Monthly Archives – January 2006

Asian Elvis dude smiles pretty for the camera. Great version of Little Richard’s “Lucille”. I honestly can’t tell if he’s singing it in broken english, or Japanese, or both.

I found this record in Paris last fall for one euro. I nearly flipped when I noticed the Eye of Fatima on the cover (hard to see in the photo but look at her hands). I was convinced that I had scored some amazing French hippie goddess folk gem. As my vacation went on, I […]

Unfortunately waxidermy lacks the right character set so the title is obviously wrong. This is a Canadian pressing of a Ukranian folk/psych album, however all the information is written in Ukranian so there’s not much I can say. I’ll simply quote a recent ebay description: “GREAT MAGIC SOUND RECORD!!!!!!” The music is all over the […]

Volume 1 of a 2 part series here. Sam Spence was the dude known for his musical contributions to NFL Films highlights in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Going by the cover art, it seems Spence is playing a Moog 55 Synthesizer on here, and in the process of doing so he actually creates some […]

This is top notch psychedelia from a Korean trio who gets the job done: fuzzed out guitar, deep bass, tight drums, organ that never goes wrong, and singing that is absolutely off the chain. The whole thing has a sparse groove with the bass and drums chugging along underneath some pretty mental guitar, and the […]

This cover really gives me the creeps.

Pretty amazing lp on a tiny label called “Wim” outta Los Angeles. Robert Kraft conducts, but the album is credited to Ervin as she is the featured soloist on all tracks. The whole lp is quite good as an Avant Garde Percussion record, but the tracks that really set this apart are two spoken word […]

I originally bought this to trade/sell but it eventually grew on me after playing it during a late-night discussion with a special lady. Bobby Brown is a multi-instrumentalist and the ultimate in DIY. This album, whilst saying “Live” on the front, was actually recorded in his van to an audience consisting soley of his dog. […]

Released on Ilhan Mimaroglu’s pet record label Finnadar in 1973, this is renowned visual artist Jean Dubuffet’s chance to clank, saw and blow his way around a huge variety of acoustic instruments. He also uses tape manipulation extensively – well either that or he’s worked out how to play sax honks, prepared piano and assorted […]

The menace of LSD on wax! One side is called “the Trip” and it consists of people talking about their personal experiences on acid. The best being a guy who they actually tape recorded having a bad trip. There is about 5 minutes or so of this dude just freaking out, all by himself, in […]

I spent fives years searching for marginal Quebecois records and this is one of my favourites from that period. It’s a lounge LP recorded live at “Chez Bourgetel”, the storied Montreal club where in the 70s anybody who was anybody gathered for mirth and mayhem. The record is a mediocre exercise in the day’s lounge […]

Folk-psych mends an aching heart. Granted, too much will make you lactate (or so I’ve been warned), but a little is good medicine. I suppose everybody knows about this record by now, but because I just discovered it and I think the cover art is so very nifty, I’m going to share it anyway. Basically, […]

Every so often you come across an album that, but for one track, is just another addition to the endless heap of profoundly mediocre music. This baffles me; I don’t understand how a band recording an otherwise crappy LP manages to create the one fantastic track. Maybe, after a long session and a lot of […]

Released in 1960, this is the first CIBA clinical record issued by CIBA Pharmaceutical Products in N.J. and is meant to be “an audio-visual journal devoted to postgraduate reviews of diagnosis and therapeutics.” In his day (and at the time of this recording) Max S. Sadove was rocking out as an anesthesiologist at the University […]

I try not to get too carried away with featuring records that I have never owned, but I will probably never ever ever own this one, so whatever. If knowing that I do not actually own an original pressing of this hinders your enjoyment of reading about it on the internet may I suggest you […]

In 1980, Mott The Hoople Keyboardist and Londoner Morgan Fisher solicited musical contributions from 50 musicians that he admired…

Along with the early Fahey stuff, the first few Basho lp’s are probably pretty much ground zero for the “modern” sound of the solo acoustic steel string guitar music that would become popular on through the 70’s. This is Basho’s first record, and one of the first non-Fahey releases on Fahey’s Takoma label. Much more […]

Apparently this dude Heller owned an ad agency and did jingles and stuff, and some of the more tepid tracks on here have a corny sort of jingle feel to them. But, the hot tracks fall somewhere between Dick Hyman’s Moog experiments & “soft psych” like Free Design. It took me a couple of times […]

Elven harp lady who, according to the back cover of this LP, was given “a harp and the courage to make her music her way” by Bobby Brown (the hippie of private press fame, not the crackhead of Whitney Houston fame). I suppose a woman of lesser stuff might not take advice from a one-man-band […]

Don’t know the group’s name on this one as it isn’t listed anywhere. Here’s the lineup though, John Gruntfest, Weldon McCarty, Richard Festinger and Joseph Sabella. This is a wayout avant jazz record, to give you an idea here’s some instuments played on this album: tin cans, log drum, oil drum, bell and gong tree, […]

The Tuba Trio consists of Sam Rivers, Joe Daley and Warren Smith. As you can see by the picture, this was recorded live at the Bim Huis in Amsterdam in 1976. Surprisingly the tuba sounds great in the free improv setting. I really dig Sam Rivers flute playing on this one as well as Warren […]

Here’s one of my favorite gospel records. This came out in 1972 on The Gospel Truth label, which was a subsidiary of Stax. Every track on here is very soulful, definitely keep an eye out for this one. The Sons Of Truth: “Give It Up”

Heldon is mainly Richard Pinhas, who some would say is the Robert Fripp of France. Nice spacy stuff, tons of moogs and electronics. This would appeal to fans of Fripp and Eno and Cluster and whatnot. Goes for cheap on ebay too due to it’s obscurity which is always nice.

Before becoming a mystery thriller author, Daniel Hecht put out a handful of records. This one is in the same vein as Fahey/Basho’s recordings. His lp on windham hill called “willow” is one of my favorite dollar bin records. Definitely worth seeking out imo.

Nice mellow private issue folk lp on Burntoothbrush records circa 1987. The music sounds more like it came out in the early to mid seventies. My favorite track on here is “purple martin”. Brian looks like Charles Manson’s twin brother on the back cover, freaky.