When the Rascals broke up in 1972, guitarist Gene Cornish and drummer Dino Danelli wasted little time putting together another band.
For the unaware, the Rascals — who were initially called the Young Rascals — held sway as one of the greatest groups of the 1960s. Hailing from Long Island, New York, the band collected a cluster of shiny gold nuggets, including “Good Lovin’,” “I’ve Been Lonely Too Long,” “Groovin’,” “How Can I Be Sure,” “It’s a Beautiful Morning,” and “People Got to be Free,” that keenly mixed punchy rock arrangements with a smooth soul slant.
And so, shortly after the Rascals ceased to be, Gene Cornish and Dino Danelli joined forces with lead singer and bassist Billy Hocher, guitarist Eric Thorngren and keyboardist John Turi, resulting in the birth of Bulldog. The band’s self-titled debut album, produced by Gene and Dino, suggested they were off to a very promising start. Dominated by a loose and lively party vibe, Bulldog (Decca Records) stomped and swaggered with the raunchiest of the lot.
Smasher, Bulldog’s second album, appeared in 1974 on the Buddah label, and although credible moments were to be had, sales were weak and the band was then laid to rest. Come 1978, Gene Cornish and Dino Danelli connected with ex-Raspberries guitarist Wally Bryson and formed Fotomaker, and they experienced a brief burst of fame with their brand of slick power pop.
Hammering the point home with funky frills and boogie woogie rhythms, Bulldog steps in as a classic example of early-’70s blues-rocking soul. To be played loud for maximum effects, here’s an album worth checking out.
by Beverly Paterson, November 22, 2015
Tracks
1. Flamingo (Eric Thorngen, Billy Hocher) - 4:16
2. Are You Really Happy Together (Eric Thorngen, John Turi, Billy Hocher) - 2:43
3. Honeymoon Couple (Eric Thorngen, Billy Hocher) - 2:23
4. Bad Bad Girl (Eric Thorngen, John Turi, Billy Hocher) - 2:18
5. Brown Eyed Handsome Man (Chuck Berry) - 2:42
6. We Had A Real Good Time (Dan Hartman, Edgar Winter) - 3:28
7. Ooh When You Smile (Eric Thorngen, John Turi, Billy Hocher) - 2:39
8. Rock 'n' Roll Hootchi Coo (Rick Derringer) - 4:55
9. I Tip My Hat (Eric Thorngen, John Turi, Billy Hocher) - 2:27
A lot of blues have gone under their musical bridge in the four years since the Animals first exploded on the pop music scene–blues musical and personal. A dozen sidemen have come and gone, the billing was changed to read "Eric Burdon and the Animals," they stopped recording blues classics preferring to present original material, and where once this young English mining town tough was the critics' darling and voted the best white male blues singer in the business, he now is relegated to a position somewhere in the Siberia of Teenybopperland.
Burdon has also changed personally. Once upon a time he was remote and uptight. Today he is friendly and relaxed. The ego you think might have dictated the changes in billing and personnel is, if present, not apparent. So it is not difficult to ask Burdon, quite bluntly: What happened?
"I got changes to go through and I've got to go through them," he said recently, between out-of-town concert gigs. "If I worried about what people said in the beginning, I'd never have done anything. When I was still in school I said Ray Charles and Bo Diddley were where it's at, not Bobby Vee. So after a while I was right, and blues was right. Then, later, when I did something else, they came to me and said I should be doing blues and not Ravi Shankar and 'Sky Pilot'."
He made this short speech with conviction, but without anger. "It took Don Ellis ten years to get his band together where it is now," he added. "When I think of that I know I've got plenty of time. "You know, I can still walk out on any stage and get a good reaction The record business can take second place to that. Performing for people is where it's at. I guess I find it difficult to connect through a record."
Burdon has a home in Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles now and it is this city he uses as a base for his far-ranging, continuing concert tours. There is a new album out–Every One of Us, the band's tenth–and there are certain to be several more, but it is the stage act Burdon seems to believe in.
"If you get hung up in a studio, you lose people," he said. "If you live in a castle, you can't take a walk on the Sunset Strip. I think the Stones are finding this out right now. I think the Beatles may learn the same thing. You got to be out in front of the people.
"The English critics thought 'Sky Pilot' was bad when they listened to the record, but they liked it in the stage show. You got to see it with the film and the light show to know what we are talking about. "You see, I can't get it out of my head every time I make a record I'm making a documentary movie, and records you can only listen to. You can't see them. What we really are, right now, is a stage act."
Eric Burdon and the Animals travel with a light show team and currently there are four films included in the presentation, so it is not surprising when Burdon defends visuals. "The best way to communicate is to make a movie," he said. "No one will let me make a film now, just like when I started out I couldn't make a record; no one would let me get into a studio. That's okay. I'll keep on making records until someone lets me make a film, and then I'll stand on people's fingers with what I do.
"Film is the medium. If people have eyes as well as ears, records only half-satisfy." Why has Burdon abandoned the blues classics that were so good to him? "I haven't, really. Not altogether. I still do some of me old things in the stage act occasionally. I still sing blues, even if they are original. Most of the new album is our own stuff, but 'St. James Infirmary' is in there. Besides, I did all that before. Why do it again?"
(It's a pallid rendition of "St. James Infirmary" the Animals provide on this album, sharing the second side with a 19-minute-long "documentary" called "New York 1963–America 1968," which might best be described as Burdon's latest sophomoric attempt to convince us his soul is black. The first side is somewhat less offensive, although it features, for elusive reasons, "The Immigrant Lad," running 6:15 and being little more than a seagull track with intruments and a mundane conversation between Engish workingmen. The album was produced by the band, Tom Wilson having gone on to other things. It is not a collector's "must.")
As shy and uptight as Burdon was in 1964 when "House of the Rising Sun" was a hit, even then he was outspoken. He is no less honest today, and some of the things he says are the sort that send record biz execs running for drink.
About drugs and booze: "I usually don't go on stage unless I am stoned out of me head. Or after drinking half a bottle of scotch. I've decided there's nothing like dope . . . booze . . . meditation . . . anything to get high."
About his record company: "Stanley Kubrick gets $15 million and doesn't have to show one foot of film to MGM for three weeks, and I can't get them to put a billboard on the Strip to advertise me records."
About London: "The whole city has gone homosexual. All me friends have gone bent. They're freaking out . . . looking for something to do, I guess."
Burdon made several small speeches in a short period of time. There was no uptightness, no matter how strong the opinions. The man had been relaxed. He grinned when he talked. He was, like too many others in his field, talking too much about film and paying too little attention to music. But he was exceptionally likeable. "Meanwhile," he said, finishing one of his small speeches, "it's off to Portland for a gig. We are but strolling minstrels."
Also meanwhile (and a week following the interview) two of his guitarist-bass players, Vic Briggs and Danny MeCulloch, left the group. Briggs was replaced by Andy Somers, formerly with the Soft Machine and Zoot Money's group before Money joined the Animals. McCulloch, who already has cut an album with a new group, has not been replaced.
by Jerry Hopkins, September 14, 1968
Tracks
1. White House - 3:51
2. Uppers And Downers - 0:26
3. Serenade To A Sweet Lady (Johnny Weider) - 6:16
4. The Immigrant Lad - 6:17
5. Year Of The Guru - 5:25
6. St. James Infirmary (Traditional) - 5:03
7. New York 1963 America 1968 (Eric Burdon, Zoot Money) - 18:52
All songs by Eric Burdon except where noted
Bonus Track on 2013 SHM Japan
8. White House (Eric Burdon) - 3:03
Bonus Tracks on 2004 Repertoire edition
8. River Deep, Mountain High (Jeff Barry, Phil Spector) - 3:52
9. White House (Eric Burdon) - 3:03
The Animals
*Eric Burdon - Vocals
*Vic Briggs - Guitar, Bass
*John Weider - Guitar, Celeste
*Zoot Money (Aka George Bruno) - Hammond Organ, Vocals, Piano
Born 27 February 1947, US Navy Base, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, died 31 December 2000, England. Having played piano and guitar from childhood, Guillory first explored the electric guitar while in Florida, playing with the Illusions. Moving to Chicago in 1965, he studied Theory and Composition at Roosevelt University. He joined the Chicago-based pop outfit the Cryan’ Shames in 1967 as bass player, and recorded two albums with them before leaving in 1969. In 1970 Guillory left the USA in order to travel. He made his British debut at the Cambridge Folk Festival in 1971, when he was invited to accompany Al Stewart. Having earned a growing reputation as a session musician, Guillory was signed by Atlantic Records to a solo contract in 1973 - his self-titled debut appeared the following year.
Continuing as a session musician, he appeared on albums such as Tall Tree by Peter Sarstedt, Past, Present And Future by Al Stewart, and Two Days Away by Elkie Brooks. Proving his versatility, Guillory went on to play on albums by the jazz fusion band Pacific Eardrum (replacing guitarist Big Jim Sullivan on two 70s collections), Donovan, Buggles, Barbara Dickson (for whom he became musical director) and Nick Heyward. He pursued a solo career from 1986, touring the UK, USA, Europe and Canada. In addition to being a guest lecturer during the Guildhall School Of Music’s summer programme, Guillory also wrote all the musical information in The Guitar Handbook by Ralph Denyer - a definitive textbook which served as the inspiration for the BBC television series, Rock School. He also accompanied Joan Baez in a televised concert in France and toured with both John Renbourn and Pierre Bensusan.
Despite not achieving commercial success in his own right, Guillory thrived in the live environment, remaining a much in demand virtuoso performer. His death from cancer in December 2000 robbed the music world of a great talent.
All Music
Tracks
1. St. Peter - 4:19
2. Staying Awhile (Virginia Clemens) - 2:12
3. Brusselles - 2:46
4. Steamboat - 3:20
5. Sidewalks Of America (Geoff Boyan) - 3:12
6. The Carbondale Strutt - 2:57
7. Movin' On - 2:37
8. Ice Cream Phoenix (Charles Cockey, Jorma Kaukonen) - 4:06
Marvelous Kid formed in 1970 when drummer Paul Moon and guitarist Tony Coxon met keyboard player/singer Steve Betts in the St. Austell Bay area of Cornwall. The band started gigging as a three piece, playing covers as well as some of their own material. After a few months they had gathered a loyal following and were joined by celebrated local musician Spike Hooper on tenor sax. Their reputation as an original and inventive band started to grow and was given a further boost when they won a South West Best Band competition in 1970. The prize, a recording session at Decca studios in West Hampstead and a new Laney PA system, enabled them to consolidate and continue developing their own material. Soon the band were gigging all over the south west of England, headlining and supporting various name bands, their continuing success culminating in a performance at the 1971 Glastonbury Fayre.
At the end of that year Steve moved to London where he joined Grannie, another unsung prog band of the period, as lead singer, while Paul, Tony and Spike continued playing in Cornwall. In 1972, following Grannie's demise, Steve returned to Cornwall and with Tony and Paul reformed Marvelous Kid. This second incarnation of the band marked the debut of bass guitarist and vocalist Frank Artés, who had been playing with bands in Exeter, and tenor sax and flute player Ivor Carroll who'd spent time in the New York jazz scene studying with Sonny Rollins. This line up began preparing a set of original material in a Cornish country cottage. In 1973, the band travelled to Dublin to record songs for a proposed first album. Following this, and after some farewell gigs in Cornwall, the band decamped to a large house in Walton-on-Thames where they continued writing new material and began gigging on the London live music circuit. This first Marvelous Kid CD contains five of the tracks recorded in the Dublin sessions.
Jean-Jacques Kravetz a classically trained keyboardist-extraordinaire and veteran of such Deutschrock mammoths as Atlantis, Frumpy, Lindenberg, Randy Pie, recorded a little-known solo album in 1972, aided and abetted by his erstwhile partner Udo Lindenberg (later a solo star in his own right) on drums and percussion, simply titled, "Kravetz", and re-released as "The Hamburg Scene - 8 Days In April". It's indeed a strange mixture side one strives to be "conceptual", comprised of just two long tracks I'd Like To Be A Child Again" (with Inga Rumpf guesting on vocals) clocks in at nearly 10 minutes and is surprisingly light on keyboards and heavy on guitar! Side two is much more streamlined with three shorter tracks, featuring some straight-ahead early 70s style heavy rock, gorgeous guitar and organ passages and even some "weird" (avant-garde?) moments, a-la King Crimson.
by Alex Gitlin, November 2001
Tracks
1. I'd Like To Be A Child Again (Jean-Jacques Kravetz, Udo Lindenberg) (9:35)
2. Ann Toomuch (Jean-Jacques Kravetz, Udo Lindenberg) (7:55)
The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band released three albums in 1967 and 1968 on the Reprise Records label, blending straightforward late-'60s L.A. rock with dark, often surreal lyrics and psychedelic soundscapes. All of these psychedelic platters have been collected on A Door Inside Your Mind: The Complete Reprise Recordings 1966-1968 in both stereo and mono, along with a bonus disc of previously unreleased alternate versions and mixes; single edits; and a radio spot.
The band coalesced when wealthy Los Angeles bachelor and sometime-race car driver Bob Markley was introduced by Kim Fowley to young musician Michael Lloyd - whose many credits include production for Shaun Cassidy, Barry Manilow, and Belinda Carlisle - and brothers Shaun and Danny Harris. Despite little obvious talent, Markley wanted to join a band, and offered to bankroll such an operation with his new, clearly talented friends. With the addition of drummer John Ware (later of Michael Nesmith's First National Band), the band launched.
Their first LP, on the small Fifo label, featured Michael and Shaun on a set of folk-rock and garage-rock. Before they were signed to Reprise, guitarist Ron Morgan had joined the group. Part One was on an establishment label with an establishment producer (Jimmy Bowen, who had helmed Frank Sinatra albums for Reprise) but was a decidedly non-establishment album. Alongside more-or-less conventional songs by Baker Knight, P.F. Sloan, and Van Dyke Parks tunes, the group covered Frank Zappa and provided somewhat sinister originals that handily out-weirded Zappa. Still, Lloyd and the Harris brothers' beautiful harmonies shone through, as did the musicianship of all members except Markley, who supplied bizarre spoken word.
Tired of Markley's machinations, Michael Lloyd left TWCPAEB prior to the recording of 1967's Vol. 2. (With the band splintering, Markley also formed an alternate, touring version of the band with future Three Dog Night member Jimmy Greenspoon among its members; the whole madcap story is beautifully told in Alec Palao's liner notes.) The album took a big step further into the realm of the outré, with the liner notes promising, "Every song in this album has been written, arranged, sung and played by the group. No one censored us. We got to say everything we wanted to say, in the way we wanted to say it." With protest songs surrounded by macabre ditties and Markley's increasingly disturbing odes to young women, Vol. 2 also included arguably the group's most famous song. Markley and Morgan's "Smell of Incense" (covered the next year in a moderate hit version by Texas band Southwest F.O.B.) was a haunting and delicate psych-folk nugget that stands among the best of the era.
TWCPAEB was down to a trio (Markley, Morgan, Shaun Harris) by the time they entered the studio for Vol. 3: A Child's Guide to Good and Evil, a loose concept album about the corruption of innocence. Markley's often strange and unsettling lyrics were contrasted by Shaun's strong vocals and Morgan's varied guitar. With dollops of effective Vietnam-era protest (including a closing track consisting solely of silence) and offbeat, dreamlike twists on fairy tales, Vol. 3 is the band's most memorable record if certainly not one for everybody; Palao quotes one critic upon its release who called it "sick."
Though Reprise dropped the band, Jimmy Bowen brought them over to his new Amos label where they reunited with Michael Lloyd on 1969's Where's My Daddy? The original foursome of Lloyd, Markley, and the Harrises brought TWCPAEB to a close in 1970 on Lloyd's friend Mike Curb's Forward label; that album was entitled Markley - A Group as Bob's ego reportedly swelled once again. Freed from Markley's grasp (and his cringeworthy predilection for songs about young girls), Lloyd continued to collaborate with the Harris brothers under a variety of names. He also produced Shaun's solo album for Capitol in 1973.
Disc Four of Grapefruit's box is a real treasure trove for collectors, with 18 rarities and previously unreleased tracks mixed in 2006 by Andy Zax and Brian Kehew for an abortive Rhino Handmade release. Liner notes author Alec Palao has remastered all audio to the highest standard. Each disc within the clamshell case is housed in a mini-sleeve replica of the original album, and the custom CD labels utilize Reprise-style designs. A 40-page booklet with artwork by Andy Morten is an essential component of the package, and Palao's notes put the band's complicated legacy into perspective.
Bob Markley's sickening interest in underage girls would eventually lead to numerous brushes with the law, and a period in which he fled the United States. He died, institutionalized, in 2003. Ron Morgan passed away in 1989 and Danny Harris in 2012. Michael Lloyd and Shaun Harris remain friends today. This box set is the ultimate tribute to a band that managed to leave behind some worthy and fascinating music despite the darkness surrounding them.
by Joe Marchese, December 7, 2023
Tracks
Disc 1 Part One 1967
1&12. Shifting Sands (Baker Knight) - 3:55
2&13. I Won't Hurt You (Shaun Harris, Michael Lloyd, Bob Markley) - 2:24
3&14. 1906 (Bob Markley) - 2:21
4&15. Help, I'm a Rock (Frank Zappa) - 4:26
5&16. Will You Walk With Me (Dan Harris) - 3:01
6&17. Transparent Day (Shaun Harris, Bob Markley) - 2:18
7&18. Leiyla (Shaun Harris, Bob Markley) - 2:55
8&19. Here's Where You Belong (P.F. Sloan) - 2:50
9&20. If You Want This Love (Baker Knight) - 2:52
10&21.'Scuse Me Miss Rose (Bob Johnston) - 3:03
11&22.High Goin' (Van Dyke Parks) - 2:04
Tracks 1-11 Stereo Recordings
Tracks 12-22 Mono Recordings
Disc 2 Vol. 2 1967
1&11. In The Arena - 4:10
2&12. Suppose They Give A War And No One Comes (Bob Markley, Roger Bryant) - 3:38
3&13. Buddha - 2:05
4&14. Smell Of Incense (Bob Markley, Ron Morgan) - 5:47
5&15. Overture / Wcpaeb Part II - 1:28
6&16. Queen Nymphet - 2:19
7&17. Unfree Child - 3:58
8&18. Carte Blanche - 2:42
9&19. Delicate Fawn - 2:30
10&20.Tracy Had A Hard Day Sunday - 4:35
All songs written by Bob Markley, Shaun Harris except where indicated
Tracks 1-10 Stereo Recordings
Track 11-20 Mono Recordings
Disc 3 Vol. 3 - A Child's Guide To Good And Evil 1968
1&13. Eighteen Is Over The Hill (Bob Markley, Ron Morgan) - 2:42
2&14. In The Country (Bob Markley, Shaun Harris, Terry Kath) - 2:03
There's so much music out there that's not only indifferent but so finely worked or rather overworked that to hear aged, sparse demos of this quality is a breath of Alpine air. Candy's Waltz is not outakes from the great ifyoubelievein CD from two years ago (see CWAS#3) but further revelations from similar sources. Indeed it may be an overall stronger and more even collection. The vocals are fuzzy at the edges belying the tapes thirty years existence in damp or dusty garages and the songs are probably one takes. And it's great.
All the observations I made about the former collection remain relevant here: the Crosby inspired jazz/folk guitar with its Spanish tinges; the flighty Tim Buckley exuberance of the vocals, so rich and romantic, so much rounder and bigger than Arthur Lee's often mumbled delivery. Again it is a matter of taste if one prefer Bryan's idiosyncratic phrasing or Arthur's more normal arrangements. Probably a band arrangement could not handle such enormous and sudden changes in tempo and phrasing and, anyway, the daCapo Love could bring a warm sunshine to Bryan' music. Well whatever here's seventeen new Bryan Maclean songs! Assuming Arthur had it in him to write another Forever Changes (and it seemed not) Bryan could have submitted about half a dozen Candy songs.
The tunes really get inside you. Opener I can'tremember was written, like Orange Skies in 1966 age 17 and is similarly effortlessly inspired. I had to find this and several other beautiful tunes like Always I Wanted, Claudia and the title track on the piano to marvel at the Brian Wilson-like complexity of the melodies. It has been suggested that Arthur, though passing over many BM songs took more than a little inspiration from them. Castle Waltz from 1966 bears a huge resemblance to DaCapo's The Castle. A 1969 tune Father and Husband conversely sounds like several Forever Changes epic passages. There are two live songs replete with charming banter and track 20 is a telling BM radio interview for all Love fans. For many of us this album will again open the overgrown door to the magic garden.
Inside the twenty-page booklet enclosed within the Feats Don't Fail Me Now (Deluxe Edition), an erudite essay by esteemed author/biographer Dennis McNally gives due recognition to artist Neon Park's outlandish front cover image for Little Feat
's fourth longplayer. As with the other imagery of this artist that adorns the group's various longplayers, it is a thought-provoking yet unsettling combination of humor and cultural commentary that deserves the insightful notation, so, like the period photos of the musicians adorning the triple-fold package, the prose composed by the long-time media maven for the Grateful Dead is directly in line with the best of the wealth of music herein.
In fact, the remaster of the original album is only slightly less tantalizing than the rare and/or unreleased material accompanying it. Like their expertise with the other recordings here, Dan Hersch and Bill Inglot's engineering of the 1974 studio album reveals an almost granular level of detail. Accordingly, the minutiae of the mix highlights, on this title song among others, reveals keyboardist Bill Payne's uncanny ability to fill holes in the sound—and not just on his own composition "Oh Atlanta." Equally nuanced in that regard is the way Paul Barrere's and Lowell George's guitars snake in, out and around the other instruments during, for instance, "Skin It Back."
Eight cuts in the three-to-four minute range formulate a continuity comparable to the live material included in this package. Yet it also enhances how the studio track sequencing so accurately captures the dynamics of the sextet, including the odd imagery in the song lyrics: especially in Lowell George material like "Down The Road," the verbal wordplay piques the curiosity as much as the instrumental interplay. And those virtues coincide with the imagination evident in arrangements such as the earthy horn charts from Tower of Power on "Spanish Moon." The production on such a take, courtesy of titular bandleader George, along with his non-conformist kindred spirit Van Dyke Parks (plus Erik Jacobsen), nevertheless lent itself handily to stage performance.
While Electrif Lycanthrope: Live at Ultra-Sonic Studios, 1974 (Rhino Records, 2021) remains the definitive demonstration of Little Feat's shared instincts at this juncture of its career, the concert content contiguous with this reissue reaffirms the various bonds of the band in the spirit of the moment on stage. Each performance, in fact, is remarkable in its own way and no less so on the complete show from l'Olympia in Paris, France on 2/1/75, despite a sound quality that, in contrast to its corollary, captures as much of the room as the sound of the band.
Beginning with Allen Toussaint's "On Your Way Down," the sextet builds momentum almost imperceptibly over the course of its fifty-four some minutes, picking up the pace through "Rock And Roll Doctor" (a tribute to the author of the aforementioned song). The frenzied finish that is "Teenage Nervous Breakdown" carries all the more impact precisely because it follows the subdued take on "Willin'" (the song that purportedly moved Frank Zappa to ask author George to leave The Mothers of Invention).
Equally edifying in its own way is a limited edition compact disc (available separately through the Rhino label) containing more previously unreleased performances. Recorded at The Rainbow Theatre in London in January of the same year as its companion piece, the sextet's musicianship flows effortlessly after its fade-in. The shared gusto of Little Feat makes room for multiple impromptu jams over the course of its slightly less than half-hour duration before the coy denouement "Bag of Reds" (a play on the Gene Chandler's "Duke of Earl").
Labeled Hotcakes, Outtakes, Rarities, the second compact disc of the set features eight previously unreleased tracks that, combined with some culls from the similarly-titled four compact disc set released in 2000, give a glimpse of future Little Feat albums (it might well have been disc three of the set for that reason). An outtake of "All That You Dream" (from The Last Record Album (Warner Bros., 1975) and an alternate version of "Front Page News" (only ever released on the compilation issued after George's passing Hoy-Hoy (Warner Bros., 1981) suggests how the creative axis of the band was shifting.
Payne composed the former with Barrere and the latter with George. Meanwhile, an unfinished and abbreviated version of "Day At The Dog Races"—eventually issued on Time Loves A Hero (Warner Bros., 1977) is credited to everyone in the band except the latter (who would leave the stage in subsequent years when the finalized arrangement of this fusion-oriented instrumental was played).
Little Feat's preternatural grasp of groove otherwise abides throughout the dozen tracks. It is nothing less than remarkable how, even at the halting tempo Feats apply to Hank Williams' "Lonesome Whistle," Richie Hayward sounds like more than a single drummer. And it is only a little less fascinating to hear how percussionist Sam Clayton and bassist Kenny Gradney Jr. find places for themselves to play in the midst of the late co-founding member's deceptively casual and altogether dense motion around his kit.
As much through the sonic detail as the writing and playing, the uniformity of Feats Don't Fail Me Now renders the original thirty-four minutes-plus, recorded at engineer George Massenburg's Blue Seas studio in Maryland, a virtual template for Little Feat 2.0 (the band was originally a quartet). It was thus poetic justice indeed for the record to excel in the commercial marketplace, even if it is less of an adventurous creative statement than the album from the preceding year Dixie Chicken (Warner Bros., 1973).
Produced by Jason Jones with a team of admirable curators, this third Little Feat Deluxe Edition is a labor of love as affectionate in its own way as the devoted loyalty of the group's longstanding fan base. Like the prior deluxe editions of Sailin' Shoes (Warner Bros., 1972) and the aforementioned third album of the group's (originally issued the next year), this collection serves to further illuminate the attractions of one of the most eccentric bands in rock history.
by Doug Collette, June 28, 2024
Tracks
Disc 1 Feats Don't Fail Me Now 1974
1. Rock And Roll Doctor (Lowell George, Martin Kibbee) - 2:57
2. Oh Atlanta (Bill Payne) - 3:28
3. Skin It Back (Paul Barrere) - 4:11
4. Down The Road (Lowell George) - 3:45
5. Spanish Moon (Lowell George) - 3:06
6. Feats Don't Fail Me Now (Lowell George, Martin Kibbee, Paul Barrere) - 2:27
7. The Fan (Bill Payne, Lowell George) - 4:28
8. Medley: Cold Cold Cold / Tripe Face Boogie (Bill Payne, Lowell George, Martin Kibbee, Richie Hayward) - 9:57
Disc 2 Hotcakes, Outtakes, Rarities
1. Brickyard Blues (Allen Toussaint) - 3:00
2. Feats Don't Fail Me Now (Lowell George, Martin Kibbee, Paul Barrere) - 2:30
3. Rock And Roll Doctor (Lowell George, Martin Kibbee) - 3:24
4. Spanish Moon (Lowell George) - 3:44
5. Skin It Back (Paul Barrere) - 4:34
6. Oh Atlanta (Bill Payne) - 3:36
7. All That You Dream (Bill Payne, Paul Barrere) - 3:33
8. Front Page News (Bill Payne) - 4:57
9. Long Distance Love (Lowell George) - 2:53
10. Lonesome Whistle (Hank Williams, Jimmie H. Davis) - 3:47
11. Day At The Races (Bill Payne, Ken Gradney, Paul Barrere, Richie Hayward, Sam Clayton) - 3:12
12. Spanish Moon (Lowell George) - 2:41
Disc 3 If You Got It, A Truck Brought It: Live At The L’Olympia, Paris, France, 2/1/75
1. On Your Way Down (Allen Toussaint) - 6:51
2. Skin It Back (Paul Barrere) - 5:30
3. Fat Man In The Bathtub (Lowell George) - 5:55
4. Rock And Roll Doctor (Lowell George, Martin Kibbee) - 4:05
Aztec Two-Step found their name in a poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti: waltz into this place/and a couple of Papish cats/is doing an Aztec two-step. They found each other in Boston where each was individually working the local coffee-house circuit. They met one fateful hoot night, decided to join forces on the spot and were playing their first combined gig less than a week later. After two months in Boston, they headed for New York to seek fame, fortune and a record contract.
But to re-trace steps:
Aztec Two-Step consists of Rex Fowler and Neal Shulman, and each progressed in his own way before they met. Rex was born in Kansas City, Mo., but moved with his family to Maine at an early enough age to lay claim to the title of "Maine's only rock and roll star." At age 17, Rex started to play guitar and write songs and briefly appear with college friends in a now-defunct rock group called The Second Phlore. By the time he went to Boston to play his music as a career, he had been to college, dropped out, drop- ped back in and written about 80 songs. Rex calls himself an "evolutional writ- er." The songs take time to mature and grow. But when they're done, they're fine.
Neal Shulman is an absolutely indigenous New Yorker. Born and raised in Manhattan, he is the child of folk music devotees who taught him all the trad- itional songs, which became part of his arsenal in clubs. He started to play guitar and sing when he was "13, no 12 years old." Writing songs came later, at age 15. Neal, too, had a brief encounter with college, odd jobs in book and record stores and a trip to Europe. It was on his return from that trip that he went to Boston to study music, play guitar and meet Rex Fowler.
Once the move to New York had been made (in May 1971), the two spent six months playing clubs such as the Gaslights Au Go-Go and II and Folk City and concerts with Don McLean and Seals And Crofts. When they had nowhere else to play, they took themselves to Central Park to do open-air sets. And it was in the park that they met the man who brought them to Elektra where they were audi- tioned and signed. A debut album was made early in 1972 and released in June o that year. Titled, simply, Aztec Two-Step.
No amount of words or background information can adequately explain the quality of their music. Not many chance meetings are likely to produce the song and performance of the Aztec Two-Step, which are truly a joy. Their guitar playing (Neal on lead, Rex on rhythm), their singing (Rex sings lead most of the time and Neal harmony), even their personalities have that magic quality of mesl ing and complementing each other that is a sure sign of talent and professional- ism. And each contributes his share of songs---Neal, the younger of the duo, has two on the album, while Rex wrote the other nine. They all share in common the uncommon trait of being good. Pick a song, any song, and be guaranteed of fine music and lyrics that range from funny to philosophical.
Aztec Two-Step is a funny name that means beautiful music.
Original Liner Notes
Tracks
1. Baking - 2:42
2. Killing Me - 3:58
3. The Persecution & Restoration Of Dean Moriarty (On The Road) - 4:16
To the outside observer, Looking Glass were one of the luckiest bands to come up during the early '70s -- and doubly so, coming out of New Jersey in 1972 with a number one hit, three years before anyone was thinking about Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, and getting radio play on the song that has carried over into the oldies and '70s nostalgia boom over the decades since. Ironically, the bandmembers were never entirely happy with either the hit or the nature of the success that it brought them, mostly because it didn't represent what Looking Glass actually sounded like.
The group was founded by Brooklyn-born guitarist/singer/songwriter Elliot Lurie, bassist Pieter Sweval, and pianist Larry Gonsky, all of whom were students at New Jersey's Rutgers University. In their original late-'60s incarnation, Looking Glass were successful playing frat parties and local clubs before splitting up in the early '70s after graduation. Eventually, Lurie and Gonsky linked up again with Sweval and drummer Jeffrey Grob (who had been playing together in a band called Tracks), and Looking Glass were reborn. A hard rock outfit with a lot of virtuosity, they decided to try turning professional and shooting for a real career; even as they got lots of work at clubs up and down the East Coast, they began writing songs and heavily rehearsing the new material. Their music impressed Columbia Records president Clive Davis, who signed them to the Epic Records label, and a debut recording session for the company was scheduled.
After two failed attempts at recording (including one with guitarist Steve Cropper in Memphis), they struck gold with a producer named Bob Liftin and a Lurie original called "Brandy." They went through a lot of different versions before coming up with one that worked, with unobtrusive strings and horns dubbed on and the group harmonizing more than usual. Initially released as the B-side of "Don't It Make You Feel Good" in early 1972, "Brandy" was overlooked (along with the A-side) until Harv Moore, a disc jockey in the District of Columbia, flipped the single over and took it up as a personal cause. The record broke out in the city of Washington and spread rapidly, peaking six months after its release at the number one position. A self-titled debut album was released in the spring and was more representative of the group's sound. Although it didn't sell nearly the way the single had, it performed well enough, riding the charts for 16 weeks. Unfortunately, Looking Glass were never able to emulate "Brandy's success, and their next few singles failed to chart. It was a year later before another single, "Jimmy Loves Mary-Anne," reached the Top 40 for the group.
These chart successes didn't really do as much as one might have expected for the group, however. Neither hit single sounded very much like the band did on-stage -- much more representative were fast-paced rock & roll songs like "Jenny-Lynne" and "Don't It Make You Feel Good." They were a long way from the horn and string overdubbed singles by which radio listeners knew them, and inevitably many concertgoers were disappointed in their shows, which emphasized the rock & roll songs over the catchy AM pop they'd released so successfully. Lurie, wearied over the contradictions in the group's success, left Looking Glass in 1974 and embarked on a short-lived solo career that yielded a solo album and a series of unsuccessful singles. He also played live locally in the New York-New Jersey area, including a gig with Al Kooper at New York's Bottom Line. When Clive Davis founded Arista Records in the mid-'70s after being forced out of Columbia, Lurie was signed to the new company but failed to find a hit.
The other members of Looking Glass stayed together for another year, playing out their string as "Lookinglass" without a recording contract and a decreasing audience, until they called it quits in the middle of the decade. By the end of the 1970s, Lurie was no longer a performer and had moved into the motion picture business, working in music. He has supervised numerous scores, including The Last of the Mohicans, and wrote or produced the music for Night at the Roxbury, Alien 3, Mary Katherine Gallagher: Superstar, Perfect, Die Hard 2, Dying Young, and a remake of Miracle on 34th Street, among other films. Lurie and Sweval revived Looking Glass as a touring band in 2003 and hit the road with a show that included their hits, album cuts, and cover versions of rock and pop favorites from various decades.
by Bruce Eder
Tracks
1. Jenny-Lynne (Pieter Sweval) - 3:05
2. Brandy (You're a Fine Girl) (Elliot Lurie) - 3:09
3. Catherine Street (Pieter Sweval) - 5:50
4. Don't it Make You Feel Good (Elliot Lurie) - 2:50
5. Golden Rainbow (Elliot Lurie) - 3:07
6. Dealin' With the Devil (Pieter Sweval) - 3:20
7. From Stanton Station (Elliot Lurie) - 3:48
8. One by One (Pieter Sweval) - 6:03
9. Jimmy Loves Mary-Anne (Elliot Lurie) - 3:24
10.City Lady (Elliot Lurie) - 3:26
11.For Skipper (Pieter Sweval) - 3:19
12.Sweet Somethin' (Elliot Lurie) - 2:51
13.Who's Gonna Sing My Rock and Roll Song (Larry Gonsky, Nancy Nalence) - 3:51
