pass: tdats
Number 55 is another random collection, with plenty of heavy psych, and also hard rock to keep you satisfied, the most commercial sounding (but still little-known) being Chicago's Mariah who seem to have come out of nowhere with a single album and disappeared just as fast, though the six piece group's second guitarist Frank Sullivan found fame several years later with AOR kings Survivor.
Track List:
01. Rubber Memory - All Together (1970)
02. The Running Man - Running Man (1972)
03. The Omens - Searching (1966)
04. Leviathan - Angel Of Death (1974)
05. Headstone - I Love You (1974)
06. Mariah - Reunion (1975)
07. The Purple Sun - Doomsday (1970)
08. JPT Scare Band - All Lit Up (1979)
09. The Dickens - Don't Talk About My Music (1969)
10. Goodthunder - Barking At The Ants (1972)
11. White Clover - (Keep Your People) Dancin' (1968)
12. Spirit - When I Touch You (1970)
Rubber Memory recorded their album on basic equipment in 1970, and the first track here "All Together" is an absolute stormer, quirky, unique, and very heavy in places. The Running Man recorded one album in 1972, most of which is jazz orientated but the eponymous track here is lurching stoner-riff perfection. The Omens are the first of our 60s psych bands here and 'Searching' has a rock-solid insistence to it, with some crazy keyboard improv. Leviathan were a heavy prog band from Memphis who had up to three keyboards playing together and Angel Of Death one of their Uriah Heep-ish heavies.
Headstone made one private album "Still Looking" in 1974, with some great heavy psych that was probably a little behind the times even then, with its growling 60s fuzz guitar sound. The Purple Sun are a bit of an enigma, with unfortunately only this single in existence, but awesome it is with a great theatrical vocal performance backed by big fuzz guitar lines. JPT Scare Band may be known to many of you and "All Lit Up" is from a late (1979) recording that has been re-released by Ripple Music recently, it finds them in a more straight-forward radio friendly mood than their earlier stuff. There is an interesting story that The Dickens were actually the road crew of a band called NRBQ (The New Rhythm and Blues Quartet) who were sent out to play after NRBQ shows holding instruments they were not familiar with, turned up as loudly as possible, to see what might happen...'Don't Talk About My Music' is one of the results! Read more here.
Goodthunder created one album in 1972, at first listen it did not reveal too much but I found on repeated listens that it's actually very good, subtleties in the music become apparent and the comp's title track 'Barking At The Ants' has an involving progressive structure with nice heavy hammond. We return to some more pounding heavy psych with White Clover's '(Keep Your People) Dancin', which is taken from a demo tape of this early incarnation of Kansas no less. The compilation ends on an awesome track from the not so obscure Spirit, which I found to have some great heavy transitions along with some spacey keyboard work.
Fantastically good compilation! Track 1-2-3 and 10 are great! Very, very thank you!
ReplyDeleteamazing stuff again dude, thanks!
ReplyDeleteAnother comp of new names!
ReplyDeleteI love the Leviathan album cover--when I was collecting old 70's hard rock before it was so easy to snag things on blogspots, this album was always very expensive or out of stock on Amazon. Always coveted that album cover!
Maybe JPT Scare Band's first appearance on DATS? So good call there.
That Goodthunder song definitely has its heavy moments, I'm glad you used it, and a track from Spirit I don't know?! Look forward to giving it a spin!