As I said back in May of 2021, I have a real soft spot for music that came out in the Psychedelic Years of 1966-1969, and when I first getting into ‘it’, I only thought that this sort of music was produced in the UK and USA. As I showed in that previous post, it did not take long to discover that the rest of the world wasn’t that far behind. I did cover this this topic in Episode 80 and 81 of the my podcast under the title of ‘Mundo Psych’. As I said previously, those shows only scratched the service of what there was, and so this month I present a second volume look at this genre from around the world.
Some of these songs could be argued to be bordering on Progressive Rock, but this works well as a compilation and a genre label is pretty loose anyway.
When Pink Floyd released their debut album ‘Piper At The Gates Of Dawn’, there was one driving force behind it. That was original guitar player/vocalist Syd Barrett. However, but the time they were ready to record their second, Barrett’s days in the band were numbered. His behaviour had becoming more erratic throughout 1967 to the point where he was detuning his guitar on stage. His material which once managed to break the Top Ten in the UK Singles chart was now failing to make the grade. By the time of ‘Apple & Oranges’, the last single he wrote for the band, their days as a chart band were gone and it would remain that way for another twelve years. The fact that they did not realise many singles in the UK in those twelve years might have played a part in that also. Anyway, as his ability to perform live diminished, Dave Gilmour, an old friend of Barrett’s was brought in as cover. The band thought that as Barrett had been responsible for most of the bands material up until this point, they would keep him on as a writer and non touring member along the lines of Brian Wilson from The Beach Boys.
This situation did not last long and by the end of January 1968, Barrett was no longer in the band. Even though he contributed to the playing on a couple of songs as a player, only one of the songs he had written for the group was used on the album that would be known as ‘A Saucerful Of Secrets’. ‘Jugband Blues’ was not like the joyous songs that had been included on the debut album but many have seen it as a self diagnosis of what he perceived was happening to him. Was it schizophrenia, a wry sense of humour, too many drugs, the fact that he longer wanted to be a star or a combination of all of them. Barrett had recorded a number of other songs but these would not seen an official release until 2016 and the Early Years box set. So, what if the second Pink Floyd album had sounded like it if it had used more of the material the band had recorded with Syd Barrett?
I’ll start by looking at the one track that did not make the cut. I did not want to use Saucerful of Secrets as it is the only the third section that I can actually listen to repeatedly. Wikipedia has that part listed as Celestial Voices and it is beautiful. It is shame that the rest of it was a load of psychedelic noodling that in any other era would have been seen as self indulgent. Seeing as this is quite a long song, that leaves plenty of room to fill on this LP. More on that later. Side A is the same as the album that was actually released. I did play around with this, moving songs around and trying to place the songs in a different order but it just didn’t work.
It is Side B that is very different from the album that was ultimately released. It starts off with ‘See-Saw’ was listed on the recording sheet as ‘The Most Boring Song I’ve Ever Heard Bar Two’. It its not the most memorably of songs but it is not terrible. I would love to know what the two songs the band thought were more boring than this though. I have followed this with one of the unreleased Barrett songs that was officially released in 2016. ‘Vegetable Man’ is not an easy listen and the lyrics show Barrett looking in on himself. This and the other unreleased Barrett number, ‘Scream Thy Last Scream’ were considered as the A and B side of a single, in lieu of anything else in the can. This, as we know did not come to pass and I suspect that it would not have returned the band to the top of the single chart. The band did perform these songs on a BBC session in December 1967.
‘Painbox’ was originally released as the B-Side of the Apple & Oranges single, and is one of a number of songs that band recorded that show the Barrett influence whilst not being written by him. ‘Jugband Blues’ is another song with lyrics that could be said to be Barrett looking in on himself and I almost finished this album in the same way it did on the original LP did. However, I decided to throw a little bonus in there, because otherwise my sides would not match up time wise. That track is an instrumental that has been bootlegged under the name as Sunshine, but supposedly the track is officially known as ‘Experiment’. Even though this track is meant to be 15 minutes long, only the first 90 seconds have escaped the studio. The track does sound a little rough, it fits into the sound of the album. I put a fade in and out and added some echo to the first 20 seconds.
The original Saucerful of Secrets was possibly the most democratic album the band ever made. Each of the five members take a lead vocal and this is the only album where Keyboardist Rick Wright vocal performances outnumber everyone else. I have used the same artwork as Saucerful of Secrets but I took out the original photo to include one with all five Floyd members in it.
Side A
Let There Be More Light
Remember A Day
Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun
Corporal Clegg
Side B
See-Saw
Vegetable Man
Paintbox
Scream Thy Last Scream
Jugband Blues
Experiment
A Spotify playlist could not be created for this play list due to one or more songs not being available on that platform.
Harlequins have played in numerous grounds around London since their formation. In the fourth and final part of this series of videos, The Squire sets out to find where each and everyone of them was (including a couple that are still in existence today).
Now, normally I create a playlist and then try to put together a piece of artwork to go along with it. With this what-if album, this was the complete opposite in that I had the piece of artwork and wondered how I could find a playlist to go with it.
Now, this piece of artwork was is another one taken from the site https://idesignalbumcovers.tumblr.com and is for an album that would have been an overview of American popular music throughout the 20th Century. This was meant to be a follow on from the band’s previous album, ‘The Notorious Byrd Brothers’ which had already laid the template by expanding the genres of music the band was looking to incorporate into their repertoire. The ‘Notorious Byrd Brothers’ was an end of an era album though as drummer Michael Clarke and guitar player David Crosby had been fired before the record had been released. Pulling in new drummer in the from of ex-Rising Sons member Kevin Kelley, the band thought that they needed a jazz pianist to achieve the sound they required for their 20th Century album. In came Gram Parsons who did not waste anytime in turning this project into the album he wanted to make which would be released under the name ‘Sweetheart Of The Rodeo’. This is considered to be one of the first country rock albums and would be an influence on many bands that came after this. The 20th Century album was never revisited and as far as I can tell, not one recording session took place.
So, why use this cover when no material was recorded for it? Well, it is a really good cover and it is a shame that it does not have a what-if album to go with it. I took inspiration from the sleeve itself and wondered if I could produce an album that followed a space theme. Not quite, but with some songs thrown in that have a flying theme (and Mind Gardens as it could be argued that the song is about travelling through inner space), there was enough material recorded between 1965 and 1967 to get an album of sorts. Most of the songs on this record were written or co-written by Jim McGuinn who was fascinated by aeronautics, so much so that he started using the name of Roger instead of Jim. Roger being used by pilots as part of the signalling protocol to say that the last message has been received satisfactorily. Like many of the what-if records I put together, this one would never have come out as the songs had already been used on other records but it did mean that that wonderful piece of artwork found a home.
Side A
Artificial Energy – The Notorious Byrd Brothers
C.T.A.-102 – Younger Than Yesterday
5D (Fifth Dimension) – 5th Dimension
Stranger in a Strange Land (Vocals by Blackburn & Snow) *(See Below)
Eight Miles High – 5th Dimension
Side B
The Airport Song – Preflyte
Mr. Spaceman – 5th Dimension
Mind Gardens (Alternative Version) – Younger Than Yesterday
Space Odyssey – The Notorious Byrd Brothers
2-4-2 Fox Trot (The Lear Jet Song) – 5th Dimension
* The Byrds did not finish their version of ‘Stranger In A Strange Land’ and the instrumental backing track was released on the 1996 reissue of the ‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’ album. However, in 1966, the duo of Blackburn & Snow recorded their own version of the song with vocals included. Paul from the Albums That Should Exist website took the vocals from the Blackburn & Snow recording and added them to the Byrds backing track. To find out more, follow the link.
Harlequins have played in numerous grounds around London since their formation. In the third part of this series of videos, The Squire sets out to find where each and everyone of them was.
It is always nice to come across a gem of a film that I knew nothing about beforehand. One of those which I saw over the Christmas period was Boss Level. It doesn’t have the most original of premise in that the hero of the film must relive the same day over and over again until he figures out what he needs to do to end this event from repeating itself. However, the action, acting and kick arse soundtrack made this 100 minutes of my time that I did not feel was wasted. Time being the operative word here because the majority of the songs on this soundtrack are concerned with it.
Even though a soundtrack album was released for the music, this was the incidental music by Clinton Shorter. There wasn’t one for the songs that were used throughout the movie so I thought I would put one together. This includes nineteen of the twenty songs included in the film. The only one missing is ‘Sixties Airport Lounge’ by John Plowright which does not seem to be available anywhere. There were enough songs for a short double album so so here it is, the soundtrack to Boss Level.
Side 1
Working For MCA – Lynyrd Skynyrd
Alcohol Part 1 – Robert Jay
Mean Little Mama – Roy Orbison
Time Has Come Today – The Chambers Brothers
Baby I Don’t Care – Carl Mann
Side B
Burn Rubber On Me (Why You Wanna Hurt Me) – The Gap Band
Got My Mojo Workin’ – Billy Adams
Slow Down – Jack Earls
Foreplay/Longtime – Boston
Side C
Fine Time – Genie Brooks
Fix Me – Black Flag
Destroy Everything – The Helltones
That’s Why I Love To Call His Name – Village Singers
Harlequins have played in numerous grounds around London since their formation. In the second part of this series of videos, The Squire sets out to find where each and everyone of them was.
On 15th January 1994, Harry Nilsson passed away. With this in mind, I had a think about about how I could celebrate the life of the great man, especially as I have already posted a good deal of Nilsson related material of late. Well, this is what I came up with.
Nilsson wasn’t just a great singer, he was also an innovative songwriter who could work in many genres. Nilsson was also that prolific with only the ‘Skidoo’ Soundtrack, ‘The Point’, ‘Duit On Mon Dei’ and ‘Knnillssonn’ albums having no cover versions on them. It could be argued that the songs Nilsson is best known for were both covers; ‘Without You’ and ‘Everybody’s Talkin’. He even produced an album that was a show case for another songwriter in the then up and coming Randy Newman. I therefore thought that it would be an interesting exercise to put together a What-If release containing all of the covers that Nilsson recorded whilst on the RCA label.
I decided not to include any songs from ‘Nilsson Sings Newman’, as this was designed to be an album completely made up of covers. The same with ‘A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night’. This was a standards album and therefore designed to be made up of from the Great American Songbook, none of which Nilsson wrote. I also did not include covers from his pre-RCA days (as these have already been covered in previous posts), nor from ‘Flash Harry’. Including songs from those albums would have made this project too big and unwieldy. As it turns out, it is quite big enough as it is as it would have to be a three LP set and ‘Flash Harry’ was on a different label to everything else on this collection so we will go for the fact that a rights issues meant they weren’t included.
On the version I made for myself, I included a couple of edits. There is a spoken outdo to ‘River Deep – Mountain High’ which has nothing to do with the song, but everything to do with how the parent album ‘Pandemonium Shadow Show’ starts. I also edited out the fluffed take of ‘Sweet Lorraine’ but kept in the second half of the song as it meant that the sides of that disc matched up more closely. ON Spotify though. these edits could not be made. Nilsson also covered ‘Ballin’ The Jack’ in 1970 and 1976, but I decided to include both as they are significantly different to each other. For the completist, I included an alternative version of ‘Everybody’s Talkin’ that was the closing track on the original soundtrack album of ‘Midnight Cowboy’. The songs included from 1967 and 1968 were the mono version, as these would not have been as well known as their stereo equivalents. The Italian song ‘Leggenda’ is repeated here from the previous post, but it is a cover version so it needed to be included.
Side A
She Sings Hymns Out Of Tune (Mono)
You Can’t Do That (Mono)
She’s Leaving Home (Mono)
There Will Never Be (Mono)
Freckles (Mono)
River Deep – Mountain High (Mono)
As I Wander Lonely (Mono)
Leggenda (Mono)
She’s Just Laughing At Me (Mono)
Side B
Everybody’s Talking (Mono)
Searchin’
Fairfax Rag
Mother Nature’s Son
Mr Bojangles
Simon Smith & The Amazing Dancing Bear
Ballin’ The Jack (1970 Version)
Blackbird
Lucille
Side C
Early In the Morning
Let The Good Times Roll
Isolation
Without You
Walk Right Back
At My Front Door
Campo De Enchino
Side D
Save The Last Dance For Me
Many Rivers To Cross
Subterranean Homesick Blues
Loop De Loop
Rock Around The Clock
I’ll Take A Tango
Side E
Just One Look/Baby I’m Yours
That Is All
I Need You
Sail Away
Shuffle Off To Buffalo
Zombie Jamboree (Back To Back)
That Is All (Reprise)
Side F
Ballin’ The Jack (1976 Version)
A Thousand Miles Away
She Sits Down On Me
Sweet Lorraine
Ain’t It Kinda Wonderful
Everybody’s Talkin’ (Soundtrack Version)
The sleeve is adapted from Belle Ghoul’s release called ‘Songs By Other People’. The title was perfect. If only my computer skills were as good.
Harlequins have played in numerous grounds around London since their formation. In a new series of videos, The Squire sets out to find where each and everyone of them was.
I do like a good what if album and this month, we have two for the price of one. Recently, I gave a couple of Crowded House albums a spin. They were ‘Woodface’ and ‘Afterglow’. I had always read that ‘Woodface’ was a amalgam of Crowded House tracks and songs that main House songwriter, Neil Finn had written with his brother Tim for an album project of their own. The story goes that Tim and Neil Finn were looking to record an album as the Finn Brothers and had written an albums worth of material when Neil said could he use some of the songs for the next Crowded House Record. With Tim saying yes and joining the band, what we got was a great album that had been made out of the ashes of two. So, what if Capitol had not rejected the original version of Woodface and the Finn Brothers had recorded their first collaborative effort as planned? Well, with the wonders of the internet and the bands reissue programmes, we can do just that.
Crowded House – Woodface (Original Version)
With Woodface, we get an album that does not sound too dissimilar to Temple Of Low Men. I only allowed songs on here that were either written by Paul Hester, the bands drummer or Neil Finn. None of the co-write between Tim and Neil would be allowed. That does mean that most of the singles that were released from ‘Woodface’ would no longer be on here, with only ‘Fall At Your Feet’ left. The album is solid, if not spectacular. It does lack some of the sparkle that came when the tracks form the abandoned ‘Finn’ project were added, but I believe it would have stood up against the other records the band had released up to this point.
Side A
Anyone Can Tell
Left Hand
Fields Are Full Of Your Kind
As Sure As I Am
Sacred Cow
She Goes On
Italian Plastic
Side B
Fall At Your Feet
Dr. Livingston
Fame Is
I Love You Dawn
Whispers & Moans
My Telly’s Gone Bung
My Legs Are Gone
The cover for this collection is based upon a band T-Shirt that came out at the time.
The Finn Brothers – Self Titled
On the other hand, we have the Finn Brothers record. What we get are all of the songs that were recorded for Woodface, plus some of the others that had been written for ‘Finn Brothers’ record but not used at the time. That would mean that four out of the five singles from Woodface would be included here, potentially making this a more commercial record. Out of the songs demoed by the Finn’s, two would end up on Tim Finn’s first solo record after leaving Crowded House which was called ‘Before & After’. These would be ‘In Love With It All’ and ‘Strangeness & Calm’. Two more, ‘Prodigal Son’ and ‘Catherine Wheels’ would be released via Neil Finn’s website. Catherine Wheels (which had supposedly been gestating since the late 70s) would be finished and released on the Together Alone album. For the purposes of this what if record, I have gone with the Finn Brothers demo. One more song was demoed by the Finn’s and this was called ‘Cemetery In The Rain’. This last song has not been released anywhere as far as I know, but 12 tracks is enough to come up with an alternative history Finn Brothers album.
Side A
Chocolate Cake
It’s Only Natural
Tall Trees
Catherine Wheels
There Goes God
Four Season in one Day
Side B
Strangeness & Calm
Weather With You
Prodigal Son
All I Ask
In Love With It All
How Will You Go
It was quite difficult to find a picture of the Finn Brothers for an album cover, but they did appear facing each other whilst playing their guitars from the ‘It’s Only Natural’ video. Adopting the minimal approach of the era remembering that complicated albums sleeve didn’t work in the cassette era, we have a sleeve not too different from Talk Talk’s ‘Spirit Of Eden’.
A playlist for The Finn Brothers LP could not be complied due to one or more songs not being available on Spotify.
So what do we get when listening to these. Well, we get two albums, but take off the best songs from each and you get one excellent album. Now, if only the brothers had decided to have started ‘Woodface’ with something other than Chocolate Cake, it would have made for an even better record.
I have not included ‘I’m Still Here’ as it always sounded out of place to my ears and did nothing to add to the experience of listening to ‘Woodface’.
I cannot believe that this album is nearly 30 years old. Where has the time gone?