Rare and previously unissued tracks from the Paisley Underground
The Three O’Clock was a pillar of a rich mid-80s scene (“The Paisley Underground”) that included the Rain Parade, Dream Syndicate, Bangs, Green on Red, Long Ryders and others. Having started out as the Salvation Army, the renamed and expanded lineup of the Three O’Clock lowered their punk-rock buzz and heightened their flower-power pop chime for an EP (Baroque Hoedown) and LP (Sixteen Tambourines) produced by Earle Mankey for the Frontier label. Their first LP for I.R.S., Arrive Without Travelling edged away from the more overt psychedlia, and garnered MTV spins with the up-tempo “Her Head’s Revolving.” A second album (Ever After) and one for Prince’s Paisley Park (Vermillion) continued to polish the group’s sound, and, ironically, sound more dated than these more retro early works.
In celebration of the band’s recent reunion (which included shows at Coachella, an appearance on Conan and a short tour), the group’s drummer, Danny Benair, has put together this collection of odds and sods. The track list spans the band’s early years, from their inception as The Salvation Army, through their two albums on Frontier and their first release  for I.R.S. Although there are a few original EP and album sides, the track list focuses mostly on alternate versions, demos, lost session tracks, fan club singles and compilation appearances. Even if you’ve collected the previously released material (including the Radio Tokyo appearance of “All in Good Time,” the fan club original “In Love in Too,” covers of “Lucifer Sam” and “Feel a Whole Lot Better,” and a beautiful Michael Quercio arrangement of the Latin hymn “Regina Cæli”), the alternates give insight as to how material developed into its final form, and the demos and session tracks broaden the picture of the band’s progress.
A prime example of how tracks grew in the studio is an early mix of “When Lightening Starts” that’s still in need of the final version’s horns and higher-energy organ riffs. Similarly, the alternate take of “A Day in Erotica” has a harsher feel, with a harder guitar and without the vocal overlay that softens the song’s mood. In contrast, the raw version of “In My Own Time” sounds tougher without the brass added to the final mix, and stands interestingly on its own. Other changes show the band fixing problems and stretching their imaginations. The original version of “On My Own” features strings that were deemed off-pitch and replaced by keyboards, and a finished alternate take of “I Go Wild” reels in the signature bass line and uses guitar solos in place of keyboards.
Sonny Bono’s one and only solo album was released in 1967, just as Sonny & Cher’s hits and Cher’s solo success were entering a three-year drought. The obvious touchstone for this 5-track, 33-minute experimental outing is the Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which Sonny quotes in the album’s title track. But the acid-tinged lyrics (including quotes from both “The Battle Hymn of the Republic†and “A Day in the Lifeâ€) and pseudo-psych musical freakouts have neither the expanded consciousness nor musical inventiveness of the Beatles. The anti-drug Bono might have heard Sgt. Pepper’s, but he didn’t really seem to understand it. The drums, likely played by Wrecking Crew ace Hal Blaine, sound as if they were lifted from a Phil Spector session, and the sitar noodling and tuneless harmonica blasts are indulgent and irritating, especially at the jam-session length (12’45) of the opening track.
The social commentary of “I Told My Girl to Go Away†might have drawn more attention had Bono been a more commercially compelling vocalist, or perhaps if Janis Ian’s scathing “Society’s Child†hadn’t exploded earlier in the year. The 32-year-old Bono sang with an air of defeat that couldn’t compare to Ian’s searing defiance. “I Would Marry You Today†might have made a nice light-pop folk-rock production for Sonny & Cher, and would have greatly benefitted from the latter’s ability to carry a tune. A few years earlier, and with a gender switch and some editing, “My Best Friend’s Girl is Out of Sight,†might have made a good tune for one of the New York girl groups, but sung as light-pop and stretched to over four minutes, it hasn’t the focus of Bono’s hits. The closing “Pammie’s on a Bummer†is more successful with its instrumental experimentation, though its message (prostitution leads to pot leads to LSD) isn’t particularly knowing.
Small Faces first U.S. release transitions from R&B to Freakbeat
This 1967 album was Small Faces’ U.S. debut, combining tracks from their self-titled third album (and first for the Immediate label) with three hit singles and two B-sides. Though the group had already established themselves in the UK, topping the British chart in 1966 with “All or Nothing,” it was the single that is this album’s first track, “ItchycooPark,” that broke them in the U.S., charting at #16. This was also to be their biggest stateside hit, as the follow-on single, “Tin Soldier,” fell short of the Top 40. The third single collected here, “Here Come the Nice,” was the group’s first for Immediate, and though it charted in the UK and Germany, it wasn’t released as a single in the U.S.
The band’s earlier releases on Decca were the epitome of mod R&B, but with their move to Immediate their music helped usher psychedelic influences into what’s retroactively been labeled Freakbeat. The lyrics are more impressionistic and fantastic than their earlier material, and production touches include flanging on “ItchycooPark,” a false fadeout on “I Feel Much Better,” and a variable tape-speed descent to end “Here Come the Nice.” The latter also slipped an overt drug reference by the day’s censors, complementing the suspected (but denied) reference to getting high in “ItchycooPark.” The band’s more straightforward R&B sound can still be heard on several tracks, including the romantically frustrated “Talk to You” and the hopeful “Get Yourself Together.”
Small Faces proved themselves just as adept at flowing psych as they’d been at beat rock, with Ian McLagan’s keyboard providing multiple textures. McLagan and Ronnie Lane each provided a lead vocal, but it was Steve Marriott who showed himself to be the truly riveting front man. The album peaked just shy of the UK Top 10, and though the following year’s psychedelic concept album, Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake, is more often cited as the group’s creative high point, this self-titled release (not to be confused with their like-titled 1965 Decca debut) was the more musically influential – both at the time, and on subsequent generation of British musicians. Varese’s reissue includes the original 12-track U.S. lineup in stereo; completists should check out the mono-stereo-UK-US 2-disc edition.Â
After 45 years, Billy Gibbons and the Moving Sidewalks reunited to play a set in New York City on March 30, 2013. You can find several audience videos on YouTube, including this one of their best-known tune, “99th Floor”:
ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons and his pre-ZZ Top bandmates from the Moving Sidewalks will reunite for a show on March 30th – the first time the original quartet has played live in 45 years! Performing as part of the Cavestomp garage rock festacular, the Moving Sidewalks will play B.B. King’s Blues Club & Grill in New York City. Advanced tickets are already on sale. Also check out the recently released complete anthology of the Moving Sidewalks’ recordings.
Reissued two-disc anthology of San Francisco legends
Legacy’s two-disc Essential collection is actually a re-branded reissue of the 1998 Hits release, reiterating the same 35-track lineup and including Ben Fong-Torres original liner notes. If you pop these discs in your computer’s CD drive, you’re even likely to have the cover image of Hits pulled up by your media player. The set remains a good overview of “the band that transformed with the times,†from Jefferson Airplane’s scene-leading San Francisco Sound recordings of the mid-to-late ‘60s, through Jefferson Starship’s inheritance and evolution, and the Kantner-less Starship’s full-face turn to radio-friendly pop. The musical, social and commercial distance traveled from the Airplane’s earthy psychedelic jams to the Starship’s synth-laden ballads is itself a monument to adaptability.
The seventeen Airplane selections cover all seven of the band’s first run albums (nothing from their 1989 self-titled reunion is included), along with the single-only “Have You Seen the Saucers.†A few of their lower charting singles are absent, but other than “Somebody to Love†and “White Rabbit,†the Airplane was never a Top 40 success, and so the additional album tracks are more telling. Missing are tracks with early Airplane vocalist Signe Anderson singing lead, and even more noticeable is the lack of live material. Performance was an essential element of the San Francisco scene, and no telling of the Airplane’s story is truly complete without the stage interplay of vocalists and instrumentalists. Follow-on purchases of 30 Seconds Over Winterland, Bless Its Pointed Little Head or the more recent 6-CD anthology of vintage tapes can fill that gap.
Though the Jefferson Starship name was employed for Kantner’s 1970 sci-fi concept album, Blows Against the Empire, a steady band wasn’t formed until four years later for 1974’s Dragon Fly. This set skips the former album and picks up with two songs (“Caroline†and “Ride the Tigerâ€) from the latter. Though Dragon Fly went gold (and hit #11 on the album chart), it was the group’s next release, Red Octopus, that marked their real commercial breakthrough. Topping the album chart, the album spun off the Top 5 single “Miracles†and introduced a band who would have a ten year run in the Top 40. Most of Jefferson Starship’s biggest hits are included here, missing only their Top 20 “Winds of Change.†All eight of the group’s first run studio albums are sampled here; their two reunion releases (1998’s Windows of Heaven and 2008’s Jefferson’s Tree of Liberty) are skipped.
Deluxe reissue of infamous 1960s Texas psych-blues
The Moving Sidewalks first came to wide attention outside of Texas with the inclusion of their incendiary 1967 single “99th Floor†on the second volume of the garage rock anthology, Pebbles. Tantalized by a liner note reference to “Bill†Gibbons and ZZ Top, fans tracked down the group’s album, Flash, and found – no doubt disappointingly to some – that the bulk of the band’s oeuvre favored heavy psychedelic blues-rock, rather than the organ, guitar and harmonica punk of “99th Floor.†Though part of the Texas scene, the Sidewalks leaned more to the electric blues of Jimi Hendrix (to which “Pluto – Sept 31st†clearly tips its cap) and Savoy Brown, than to the punk rock or Mouse and the Traps or the psychedelia of the 13th Floor Elevators.
The album’s been reissued before [12], including a few of the bonus tracks heard on this set’s second disc. What sets this reissue apart, aside from the crisp audio (mono on 1, 3 and 5 of Flash) and the involvement of Billy Gibbons, are non-LP singles, demos and alternate takes that provide the bridge from “99th Floor†to Flash. The three singles include “99th Floor†(also heard twice more in earlier form by the Moving Sidewalks’ predecessor, The Coachmen) and its B-side “What Are You Going To Do.†The band continued to flirt with garage even as it turned more heavily to the blues with the guitar-and-organ instrumental “Headin’ Out,†and their single for Wand (the bluesy “Need Meâ€) features the punkier “Every Night a New Surprise†on the flip. Their last single, a cover of the Beatles’ “I Want to Hold Your Hand,†is either magnificent or Spinal Tapian, depending on your perspective.
Mono mixes of the Electric Prunes’ singles 1966-69
For those who weren’t there in ’66 and ’67, the oldies radio shorthand for the Electric Prunes has been their one big hit, “I Had to Much to Dream (Last Night),†as anthologized (as the lead off track, no less) on Lenny Kaye’s legendary Nuggets compilation. The few strokes of shading inclues their chart follow-up, “Get Me to the World on Time,†and an oft-anthologized ad for Vox Wah-Wah pedals. It’s an abbreviation that shortchanges the band’s recorded legacy. Reissues of their albums along with single- and double-disc compilations (including Birdman’s Lost Dreams and Rhino’s Too Much to Dream) expanded the group’s posthumous reputation, and are now joined by this collection of twenty-four mono single mixes. As a group whose tenure spanned across AM Top 40 and the birth of underground FM radio, their singles are just as interesting as the stereo album tracks.
Like several other groups of their era, including the Chocolate Watchband and Grass Roots, the Electric Prunes name was applied to several wholly different aggregations of musicians. The original lineup shifted subtly through the group’s first two albums (I Had Too Much to Dream (Last Night) and Underground), but with their third, the David Axelrod-produced orchestral Mass in F Major, the original band essentially broke up. The album was completed with studio musicians, and its follow-up, Release of an Oath, was produced similarly by Axelrod. The final album released under the Electric Prunes name, Just Good Old Rock and Roll, was recorded by a newly recruited group of musicians, wholly unrelated to the original lineup.
The singles gathered here span all three eras of the Electric Prunes – variations of the original lineup on the first two albums (1-12, 15 and 24), the Axelrod years (13-17), and the “new and improved†lineup (18-23). Original members James Lowe and Mark Tulin appeared on two of Axelrod’s productions (“Sanctus†and “Credoâ€), but the compositions and productions are so far divorced from the group’s earlier garage psych as to be nearly unidentifiable as the same band. The new lineup held on to only hints of the original group’s roots, bringing hard rock, boogie, funk and soul sounds to the Electric Prunes name.
Crafty blend of psych, garage-rock, pop and soul
