Creeper Lagoon - Take Back The Universe And Give Me Yesterday (2001)

This album is a request from my bro Dylan. This is Creeper Lagoon's second album. I think it rules a little bit, and apparently David Cross does too. Did I say that in my other Creeper Lagoon post? Probably, but I'm drunk at a family dinner right now so I don't really care.

Tracklist:
1. Chance Of A Lifetime
2. Wrecking Ball
3. Sunfair
4. She Loves Me Not
5. Up All Nights
6. Naked Days
7. Under The Tracks
8. Dead Man Saloon
9. Hey Sister
10. Cellophane
11. Keep From Moving
12. Lover's Leap
13. Here We Are

Download: mediafire

The Flame - The Flame (1970)

The Flame are most well-known for their connection to The Beach Boys. Al Jardine saw them play at a bar one night, and thought they were so good that he brought Carl Wilson to see them the next night. Carl also liked them, so he invited them to LA to record an album for Brother Records, which Carl produced. Two of the members, Blondie Chaplin and Ricky Fataar, also became short-term members of The Beach Boys, playing on 2 studio albums and 1 live album.

This album's pretty good, sounds kind of like the late-60's Beatles.

Tracklist:
1. See The Light
2. Make It Easy
3. Hey Lord
4. Lady
5. Don't Worry, Bill
6. Get Your Mind Made Up
7. Highs And Lows
8. I'm So Happy
9. Dove
10. Another Day Like Heaven
11. See The Light (Reprise)

Download: megaupload

The Beach Boys - Sunflower (European Pressing) (1970)

This album is often critically acclaimed as The Beach Boys creative re-birth. I'm not sure if I agree with that statement entirely, as I don't really think The Beach Boys released any bad music at all before this album, if anything, their most creative period was in the years right before before this album. Though after Pet Sounds, Smile, and Smiley Smile, this album does show The Beach Boys as a fully working band again, and a return to the style of songs they were recording in the mid-60's, similar in sound and feel to albums like "Today!" and "Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!!)".

This is ripped from a European pressing of the vinyl, which includes a recording of "Cottonfields", alternate to the version found on "20/20".




Tracklist:
1. Cottonfields
2. Slip On Through
3. This Whole World
4. Add Some Music To Your Day
5. Deirdre
6. Got To Know The Woman
7. It's About Time
8. Tears In The Morning
9. All I Wanna Do
10. Forever
11. Our Sweet Love
12. At My Window
13. Cool, Cool Water

Download: megaupload

Taylor Swift covers "God Only Knows".

Like it or love it (I personally like it, besides all the screaming fans), it's cool to see someone sharing this music with a younger audience. The sing-a-long part at the end rules. Also, she has "Don't worry baby, everything will be alright" written down her arm.

Annette - Muscle Beach Party (1964)

This album was the soundtrack to Annette Funicello's 1964 movie Muscle Beach Party. It's pretty much by the books surf-girl-pop. Brian Wilson get's a recording credit on 3 tracks on this album, and Gary Usher gets writing credits on almost all of the album. Rumors are that Brian Wilson produced this album, as well as providing backing vocals with The Honeys, however I can't really find any proof of that on the internet.

Here's what Beach Boys historian Andrew G. Doe has to say about it: "Depending on who you listen to, and when, the two Wilson/Usher cuts are either self-recording with no BW involvement or the original soundtrack recordings, co-produced by Brian and with him helping out on the bvs. if I had to come down one side or the other, I'd have to say "re-recordings"."

I think it's a pretty fun album, has a definite early 60's Brian Wilson/Phil Spector feel to it. Though keep in mind it's the soundtrack to a Disney album so all the songs are very, very tame, but still nothing like you'd expect from a teens album now-a-days. This is taken from a mono pressing.

Tracklist:
1. Muscle Beach Party
2. A Girl Needs A Boy
3. Surfer's Holiday
4. I Dream About Frankie
5. Muscle Bustle
6. Merlin Jones
7. Custom City
8. Draggin' U.S.A.
9. Rebel Rider
10. Waikiki
11. Shut Down Again
12. The Scrambled Egghead

Download: megaupload

The Bee Gees - 1st (1967)

It seems like quite a few pretty/really good psych bands/musicians/producers from the 1960's eventually ended up making disco. As you all know, Curt Boettcher was huge into disco in the decade following his genius sunshine pop productions, The Beach Boys dabbled in disco on LA Light Album (with the help of Curt Boettcher, or uhh... Becher), if you look back a few posts on this blog, you'll see The Flower Pot Men, who were a great sunshine pop band in the 1960's, and eventually partially became First Class, who still kept their sunshine pop sound but implemented tons of disco sounds into their music, and these examples just barely scratch the surface. What you might not know though, is that some of the hugest disco acts of the 1970's, also started as psych bands in the 1960's. The Bee Gees are the perfect example of one of those bands.

Sounds similar to The Hollies, The Tremeloes, and Revolver-era Beatles. Though it sounds like a lot of other psych-pop albums, it's still a good album, and it's interesting to hear pre-disco-love-ballad The Bee Gees.

Tracklist:
1. Turn Of The Century
2. Holiday
3. Red Chair Fade Away
4. One Minute Woman
5. In My Own Time
6. Every Christian Lion Hearted Man Will Show You
7. Craise Finton Kirk Royal Academy Of Arts
8. New York Mining Disaster 1941
9. Cucumber Castle
10. To Love Somebody
11. I Close My Eyes
12. I Can't See Nobody
13. Please Read Me
14. Close Another Door

Download: megaupload

The Crazy People - Bedlam (1968)

The Crazy People is very similar to the Victims Of Chance LP. Not much is known about this album. It was recorded in Burnaby, British Columbia in 1968 and released on the small Condor Records label. The main theory behind this album is that it was produced and written by Johnny Kitchen and recorded by Canadian studio musicians, though the sleeve says it was produced by "Jean Daniel Productions and Jack Millman - Music Industried". Again, one theory is that Johnny Kitchen may have been Tandyn Almer, though it's unknown for sure. Just like The Victims Of Chance, this record is a hodge-podge of weirdness and psychedelic sound collages. If you listen closely, in one of the songs they mention The Victims Of Chance in the lyrics.

Tracklist:
1. Parade At The Funny Farm
2. Head Amusement
3. Raunchy Boog-A-Loo
4. After Six
5. The Truth
6. Head Games And Other Assorted Crap
7. Head Job
8. Happy Academy
9. Trans Luv Airlines
10. Let's Split

Download: megaupload

The Victims Of Chance - The Victims Of Chance (1968)

Update: A user by the name of Robert Plante posted a comment on this saying Johnny Kitchen is Jack Millman, a jazz musician. A little bit of research proves this to be true, more info on Jack Millman can be found here.  However, Barnaby Bennett of Tetraktys fame says that some of the tracks on this, as well as The Crazy People album, are indeed Tandyn Almer songs.

The Victims Of Chance were an American psychedelic band, and a project of the pseudonymous Johnny Kitchen, who also produced The Crazy People, Blues Train, and Larry "Wild Man" Fischer. Not much is known about this album, or Johnny Kitchen, though there's rumors that Johnny Kitchen is a pseudonym for fabled LA producer/songwriter/friend of Brian Wilson, Tandyn Almer.

This album features all types of tripped out shit. Think funky sunshine pop, full of weird samples, weird spoken word, tripped out guitar noises, snippets of cartoons, and more. This album sounds very similar to the other Johnny Kitchen production, The Crazy People - Bedlam. It also syncs up perfectly with the Easter Island episode of theJacques Cousteau Odyssey if you time it just right.

This album is certified for only the heaviest of trippers. Be careful with this one, it's a real heavy hitter.

Tracklist:
1. The Victims Of Chance, Part 1
2. The Victims Of Chance, Part 2
3. Adventured In Time
4. Break Away
5. Over & Out
6. Tuesday's Victim
7. L.A. To Frisco - Four Eleven Flat
8. Funky Sunshine
9. Devil's Prayer

Download: megaupload

Sandy Salisbury - Sandy (2011)

Originally recorded between 1967 and 1969, this was intended to be the debut solo album for Sandy Salisbury, who is known for his work with The Millennium, Sagittarius,  The Ballroom, and Tommy Roe. Intended for release on Gary Usher's ill-fated Together Records, it was unfortunately never released until 2001, after reissues of The Millennium's Begin, and Sagittarius' Present Tense were critically acclaimed. This reissue was released in 2011 to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the album's release.

Tracklist:
1. I Just Don't Know How To Say Goodbye
2. Spell On Me
3. The Hills Of Vermont
4. The Good Ol' Good Times
5. Come Softly
6. On And On She Goes (With Me Tonight)
7. Cecily
8. Do Unto Others
9. Once I Knew A Little Dog
10. Baby Listen
11. Goody Goodbye

Download: megaupload

Phil Ochs - Tape From California (1968)

Folk revivalist Phil Ochs' fifth album

Tracklist:
1. Tape From California
2. White Boots Marching In A Yellow Land
3. Half A Century High
4. Joe Hill
5. The War Is Over
6. The Harder They Fall
7. When In Rome
8. Floods Of Florence

Download: megaupload

Todd Rundgren/TR-i - No World Order (1993)

No World Order was Todd Rungren's attempt at a interactive album made up of 4 hours of musical fragments 4 to 8 seconds long that could be combined and altered in an infinite amount of ways allowing users to create their own custom musical experience. Unfortunately, this only worked out if you had a CD-ROM, if you just had a regular old CD player, all you got was this album of 16 tracks. Some of them are rap.

Tracklist:
1. Worldwide Epiphany
2. No World Order
3. Worldwide Epiphany
4. Day Job
5. Property
6. Fascist Christ
7. Love Thing
8. Time Stood Still
9. Proactivity
10. No World Order
11. Worldwide Epiphany
12. Time Stood Still
13. Love Thing
14. Time Stood Still
15. Word Made Flesh
16. Fever Broke

Download: megaupload

The First Class - The First Class (1974)

The First Class is John Carter's studio project after The Flower Pot Men. The studio band was made up of John Carter, Tony Burrows, and Chas Mills. John Carter wrote all the songs with his wife Gillian Shakespeare. The First Class are best remembered for their smash hit "Beach Baby", which mimics the production styles and sound of The Beach Boys.

John Carter, Tony Burrows, and Chas Mills had no interest in touring, so they hired a group of 5 musicians to perform the song live. The 5 musicians, as well as John, Tony, and Chas are pictured on the front cover of the album, though the 5 musicians that performed the song live took no part in recording the album.


Tracklist:
1. Beach Baby
2. Won't Somebody Help Me
3. What Became Of Me
4. Surfer Queen
5. The First Day Of Your Life
6. Long Time Gone
7. Dreams Are Ten A Penny
8. Bobby Dazzler
9. The Disco Kid
10. I Was Always A Joker

Download: megaupload

updates

I just spent the last 2 hours adding the years of release to the titles of every post on this blog. Let me know if you find any mistakes.

The Left Banke - Walk Away Renee (1967)

While bands like The Byrds, and The Beatles were experimenting with different ways to use string instruments, The Left Banke incorporated a harpsichord, small strings section, and woodwinds section, giving them their signature, and much copied, Baroque-n-roll sound.This sound mixed with vocal harmonies similar to The Beatles or The Zombies, earned them two hits early in their career with "Walk Away Renee" and "Pretty Ballerina". Michael Brown, who played keyboards for the band, and wrote most of the songs on this album was only 17 years old at the time of it's release. His father, Henry Lookofsky, produced and arranged the album.

Tracklist:
1. Pretty Ballerina
2. She May Call You Up Tonight
3. Barterers And Their Wives
4. I've Got Something On My Mind
5. Let Go Of You Girl
6. Evening Gown
7. Walk Away Renee
8. What Do You Know
9. Shadows Breaking Over My Head
10. I Haven't Got The Nerve
11. Lazy Day

Download: megaupload

Small Faces - 78 In the Shade (1978)

A while back someone requested that I upload The Small Faces 1970's comeback albums. At the time I only owned a copy of Playmates so I uploaded that. But I recently found this in a discount bin at a local record store. I feel exactly the same way about this as I do about Playmates. Not a bad listen, but no where near as good as the 1960's Small Faces recordings.

Tracklist:
1. Over Too Soon
2. Too Many Crossroads
3. Let Me Down Gently
4. Thinkin' About Love
5. Stand By Me (Stand By You)
6. Brown Man Do
7. Real Sour
8. Soldier Boy
9. You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet
10. Filthy Rich

Download: megaupload

Mississippi John Hurt - The Immortal Mississippi John Hurt (1967)

John Smith Hurt (1892 - 1966), better known as Mississippi John Hurt was an influential country-blues guitar player and singer. Raised in Avalon, Mississippi, John taught himself how to play guitar at the age of nine. His first recording sessions were in 1928 for Okeh Records, but after these were a commercial failure, he continues his work as a farmer. After a couple of his early recordings were released on Harry Smith's Anthology Of Folk Music, there was a interest in his music in the folk revival scene. When an Australian man found a recording of "Avalon Blues" there became an increased interest in finding Mississippi John Hurt himself. in 1963, folk musicologist Tom Hoskins, was able to locate Mississippi John Hurt in Avalon, Mississippi, using the lyrics to "Avalon Blues". While in Avalon, Tom Hoskins encouraged Mississippi John Hurt to move to Washinton D.C. and continue to perform. During the final years of his life, Mississippi John Hurt performed extensively, including a performance at 1964's Newport Folk Festival and recorded three albums for Vanguard records.

One of the rediscovered Mississippi John Hurt's 1960's albums, and one of the best country-blues albums ever recorded. One of the most honestly gentle recordings I've ever heard.

Tracklist:
1. Since I've Laid My Burden Down
2. Moaning The Blues
3. Buck Dance
4. Lazy Blues
5. Richland Women Blues
6. Tender Virgins
7. Hop Joint
8. Monday Morning Blues
9. I've Got The Blues And I Can't Be Satisfied
10. Keep On Knocking
11. Chicken
12. Stagolee
13. Nearer My God To Thee

Download: megaupload

The Flower Pot Men - Let's Go To San Francisco (1967/1988)

The Flower Pot Men were a California-obsessed British sunshine-psych group from the Late 60's. The band was a studio group created by ex-members John Carter and Ken Lewis, of The Ivy League and Carter-Lewis & The Southerners. The Ivy League were known for recording vocal harmonies for The Who's early records, as well as recording the first version "My World Fell Down", which later became a famous non-hit for Sagittarius. After The Flower Pot Men, John Carter wrote the smash hit "Beach Baby" for First Class.

The Flower Pot Men was a studio project for John Carter, and Keith Lewis, who got a minor hit at the tail end of the Summer Of Love with "Let's Go To San Francisco", and had released 4 more singles, one under the moniker Friends. Though none of those singles were hits, and the group dissolved in 1970. Over all, the band recorded a couple LP's worth of tunes, this album compiles the highlights of their recordings.  I would highly recommend this album to fans of the late 1960's Beach Boys, and The Byrds.

Tracklist:
1. Let's Go To San Francisco Pt. 1
2. Let's Go To San Francisco Pt. 2
3. A Walk In The Sky
4. Am I Losing You
5. You Can Never Be Wrong
6. Man Without A Woman
7. In A Moment Of Madness
8. Young Birds Fly
9. Journey's End
10. Mythological Sunday
11. Blow Away
12. Piccolo Man
13. Let's Go Back To San Francisco
14. Silicon City

Download: megaupload

Thirteenth Floor Elevators - Wait For My Love 45 (2011)

An exclusive release for Record Store Day 2011, this 45 features 2 songs by Thirteenth Floor Elevators off Music Of The Spheres: The 13th Floor Elevators Vinyl Box. Remastered by Sonic Boom of Spacemen 3 and Spectrum fame.

Tracklist:
1. Wait For My Love
2. May The Circle Remain Unbroken

Download: megaupload

P.F. Sloan - Twelve More Times (1966)

Hey guys, after a nearly 2 month hiatus, I'm finally back, and I sprained my ankle so I got a week off work, which means I should be able to get quite a few more albums up here to make up for the 2 month break.

I've uploaded a couple P.F. Sloan 45's here before, but in case you don't know, P.F. Sloan is most known for writing hits such as "Eve Of Destruction" for Barry McGuire, "Let Me Be" for The Turtles (which is on this album), "Secret Agent Man", and quite a few others. Jimmy Webb wrote a song called "P.F. Sloan", which became a minor hit for The Association. And, Brian Wilson's controversial therapist, Eugene Landy, had claimed to be P.F. Sloan in interviews. He also helped arrange "Vibrations In C" with Calgary folk-pop maestro Barnaby Bennett, for release on The Tetraktys' classic Die Brucke. There's also rumors that around the same time he was working with folk-pop maestro Barnaby Bennett, he was attending private song-writing sessions with the much fabled Friar Chris. It's all pieces of the puzzle.

This is P.F. Sloan's second solo album. Originally released in 1966, it has more of a full LA folk-pop sound than his previous work. In my opinion, this album is P.F. Sloan's best solo album, and has his best songs. "The Man Behind The Red Balloon" is one of my all-time favorites, and the version of "Here's Where You Belong" is much better than the version on The Grassroots - Feelings. "Halloween Mary" is a real heavy-hitter, and it can also be found on the fairly-recent Where The Action Is: LA Nuggets collection. Though you could complain that this album is almost a little too Bob Dylan influenced, the songs are still all great in their own merits, and I highly recommend it to fans of 1960's LA, folk-pop, and of course, Bob Dylan.

Certified For Trippers.

Tracklist:
1. From A Distance
2. The Man Behind The Red Balloon
3. Let Me Be
4. Here's Where You Belong
5. This Precious Time
6. Halloween Mary
7. I Found A Girl
8. On Top Of A Fence
9. Lollipop Train (You Never Had It So Good)
10. Upon A Painted Ocean
11. When The Wind Changes
12. Patterns Seg. 4

Download: megaupload

good news

I'm finally getting the internet hooked up at my new place August 15th, so expect some uploads then.

The Tetraktys Reimagines The Carter Family (2011)

Barnaby Bennett covers Carter Family songs.