CONTACT - NOBODY WANTS TO BE SIXTEEN 1970

The embryo to the Contact Group was Rupert annexed around 1963 during high school at Indore Southern Läroverksvägen for Ted Power, Tomas Larsson, Lars-Goran Reijner and Jens Bagge. The band played mostly cover songs that every other band at that time. Ted Power read later on at Konstfack and formed there with Tomas Larsson and Leif Reinholds even a cover band at the name Harbor. The group played some Beatles and Stones covers, but since changing its name to Yellow & Blues and went more towards RnB.

1967 came and the Flower Power wave band change its name to the Grand Canyon and took with Ann-Sofie Nilsson on vocals. The group songs had now become very long and more monotonous and the thought of including Club Circle and Domino. The skills including the then completely unknown Peps Persson on one occasion. In 1968 the group changed its name finally to Contact and played on the particular gun Theatre and Museum of Modern Art.

Contact 1969 got an offer to record a single at MNW. The single was released in autumn 1969 and the same time the group participated in a radio program where Måns Rossander brought together groups with different styles of music. Contact meeting where Beard's team and there was sweet music. The single "She came over mon" was thus submitted by the two groups together. Contact has also appeared with the song "Crying song" to the Beard's team's debut LP.

In the summer of 1970 came to American Kim Fowley Sweden and managed to persuade Contact MNW and to make an English album for "internationalization" instead of following up the success with the single "She came over mon". Some international launch but it was never the plate "Nobody want's to Be Sixteen" was in all cases the autumn 1970th Around the same time ended Tomas Larsson and Lorne de Wolfe jumped in on bass.

In the autumn of 1970 participated in the Contact a play at the Royal Dramatic Theatre, which inspired them to once again write lyrics in Swedish. In the spring of 1971 came at last LP "She came over mon" which became MNWs first big seller and it got lots of positive reviews and even a Grammy. On disc'm Contact with Beard's team of Swedish folk music texts that was something completely new and almost revolutionary in Sweden (Kebnekaise played folk rock until 1972). Before the group's next album broke them with MNW and went instead to the more commercial Polydor which brought about some debate in prog circles. In the autumn of 1972 was "excellent" and contact was now a popular live band that toured in 1970-72, both Sweden, Norway and Denmark.

Contact Autumn 1972 was his last gig at the Corps in Gothenburg together with Hoola Bandoola Band and after the group disbanded. After Contact drove Lorne de Wolfe with Dick Hansson Group Hansson de Wolfe United and Ted Power then moved to the Norrbotten iron where he was a member 1974-76. He has also published eight boards in his own name over the years and done some theater and film music.

1989 reunited the group with the same composition as 1971 to MNWs 20th anniversary and a gig at Joy House in Stockholm. Even in the summer of 1991, visitors had to Visfestivalen in Västervik visit the Contact reunited. It was not until the summer of 2001 when the group was invited to play at Skeppsholmen Festival in Stockholm. Autumn 2002 Contact'm in the Baltic Sea "Rock at Sea". In summer 2003 they played at the Falun Folk Music Festival and later in the autumn of 2003, they visited again on the "Rock at Sea". In 2004, so even a remastered collection of Contact's best songs and some previously unreleased material and a newly written song.

Tracks :


Whats That (Steerling-Fowley)
Wounds (Power)
Visions of Apple (Steerling)
Sounds of Wind (Steerling-Fowley)
Velvet Blue Saloon (Power)
How Was Your Summer (Fowley)
One Of Those (current)
Conquest Of A Red Rose (Steerling)
Nobody Wants to Be Sixteen (Power)
Misjudgement (Steerling)
She Is Impossible to See (Steerling)

GREENFIELD & COOK - SECOND ALBUM 1973

Dutch Folk soft duo Rink Groeneveld and Peter Kok, both ex-Hurricanes and since 1967 known as a duo by the name of Popshop. In 1969, they renamed themselves as Greenfield & Cook. In 1974, the duo split up...





















Tracks :

Far Too Late
Anthony
We Want You
Girl How I Love You
Burgy Dog Food
A Man Needs Someone To Comfort Him
Easy Boy
Getting Old
Melody
Child Of The Morning Dew
Mr. Music Man
Beautiful Children

ATOMSKO SKLONISTE - NE CVIKAJ GENERACIJO 1978

Hard rock band (whose name means "Nuclear Shelter" in Croatian) founded in 1977. The name comes from the 1968 anti-war play by Boško Obradović, a poet who would later supply the band with lyrics. The band in the early phase was a rather peculiar combination of what band members described as rock music and hippie lyrics. Due to their peculiar lyrics, the band never gained as much popularity as Prljavo Kazalište or Azra, but it remained a favourite among some critics and had a small but dedicated following.

















Tracks :

1. Od rata do rata
2. Ne cvikaj generacijo
3. Tko će tad na zgarištu reći
4. Saznao sam dijagnozu
5. Umro je najveći mrav
6. Pomorac sam majko
7. Posljednji let Boinga 707
8. Otmica naše ljubavi
9. Kinematograf našeg djetinjstva
10. Nek vam je sa srećom

AGNES STRANGE - THEME FOR A DREAM 1972

This is a UK Seventies band, whose only vinyl release is highly collectable. This is a collection of unreleased studio masters and demos from the "Strange Flavour" CD. This is great hard blues rock with some incendiary lead guitar work that brings to mind those fabled days of labels like Harvest, Vertigo, etc. Screaming heavy guitars, pounding bass lines and frentic drums.











Tracks :

01-Theme For A Dream
02-Messin' Around
03-Graveyard
04-Rockin ' In ' E
05-Dust In The Sunlight
06-The Day Dreamer
07-Book With No Cover
08-Failure (Demo)
09-Motorway Rebel (Demo)
10-Children Of The Absurd (Demo)
11-Clever Fool (Demo)
12-Strange Flavour (Demo)
13-Odd Man Out (Demo)
14-Highway Blues (Demo)

DARK STREETS OST 2008

"Dark Streets - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack" features original songs written especially for the film by James Compton, Tim Brown, and Tony DeMeur. To perform them, veteran producer/music supervisor George Acogny (Paul Simon, Sting, Peter Gabriel) gathered a veritable who's who of musical masters, which also includes Natalie Cole, Aaron Neville, Chaka Khan, and Richie Sambora. Acogny himself criss-crossed the country to record and produce all 10 tracks with each of the acclaimed artists featured on the soundtrack, capturing the gritty authenticity, raw power and aching beauty of the blues echoed in the film. Additionally, Acogny composed the "Dark Streets" film score.

Tracks :

1. Chaka Khan – “Too Much Juice”
2. Natalie Cole – “Send Me Your Kiss”
3. Aaron Neville – “Life On The Layaway Plan”
4. Marc Broussard – “Lose Somebody”
5. Etta James – “It Ain’t Right”
6. Richie Sambora – “Blood On The Ground”
7. Dr. John – “It Don’t Make No Never Mind”
8. Serena Ryder – “The Game Of Life”
9. Toledo – “Talkin’ To The Devil”
10. Solomon Burke – “Dark Streets”

JOHN'S CHILDREN - ORGASM 1970

Legendary albums are often hard pressed to live up to their reputation once a listener actually hears them. There are also albums legendary more for the circumstances surrounding their release than for the actual music; Orgasm by the British band John's Children is definitely in the latter category. It's actually been reissued at times as The Legendary Orgasm Album, a self-fulfilling prophecy that very few releases could live up to.

The band's backstory (recounted in this LP reissue's liner notes) mirrors that of many other British beat-era teens: enthusiastic, untrained dudes form band, play covers to local audiences. It goes sideways, however, with the entrance of Svengali-like manager Simon Napier-Bell. Beating Malcolm McClaren's antics with the Sex Pistols by a decade, Napier-Bell recognized the musical limitations of his new charges and employed a campaign of controversy to bring them to fame. It worked, but not necessarily in the way he may have wanted.

The band's first single, "Smashed Blocked," actually was a big late-1966 hit in some US markets on the independent White Whale Records, which subsequently planned to release an album. Napier-Bell recorded more songs with the band, dubbed audience noise over the whole thing and declared the whole thing so exciting that it needed to be called Orgasm The move succeeded in drawing attention, but complaints about the title in the U.S. managed to scare White Whale into shelving the album. It went unreleased at the time in the U.K. as well, and eventually snuck out without fanfare in 1970, shortly before the label sank.

The album itself musically shows the group's genesis in the UK beat boom, and that's not a bad thing; maybe the world needed a vaguely angry Herman's Hermits. While there's some definite silliness going on, such as the "Wooly Bully" rip-off "Killer Ben," there's also some interesting Who pastiches like "Jagged Time Lapse" buried under all the overdubbed crowd noise.

This version of Orgasm gets bonus points for including the singles versions of the first two 45s along with the overdubbed LP versions. But it gets negative points for presenting the whole thing in a somewhat random track order, and for sporting a different (and cheesy) cover as compared to the White Whale release. But who knows, maybe that was the original plan for the cover!

Those who are interested in the band (which included a pre-fame Marc Bolan shortly after the White Whale debacle) would probably be better served tracking down a compilation, but Orgasm stands as an interesting side note in the history of rock 'n roll craziness.

Tracks :

1. "Smashed Blocked" (Studio) - 2:57
2. "Just What You Want - Just What You'll Get" (Studio) - 2:57
3. "Killer Ben" - 2:29
4. "Jagged Time Lapse" - 3:13
5. "Smashed Blocked" (Live) - 3:20
6. "You're a Nothing" - 3:36
7. "Not the Sort of Girl" - 2:05
8. "Cold on Me" - 2:51
9. "Leave Me Alone" - 3:12
10. "Let Me Know" - 3:27
11. "Just What You Want - Just What You'll Get" (Live) - 3:40
12. "Why Do You Lie" - 5:00
13. "Strange Affair" - 1:59
14. "But She's Mine" - 2:01

MILES MARTIN FOLK GROUP 1971

One of the rarest UK folk private pressings new on CD. Recorded in '71 this ultra rare album was originally issued in minute quantity on the privately commisioned Amber label. This remastered CD edition enhances the trio's haunting sound of a mix of original and traditional tunes with beautifull flowing male / female vocals. Recommended to those apreciative of OBERON, MARIE CELESTE, etc.

Tracks :

01 Leaves that are green
02 Polly von
03 Kilfanora jig
04 Ye jacobites by name
05 Once i had a sweetheart
06 Fast freight
07 October song
08 I never will marry
09 Grandfather's clock
10 Geordie
11 Gone the rainbow
12 Sunday rainbow

DONOVAN - MELLOW YELLOW 1966

Mellow Yellow is the fourth album from Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. It was released in the United States in March 1967 (Epic Records LN 24239 (monaural) / BN 26239 (rechanneled stereo)[1], but was not released in the UK because of a continuing contractual dispute that also prevented Sunshine Superman from a UK release. In June 1967, a cross-section of both albums was released as Sunshine Superman (Pye Records NPL 18181) in the UK. "Mellow Yellow" was the name of Donovan's hit single released the previous November.
The songs on Mellow Yellow represent a transition in Donovan's writing. Donovan's songs had previously illustrated his infatuation with an ability to define the mid-sixties pop music scene. On Mellow Yellow this is still evident in "Sunny South Kensington", "Museum" (originally recorded for the Sunshine Superman album and rerecorded for Mellow Yellow) and the title track, but is also tempered with world-weary observations of that scene ("Young Girl Blues"). The contractual problems that prevented the release of Donovan's music in the UK led him to write such songs as the resigned "Writer in the Sun", where he contemplates the possibility of his own forced retirement from the music business at age 20.

Mickie Most's production and the arrangements of John Paul Jones accommodate these two divergent traits of Donovan's songwriting throughout Mellow Yellow. The peppier songs feature a diverse selection of instruments similar to Sunshine Superman and helped make a top 10 hit out of the title track on both sides of the Atlantic. The introspective ruminations feature sparse instrumentation that highlights Donovan's guitar playing, singing, and lyrics.

On Mellow Yellow, Donovan gave a nod to his friend Bert Jansch on "House of Jansch", marking the third Donovan album in a row that paid tribute to the British folk personage.

It has been rumored that Donovan's friend Paul McCartney whispers the "quite rightly" part of "Mellow Yellow", but this is actually whispered by Donovan. It is possible that Paul was in the studio crowd heard cheering at the end of the song but it has been contested whether or not Paul was there at all.

Tracks :

1. Mellow Yellow (3:45)
2. Writer In The Sun (4:32)
3. Sand And Foam (3:21)
4. The Observation (2:25)
5. Bleak City Woman (2:26)
6. House Of Jansch (2:45)
7. Young Girl Blues (3:47)
8. Museum (2:55)
9. Hampstead Incident (4:44)
10. Sunny South Kensington (3:51)

LARRY NORMAN - SOMETHING NEW UNDER THE SON 1981

Although released in 1981, "Something New Under The Son" was recorded in 1976 and/or 1977. It was Larry Norman's intention to release this as a double album with "The Tune" on the second album (and a blank fourth side or a side with a lengthy version of "Watch What You're Doing"). "Something New Under The Son" is a very blues-related album; Larry Norman took lots of musical & lyrical parts from old blues songs and from Bob Dylan songs. The inner sleeve of the original album gives rather exact remakes of most of the pictures on Dylan's album "Bringing It All Back Home" (or "Subterranean Homesick Blues" as the album was called in several other countries).


The album comes with a printed inner sleeve. On this inner sleeve there's mention of a free record; this is the "Barking At The Ants" single.


The song order on the 8-track tape is very different.


The cassette re-release on Phydeaux includes (much) longer versions of "Hard Luck Bad News," "Feeling So Bad," "Leaving The Past Behind," and "Put Your Life Into His Hands." The intro of "Larry Norman's 97th Nightmare" is longer (Larry Norman doesn't start singing immediately after the second turnaround). "Watch What You're Doing" has a short spoken intro and an extra verse about Little Joe Billy. The extra track "Twelve Good Men" is a raw version which is rather different from the CD version.


On CD "Larry Normans 97th Nightmare" is called "Nightmare #97" and "Let The Tape Keep Rolling" is called "Let The Tape Keep Rolling ('69 bio version)." Apart from the titles, there are no differences. The piano intro of "Leaving The Past Behind" and the "bababa" intro of "Born To Be Unlucky" are missing. "Watch What You're Doing" has the "Little Joe Billy" verse but is without the spoken intro.


"Deep Blue" is basically the same song as on "Barking At The Ants" but it is longer and the ending is a bit different.


The second CD has all tracks re-balanced, re-equalized, etc. according to information on the Larry Norman website. Larry Norman's website shows the front cover with 1977 erased and 2003 added.


The Rough Mix cassette (there might be two slightly different versions) features (variations on) songs from "Something New Under The Son" plus some additional tracks. The cassette has been titled "Something New Under The Sun" (yes, with a 'u'), but "Rough Mix" is a more well known title. The song listing is given above, see Part II for some additional information ("Rough Mix #1, #2").


The UK albums have the "Little Joe Billy" version of "Watch What You're Doing" and there is no intro to "Larry Normans 97th Nightmare." "I Feel Like Dying" is listed but it's not there (it has been released on single in the UK). The piano intro of "Leaving The Past Behind" and the "bababa" intro of "Born To Be Unlucky" are missing. I have seen a discography which lists the SRA 1 version as having nine songs; I guess this must be a mistake.


The first UK release has green labels with handwritten song titles, the second UK release has the common Solid Rock labels (open mouth) and typeset letters. The covers of the UK albums are the same but they are a little different from the US version. There are no catalogue numbers shown; only the words "A Solid Rock Ruff Mix" are given. Both albums came with an insert which is almost the same as the US inner sleeve (but it doesn't include the "free record" offer; this was meant for US citizens only).


The LP from New Zealand features the US version except that it has the "Little Joe Billy" version of "Watch What You're Doing" with spoken intro and there's no piano intro to "Leaving The Past Behind" (the drum roll is shorter). "I Feel Like Dying" is not listed. The spine and the yellow labels show "Something New Under The Sun" instead of "..Son."

There's a 7" EP called "Radio Disc VII" (released on Word AD-6568T) with radio spots to promote LPs, including a 60-second spot for "Something New Under The Son."

This album was number eight in a series of fourteen albums, mentioned on the inner sleeve of "Something New Under The Son" (albums number nine through fourteen have not been released, see part II).


Tracks :

Hard Luck Bad News
Feeling So Bad
I Feel Like Dying
Born To Be Unlucky
Watch What You're Doing
Leaving The Past Behind
Put Your Life Into His Hands
Larry Norman's 97th Nightmare
Let That Tape Keep Rolling
Twelve Good Men (demo)
Deep Blue (rough mix)
It's Only Today That Counts (rough mix)

SMITH - A GROUP CALLED SMITH 1969

Basically a mainstream pop/rock band with hard rock and soul-influenced arrangements, Smith hit the Top Ten in 1969 with their drastically revised cover of the Shirelles' "Baby It's You." Featuring three lead singers and a B-3 Hammond organ, their strongest asset was their most frequent vocalist, Gayle McCormick, an accomplished female blue-eyed soul belter. Most of their material consisted of covers of popular rock and R&B tunes, and they broke up after a couple of albums, though the singles "What Am I Gonna Do" (co-written by Carole King) and "Take a Look Around" made the middle of the charts. McCormick had a couple small hits in 1971, and made a few albums in the early '70s as a soloist.

The 1995 CD reissue on the Varese Saranbande label of their 1969 debut album (LP Dunhill 50056) A Group Called Smith, adds five significant bonus tracks: the singles "Take A Look Around" and "What Am I Gonna Do," Gayle McCormick's solo singles "Gonna Be Alright Now" and "It's A Cryin' Shame," and Smith's version of "The Weight," which orginally was included on the Easy Rider 1969 soundtrack album, even though the Band's original version was the one used in the film.

Tracks :

1. Let's Get Together
2. I Don't Believe
3. Tell Him No
4. Who Do You Love
5. Baby It's You
6. Last Time
7. I Just Wanna Make Love to You
8. Mojaleskey Ridge
9. Let's Spend the Night Together
10. I'll Hold out My Hand
11. The Weight (Robertson,Robbie)
12. Take a Look Around
13. What Am I Gonna Do
14. Gonna Be Alright Now
15. It's a Cryin' Shame