David Crosby - Might As Well Have A Good Time (1980)

In 1977, Crosby, Stills and Nash released their third album, with 'CSN' being a return to form for the trio after divergent yet successful solo careers that followed their 1969 debut and 1970 follow up as CSNY with Neil Young. Personality clashes were common between the triad, and even more so when Young’s heavy presence got involved. After a successful 1977/1978 tour in support of the 'CSN' album, they failed to get a follow up record together, but instead they spent time bouncing around and working on various solo projects, while reuniting once for a loose performance at 1979's No Nukes concert. By the dawning of 1980 Stills had put together his California Blues Band and Nash released his 'Earth And Sky' record to unreasonably tepid reviews, and so what was originally planned as a Crosby and Nash project became a solo effort when Crosby just couldn't get his shit together. The trio reunited briefly for a benefit at the Hollywood Bowl in June, where Crosby looked and sounded a bit rough for wear, and so shortly afterwards he convalesced in Los Angeles, while Stills and Nash embarked on a duo project in Hawaii. Tensions were high in the group and Crosby took his being left out of the Stills and Nash sessions personally, although the truth was that Crosby was just not dependable at this point in his life, and so Stills and Nash brought in Art Garfunkel and Timothy B. Schmidt to cover for his missing harmonies. 

Additionally, the reality was that the music industry seemed to be passing them all by, as no record label wanted to deal with CSN as solo artists, and getting the band together was not optimal or easy, so the only way for Crosby to keep going was to book studio time and try to put something together himself. In spring of 1980 he booked time at Rudy Records and Brittania Studios, and compiled a group of musician friends and collaborators including keyboardist Craig Doergre, bass player Lee Sklar, and guitarist Larry Carlton as his band. Crosby later said that making a solo record was one of the strangest experiences of his life. The sessions were successful enough that Crosby ended up recording five new songs, and he also retrieved 'Drive My Car' from the failed CSN sessions, and included an unreleased song he wrote with Jerry Garcia for his 1971 solo debut 'If I Could Only Remember My Name', called 'Kids And Dogs'. He also planned to include one of his earlier compositions 'Samurai', plus a live version of his unreleased song 'King Of The Mountain', which was played on dates during the 1976 Crosby/Nash tour. When the finished album was presented to his record company, Atlantic, it was roundly rejected for both musical and non-musical reasons, and it was consigned to their vaults.  the Crosby’s prospective album would languish in the vaults for perpetuity. Thankfully, four songs resurfaced for Crosby's 1989 post sobriety record 'Oh Yes I Can', on his new label, A&M Records. A bootleg rough mix of the entire proposed album, tentatively titled 'Might As Well Have A Good Time', has circulated for several years, and it was analysed in depth a couple of years ago by the 'Talk From The Rock Room' blog: 

'Melody' is beautifully self-aware song that shows Crosby at his most fallible, yet acutely aware of his frailties, and is one of the songs rescued for 'Oh Yes I Can'. The original 1980 version has a shady kinetic edge that may be because of the fidelity of the recording, whereas the 1989 re-recording contemporizes the song with current production, and has a clarity that rescues it from delaminating on a lost reel in a Los Angeles vault. 

'Drive My Car' is another song Crosby revisited for 'Oh Yes I Can', and it ended up opening the record. The original recording was for an ill-fated CSN session in late 1978 with the CSN touring band backing Crosby. The 1989 version is full throttle and spotlights large, gated drums and phased slide guitar by David Lindley. The track would become an in-concert favourite for Crosby.
'Delta' is a stunning and underrated song that Crosby composed stoned out of his mind on his schooner, the 'Mayan'. He later finished it on Warren Zevon’s piano with stern encouragement from Jackson Browne who told Crosby, "Finish it or I’ll break your arms". The song would eventually get the full Crosby, Stills and Nash treatment and end up with a place on 1982's 'Daylight Again'. 
'Kids & Dogs' is a legendary song from the vaults, recorded during the fruitful sessions for Crosby's first solo album, and featured Jerry Garcia and Crosby on acoustic guitars, ending up a playful musical love fest between two like-minded geniuses. 
'Flying Man' is another one of those strange wordless Crosby melodies that lie just below the surface of the breakers. The song was composed around the same time as another Crosby/Doerge collaboration, 'Shadow Captain', and the original version cut in 1980 has low fidelity but sounds like it transposed to the 1989 version seamlessly. The tune cruses just inches above the water with trademark Crosby changes and breeze through the hair keyboard washes.
'Might As Well Have A Good Time' was written by Craig Doegre and Judy Henske, and was planned to be the title track of the album. Doegre encouraged Crosby to cover the song originally, and its lyric of an old rocker standing on a jagged shoreline wondering whether to sink or swim fitted him perfectly. The sparse piano based number cut close to the bone and found a place on 1982's 'Daylight Again', outfitted with soaring Stills and Nash harmonies. 
'Distances' has a delicate descending guitar line, and begs for intimacy both mentally and physically. The re-recording a decade later stayed tight to this original arrangement, but the 'Oh Yes I Can' version has to be considered the definitive one, with both conversational and sweetly sung Crosby vocals. 
'King Of The Mountain' is a song he demoed and played in concert in 1974 but never released officially on a record, and so he wanted to include a live version on his 1980 record. The song is believed to be a commentary on his bandmate Stephen Stills, with Crosby's original demo sounding spectral, with only Crosby's voice and his 12-string guitar carrying the melody.
'Samurai' was a song that Crosby carried around for years just like his subject's sword. A solo performance was recorded on 26 May 1980, at Rudy Records, with only Crosby’s soulful vocals as the instrumentation. A disorienting multitracked version believed to be from the same session circulates in collector's circles, and can be found on a 1980's bootleg called 'Best Two Of Three', although Crosby and Nash would record the definitive version of the song almost 25 years later for their self-titled 2004 duo record, replete with stacked and orchestrated Crosby/Nash harmonies.
While Crosby's 1980 solo album never came to fruition, its musical riches were later dispersed across years of musical projects, and it's a shame that he never managed to consolidate these songs into the cohesive vision that he was unable to see clearly at the time. 

Track listing

01 Melody
02 Drive My Car
03 Delta
04 Kids & Dogs
05 Flying Man
06 Might As Well Have A Good Time
07 Distances
08 King Of The Mountain
09 Samurai

Neil Young - One Man Workin' (1988)

Following on from my two recent posts of imagined albums that Neil Young could have released just before 1989's return-to-rock 'Freedom' in 1989, after his dalliance with The Bluenotes as a backing band, Mike Solof pondered what 'This Note's For You' might have sounded like if it only had a rock band behind him. He's therefore done what I did to the live tracks that I used, and removed the horn section from the studio recordings for the album, leaving a less bluesy version of the songs. To be honest, I'd never bothered with 'This Note's For You' as I never fancied the concept, for much the same reason that I've never heard 'Everybody's Rockin'', as I like my Young in a hard rock format, so for me, listening to this is like having a brand new Neil Young rock album. Fans who already know 'This Note's For You' might find it stranger to listen to, as they'll be expecting the horns to come in now and then, and where there would otherwise have been a gap in the music I've brought the organ more to the fore, so I'm sure they'll be intrigued enough to give it at least one listen. Mike decided to call it 'One Man Workin', as the other nine can now take the day off, so I made him a cover based on the 'Ten Men Workin' single sleeve.  

Track listing   

01 Ten Men Workin'
02 This Note's For You
03 Coupe De Ville
04 Life In The City
05 Twilight
06 Married Man
07 Sunny Inside
08 Can't Believe Your Lyin'
09 Hey Hey
10 One Thing

Brian Appleton - The History Of Rock 'n' Roll (2002)

This won't mean much to people living outside of the UK, but the BBC have just announced that in a money-saving exercise they have decided to close Radio 4Extra. It mostly broadcasts archived repeats of comedy, drama and documentary programmes, and is the sister station of Radio 4, while it is also the principal broadcaster of the BBC's spoken-word archive. I must admit that I don't listen to it that much, but it was nice to know that it was there to dip into if I couldn't find any comedy to listen to on Radio 4, and as an example of the kind of programmes that you could find there, last week's schedule included episodes of 'The Goon Show' from 1954, 'Whacko!' with Jimmy Edwards, 'The Clitheroe Kid, and 'The Eric Morcambe and Ernie Wise Show' from the 1960's, 'The Inexplicable World of Lionel Nimrod' from 1992, which was an early outing from Stewart Lee and Richard Herring, and various panel shows and sitcoms from the 1980's. Tucked away in there was a programme that I fondly remembered from 2001, and this was 'Brian Appleton's History Of Rock 'n' Roll', which was a series of rock music lectures by the musicologist and part-time media studies tutor, Brian Appleton, written by and starring Graham Fellows. 

If you're really into your music-based comedy, then you'll recognise that name as being the person behind the hit single 'Jilted John' in 1978, and then latterly the character John Shuttleworth, who has had his own Radio 4 comedy show since 1992. In the late 1990's, with John Shuttleworth's popularity still growing, Fellows decided to create a new character; Birmingham-born multi-media lecturer and embittered rock performer, Brian Appleton. In preparation, he began studying rock 'n' roll history books, and soon saw the dramatic possibilities of weaving Brian's own fictional history into the true life stories of famous rock musicians. 'Brian Appleton's History Of Rock 'n' Roll' made its debut at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival of 1999, and over the next decade led to three more UK tours, two Radio 4 series and a Christmas special. Despite full houses and encouraging press reviews, however, comparisons were inevitably made between the life affirming, fully rounded character of John Shuttleworth and Brian Appleton's bitter demeanour and less developed persona, and so Brian Appleton never reached the dizzy heights Fellows had hoped for, and the sheer time and effort involved in researching his shows made him decide to bring the experiment to an end. Having listened to a couple of the episodes and really enjoyed them, I sought out the whole of the two series so that I can share them here for any other aficionados of Fellows' work, or just for fans of a well-made spoof musical documentary. 

Track listing

01 Eight Miles Low
02 Consider Yourself Dumped Upon
03 Come Up And See Me
04 Kajaboohoo
05 My Turn To Be Poorly
06 A Lot Of Knowledge
07 Christmas Single
08 From Cliff To Dale
09 Elvis Lives
10 Let's Look At Sound
11 Now Let's Listen To Light
12 King Steve
13 It's Not What You Know, It's The Who

Barbra Streisand - Life Cycle Of A Woman (2003) **UPDATE**

Just a quick update to this post, as I was listening to it again and felt that the track 'How Do You Keep The Music Playing' seemed to be talking about trying to save a failing marriage, and so it really should be later in the track listing. I've also added a gap between a couple of tracks that I'd missed before, and slightly updated the cover, so probably worth another download.  

For fans of Barbra Streisand the holy grail of unreleased albums is a project which began in 1973 but was never completed. Michel Legrand wrote the music and Alan and Marilyn Bergman contributed lyrics to a concept album tentatively titled 'Life Cycle Of A Woman', described by the composer as "an oratorio for one voice and a symphonic orchestra". They began writing it sometime in early 1970 and it took three years to get Streisand into the recording studio. The album was to cover a lifetime, with the first song dealing with birth, and the last with death. In between are songs about childhood, adolescence, a first love at age 16, marriage, and motherhood. Recording sessions took place at TTG Studios in Hollywood, California in April 1973, as Streisand was also laying down tracks for 'Classical Barbra' with Claus Ogerman. Michel Legrand conducted the day-long 'Life Cycle...' session, which also included two Legrand movie theme songs that the Bergmans had written lyrics for but were not part of the 'Life Cycle...' album. Those songs were 'Once You've Been In Love' from the film 'One Is A Lonely Number' and 'The Smile I've Never Smiled' from 'Portnoy’s Complaint'. Streisand tried something new at that 1973 recording session, standing in the middle of the studio surrounded by the orchestra, and she found it thrilling being enveloped by the music, as opposed to standing in an isolated vocal booth with the musicians playing on the other side of the glass. However, it did make the record very difficult to mix, as if the vocal needed to be raised or lowered, it raised or lowered all the music around it. Later, the Bergmans and Legrand reworked the ending on another song written for the 'Life Cycle Of A Woman' album, and Streisand recorded 'Wait' for her 1999 album 'A Love Like Ours'. At the time of the original recording sessions, Streisand wasn't of the opinion that Legrand and his lyricists had fully mapped out their concept, except for the basic 'womb to tomb' idea, and she didn't relate either musically or lyrically with the birth and death songs. 

As Legrand didn't want to change them, the idea lost momentum, and they all became involved in other projects. Ultimately, over the years, Streisand, the Bergmans and Legrand recorded only four songs for this project, and my original idea for this album was to start off with those songs and then add some more Streisand/Legrand recordings, for an album that would basically be 'Streisand Sings Legrand'. But as I was deciding which tracks to include, I realised that Legrand and the Bergman's writing style was very much based on life experiences, and some of their other songs could replace the missing ones from the 'Life Cycle...' album. I've therefore come up with a track listing which loosely follows the original concept, starting with the birth, then 'Mother And Child', followed by 'Can You Tell The Moment?', which would have been the third song on the album, then the questioning childhood years with 'Ask Yourself Why'. By the time she is a teenager she is looking for 'Something New In My Life', and she finds it after falling in love, and asking her lover 'What Are You Doing For The Rest Of Your Life?'. Motherhood soon follows, but they later start to drift apart, and after trying to save the marriage with 'How Do You Keep The Music Playing?', her feelings are summed up in 'Once You've Been In Love'. As she reaches her twilight years she reflects on the summer and winter periods of her life, before 'Between Yesterday And Tomorrow' closes the original album. OK, some of the tracks don't stand up to scrutiny of the lyrics, but because the songs are all written by the same people, I think this hangs together very well as a reconstruction of the 'Life Cycle...' album, or as just a collection of Legrand/Bergman songs as sung by Streisand in her prime. 

Track listing

01 Birth (Intro)

02 Mother And Child
03 Can You Tell The Moment?
04 Ask Yourself Why
05 Pieces Of Dreams
06 Something New In My Life
07 Look
08 What Are You Doing For The Rest Of Your Life?
09 Mother And Child Duo

10 How Do You Keep The Music Playing?
11 Once You've Been In Love
12 Wait
13 Summer Me, Winter Me
14 Between Yesterday And Tomorrow

15 Last Breath (Outro)

The Tubes - Suffer For Sound (1980)

The Tubes formed in March 1972 in San Francisco, and featured members from two Phoenix bands who had moved to San Francisco in 1969. One, The Beans (alternately billing themselves as the Radar Men from Uranus), included Bill Spooner, Rick Anderson, Vince Welnick, and Bob McIntosh. The other, the Red White and Blues Band, featured Prairie Prince, Roger Steen, and David Killingsworth. After performing at Expo '70 in Japan, Killingsworth left the Red, White and Blues Band, leaving Steen and Prince to audition new bass players, albeit unsuccessfully. Before moving to San Francisco the Beans had been a local favorite in Phoenix, selling out shows with a tongue-in-cheek concept rock show called "The Mother of Ascension" featuring costumes and props. The Beans' manager and former Alice Cooper Group drummer, John Speer, suggested they add Prince and Steen along with their roadie John Waybill to one of these shows. Waybill's nickname among the band was "Fee," short for "Fiji," thanks to his copious head of hippie hair. After securing the opening slot for Led Zeppelin at Kezar Stadium by winning a bet with Bill Graham that they could sell out three local shows, the band pulled out the stops, including Waybill dressed as an early version of "Quay Lewd" throwing "Cocaine" (flour) and "Pills" (candy) at the crowd, who threw it back. Graham threatened that the band would never play in San Francisco again. but calmed down and eventually fell in love with the band, booking them at Winterland and other California venues for New Year's shows and Halloween. 

After the 1973 Led Zeppelin show, Herbert wanted to manage the band, but Spooner and the group went with local management team Mort Moriarty and Gary Peterson, also known as "Bag O' Bucks", and after unsuccessfully pitching the group to Columbia Records, they managed to secure a deal with A&M Records. The Tubes' first album, the Al Kooper-produced 'The Tubes', was released in 1975, and included the track 'White Punks On Dope', which was an "absurd anthem of wretched excess" and ridiculed the Hollywood kids of the rich and famous. By late 1975 the had band created a stage show unlike any other, after hiring Kenny Ortega to direct and choreograph, and event support/video pioneer T.J. McHose to run a live video feed with films for each song. The show was critically acclaimed and broke them into show business in Los Angeles during sold-out runs at the Roxy Theater, David Allen's Boarding House and Bimbo's in San Francisco. The Tubes' second album, 'Young And Rich' came out in 1976 on A&M Records, and was produced by Ken Scott. It featured 'Don't Touch Me There', a suggestive duet between Waybill and Styles, which was arranged in classic "Wall of Sound" style by Jack Nitzsche. The band toured America with a new stage show, including new numbers 'Slipped My Disco', 'Madam, I'm Adam' and 'Pimp', and in 1977 they released their third album, 'Now', which was an attempt to write less satirical songs, with the band sharing song-writing duties with Bill Spooner. 

They played a small American tour of the west coast and a month-long run at San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts, featuring the band's most elaborate stage show to date. Their fourth outing was 1978's live album 'What Do You Want from Live', which was recorded during their record-breaking run at the Hammersmith Odeon, London. They followed this with a tour of America, and they played a sold-out run at The Pantages Theater in Hollywood, which attracted celebrities such as the cast of Laverne and Shirley, Cher, Kate Jackson, and Gene Simmons. The band went back to Europe to follow up this success, but it was canceled after Waybill fell off stage and broke his leg at a Leicester, England show. The band's fifth album, 1979's 'Remote Control', was a concept album produced by Todd Rundgren, about a television-addicted idiot-savant, inspired by the Jerzy Kosinski novel 'Being There', which was later made into a movie starring Peter Sellers. Much of the new music was rewritten by Rundgren and the band in the studio, and synth player and visual stylist Michael Cotten designed an innovative multimedia stage show for the 'Remote Control' tour, which employed multiple TV monitors and a 35 mm film projector, However, after a disastrous gig at UCLA's Royce Hall, which was beset by multiple technical problems, including poor visibility of the small TV screens, the show was scrapped and was replaced with a stripped-down tour in the U.S., Japan, and Europe, with Squeeze as the support act. 

The band's fifth studio album, the self-produced 'Suffer For Sound', was meant to complete the group's contract with A&M, but the recession had affected the music industry, and many other bands were cut from A&M at the end of the 1970's. The Tubes owed A&M a large amount of money, and after playing the new record for Jerry Moss, their manager Rikki Farr insulted Moss' taste in music to ensure that the band was let go and were able to sign with a new label. Tubes friend Matt Leach compiled the outtakes, b-sides, and oddities collection 'T.R.A.S.H. (Tubes Rarities And Smash Hits)' for a 1981 release on A&M, after which the band was signed to Capitol Records, toning down the X-rated sketches for the live shows, and redesigning itself as a leaner ensemble with a view to release more accessible hits. They worked with Bobby Colomby to find a new musical direction, and then met with possible producers, including Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, before deciding on David Foster. In 1981 they recorded 'The Completion Backward Principle' with him as their first album for Capitol, and so 'Suffer For Sound' was quietly forgotten. If you are interested to hear what the follow-up to 'Remote Control' would have sounded like then here is that very album. 

Track listing

01 Drivin' All Night
02 Dreams Come True
03 Dangerous
04 Don't Ask Me
05 Holy War
06 Rat Race
07 Train Of Pictures
08 Don't Slow Down
09 Suffer For Sound
10 Color Me Wild
11 Satellite

Guided By Voices - Pissing In The Canal (1984) **UPGRADE**

Many thanks to Guy for pointing me in the direction of the original demo of 'Quality Of Armor' that I was after, so the file is now updated to include the version which matches the lyric sheet, which I have also now included in the post. Just '6 Feet Down' to find now.  

Track listing

01 Angry Pillows (Gone Away)
02 Lockets of the Empress
03 The Quality Of Armor
04 Tell Me
05 Walls and Windows
06 Echoland
07 Before My Eyes
08 Together/Apart
09 Amnesia
10 A Kind Of Love
11 Try To Find You
12 Old Friend
13 I'd Choose You
14 Groundwork
15 Shake It Out

The Miracles - The Miracles Sing Modern (1962)

The group that later became the Miracles was formed in 1955 by five teenage friends from Detroit, Michigan, under the name the Five Chimes. Three of the founding members, Smokey Robinson, Warren "Pete" Moore, and Ronnie White, had been singing together since they each were around the age of eleven. After Dawson quit the group and Grice dropped out to get married, they were replaced by Emerson "Sonny" Rogers and his cousin Bobby, and they changed their name to the Matadors. In 1957, Rogers left to join the United States Army and Claudette Rogers, his sister, who had been singing with the sister group the Matadorettes, joined them shortly afterwards In 1958, the group became the Miracles, and following two years of courtship, Smokey and Claudette married in November 1959. The group signed with Berry Gordy's Tamla Records label, and gave the parent label Motown Record Corporation its first million-selling hit record with the 1960 Grammy Hall of Fame smash, 'Shop Around'. They further established themselves as one of Motown's top acts with the hit singles 'You've Really Got A Hold On Me', 'What's So Good About Goodbye', and 'Way Over There'. Their first album for Tamla was 'Hi... We're The Miracles', which was released in 1961, with most of the songs being written or co-written by Robinson. This was followed later that year by 'Cookin' With The Miracles', which was a much more polished production, and involved more extensive instrumentation than their debut album. 

In 1962 they started work on their third album, which was to be called 'The Miracles Sing Modern', and the original plan was for a collection of covers of show tunes, but according to Miracle Pete Moore, the group thought the songs did not fit their style but were unwilling to go against Berry Gordy, Jr.'s orders. The idea was to showcase the Miracles' talent and versatility on different genres of music, and the ability of different group members to sing lead vocals in addition to main lead singer Robinson. Cousins Bobby and Claudette shared lead vocals on the standard 'Easy Street', and Claudette leads alone on Mr. Misery', 'My Heart Says Yes', and 'Father Dear'. Smokey and Claudette Robinson share the lead chores on the standard 'If I Were A Bell' (from the 1950 musical 'Guys And Dolls'), joined in mid-song by Bobby Rogers, Pete Moore, and Ronnie White in an ensemble lead. This was a transitional period for the group's line-up, with bass singer/vocal arranger Pete Moore featured on the front cover even though he had not been available as he had been recently been drafted into the U.S. Armed Services. His place was taken by Marv Tarplin, and so 'The Miracles Sing Modern' would have been one of the few Miracles albums to feature the complete original six-member group line=up on its cover, including Tarplin, Claudette & Smokey Robinson, Rogers, White, and Moore. The album was ultimately left unfinished, but three show tunes recorded for it were included on its replacement record 'I'll Try Something New', which featured 'I've Got You Under My Skin' from the musical film 'Born To Dance', 'On The Street Where You Live' from the Broadway musical 'My Fair Lady', and 'Speak Low' from the Broadway musical 'One Touch Of Venus'. The remaining recordings were shelved until they later appeared on various compilations over the subsequent years, and so if you want to hear them all in one place then here is the abandoned 'The Miracles Sing Modern' album. 

Track listing

01 Easy Street
02 If I Were A Bell
03 Along Came Love

04 On The Street Where You Live
05 Come To Me
06 Father Dear
07 My Heart Says Yes
08 Speak Low

09 I Had To Cry
10 (Talking 'Bout) Nobody But My Baby
11 I Think We Can Make It
12 I've Got You Under My Skin

13 Mr. Misery (Let Me Be)

Richie Havens - Richie Havens' Record (1968)

Richard Pierce Havens was born on 21 January 1941 in Bedford–Stuyvesant in Brooklyn, and was the oldest of nine children. As a youth, he began organizing his neighborhood friends into a street corner doo-wop group, and by the age of 16 he was performing with the McCrea Gospel Singers. When he was 20, Havens left Brooklyn, seeking artistic stimulation in Greenwich Village in Manhattan, and soon word of his solo performances spread beyond the Village folk music circles, and he signed with Bob Dylan's manager Albert Grossman, and landed a record deal with the Verve Folkways label. HIs first album, 'Mixed Bag' appeared in late 1966, and featured tracks such as 'Follow', a cover of Dylan's 'Just Like A Woman, and 'Handsome Johnny', which was co-written by Havens and actor Louis Gossett Jr. He released his first single, 'No Opportunity Necessary', in 1967, and this was later covered by Yes on their second album 'Time And A Word'. 1967's 'Something Else Again' became his first album to hit the Billboard charts, and it pulled 'Mixed Bag' back onto the charts. Also in 1968, two albums that he had recorded for producer Alan Douglas made their appearance, but both of these were unauthorised releases, being solo demos that Havens had recorded for Douglas in 1965. As he rose to stardom, Douglas took the original solo demos and overdubbed them with electric instruments, but after objections from Havens, the albums were pulled from circulation, and today are very hard to find. 

The result of the late-date overdub created the misleading impression of an artist caught between the transition from folk to rock music, sometimes awkwardly so, as if he or the producers couldn't decide whether to be one or the other. The first of the two records, 'Richie Havens' Record', has some organ, backup vocals, and light drumming on some of the songs, but essentially this is an album that probably reflects his live sets in folk clubs, mixing covers of folk tunes such as 'I'm On My Way' and 'Babe, I'm Leavin'', with blues like 'Daddy Roll 'Em' , and soul with 'Drown In My Own Tears'. He also covered material by then contemporary singer/songwriters, such as Fred Neil's 'The Bag I'm In', and it convincingly establishes Havens as a talented singer and interpreter, making songs his own with his gritty soul-folk voice and urgent guitar strums. There's a low-budget feel to the production and arrangements, and even more so with the packaging, with no mention of songwriter credits, and a frankly awful caricature on the front, while the title is misspelled as "Richie Haven's Record" on the spine. Despite all this, fans of Havens who haven't heard this before should find much to enjoy, as even as early as 1965 you could hear something of what was to emerge from the singer in the next few years. And if the name Alan Douglas rings a bell, then it's because he carried out exactly the same trick with two albums worth of Jimi Hendrix demos in the 70's, for which fans have still never forgiven him. 

Track listing

01 I'm On My Way
02 Babe, I'm Leaving
03 Down In The Valley
04 Nora's Dove
05 I'm Gonna Make You Glad
06 Chain Gang
07 Drown In My Own Tears
08 Daddy Roll 'Em
09 It Hurts Me
10 That's The Bag I'm In

Trees - Tom Of Bedlam (1973) **UPGRADE**

When I posted this album in July 2021 I was quite pleased with the result, but it had taken a lot of work to bring it up to listenable quality. As I mentioned in the notes, Trees had one of the concerts recorded in 1973, and it was released as a live album by Habla Records in 1989. Some years later an enterprising bootlegger took a rip of the album and cut all the applause from the beginnings and ends of the tracks and then reposted it as a lost studio album by the band. Back in the late 1980's audio editing software was pretty much non-existent, and so the only way to remove the applause was to cut the beginning and end of each track, which means that the intros were removed, and the end of the tracks cut off suddenly. I had to do a lot of work to reinstate the intros to these butchered tracks, and fade them out if I couldn't fix the ending. The audio quality of the original live album was notoriously poor quality, and one good thing that the bootlegger did do was to slightly improve the audio quality, but it still wasn't a great listen. After listening to my post the other month I decided to see if I could improve it, so I went back to the original source material and found a rip of the original vinyl live album and started to work with that. I used MVSEP to remove the clicks and pops and the hiss, as well as the crowd noise, and this uncovered the intros of the tracks so that I didn't have to recreate them, other than adding a few seconds to the beginning of 'The Innocent Hare', whereas last time I had to patch in the whole of the first verse. I then ran each track through a re-mastering programme, boosted the middle range, removed the reverb, and added a lot of bass to fill out the hollow sound of the live recordings. Finally, I boosted the vocals on the title track where they were a bit low in the mix, and after all that I was much happier with the result. 'Forest Fire' is the original 1971 BBC recording which was added to the live album, but this time taken from the re-issue of 'On The Shore', and I'm pleased that it doesn't sound at all out of place compared to the sound quality of the other tracks. It was worth all this effort, as Trees are an extremely under-rated folk-rock band, and the two studio albums that they released are now regarded as classics of the genre. It is therefore great to have one more album of new material, now in a much more listenable format.    

Track listing

01 Prince Of Heathens 
02 Tom Of Bedlam
03 Cry Of Morning 
04 Burgen Polka
05 Friar Tuck Gets His
06 The Innocent Hare
07 Forest Fire
08 Van Dieman's Land

The Sisters Of Mercy - Eyes Of Caligula (2024)

I mentioned in my recent post of rarities from The Sisters Of Mercy that the band are still touring, and also writing new material, but Andrew Eldritch has cited both time constraints and lack of available material as reasons for the band not venturing into the studio to record some of their new songs. I guess I understand the lack of material excuse, as having trawled through their live sets of the last few years there are only about 13 new songs that are being played, but that does make up just enough music for an album, as proven by this post. I've taken twelve of their best live recordings and re-mastered them to sound like a studio album, so here is the first "new" album from The Sisters Of Mercy since 1990. 

Track listing

01 Don't Drive On Ice   
02 Summer
03 I Will Call You
04 We Are The Same, Susanne
05 Quantum Baby
06 Eyes Of Caligula
07 Romeo Down
08 But Genevieve
09 Black Sail
10 Here
11 When I'm On Fire
12 On The Beach

Thanks to geofmcm for the suggestion of a "new" Sisters Of Mercy album.

Simple Minds - The Early Years 1977-1978 (1998)

In 1977 friends Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill formed a band called Johnny And The Self Abusers in Glasgow, and after gigging around the city, their reputation reached London, and they attracted some record company attention, finally signing to the indie label Chiswick, run by ex-record store boss Ted Caroll. By now their line-up was Kerr on vocals , Burchill on guitar, John Milarky on vocals/saxophone , Tony Donald on bass, Alan McNeil on guitar and Brian McGee on drums. In November 1977, they released their debut single 'Saints And Sinners'/'Dead Vandals', but on the day it hit record shops, the group split up. Next Kerr and Burchill formed Simple Minds, with the band name taken from a lyric in the David Bowie song 'Jean Genie', and although they were seen as punks, they had a host of influences which included Bowie, The New York Dolls, Iggy Pop, Genesis, Eno and The Velvet Underground, and so they possessed a more experimental approach to music. On 17 January 1978 Simple Minds played their first ever gig at Satellite City, supporting reggae band Steel Pulse, and also on the bill was The Nu Sonics, who later became Orange Juice. On 11 & 12 May the band recorded their first demo at Ca Va Studios in St. Vincent Street, Glasgow, where they laid down six tracks. They hawked the demo around London's major labels, and support slots followed with Siouxsie And The Banshees, Generation X and The Pleasers, bringing more attention across Scotland. Within the group there were line-up changes, with Donald dropping out, and second guitarist Barnwell moved on after just four months, so with the band's nucleus now Kerr, Burchill and McGee they recruited Derek Forbes from punk band The Subs, and in April they added keyboards player Mick MacNeil. 

During their string of gigs at The Mars Bar, the group were watched by Bruce Findlay, who ran a chain of independent record stores called Bruces', and he had formed his own record label, Zoom, in 1977. Findlay was hooked by their dark, haunting songs and striking, almost glam image, and he became the group's driver, then manager, and after touting the band's demo around London, he found interest from Arista Records. After a gig at Pollock Halls in Glasgow, Simple Minds signed to Zoom Records, in a special licensing deal through Arista. In December 1978 the band went back into Ca Va Studios to lay down demos for what would evolve into their first album, and in the new year they began to make plans for their debut record. Impressed by his work with Magazine, the group approached John Leckie to see if the was interested in working with them, and after catching a show at Dundee University, Leckie agreed to produce the band. The early sessions produced a new song called 'Life In A Day', which quickly stood out and became the record's title track, and when the album was released in March 1979, it sold well, despite critical opinion in the music press being mixed. The title track was released as Simple Minds' first single and reached No. 62 in the UK singles chart, with the album reaching No. 30 in the UK Albums Chart, and in June 1979 'Chelsea Girl' was released as the second single, this time failing to reach the charts. In 1998 MindMood Records put together a compilation of demos from this period of the band's career, titled 'The Early Years 1977-1978', and comprising the Johnny And The Self Abusers recordings from Ca Va Studios in 1977, and Simple Minds first demos at the same studio in 1978. However, after only a week it was withdrawn from sale, as nobody could remember who financed the original recordings, and therefore who had ownership of the rights. Until that issue is resolved, this album will remain unreleased.  

Track listing

01 18-18
02 Tonight
03 Little Bitch
04 Pablo Picasso
05 Subway Sex
06 Lies
07 Wasteland
08 Act Of Love
09 European Son
10 Cocteau Twins
11 Chelsea Girl
12 Did You Ever?
13 Pleasantly Disturbed

Pet Shop Boys - A Man From The Future (2014)

During 2012 and 2013 Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe of the Pet Shop Boys wrote songs with Andew Hodges about the life and legacy of Alan Turing. Hodges was Turing's biographer, and the original concept was for an electronic/orchestral piece that celebrated the life of the man who cracked the Enigma code, and it was given it's world premiere at the BBC Proms in 2014. Each of the eight parts focused on a different area of Turing's life, from his entry into Sherborne ('a moderately distinguished public school') and his close friendship with Christopher Morcom, his dreaming of the Universal Machine, and his sexual encounters with Arnold Murray, the pair's subsequent prosecution, and Turing's undergoing chemical castration. 'A Man From The Future' is not the first piece to combine music and narrative, but the Pet Shop Boys appear nonetheless to have created a new fusion genre of 80's synthpop and classical music, in which the 18 superb BBC Singers plus Tennant are treated sometimes as instruments, sometimes as narrators, and other times as singers in their own right. The music is impressive and impressionistic, swiftly adapting to fit the tone of the narrative, edited from Hodges's biography of Turing, which was expertly mastered by actress Juliet Stevenson, who acted as the narrator. The concert was a huge success, and possibly showed the Pet Shop Boys in a new light to a classical music audience. Now, 12 years later, the duo have decided to revise the piece to "give it more of an electronic emphasis", and Sven Helbig, the original orchestrator, suggested reworking his orchestrations in a more intimate arrangement for eight string players. The album features string arrangements composed by Helbig and performed by the Manchester Camerata Octet, while once again Juliet Stevenson provides spoken word narration adapted from Hodges' book 'Alan Turing: The Enigma'. Four of the eight songs additionally feature children from Manchester Grammar School choir, and the title track includes an excerpt from a 2009 statement made by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, acknowledging Turing's work and apologizing for the inhumane treatment he received, which is followed by the posthumous royal pardon granted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2013. The album version of 'The Man From The Future' was released on 9 October 2026, and I'm sure it will be snapped up by fans of the band, but if you are curious to hear the original recording from the BBC Proms in 2014, then here it is for you to compare and contrast.  

Track listing

01 Natural Wonders Every Child Should Know
02 He Dreamed Of Machines
03 The Enigma
04 Other Ranks
05 The Memory And The Control
06 The Trial
07 Only In His Death
08 A Man From The Future

The Cyrkle - Penny Arcade (1968)

The Cyrkle was formed by guitarists and lead singers Don Dannemann and Tom Dawes (who also played bass guitar), and original drummer Jim Maiella, who all met while studying at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. With the addition of Earle Pickens on keyboards and Marty Fried on drums, they started out as a "frat rock" band called the Rhondells, but were later discovered and managed by Brian Epstein, who was best known as manager of the Beatles. Epstein found out about the band when his business partner, New York attorney Nathan Weiss, heard them in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on Labor Day of 1965, and on his recommendation Epstein became their manager and renamed them, as a reference to the circular roundabout known as Centre Square, located in downtown Easton, and John Lennon provided the unique spelling of their new name. In mid-1966, they opened on 14 dates for the Beatles during their US tour, and in August they were one of the opening acts prior to the Beatles performing at Dodger Stadium. The band are best known for their 1966 song 'Red Rubber Ball', which went to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, selling over one million copies, and being awarded a gold disc. The song was co-written by Paul Simon, with Bruce Woodley of the Seekers, and was released by Columbia Records. Later in 1966, the band had one more Top 20 hit, 'Turn-Down Day', which reached No. 16 in the pop charts. After the release of their debut album, 'Red Rubber Ball', they recorded a second album, 'Neon', in late 1966, and then they recorded the soundtrack to the film 'The Minx', although the film and its soundtrack were not released until 1969. 

Instead of recording a third album, they spent the rest of 1967 and 1968 releasing various singles on Columbia Records, while CBS re-released 'Red Rubber Ball' to cash in. The band disbanded in mid-1968, and both Dawes and Dannemann became professional jingle writers, with Dawes writing the "plop plop fizz fizz" jingle for Alka-Seltzer, and Dannemann wrote jingles for Continental Airlines and Swanson Foods. Dawes produced two albums for the band Foghat, 'Rock & Roll' in 1973 and 'Energized' in 1974, and he co-wrote the song 'Wild Cherry' on the latter. Marty Fried left the music business to attend law school, and Earle Pickens became a surgeon in Gainesville, Florida. In the spring of 2014, the keyboardist of The Cyrkle, Mike Losekamp, joined a Columbus, Ohio-based band called The Gas Pump Jockeys, a regionally popular classic rock act performing in the Ohio region and neighbouring states. Following positive audience reaction to the inclusion of the two Cyrkle singles in the set, Losekamp contacted Dannemann, and together with Pat McLoughlin, Mike Rousculp , Don White, Scott Langley, and later Mike Shoaf, they reformed The Cyrkle, and recorded and released the band's third album 'Revival', which was released on the Big Stir label in 2024. However, what fans really wanted to hear was a third album by the 60's incarnation of the group, and so here is all the music that they recorded after the 'Neon' album and before 'The Minx' soundtrack, to make the third album that they should have released in 1968. 

Track listing

01 Where Are You Going?
02 Red Chair Fade Away
03 Reading Her Paper
04 Penny Arcade
05 Turn Of The Century
06 Straighten Out My Messed Up Life
07 We Had A Good Thing Goin'
08 The Words
09 You Can't Go Home Again
10 Canaro
11 Friends
12 Downtown Blues
13 We Said Goodbye