Like A Yeti With A Medallion Dept. - Amory Kane

You had to be there ...

Possibly most people who've heard of Amory Kane (a neat pun on American) heard him first on the life-changing double album sampler on CBS, Fill Your Head With Rocks, which featured the beguiling Inbetween Man. Those who got beyond the smirk-inducing cover of his album (I'm, like, seriously, bro?) discovered a bunch of fine singer-songwritery material lifted above the norm by a subtly psychedelic production from Tony Cox (Caravan, Trees, Family etc.), with nicely sinister sonics from Ron Geesin (Pink Floyd). Kane has a good voice, avoiding the Donovan vibrato, and the only mis-step is his over-wrought rendering of Get Together, a song already dated in 1970. The rest is as good as the introspective, quietly stoned genre gets.

His debut album from two years previous [left, Ed.] features a paid-at-scale Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones. Very much a product of its time, and Steve Rowland's production veers into commercial pop, which doesn't fit as well as Tony Cox's sensitive experimentation. Also - Protest Song Advisory.

Neither album exactly gave the charts a good kicking, and Kane (real name Jack) returned to the States and became a chef. Good for him. Thanks for the music, Jack. Times like these, it fits just right.

 

 

 

 

This post made possible by torrential tropical downour. Can't even see the river! Yikes! 

Morgan Freeman's Book Cart O'Books Dept.

"We got literature out the ass ..."

 

If you're the quiet, bookish type, never happier than when curled up by the fireside with a novel, curtains drawn against the night and a guttering candle at your elbow, then that's probably why you need glasses! Turn the furshluginner light on, ya doofus! Say ... who's that knocking at your door? Why, it's moviedom's Morgan Freeman, with this week's curated selection of reading material! Come on in, Mr. Freeman!

FX SQUEAKY CART WHEELS, WHISTLING 

MF Okay loser, I got a bunch of swell books to help you forget you're a lifer with zero chance of getting your ass paroled! I bet you still fantasizing about being curled up by the fireside, huh? Well, them days are gone like a train! (grins cheerily)

YOU (sobs) Society is to blame! And rock and roll music!

MF Yeah right. Listen, I got Agricultural And Land Drainage Reform In The Low Countries In The 17th And 18th Centuries, in fourteen volumes, or I got some shitty old science fiction paperbacks.

YOU Hmm, I dunno ... them drainage books ... they gots pitchers? 

MF Uhh ... nope.

YOU Got any old Oui magazines? [see below - Ed.]

Interview with Fidel Castro! Oboy!

MF (momentary dreamy expression) Ooh yeah ... Oui Magazine. Nope. Take the paperbacks.

YOU Gee whiz. I ain't into science.

MF How about fiction?

YOU (without enthusiasm) I guess.

Morgan Freeman tosses books onto your narrow cot and wheels book cart away, whistling Don't Worry, Be Happy. 

FX PRISON DOOR SLAMS 

 

 

 

 

Join in the lively discussion in the comments! 

Smart Dressed As Stupid Dept.

I was put off these guys for decades because of their dumb name and stupid cover, figuring the music to be just mullet-shaking Clod Rock with maybe some futuristic synth farts. Turns out it's worryingly clever, which makes you wonder why they chose to present themselves as the musical equivalent of Truck Nutz™.

Ewww ... big hands!

Like, check out these track titles, bro: Dancing Madly Backwards (On A Sea Of Air), Myopic Void, and I Can't Feel Nothin' (Parts One and Two). Someone who knows something about words came up with that good stuff. And the tracks, thirteen of them in thirty-six Earth minutes. Not your standard sludge-athon flex.

Turns out that yes, it's hard rock, but with NEW added smarts! It was something of a Supergroup at the time, with musicians from RSRCH PSE ED WIKI OR DISCOGS [and that's a big Fuck You from me - Ed.] but stiffed in the racks in spite of a lavish 3D cover specifically designed to appeal to absolutely nobody.

Anyway, they were picked up by Phil Walden at Capricorn - Duane Allman was a fan - for a second album called Sufficiently Breathless, which is one of the greatest album titles of all time, in a sleeve even worse than the debut [below - Ed.]. It's more mainstream, with a little Santana influence (okay, and why, exactly?) on a couple of tracks. The quality is there but the elusive youth market got even more elusive and decided to spend its walking-about money on a bag of reds and a corn dog instead.

Apparently they never quite delivered live (I've only heard a bootleg, which sounds like a bootleg, and I hate that sound), and this may be a reason for their "untimely demise". The records are basically pretty terrific, and it's hard to find a bad word about them. If you haven't heard them, they're likely to surprise you, in a good way.

I think they made a third album, which was a mistake.

Yeucchh, right?

This post has a Tog Rating of 3.5

Randy Randomguy's Rubber Room O' Randomness Dept.

 

You know the rules by now: set your mp3 player to shuffle, list first ten that come up! If you don't like music, list the first ten things that come into your head! If you can't count, tell us your favourite colour! 

Art Gallery O' Art. Dept.

 

Jari Anttonen

Wm. Blake

Jari Anttonen

Ivan Albright

Austin Osman Spare

Sidney Sime

Burt Shonberg

Max Ernst