Indie Jangle From Canadia! Dept. - The Seams

A young Clarence Pune [left - Ed.] politely arrests notorious maple syrple bootlegger Velma Kowznofski in shadow of majestic Rocky Mountains. Note split beaver chaps.

Canadia! Home of Majestic Rocky Mountains [so called because they're made of rocks - Ed.]; Majestic Canadian Pacific, which is not a ocean, like you might reasonably expect, but a train; Majestic Mounted Police of Canadia (they don't have cars yet, and horse-powered "Mountie" easily apprehends swag-laden miscreant); Majestic Lumberjacks, having sex with mooses in cabins made of lumbers chewed down by beavers; Majestic Clarence Pune, National Emblem of Maple Syrple; and last and possibly least Majestic, The Seams, jangle-pop sensation Toronto Teens aver "better than The Beetles!".

These guys is pretty obscure, even on an internet, but here they are. You gots to love a group what calls its first album Meet The ... and its second ["sophomore effort", Shirley? - Ed.] Another Side Of ...

Today's loadup sponsored by the National Film Board Of Canadia, a non-profit organisation devoted to making joyless, life-sapping abstract cartoons about industrial processes and the funny side of the Dewey Decimal System.

Rickroll Dept.

Had a flattering request for an upre of Late Rick, and I'm a sucker for flattering comments. Also, requests for upres save me having to think of something new to keep youse bums amused. So here's a blisterpak to make your weekend sweet. The brilliant cover to Return To Vienna [above - Ed.] is mine *simper*, but the rest are as is. Don't be put off by dated stylings - this is quality music. Nelson was a musician first and foremost, with impeccable taste (if not in hairstyles and jackets), and it's always a pleasure to give these a spin. Major dude.

EDIT: Early Rickrollers will dig this swell Bear Family collection! Linkage in comments.

This post made credible thru' th' intercession of tooner.

Peak Wooze Dept. - Olivia Tremor Control

Th' Tremors relaxing at home, yesterday

Collectives, huh? Fuck 'em. A "collective" is a committee, and while they're useful for drafting policies and squaring up papers on conference tables, nobody ever looked to a committee to make a great album. A music collective consists of individuals moving around different lineups without any of them catching light. Devolving responsibility (nobody steps up to be a leader, that's against the collective spirit) involves compromise and lack of individuality, and this characterised the Elephant 6 collective wa-a-ay back in the late 'nineties as much as any floating pool of Brooklyn hipsters making landfill side project albums.

Of all the loose knots in the net of Elephant 6, the Olivia Tremor Control seemed to rise above the satisfied-with-less lo-fi æsthetic [dig that crazy ligature - Ed.] to deliver some finely-crafted and genuinely psychedelic recordings, not just ticking the boxes in the stylistic exercise so many artistes confuse for creativity. Hits, of course, eluded them, and it's always useful to have the "we're not aiming for hits, we're artists" line ready. The OTC were self-admittedly influenced by 'sixties pop, citing the the obvious Beach Boys and Beatles references in their resumé; popularity is at the heart of pop, and although much worthwhile and beautiful and lasting music is made by musicians the public has never heard of [including most of the albums washed up on th' IoF© - Ed.], any band would be happy to get media exposure and sell albums and make a living doing what they love. But that was always hard, and a crapshoot, and maybe it's impossible in today's conditions.

The Olivia Tremor Control cut two crazily ambitious (and very long) albums, sounding unsettlingly like an early AI algorithm prompted to create psychedelic soundtracks evocative of the Beach Boys and the Beatles at their most hallucinogenic. Memorable songs are mostly absent, but in their place are fugitive, dreamlike threads of melody, like half-remembered B-sides, familiar yet strange, and episodes of authentically disturbing psychedelia - Green Typewriters is half an hour of unbridled abstract sonic creativity that never becomes an indulgent mess. Woozy is the right word - OTC are Peak Wooze.

Included in today's Loaddown O' Lysergia™ is their Singles And Beyond collection. 

Right Album, Wrong Label Dept. - Sundance

 

Maybe their manager convinced them that any deal was better than no deal. Maybe they didn't have a manager. But Kapp was a weird home for Sundance, a New York label with no clear direction and an aisle-end dump-bin roster that was the envy of nobody. The label was merged into Uni Records in '67, and the last Kapp record appeared in '73. The lone Sundance album was dead on arrival in '71, and it's tough research, even with an internet. The band was straight outta Chico, Butte County CA (there's a song dedicated to local womenfolk on the album), and if there was a lively local music scene back then I can't find mention of it, or them.

The musicians, according to a hard-to-find discogs entry, didn't do anything much before or since, so that's it for them, and if they hadn't made this album I wouldn't care, but here it is, and you should find room for it somewhere, because it's too damn good to be forgotten. The original sleeve was a tad anemic [left - Ed.], so I've pumped it up a little, but at potato quality that won't stand up to your gimlet-eyed inspection.

The first thing that hits you on cueing it up is the jolt of the rhythm section - they're locked into a solid, urgent pulse that changes gear with the song. The arrangement and harmonies are tight, and it's as impressive an opener as you could wish for, the six and change minutes not wasting a single beat. The quality doesn't lapse throughout the thirty-eight minute run time - these guys could clearly put on a show, dynamically paced country-inflected rock, with no studio sweetening. The 'sixties were already history, the kaftans had been burned, but one pair of striped pants remained.

Some of youse bums blagged this first time around, so this is for them as missed it. And if anybody knows anything more about the band than I do (which is, leave us face it, Jack Shit) tap out a comment with that stick strapped to yer forehead.

“Everybody Is Kind Of A Dick. This Whole Industry Sucks” Dept.

Retina-frying art from Victor Moscoso

Steve Miller doesn't much like Jann Wenner and his Famous Hall Of Fame. “Everybody is kind of a dick. This whole industry fucking sucks. It's a bunch of jackasses and jerks and fucking gangsters and crooks who've fucking stolen everything from a fucking artist," he said graciously after getting inducted in 2016. The Rock (and indeed Roll) Hall Of Fame is one of those lost-in-translation American rites which get a great big shrug/eye-roll combo from the rest of the world, like half-time Superbowl shows, the "World Series" and Thanksgiving. Miller was sneered at back in the day for not being a real hippie and saying rock musicians couldn't play for shit, and later for becoming a hugely successful AOR act, but it's impossible not to warm to the guy when he gets up on his hind legs and sticks it to Wenner. 

Inner gatefold. Many hippies, to this day, can't read the words without chemical assistance

Yeah but, those first two Steve Miller Band albums are exceptional, ain't they? There's much to like in his later catalog, but these are les couilles de chien [canine testicles - Ed.]. Children Of The Future, incredibly, lives up to the promise of that blisteringly wonderful cover, it's that great so great is it. Recorded 1968 in London and produced by Glyn Johns, there's nothing fish n' chips about it - this is as pure Left Coast psych as it gets. Boz Scaggs makes his presence felt to advantage, and Ben Sidran sits in on harpsichord. Wenner's simpering eulogy in Rolling Stone - "one would not characterize the record as being 'far out' or revolutionary, but rather as being excellent" - makes you wonder how their sweetheart relationship could turn so very sour. Wonder, not care.

For Sailor, their *sophomore effort* [rockspeak advisory - Ed.], Glyn Johns was flown over to LA. It's nearly, but not, as good, sounding suspiciously like they rocked up to Wally Heider's with only a couple of tunes in their pocket, which is what they did. The album starts strongly with four songs from Miller, including the gorgeous Song For Our Ancestors and the hit Living In The USA, but fizzles out with a couple of formulaic Scaggs efforts. From Miller to filler.

The uncredited sleeve design is another stunner, an epic scissors-and-paste montage using band photography by Thomas Weir ["not Bob's bro" - Babs]. And look! In an IoF© exclusive, I can reveal if you join the top of the back sleeve to the bottom of the front - an impossibility unless you own two copies - the sea at the bottom of the front cover turns into the clouds at the top of the back cover! [left - Ed.] OH WOW! I just discovered this and I'm, like, OH WOW, man! It's like, the sea is the sky, man! And we're all floating, like sailors ...

Backing up a little before we go forward, here's the gorgeously-covered Chuck Berry With The Miller Band Live At Fillmore Auditorium, from '67 ...

... and th' AF-F© OST to Revolution, with pre-first album cuts (great album, no filler!)

... and here's a cover for SteveShark's Matrix boot linked in th' comments. This is the kind of Team Commitment to Excellence in Deliverables you just don't get anywhere else on the internet.

WIN!!! Inflatable "Social Distancing" Twister© In This Easy-To-Enter Competition! Dept.

Milton Bradley© - "The Fun's Just Started!"™ ©Foam-O-Graph Watermark Removal Dept.

We can all make lists of Greatest Classic Iconic Albums, and we're likely to have some in common, but listing the albums that actually have a deep personal connection - for whatever reason - may give more interesting and varied results. Music that's part of your D.N.A., not critical analysis of artistic quality. Albums that evoke a particular time or moment in your life, comfort music maybe, or albums that you love in spite of their faults. Old friends who are always there for you, that never grow old.

Let's avoid a relative ranking from "most loved" to "least most loved" or whatever - a random order is better than a meaningless 1 to whatever. Your list can be as long as you like, or as short (shorter is better - ask my wife!), but the music should be part of you, not just critically respected or simply enjoyed. If you want to say why the album is your lifelong pal, you get extra points. And remember - being hip here means being hip to yourself, man. It's your trip, baby!

Thanks to Blythe "Bitsy" Halliburton-Whitney [left - Ed.], Senior Diversity Development Officer at Milton Bradley©, for donating [and inflating! - Ed.]  this week's Grand Prize!

Please note your prize will be delivered pre-inflated. Delivery charges applicable.

Brooooce!! Dept. - No Not That One, This One

Shiny. Dark and shiny.

Jack th' Bruce isn't so much depressing as serious. Scots are genetically incapable of frivolity. A Scot's smile is a rictus grimace; his laugh a death rattle. Bitter? You'd be goddamn bitter if forced to wear skirts, toss cabers, dance from the waist down and eat sheep bladder in the rain for the amusement of your smirking English overlords. Bruce broke with native tradition by sobering up enough to find work south of the border with popular beat combo The Creams, but it's his solo albums he put the most into, and we get the most out of.

The tri-ology of albums from '69 to '74,  Songs For A Tailor, Harmony Row, and Out Of The Storm is an extraordinary artistic statement. The music is uncompromised by cliché, market forces, current trends, genre categorisation, or a desire to be liked (or get laid - usually a prime motivator). It's not an easy job, evolving music out of the blues-rock tar pit of the 'sixties, but someone had to do it. His remarkable voice comes more from the lieder tradition than rock - these are unapologetically art songs - and his limber, jazz-rooted bass enables song-writing structure beyond the remit of pop. Add Pete Brown's dream-logic lyrics, contributions from the best musicians in the business, and something monumental is created.

Conventional critical wisdom - that idiot - relegates Out Of The Storm to third place, but it's entirely consistent in quality and integral to the tri-ology. The bass playing on Timeslip defies analysis and comprehension - you can follow, but never predict. Leave us face it - this stuff asks more investment from the listener than air-punching and Confederate yelps. Bruce isn't playing down for anybody (as he sometimes had to) but persistence pays dividends, and once you're in, you're in for life and your world is a better place.

For once, the covers are up to the task, setting an appropriately dark, reflective mood. Dark, reflective, demanding, but never depressing. Shiny. Things only shine in the dark. Like stars.

As an amuse gueule, here's Timeslip, with its trip-stumble bassline:

As a service to you, Mr. Freeloadin' Bum fracking the internet in your insensate greed, the loaddown cake is iced by Jack's jazz jamboree from '68, Things We Like (a missed opportunity in titling, you ax me - should of been: "Like, Things We Like") which plays beautifully with John McLaughlin's Extrapolation, should youse bums gots that already, which you should.

The Womens' Prison Record Club Dept.

Harsh conditions and brutal discipline for the incarcerated! But is Society to blame?

Babes Behind Bars! Hoosegow Hookers! Death Row Dames! Big House Broads! Sorority Cellmates! Slammer Sluts! Gubmint Gals! Er ... Correctional Facility Co-Eds? Call 'em what you like - they can't hear you - but what do they get up to in there? In what will be a regular FoamFeaturette™, we address the issue of how the Weaker Sex (bless 'em!) live without menfolk around to give meaning and structure to their lives! And, crucially, with no way to release those oh-so-natural womanly frustrations!

We axed Herta Von Klammpenstrüdel-Dieseldyke [left - Ed.], stern Wardeness of the Pork Bend Residential Facility For Undisciplined Women, for an insight into how "the gals" spend their leisure time!

FT3 Give us an insight into how the gals spend their leisure time, why don'cha!

HVK [gestures with foot-long cigarette holder] Personal hygiene is important, obviously, so inspections are frequent and they spend much of their time in the showers. But they also enjoy relaxing at the weekly Record Club, sometimes dancing together, their bodies pressed close, their lips parted-

FT3 [cutting in] Right! So who chooses the music?

HVK [snapping out of reverie montage] That is my responsibility. It is a ... sociological experiment. I scientifically monitor their physical reactions through the CCT network from my command center.

FT3 So what long-player did the locked-up lovelies listen to this week?

HVK [adjusts monocle, consults clipboard] Variations Sur Le Même T'Aime, by Vanessa Paradis [left - Ed.]. With accompanying short film. French women have many admirable traits - their haughty disgust for men, their natural propensity for intimacy with their own gender, unfettered by the toxic social mores of patriarchal hegemony. Ms. Paradis has much to offer my clients. And I ... [eyes narrowing] have much to offer Ms. Paradis ...

In th' interests of cross-cultural education, the video clip Von Klammpenstrüdel-Dieseldyke alludes to is presented below [below- Ed.].

Shapeshifter Of Delight Dept.

The boundary between solo albums by Carlos Humberto Santana Barragán and band albums by Santana is blurred and tricky to negotiate. I avoid the problem by filing everything under Santana. Shape Shifter, 2012, might have lifted the "band albums" out of a ten-year creative rut, but it sold less than the previous Guitar Heaven, his absolute nadir, and the rut was soon slipped back into.

Shape Shifter is basically instrumental, a good start. The only vocal nicely prefigures the last Santana album anybody really needs, the underrated (because unapologetically Mexican, I'm guessing) Corazon. This is above all, a Swell Album, not exactly like any other in the canon, and will provide you, Mr. and Mrs. Consumer, with many hours of musical pleasure. New cover art [above - Ed.] to freshen things up a bit.

The Swing Of Delight, attributed to Devadip Carlos Santana, is three decades older [pause for quiet contemplation while we stare into the abyss of time - Ed.] but they make an interesting pairing. This is an entirely instrumental jazz album, with Chucky leading, and allowing his musicians (including Herbie Hancock, Waynie Shorter, Ronnie Carter, and Tony Williams) to strut their stuff. This doesn't sound exactly like a Santana album, either, even with his instantly recognisable playing and dialled-back Latin percussion. Like Shape Shifter, it's not quite the success we might have hoped, and the wild magic that inspired his incredible run from Abraxas to Borboletta is absent. But again, it's a Swell Album, so being too critical is, well, being too critical. Quit yer whinin' an' let the music play. New cover art features rare selfie of Krishna - hubba hubba! [left - Ed.].

This post sponsored by Krishna's Karmic Klam Kastle™, Pismo Beach, CA.

David Miscavige's Fidget Spinner O' Funk! Dept.

TV's sultry Alexandra Bastedo, star of TV's The Champion Wonder Horse, subs for unavailable David Miscavige

Boyish, charismatic cult supremo and Fifth Beatle David Miscavige [not above - Ed.] likes nothing better than choosing which funk album to play next using his special Thetan Fidget Spinner!

Call David now! (727) 467-5000

Dave spoke to us yestiddy from his Secret Hideaway Penthouse Suite in The Flag Building, Clearwater, FLA [above - ED.] as attempts are made to serve him with a child trafficking lawsuit.

FT3 So, Davey-boy - what's next on th' Scientologological stereo?

DM [laughs] I never trafficked them kids!

FT3 Why would you?

DM [laughs] Exactly! Like I need the hassle. I got kids my own to traffic.

FT3 Ri-ight - so - you got an funk album for us?

DM [laughs] Just lemme give th' old Thetan Fidget Spinner a spin here ...

FT3 [some time later] What's it tellin' you, Dave?

DM [laughs] Still spinnin' here ... I never trafficked no kids.

FT3 Nobody's sayin' you did, Dave! 'Cept some mothers and witnesses. Album yet?

DM [laughs] Who traffics kids? I got my own helicopter so I don't got to deal with no fuckin' traffic. Okay - the spinner's tellin' me - Alphonse Mouzon? Never heard of the guy.

FT3 How's the wife, Dave?

[call ends abruptly]

Today's deliverables is this here couple of swell album records by Alphonse "Call me Al" Mouzon! Oboy!

"Harp Spirals, Frosty Vibraphone Droplets And Heavily Wafting Strings" Dept.

You're going to dismiss this as easy listening pablum, because although you pride yourself on your broad-ranging musical tastes ("it's all good"), this is - obviously, from the title and cover - something Populuxe suburbanites spun on their consolettes at weekend cocktail parties. Music for morons, or worse, your parents.

But you'd be wrong. Not totally, hopelessly wrong - how could you be that? But wrong in a nuanced way that does you credit. This is no exotica or lounge novelty for smirking vinyl fetishists with kidney-shaped coffee tables. This is Nelson Riddle, in 1961, when covers like this were considered steamy stuff. Elvis was safely in the Army and beat groups yet to change pop forever - well, at least until nobody cared about them any more. Look at it this way - if you were newlyweds (what a heartbreaking word) in '61, your future bright as the chrome on the Chrysler Newport in the driveway, you'd have picked this up at the record store and been pretty damn cool. It wouldn't have been an ironic purchase to show how hip you were.

And it's Nelson Riddle, fercrissakes, the Noo Joizy boy who became one of Sinatra's most distinguished arrangers. Worked with all the greats, won all the awards, and made a surprising comeback in the 'eighties with Linda Ronstadt.

So - quality is assured. Human musicality, talent and skill present in profligate abundance. But can you listen to it without feeling sick to your stomach? Can this music be appreciated for what it is - an interlude of relaxing escapism and exotic romance - without cultural change and the blight of irony souring it? I'm guessing not, but give it a try. That Newport won't suddenly materialize in the sunny driveway, but you're on th' Isle O' Foam©, where interludes of relaxing escapism and exotic romance are enforceable by law.

Hi-Fi listening tip: avoid embarrassing string shrillness by rolling the treble right back on the RIAA curve!

Sitarswami Dept. - All The Dey And All The Knight

Ultra-swell art by Sitarswami

In 1961, while still in high school, Nora Ferrari released two singles as Nora Ferris [most unwise name change of all time? - Ed.]. Upon entering Fordham University the next year she sent out a demo which reached Bob Crewe, the mastermind behind the 4 Seasons. Crewe was looking for a girl to sing an answer song to the 4 Seasons recent hit, “Sherry.” The record “Jerry (I’m Your Sherry)” was not a chart success but was the beginning of a five- year professional relationship between Crewe and the newly christened Tracey Dey. Dey & Crewe released a dozen girl-group singles (across four labels) before Dey left the music business in 1966. She later got her master’s degree from Columbia U., taught for a spell, then became an actor / screenwriter. Of particular note, depending on which source you believe, she recorded the first version of Jagger- Richards’ “Blue Turns To Grey.”

Immediately after graduating high school in 1960, Harold Temkin started knocking on music publishers’ doors looking for work as a writer or singer. In 1961, he released two singles as Gary Temkin and in 1962 issued a third as Gary Weston. He co-wrote most of his early records as either Tem(p)kin or Weston and in ’62 placed several songs with Connie Francis. In 1964, Gary began writing with Bob Crewe. Crewe suggested the Gary Knight moniker and in 1965 he brought Dey & Knight into the studio together. Although the Dey & Knight partnership was limited to two singles (plus Tracey’s last single which Gary wrote) before her retirement, Gary continued to write and occasionally record. In the early 1970’s Gary began writing with Gene Allan and the pair knocked out many sweet soul hits throughout the decade.

This mostly chronological compilation covers Dey & Knight recordings from 1961-1972. Gary wrote/co-wrote all but nine -- the Nora Ferris / Tracey Dey tracks (#1, 7-8, 10-12, 14-16). Besides Crewe & Allan, Gary’s frequent writing collaborators were Francine Neiman, Don Stirling, and Irving Levine. Herb Bernstein handled most of the arranging and, in Crewe’s absence, production. Charles Calello arranged most of the Tracey Dey material. The songs run the gamut of 60’s sounds: teenage heartbreak, adventures on the beach, girl group, sunshine pop, soul, r & b, pop-sike, and novelty.

Thanks to Senor Swami for this swell assemblage!

Pole Vault Pin-Up Wants To Be Respected As Steely Dan Fan Above All Else Dept.

"I like a pole to be firm yet flexible, ultra-long, and strong enough to take all of me, again and again  ..."

Comely Athletician and Marine Biologist Holly "Holy Hula" Hayley-Hall is damn tired of fellows who just want to watch her yeet herself over some stick in the sky. "There's so much more to me than mere Olympian athletic prowess," she averred yesterday. "For instance, which I am a passionate expert of the music of Steely Dan. I have, like, all their albums which surprises the shit out of the dumb-ass jocks what I date. Where's a skinny Jewish guy when you need one?"

Here[left - Ed.]'s a swell collectible for your collectible collectibles collection! Instantly reduce your confreres to grovelling supplicants prostrating themselves at the hem of your garment! They will literally sacrifice their firstborn to get a lick at this Steely Danish deli delite! Either that or turn away with a sneer of disdain on their lovely pan. Probably that. Best keep this quiet, because only a Dan Fan like you would find this kind of thing mildly interesting.

It's what the music business knew as a "promotional" disc back in the day. It would - as the name seems to imply - "promote" the band via a selection of representative cuts [Aja features strongly] interspersed with a intryview with the "lads" themselves, Dolt n' Wonnie! Oboy!

This post fulmigated from Th' Lupine Assassin Collection Of Collectible Collectibles Collection