Horizontal is the Bee Gees' second album. It was released in early 1968, and included the international hit singles "Massachusetts" and "World".
Other standout tracks include "And the Sun Will Shine", a love ballad song by Robin complete with psychedelic references to trains walking by and pastoral orchestral backing conducted by Bill Shepherd. Two other Robin-led tracks are worth noting. "Harry Braff" is a rocking story about a racing driver that is reminiscent The Beatles or The Kinks and the poignant "Really and Sincerely", which documented Robin's emotions following his survival of the Hither Green train wreck while the album was being made.
Psychedelia also abounds in the quirky "Lemons Never Forget" which without the familiar string-backing and featuring guitar work from Vince Melouney as well as the piano and bass interplay of Maurice Gibb, shows a side of the early Bee Gees rarely seen by singles buyers.
In 2006, Reprise Records reissued Horizontal with both stereo and mono mixes on one disc and a bonus disc of unreleased songs, non-album tracks, and alternate takes.
"Seems that the brothers confused their chroniclers by singing the words ‘hark, the herald angels sing’ both times around in ‘Mary’s Boy Child’, which has two intentional variants of the famous carol title. The first verse should be ‘hark now hear the angels sing’ and the second ‘trumpets sound and angels sing’. The brothers did get the varying second lines right. They must have been singing purely from memory. The engineer wrote ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’ on the tape box and the true nature of the medley was forgotten until 2006"GibbSongs
July 25th to August 10th, 1967, Chappell Studios, London
August 9th to December 1st, 1967, IBC Studios, London
Charted singles
Sep 1967 Massachusetts / Barker of the UFO UK #1 / AUS #1 / GER #1 / JAP #1
Nov 1967 Massachusetts / Sir Geoffrey Saved the World BRA #9 / US #11
Dec 1967 World / Sir Geoffrey Saved the World (not US) GER #1 / NZ #2 / UK #9 / JAP #24
Jan 1968 Words / Sinking Ships GER #1 / CAN #4 / UK #8 / US #15
Feb 1968 And the Sun Will Shine / Really and Sincerely (FR) FR #70