger had searched archives around the world for missing Immediate tapes for the Small Faces. As part of that global search, tapes for a number of Kenney’s fellow Immediate artists have been found, including a safety master for Humble Pie.

Now, almost sixty years later, ‘As Safe As Yesterday Is’ can finally be heard as it should have been experienced in 1969 – and now with even more power & clarity!

Peter Frampton and Jerry Shirley have also restored Humble Pie’s debut hit single ‘Natural Born Bugie’ to where it should have been on the original UK LP. The newly remastered album 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.

“Thanks for the care you are giving these old chestnuts.” (Peter Frampton, July 2025)

“It sounds like it should sound. It sounds a lot cleaner. Everything is in its place and where it should be. It sounds fabulous! You should be very proud of yourselves. I know I couldn’t be happier with it all.” (Jerry Shirley, July 2025)

Tracklist
1. Desperation (2025 Remaster) (6:25)
2. Stick Shift (2025 Remaster) (2:24)
3. Buttermilk Boy (2025 Remaster) (4:20)
4. Natural Born Bugie (2025 Remaster) (4:12)
5. As Safe as Yesterday Is (2025 Remaster) (6:09)
6. Bang! (2025 Remaster) (3:40)
7. Alabama '69 (2025 Remaster) (7:00)
8. I'll Go Alone (2025 Remaster) (4:01)
9. A Nifty Little Number Like You (2025 Remaster) (6:15)
10. What You Will (2025 Remaster) (4:22)
11. Wrist Job (2025 Remaster) (4:14)
12. Growing Closer (2025 Remaster) (3:14)
13. Road to Ride (2025 Remaster) (2:29)
14. Leave No Turn Unstoned (Just a Riff) (2025 Remaster) (3:25)
15. Hello Grass (No Regrets) (2025 Remaster) (3:59)
16. Zeptoe Through the Tulips (2025 Remaster) (3:53)