Time for a kickstart...
The Dave Myers Effect - Greatest Racing Themes [Carole/GNP Crescendo stereo LP, mid-60's] Organ and fuzz guitar-driven hot rod instro's replete with overdubbed squealing tires and revving engines, as was the brief trend at the time. Several killer tunes, including an unlikely cover of jazz pianist Ray Bryant's "Shake-A-Lady".
The Rock-A-Teens - Woo-Hoo [Roulette mono LP, 1960] There's been a TV commercial running recently that uses The 5,6,7,8's cover version of the title tune (a wordless falsetto 'woo-hoo, woo-hoo-hoo' repeated over boppin'th'blues changes), and it does have a crazy way of sticking in your head (not that I can recall who it's advertising). This Virginia group seems something of an oddity, in that: they debuted playing what is for the most part quite countrified rockabilly music at the time when that genre's historic practitioners were moving on stylistically; rockabilly wasn't generally a music that had been associated with groups per se (unlike, say, doowop); they actually got to record a nationally-distributed album as minor one-hit-wonders who were of course promptly never heard from again. It's a good'un though, and I believe Norton reissued it.
John Lewis Presents Contemporary Music - Jazz Abstractions: Compositions By Gunther Schuller & Jim Hall [Atlantic mono LP, about 1960] With Ornette Coleman, Scott LaFaro, Eric Dolphy, Eddie Costa, Bill Evans, George Duvivier, Jim Hall and others including The Contemporary String Quartet. The highlight is Schuller's side-long "Variants On A Theme Of Thelonius Monk (Criss-Cross)". The album bears a dedication to LaFaro, who was killed shortly before its release. This type of 'third stream' modern jazz/modern classical fusion music hasn't always aged so well, and some of what's here is pretty pretentious, but in limited doses I like this stuff when it works.
Daughters Of Albion - (self-titled) [Fontana LP, about 1968] Leon Russell-produced, guy-svengali/girl-singer duo consisting of songwriter/guitarist Greg Dempsey with Kathy Yesse. The jacket (a dreaded UniPak gatefold) makes you think you're in for some lame hippy-dippy self-indulgence, replete as it is with a set of 3 colorful 'big-eye' cartoon mini-posters depicting the happy, hairy couple demurely naked while engaging in such Aquarian Age psychedelic pastimes as holding flowers and flying upon a cloud-dragon (that is, once you get past the strange, out-of-focus black and white cover shot). But surprise surprise, the album is actually a succinct, highly enjoyable and accomplished pop-rock delight, featuring Russell's typically astute baroque orchestrations, concise tune running-lengths, fine singing, snappy guitar work, smart lyrics, and musical hooks galore. Recommend fans of West Coast 60's pop snatch this obscurity up if you ever stumble across it (to the best of my knowledge it's never been reissued but ought to be, though the curious can probably download it). Yesse went on to record under the name Kathy Dalton in the 70's.
The Five Americans - Progressions [Abnak LP, 1967] The "Western Union" guys return, good as ever. Very talented group that straddled the line between garage-rock and bubble-gum pop, in the vein of Paul Revere & The Raiders, Every Mother's Son, and The Ohio Express (musically that is, not in sales).
The Monkees - Head [Canadian RCA/Colgems LP, 1968] Not the more common "Headquarters" LP, but the soundtrack to the band's ill-fated trip-flick collaboration with Jack Nicholson. The music's not gonna make anybody forget their earlier mega-records with Don Kirshner in charge, but neither is it anywhere near as questionable as the movie was - in fact, it's mostly not bad at all.
The Clovers - Five Cool Cats [Edsel, British compilation LP, 1984] Collects much of the cream from this seminal rhythm & blues vocal group's 50's Atlantic sides, including "One Mint Julep" and "Your Cash Ain't Nothing But Trash" (before they switched to United Artists under the auspices of Lieber and Stoller and hit big with the original "Love Potion No.9").
Miles Davis - E.S.P. [Columbia LP, 70's reissue, orig. 1965] Picking up the "Sorcerer" expanded reissue CD I listed above has sent me back to some of the other Shorter/Carter/Hancock/Williams group recordings - the last period of Miles' evolution I'm into.
The Stillroven - Cast Thy Burden Upon... [Sundazed compilation LP, 1996, orig. rec. 1966-68] Good Minneapolis-based garage punk/psych group that never broke out of the Midwest with their handful of small-label singles.
A quick visit to the discard pile...
The Young Fresh Fellows - Totally Lost [Frontier LP, 1988]
Faces - First Step [Warner LP, 1969]
Chuck Berry - The London Sessions [Chess reissue LP, orig. 1972]
Jefferson Airplane - Takes Off [RCA reissue LP, orig. 1966]
My 'discard pile' is historically actually a place where records go to be ignored for years and then exhumed to see if my mind's changed again.
But despite the Faces LP being an original gatefold issue (temporarily still bearing the by-then-obsolete group name "Small Faces"), I don't think anything could alter my dim view of this supremely boring bump in the road. It's just hard to fathom how the same core group of musicians who were concurrently busy making Rod Stewart's landmark early solo records, and who would soon make some very good ones under their group moniker, could put out such an energy-deficient dud as this 'debut'. The closest thing to a decent song here is Stewart's "Three Button Hand Me Down", which is merely a highly inferior retread of his own contemporaneous "An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down". The cover photo is great, the music and performances a tedious waste of time.
The Young Fresh Fellows record I want to like more than I do, and suspect it will always remain thus.
With Jefferson Airplane, I've decided that all I really require (though maybe that's too strong a way to put it) are "Surrealistic Pillow" and "Crown Of Creation", complemented by the "2400 Fulton Street" early anthology (I have a very low tolerance for the San Francisco sound and most hippy music in general). I happened to catch the Airplane/Starship performing for free on the beach in Santa Cruz in front of a hometown crowd the summer before last, and must say that unquestioned geezerdom doesn't excuse them from being as predictably yawn-inducing as they were IMO.
Supposedly "The London Sessions" is Chuck's best-selling LP ever. Well, I guess that certainly isn't his fault. I love the guy to death, but I don't need to keep cobbled-together toss-offs made even by the likes of him. I got this rereleased version to see if the remastering job could raise my interest since I never listen to my original copy, but now it's time to quit while I'm behind. The lesser-name Brit backing units are criminally unswinging (sorry to pick on Mr. Kenny Jones twice in one post), and Chuck didn't exactly write any new standards for the occasion. Long live rock and roll, of which "My Ding-A-Ling" ain't never gonna be a great example. If you want a Chess "London Sessions", stick with the quite good Howlin' Wolf or Muddy Waters, though none are necessaries next to the peerless originals.
