rep>>> Oriental Sunshine - Dedicated To The Bird We Love (1970 norway, dreamy exotic folk psychedelia, 2006 remaster)

I love psych. I love world music. I love psych world music. Sadly, too often what gets marketed in the west as psych world music turns out to be regular local pop from the late ’60s – early ’70s with maybe some twangy guitar thrown on top (Rough Guide, don’t get me wrong, you’re great – but you are really guilty of this). Psych should at least sound like a thick fog of burning joss sticks was present during some point of the recording, if not marijuana and/or various hallucinogens.

This most recent reissue of the legendary single LP by the Norwegian band Oriental Sunshine manages to have that effect in spades, without relying on heavy guitar freakouts. Students Nina Johansen and Rune Walle met in 1968 and bonded over a shared love of The Beatles, Joni Mitchell and Ravi Shankar.

They fortuitously met Satnam Singh, an emigrant from New Delhi, who happened to be an accomplished tabla and flute player. Together Oriental Sunshine created a gentle, peaceful, evocative sound; western pop, jazzy and mellow, yet with strong Indian influences and instrumentation on every track. It all hangs together beautifully and is quite unlike anything else I’ve ever heard, yet completely within that Joni Mitchell/Beatles/Indian musical Venn diagram that originally brought Johansen and Walle together.

Their sole album, ‘Dedicated to the Bird We Love’ was released on Philips in 1970, with the trio joined by accomplished jazz musicians Espen Rud (Min Bul), Sture Janson, and Helge Grøslie (Junipher Greene). The album was recorded by the legendary Norwegian producer and recording technician Jan Erik Kongshaug.

Unfortunately for the band,  Nina Johansen’s father died right before the album was released in 1970, and Satnam Singh was deported back to India, effectively ending the band. In the years since, ‘Dedicated to the Bird We Love’ (named after Blackbird by The Beatles as well as in honour of Johansen’s father) has only grown in stature among psych and world music aficionados, with original pressings selling for over a thousand dollars. Round 2’s lovingly remastered reissue of this album on vinyl brings it within a reasonable price for a new generation of music lovers to discover it.

by Ben Adams, 3 December 2016 

Tracks

1. Across Your Life (Nina Johansen) - 3:31
2. Mother Nature (Hans Jorgen Hoines) - 2:25
3. Look At Me (Nina Johansen) - 1:41
4. Unless (Nina Johansen) - 2:51
5. Land Of Wisdom (Hans Jorgen Hoines) - 1:48
6. Let It Be My Birth (Hans Jorgen Hoines) - 2:11
7. Can Anybody Tell? (Nina Johansen) - 5:49
8. Visions (Nina Johansen) - 2:47
9. My Way To Be Hurt (Nina Johansen) - 3:05
10. Where You Went (Tum Kahan Gaye) (Satnam Singh) - 2:51
11. I'm Going (Nina Johansen) - 0:58

Oriental Sunshine
*Nina Johansen - Vocals, Guitar
*Rune Walle - Sitar, Vocals, Guitar
*Satnam Singh - Bamboo Flute, Tablas, Vocals
With
*Helge Grosli - Keyboards
*Sture Janson - Bass
*Espen Rud - Drums, Percussion

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rep>>> Steve Miller Band - Children Of The Future (1968 us, superb psych blues rock, 2012 digipak remaster with bonus track)

The 1968 debut of the Steve Miller Band begins with a shattering cacophony, followed by an acoustic strum emerging like a beacon of light amidst the darkness and clatter.  The album’s title track “Children of the Future” is far removed from the ironic detachment of “The Joker” or the sleek majesty of “Fly Like an Eagle,” later hits that proved the group could go “pop” while still showing off their versatility and impeccable musicianship.

Though the blues-rock guitarist from Wisconsin rose through the ranks in the fertile Bay Area psychedelic rock scene, Miller’s first album was recorded by producer Glyn Johns at London’s Olympic Studios.  Miller and his band (originally Boz Scaggs on guitar/lead and background vocals, Lonnie Turner on bass/background vocals, Jim Peterman on mellotron and organ/background vocals, and Tim Davis on drums/lead and background vocals) married blues guitar licks to hazy, lysergic melodies.  The centerpiece of Children of the Future is the side-long suite which opened the LP, primarily written by Miller.  

It’s bookended by the title song (“We are children of the future…wonder what in the world we are going to do…When they get high, they can see for miles and miles/When we get high, I can see myself for miles…You know I’ve got something that you can use”) and the B.B. King-influenced closer “The Beauty of Time is That It’s Snowing (Psychedelic B.B.),” an instrumental with only the “We are children of the future” mantra for lyrics.  What Mr. King thought of it, I don’t know.  Miller did, indeed, get high, as his lyrics went, and was busted and imprisoned for marijuana possession while recording the album.  The suite’s lyrics combine optimism with hippy-dippy cosmic belief redolent of the period (“In my second mind, I can see you grow/Feel you flow/It moves my soul, yeah”) though traditional love song sentiments and blues tropes are also present.

The second side is more traditional, though songs still flow into one another.  Boz Scaggs, on the verge of coming into his own as a solo artist, contributes two tracks to Side Two.  His pretty, ethereal pop song “Baby’s Callin’ Me Home” (with Ben Sidran on harpischord) segues into the electric rock of “Steppin’ Stone” (not the Monkees hit).  Long before “Jet Airliner,” Miller contributed the folk-rock “Roll with It” (“There’s a plane goin’ down the runway…Believe I better go with it/There’s a train goin’ by the highway…believe I better roll with it”) with its wailing guitar solo.  

The album is rounded out by Jim Pulte’s “Junior Saw It Happen” and a couple of R&B covers, “Fanny Mae” (with its striking R&B harmonica and a riff that was also semi-appropriated for The Beach Boys’ “Help Me, Rhonda”) and the slow-burning “Key to the Highway.”  The new reissue adds one bonus track, the shimmering non-LP single “Sittin’ in Circles,” written by another well-regarded tunesmith, Barry Goldberg of the Electric Flag.

by Joe Marchese

Tracks
1. Children Of The Future - 2:59
2. Pushed Me To It - 0:35
3. You've Got The Power - 0:53
4. In My First Mind (Steve Miller, Jim Peterman) - 7:31
5. The Beauty Of Time Is That It's Snowing (Psychedelic B.B.) - 5:24
6. Baby's Callin' Me Home (Boz Scaggs) - 3:24
7. Steppin' Stone (Scaggs) - 3:00
8. Roll With It - 2:29
9. Junior Saw It Happen (Jim Pulte) - 2:29
10.Fanny Mae (Buster Brown) - 3:09
11.Key To The Highway (Big Bill Broonzy, Charlie Segar) - 6:16
12.Sittin' In Circles (Barry Goldberg) - 3:06
All songs by Steve Miller unless as else stated

Band
*Steve Miller – Vocals, Guitar, Harmonica
*Boz Scaggs – Guitar,  Vocals  
*Lonnie Turner – Bass, Vocals
*Jim Peterman – Hammond Organ, Mellotron. Vocals
*Tim Davis – Drums, Vocals
With
*Ben Sidran – Harpsichord

1968  Sailor (2012 digipack remaster)
1969  Your Saving Grace (2012 digi pack remaster)
1970  Steve Miller Band - Number 5 (2012 digi pack remaster)

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