Endle St Cloud’s bizarre one-off album from 1969 was the last LP released by legendary Texan label International Artists. Signed to the post-Lelan Rogers IA, towards the end of the label’s golden years of 1966-70, the decidedly oddball Endle St Cloud very much belong to the second tier of IA outfits to emerge in the wake of the label’s top-selling act, 13th Floor Elevators.
Fronted by the vocal and piano-playing talents of the singular Endle himself, and including members of IA stablemates Lost & Found among their line-up, there’s never any escaping the fact that this is one off-the-wall listen (the tracklisting includes Professor Black and Laughter, both originally written for the second Lost & Found LP that never was). Much of this oddball flavour comes from the fact that the album is sequenced with a series of surreal piano and vocal vignettes introducing each of the album’s eight tracks, which themselves jump around a spectrum of styles ranging from vaudeville and country to pop and rock.
This limited digibook reissue also includes both sides of them band’s memorably psyched-out 1968 debut single, Tell Me One More Time (What’s Happening To Our World), recorded as Endle St Cloud In The Rain.
by Grahame Bent, 16 October 2009
Tracks
1. Piano A Tempo - 0:21
2. Street Corner Preacher - 4:45
3. Piano Scherzo - 0:39
4. Who Would You Like To Be Today - 2:38
5. Piano Tranquillo - 0:29
6. This Is Love - 4:33
7. Piano Allegretto - 0:17
8. Professor Black (James Harrell, Pete Black, George Banks) - 2:46
9. Piano Diminuendo - 0:24
10.Piano Agitato - 0:33
11.Laughter (Pete Black) - 3:30
12.Piano Adagio - 0:36
13.Jessica - 2:54
14.Piano Con Brio - 0:12
15.Come Through (Pete Black) - 2:03
16.Piano Andante - 0:46
17.Like A Badge - 3:45
18.Piano Teneramente - 0:24
19.Tell Me One More Time (What's Happening To Our World) (Alan Melinger) - 2:50
20.Quest For Beauty (Alan Melinger) - 2:46
All compositions by David Potter, Alan Melinger, Peter Black except where stated
Endle St. Cloud
*David Potter – Drums
*Alan Melinger - Bass
*Peter Black - Vocals, Guitar
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