Diana Ross & The Supremes - Some Things You Never Get Used To (1968)

In May 1968 Diana Ross & The Supremes released the single 'Some Things You Never Get Used To' on the Motown label, but it stalled for three weeks at number 30 on the U.S. Billboard pop chart in July, and it became the lowest-charting Supremes single since 1963. This lack of success became the catalyst for Berry Gordy to revamp song-writing for The Supremes, since the loss of Motown's premier production team Holland–Dozier–Holland, which Gordy had assigned as the group's sole producers after the success of 'When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes'. Motown originally created an album to capitalize on the success of the single, but when it failed to hit the top of the charts the album was scrapped, and the single, plus a few other tracks, were included on the group's next official album, 'Love Child', in November 1968. The majority of the remaining songs remained unreleased until box sets and expanded re-issues began appearing some 20 years after they were recorded, and now here they are on the album which would have appeared if the title track had been more successful. Although 'You've Been So Wonderful To Me' appeared on the 'Love Child' album, I thought the strings were a bit obtrusive at the start so I've toned them down a bit, and because it was quite a short album I've added a couple of contemporary unreleased recordings to the end. 

Track listing

01 Some Things You Never Get Used To 
02 Heaven Must Have Sent You 
03 He's My Sunny Boy 
04 Come On And See Me 
05 Can I Get A Witness 
06 You've Been So Wonderful To Me 
07 My Guy 
08 It's Not Unusual 
09 Just A Little Misunderstanding
10 Uptight (Everything's Alright)
11 What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted
12 Blowin' In The Wind 
13 Treat Me Nice John Henry
14 The Beginning Of The End Of Love

Rosie Ribbons - Misbehaving (2002)

Rosemary "Rosie" Ribbons was born on 22 July 1983 in Australia, with the family moving to Pontardawe near Swansea in 1987. Ribbons reportedly wanted to be a pop singer since she was eight years old, and was a big fan of Mariah Carey, who she learned to mimic in her singing, and she also started to write her own songs. During her final school year she lost interest, however, and ended up working in a supermarket, and it was when she was bored with that career that she auditioned for ITV1's talent show Pop Idol. She initially performed her own composition called 'Colours' to judges Simon Cowell, Nicki Chapman, Neil Fox and record producer Pete Waterman, and although impressed with her vocal, Cowell suggested that she pick a more familiar song. Taking his advice, Ribbons then wowed the panel with a rendition of 'Hero' by Mariah Carey, a performance that moved Waterman to tears. Ribbons progressed through the competition and made the top 50, winning her heat by a landslide, but although she was named amongst the favourites to win, she was voted out by viewers a few weeks before Will Young was crowned winner on 9 February 2002, ultimately finishing in 6th place. Although Ribbons did not win Pop Idol, Telstar Records signed her to a five-album deal, reportedly worth £1million, and after supporting Liberty X on tour, her first two singles 'Blink' and her cover of Jessica Simpson's 'A Little Bit' were both UK top 20 hits. 

However, as 'A Little Bit' only reached number 19, Telstar considered this a disappointing chart position, and so they went to work on getting ready to release the third single only a few weeks later. Initially they had chosen 'Good Thing' before deciding on a double A Side, featuring 'Good Thing' and 'Heaven', but after Ribbons had supported Blue on their 'One Love' Tour Telstar decided that a totally fresh, new track had to be released, and they wanted something that was guaranteed to succeed. They therefore put Ribbons back in the studio to record a modern-day remake of the Deee-Lite hit 'Groove Is In The Heart', at one point considering making it a double A-side with 'Naked'. Before any of this could happen, Telstar experienced financial problems and her contract was subsequently terminated before the third single or her album could be released. Originally to be called 'Levitate', promo copies titled 'Misbehaving' did surface under the title 'Misbehaving'. In 2007, now living in Dubbo, Australia, Ribbons auditioned for Australian Idol with another original song, 'Butterfly Wings', but this time the judges did not ask for a second, more familiar song, and she was accepted into the Top 100, and then went on to make the Top 24. In the fourth semi-finals on 29 August 2007 Ribbons sang R.E.M.'s 'Everybody Hurts', but she didn't make the final 12, and so was eliminated from the competition. Ribbons returned to the UK after Australian Idol to perform and record new music, and in March 2012 she was the featured vocalist on the title track of the Alonestar EP 'Warrior', a release which also featured Ed Sheeran, who accompanies Ribbons on the track 'All Falls Down'. Telstar's back catalogue was eventually acquired by Phoenix Music International in 2018, and the album acquired a digital release, but no physical copies followed, and so here is that original 2002 debut by the Pop Idol finalist.   

Track listing

01 Good Thing
02 A Little Bit
03 Blink
04 Deadly Sin 
05 Heaven
06 Coming Up for Air
07 Trusted
08 No Space to Rent
09 Even Angels
10 Ain't That the Way
11 Colours

Dolby's Cube - May The Cube Be With You (1986)

Thomas Dolby (born Thomas Morgan Robertson on 14 October 1958), came to prominence in the 1980's, releasing hit singles including 'She Blinded Me with Science' in 1982 and 'Hyperactive!' in 1984. He started his music career in the late 1970's, forming the Camera Club with Bruce Woolley, and after leaving them he joined Lene Lovich's band as keyboardist, and wrote her hit song 'New Toy'. In 1983, Dolby started collaborating with a number of artists in an occasional studio-based project called Dolby's Cube, which had no set line-up, and was essentially a forum for him to release material that was more dance-oriented. The first single released by Dolby's Cube was 1983's 'Get Out Of My Mix', followed by 'May The Cube Be With You', featuring George Clinton, in 1985, and work on the soundtrack to the film 'Howard The Duck' in 1986. For the soundtrack, Dolby wrote the film's songs, and chose the members of the on-screen rock band Cherry Bomb, with actress Lea Thompson performing her own vocals for the role of lead singer in the group, although she states that the filmmakers were unsure as to whether they would keep her vocals in the final film. Thompson was required to learn choreography with the band and record the songs so they could be synchronized during filming, and the final sequence, in which Cherry Bomb perform the film's title song, was shot in front of a live audience at The Warfield in San Francisco. Collaborators in Dolby's Cube at various junctures included former band-mate Lene Lovich, George Clinton of Parliament-Funkadelic, Francois Kevorkian, and Lea Thompson, with Joe Walsh, Stevie Wonder and The Brecker Brothers also making an appearance on some of the recordings. 

Track listing

01 Get Out Of My Mix>
02 Get On Out Of My Mix
03 Hunger City
04 May The Cube Be With You (3D Mix)
05 Howard The Duck
06 Googooplexus - Club Creature Caviar
07 Don't Turn Away
08 It Don't Come Cheap
09 I'm On My Way

Featuring:
03 Lea Thompson
04 George Clinton, Lene Lovich, The Brecker Brothers
05 Lea Thompson, Joe Walsh
06 George Clinton, Lene Lovich, The Brecker Brothers
07 Stevie Wonder
08 Lea Thompson, Joe Walsh
09 Tata Vega

The Ivy League - Tomorrow Is Another Day (1967)

John "Carter" Shakespeare and Kenneth "Lewis" Hawker were both from Birmingham, and came down to London to make a name for themselves in the music industry. They were offered a deal by manager Terry Kennedy, and moved with him to Southern music at 5 Denmark Street. He re-christened them Carter & Lewis, and produced the seven singles they cut for Piccadilly, Ember and Oriole between 1961 and 1964 under the name Carter-Lewis And The Southerners. They had developed a close harmony style similar to the Everly Brothers, and were soon established as a popular radio team, appearing on BBC Light Programme shows 'Saturday Club' and 'Easy Beat'. The group became a vehicle for publishing the songs that stemmed from the Carter-Lewis partnership, and in summer 1964 Carter and Lewis disbanded The Southerners in order to concentrate on writing and doing sessions. By July 1964, they expanded to a trio, by teaming up with another session singer and songwriter, Brian Pugh aka "Perry Ford". Pugh was also a songwriter, penning hits for Adam Faith with 'Someone Else's Baby', and The Fortunes' 'Caroline', and was running a studio for Reg Calvert in Denmark Street when Carter and Lewis approached him. The trio developed a clear liking for high-falsetto vocals, being influenced by The Four Freshmen and The Beach Boys, and they christened themselves The Ivy League. They started out providing backing vocals on other artists' sessions, such as Sandy Shaw's 'Always Something There To Remind Me', Tom Jones' 'It’s Not Unusual', and The Who's 'Can't Explain', but after deciding to record their own music they signed to Pye's Piccadilly subsidiary. 

Their debut single failed to chart, but the follow-up 'Funny How Love Can Be' crashed into the UK Top 10, prompting the need to form a backing group and go out on tour. Micky Keene and Dave Wintour left The Tony Colton’s Crawdaddies to become The Ivy League backing band, and were joined by keyboardist Mike O'Neill and drummer Clem Cattini. The original trio released a few more singles, but only managed to release one full-length album, 'This Is The Ivy League', as because they preferring writing and producing to touring, Carter and Lewis pulled out of the band, being replaced by Tony Burrows (ex-Kestrels) and Neil Landon (ex-Burnetts). At this time, the band cut the best record 'My World Fell Down', a John Carter/Geoff Stephens composition which Gary Usher and LA group Sagittarius turn into a masterpiece in 1967. The Ivy League toured the UK and Europe unflaggingly throughout 1966 with new backing band The Jaybirds, who later found success as Ten Years After. In the summer of 1967 Carter and Lewis recorded a song they wrote to articulate the sentiments of the flower-power movement, releasing 'Let's Go To San Francisco' under the name The Flowerpot Men', and as there was no real group of this name, they rented out the band name to Tony Burrows, who put together a tour ensemble to satisfy the popular demand generated by the single, which made number4 in the UK charts in September 1967. Although The Ivy League was basically a different group from 1966 onwards, Carter, Lewis and Ford continued to write all their songs, and by the end of 1967 they had released enough material to make up a second album, but as they broke up before that could happen, here is what their sophomore record could have sounded like. 

Track listing

01 Running Round In Circles
02 One Day
03 When You're Young
04 Suddenly Things
05 Our Love Is Slipping Away
06 Rain Rain Go Away
07 My World Fell Down
08 Four And Twenty Hours
09 Arrivederci Baby
10 Tomorrow Is Another Day
11 Willow Tree
12 I Could Make You Fall In Love
13 Tossing And Turning
14 Thank You For Loving Me
15 In The Not Too Distant Future

The Dodos - Yesterday's Coming Fast (1964)

The Dodos third album was also their motion picture debut, with the title track being mainly written by Joseph Lemmon, with great vocal performances by both Joseph and Samuel, and a solid backbeat by Bippo. It was their best single up to this point and went straight to number one both in the UK and the US, as well as other countries around the world. The title was taken from something Bippo had said during a press conference when asked how much longer the band thought they'd have success, to which Bippo said, "Well, alls I know is yesterday's comin' fast, so who knows what today will bring." The b-side, 'This Guy', was also written mainly by Joseph, and is one of his most straight forward love songs to this point, and features a great sax solo by Benji Jones of the Skipping Stones (squashing some of the rumours that the two bands saw each other as enemies, spread by the media). 'I Can Buy Nice Things' was the next single from the album, mainly written by Samuel, with help from Joseph with some of the lyrics and the melody of the chorus. It's all about how the boys might be getting some monetary gains but they realize that it can't buy them love. The song speaks directly to a young woman, asking her if she she'd like to share in the wealth, but her not being impressed. 'Mister Presenter' was a song written by Joseph Lemmon specifically to give Bippo a lead vocal performance on the album, but it ended up becoming a b-side instead. The song is actually quite ground-breaking for the group in many ways. First of all, sonically it is quite bold and inventive, with a mix of instrumentation and musical styles, and some pretty interesting effects and studio tricks. Secondly, lyrically the song is among the first of the more autobiographical that had nothing to do with teenage love. The song is about Lemmon's feelings about how the band were perceived and treated by the established old guard in show business, from television presenters and hosts to radio DJs, all the way to the business men that held their careers in their hands. His frustration is evident, and yet it produced a great piece of art and a real look at the future of where Dodos music would go. The third single from the album was 'Words We Said Today', which was a co-written song by Joseph & Samuel. In later years Joseph would point out that the idea and the majority of the song was Samuel's doing, but that he came up with the bridge and the idea to speed the song up at the end. The rest of the tracks from 'Yesterday's Coming Fast' were made up of early b-sides that were featured in the film, with the disc being their first soundtrack album. 

Track listing

01 Yesterdays Coming Fast 
02 Like The Stars Above 
03 Keep It Comin'
04 Mister Presenter
05 Over The Moon
06 I Can Buy Nice Things
07 Hand In Hand
08 If I Knew 
09 Words We Said Today 
10 Look At Her 
11 Cry Cry Cry
12 Maybe You'll Win
13 This Guy
14 Out Of The Way

Les Baroques - I'll Send You To The Moon (1968)

Les Baroques had been playing around Baarn in the Netherlands since 1959, under various name such as The Modern Teenage Quartet and Hurricane Combo, but they remained unknown until 1965, when the core of guitarist Frank Muyser, organist Rene Krijnen, bassist Robin Muyser, guitarist Hans Van Embden, drummer Raymond Geytenbeek, and vocalist Gerard Schoenmakers (aka Gary O'Shannon) secured a record deal with Europhon Records and released their debut single 'Silky' in June 1965. The group stood out because unlike all other Dutch bands of that time, they sang in good English, which was partly due to Frank Muyser's English mother. Another thing that set them apart was their use of bassoon, which featured on their December 1965 single 'Such A Cad' . They also experimented with other musical instruments, such as the banjo, balalaika and harpsichord, and 1966 saw them release three singles on their new label Whamm Records, as well as appearing at the Grand Gala du Disque. In 1967, Ferdy Karmelk temporarily joined the group, playing guitar, while  Michel van Dijk replaced O'Shannon, who started his own Gary O'Shannon Group. In 1969, after a considerable period of inactivity, the group was in imminent danger of breaking up, although they struggled on with new recruits Ferdy Karmelk, Bart Terlaak Jan Dankmeyer joining the three original members. When the group finally folded, remaining members Jan, Ferdy and Bart changed their name to Island. The career of the group can be neatly split into the O'Shannon-led period, and the post-O'Shannon years, with the difference in the vocals making them sound like two different bands. Their early work is generally regarded as their best, although tracks like 'Working On A Tsjing-Tsjang' and 'Bottle Party' do have their charm. By 1968 they had an impressive body of work behind them, and so they could have released an album had they managed to find a record company to fund it, but it never happened, and so this is what it might have sounded like if it had come to fruition. 

Track listing

01 I'll Send You To The Moon
02 Such A Cad
03 I Know
04 Summerbeach
05 Working On A Tsjing-Tsjang
06 She's Mine
07 Indication
08 Dreammaker
09 Bottle Party
10 When You're Feeling Good
11 Pardon Me I Think I'm Falling
12 Bread
13 My Lost Love
14 Without Feeling Without Mind

Going forward.....

I've been thinking about the blog recently, and the fact that I've posted five or six albums every week for getting on for seven years, which means that I'm now coming up to 2,000 posts. This does mean that I'm finding fewer and fewer actual unreleased albums to post, and those that I do stumble across tend to be from the lesser known artists. I have had a few other concepts running through the years which I was quite pleased with, like ...and on guitar, The Hitmakers Sing, the on-going collection of 60's girl singers who have never had an official compilation, and the b-sides collections of recent indie bands, but I'm also running out of ideas for those as well. The series of albums where I removed extraneous instruments was fun, but was over too quickly, and the series of re-imagined 60's psyche albums is also drawing to a close. As there has only been one comment on the actual music posted for the last fifteen days (thanks LonChes) then I don't know if what I'm posting is of interest any more, and so to give me a bit more free time I'm going to scale back on the posts, to one or two a time, a couple of times a week. I have enough in draft to tide me over for a while, but they do tend to be the more obscure artists who people might not have heard of, so do let me know if these are worth posting, and if anyone has any suggestions for b-sides collections, rarities albums or anything else that they'd like to hear then do leave a comment.

pj  

Chaka Khan - Dare You To Love Me (1996)

In 1992 Chaka Khan released her first studio album in four years, with 'The Woman I Am' being a chart success due to the hit singles 'Love You All My Lifetime' and 'You Can Make The Story Right'. Around this time she also recorded a duet with Peter Cetera on the song 'Feels Like Heaven', which was a minor success, as well as contributing to film soundtracks, and so hopes were high for her next record. Between 1993 and 1995 she recorded a number of tracks for the follow-up album, to be called 'Dare You To Love Me', with a proposed release date of January 1996. However, when recording was complete and it was presented to Warner Bros., they rejected it, citing a lack of commercial viability. This was not the first time the Khan had clashed with her record company, as before 'Dare You To Love Me' was rejected, she had fallen out with them due to fact that the record company execs wanted her to do hip-hop soul tracks like what Mary J. Blige was doing at the time. She refused, saying that if they wanted someone to sing like Blige, then they should've gotten the real Blige. Despite their contention that the songs from 'Dare You To Love Me' were not commercial, they still included six of them on 1996's 'Epiphany: The Best of Chaka Khan, Vol. 1'. This was the last straw for Khan, who then left the label, stating that they had neglected her, and failed to release 'Dare You To Love Me'. Other songs from the sessions, like 'Miles Blowin'' and 'Pain', eventually ended up on the soundtrack albums of the 1993 film 'Sugar Hill', and the 1997 TV series 'Living Single' respectively, but the album itself has remained unheard. 

Track listing
 
01 Your Love Is All I Know 
02 Every Little Thing 
03 Everywhere  
04 Never Miss The Water (feat. Meshell Ndegéocello) 
05 Dare You To Love Me  
06 It Ain't Easy Lovin' Me 
07 Somethin' Deep  
08 Love Me Still 
09 Pain 
10 Miles Blowin'  
11 Don't Take Back (Your Love) 

Neon Pearl - Urban Ways (1967)

Neon Pearl was a short-lived 1960's British psychedelic band comprising Peter Dunton (vocals/guitar/keyboards/drums), Bernard Jinks (bass guitar/backing vocals), Nick Spenser (guitar/harmonium/keyboards), and also Rod Harrison. They were formed to play as a resident band in a club in Germany, but returned to England in late 1967 where they recorded a number of songs, but couldn't find a record label willing to release them. The tracks were demos of the band's live set and display an evocative line in psychedelic rock, with a slight garage psych/folk rock edge, and the drifting guitar work and melodic vocal harmonies make them an interesting collection of songs. They remained under wraps until they were excavated by Acme Records and re-issued as '1967 Recordings' in 2001, and normally I wouldn't post the album if you can still get hold of the CD, but this version is unique to the blog, as Youtuber Rock Fort Launderdale has taken the original tracks and split them out into their various components, and then put them back together using Ableton, bouncing the individual tracks to good old 1/4" tape, to give a remastered stereo version of the album. Although Neon Pearl themselves didn't have a great deal of success, they were a breeding ground for talent who went on to bigger things, with Dunton joining British psychedelic bands The Flies and Please, while Jinks later played in Bulldog Breed, and both went on to join T2, who made one of the most sought-after UK progressive rock albums with 1970's 'It'll All Work Out In Boomland'. 

Track listing

01 Dream Scream
02 Forever
03 Urban Ways
04 What You See
05 Going With The Flow
06 Dream
07 Just Another Day
08 Going Back
09 Out Of Sight

Cirdan - Beyond The Horizon (2015)

Great news for fans of the Dutch progressive rock band Cirdan, as I've managed to track down a copy of their 2015 demo CD 'Beyond The Horizon'. It's another great collection of neo-prog rock, seeing the band finding their feet in composing their own music, and so it includes a couple of lengthy instrumentals, and a rare co-song-writing effort with bassist Rico Janssen, who gets to provide a co-vocal on the title track. 

Track listing

01 Eternal Symphony   
02 Ascend To The Summit   
03 In The Heart Of The City   
04 Eternal Spiral 
05 The Last Hemisphere  
06 Journey Beneath The Waves
07 Beyond The Horizon 

Cliff Wade - Life Story (1969)

Cliff Wade came out of York, England, as part of the mid-60s British soul boom, playing with several early groups including the Misfits, before forming the Roll Movement in late 1965, where he was both the lead singer and lead guitarist. They were good enough to beat Soft Machine into the finals of a 1966 Melody Maker-sponsored competition, ultimately finishing second behind Eyes Of Blue, and this led to support slots for The Who and Cream. The Roll Movement never had a chance to show what they could have done on record, as their sole single, 'I'm Out On My Own', was released on the tiny Go label, and was lost amid the gathering psychedelic haze that spread across music in the second half of 1967. The band eventually split up in the wake of the record's failure, and after a short spell with Cucumber, Wade went to work for independent producer Monty Babson and his corporate operation, the Morgan empire, as a music copyist and jack-of-all-trades on the studio end of the operation, which eventually spawned its own label, Morgan Blue Town. In 1969 Wade began recording under his own name with the Mellotron-dominated psychedelic pop single 'You've Never Been To My House', released on the Morgan's label, and although it sank without trace, over the next couple of years he cut more sides, and also became a singer for an ensemble called Fickle Pickle, who scored a hit in Holland with a cover of Paul McCartney's 'Maybe I'm Amazed'. Wade subsequently bounced around the music business, occasionally performing and recording under his own name and in association with various groups, including the Beaver Brothers, and playing sessions with promising new performers. He also wrote songs with his Beaver Brothers partner Geoff Gill, and enjoyed a hit with 'Heartbreaker', which Pat Benatar took up the charts in 1979, at the outset of her career. Many of the tracks that he recorded at Morgan Studios in 1969 have now surfaced, and if we cherry-pick the best of them we can imagine what a Cliff Wade album could have sounded like in 1969. 

Track listing

01 You've Never Been To My House
02 I See I Am Free
03 Casting The First Stone
04 Life Story
05 Dagger Lane
06 Gonna Meet The Man
07 Shirley 
08 Fern Meadows
09 Sister
10 Rose Village
11 Yes I'm Finding Out
12 I Could Have Loved Her
13 You Should Have Seen Me

Kanye West & Andre 3000 - Life Is Stereo (2023)

While I was researching the recent post from J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar, I found another mix from the same person put together the superb 'The Millennials Folklore' album, and this was an imagined collaboration between Kanye West and Andre 3000. There isn't much to say about this one, other than this joining together of the two rap legends has been talked about for a while but as far as I know has never come to fruition, other than on the 'Donda' outtake 'Life Of The Party'. This recording had it own controversy, with Andre 3000 requesting that his verses be removed from the track after West had decided that he didn't want any cursing on his 'Donda' album. Rather than censor his verse, the Outkast legend offered to have his verse taken off the song altogether, since he didn’t approve of there being a strictly clean version of such a poignant song. The album that was posted by Will On The Soul was only 26 minutes long, which is why I haven't posted it earlier, but after finding a new nine-minute mix of 'Life Of The Party' and slotting that into the running order, we now have a very acceptable 35-minute album. I'm ignoring all the dubious shit that West has got up to over the past few months, as this is all about the music, and the skill that Will On The Soul has shown in piecing this together and making it sound like such a cohesive album. 

Track listing

01 Emotion
02 Ye & Friends (Born in Atlanta) (feat. Playboi Carti)
03 Hope
04 Team On Go (feat. Kendrick Lamar)
05 Skit 
06 Yeshua (feat. J. Cole & Iniko)
07 Exhausted 
08 Life Of The Party
09 Stereo
10 Summer '88
11 No Longer
12 Mountains (Born in Atlanta Pt. 2)

The Chocolate Watchband - Psychedelic Trip (1969)

The Chocolate Watchband was formed in the summer of 1965 in Los Altos, California by Ned Torney and Mark Loomis, who had previously played guitar together in a local band known as The Chaparrals. They were joined by Rick Young on bass, Pete Curry on drums, Jo Kemling on organ, and vocalist Danny Phay, and originally chose the name The Chocolate Watchband as a joke. The band garnered a local following, integrating cover versions of British Invasion groups, particularly The Who, into their live repertoire. Curry was soon replaced by Gary Andrijasevich, a jazz drummer from Cupertino High School, and when Torney and Phay accepted an offer from a rival band, The Otherside, the first incarnation of the band disintegrated. With the first version of the Chocolate Watchband disbanded, Loomis moved on to join The Shandels, but he quickly became disillusioned, and so he took the discarded Chocolate Watchband name and recruited The Shandels' bass player Bill 'Flo' Flores and former Watchband drummer, Gary Andrijasevich. Next he convinced former Topsiders guitarist Dave "Sean" Tolby to enlist, and with David Aguilar as the frontman and lead singer, The Chocolate Watchband Mark II was complete. 

Within a week, the band began performing at local clubs in San Francisco's South Bay, playing a range of songs that included obscure British import tunes that hadn't been released in the USA, so that unlike other local bands who were covering the latest hits from the Top 10, they played songs few people had heard before, and they therefore became associated with the Chocolate Watchband and not the original artists. Six months later, after opening for the Mothers of Invention at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco, music producer Bill Graham urged the Chocolate Watchband to sign a management contract with him. He was opening up a new Fillmore East in New York City, and wanted to shuttle the Chocolate Watchband, the Grateful Dead, and Jefferson Airplane back and forth from coast to coast as his personal house bands. However, they had to turn him down, having signed a management contract with local promoter Ron Roupe a week earlier, and their future followed a different path. Roupe, having secured a recording deal with Green Grass Productions in Los Angeles, introduced the band to producers Ed Cobb and Ray Harris. 

They flew to Los Angeles and entered the recording studio, and Cobb introduced them to a song he had written a week earlier named 'Sweet Young Thing', which was released in December 1966 by Tower Records. Frontman Aguilar began writing material for the band, including their second single, the more restrained 'Misty Lane', backed with a sweet orchestrated ballad, 'She Weaves A Tender Trap'. During this period the band were featured in two Sam Katzman films, 'Riot On Sunset Strip' and 'The Love-Ins'. The band's debut album 'No Way Out' was released in 1967, and shortly after its release Aguilar left for university studies in science, while the other members searched for ways to continue playing music. Loomis and Andrijasevich would depart after Aguilar, leaving Tolby and Flores with the duty of fulfilling a month's worth of bookings. They decided to enlist the services of Tim Abbott, Mark Whittaker and Chris Flinders, members of the San Francisco Bay Blues Band and although they still maintained a level of success, the sound and style differed from the original band. During recording sessions for the Chocolate Watchband's second album, 'The Inner Mystique', the band chafed at Cobb's influence because he presented them as being more instrumentally refined on record than they were live. 

Less than half of the featured studio work was by official members of the band, with the majority of the record featured session musicians, and a singer named Don Bennett contributed vocals on the track 'Let's Talk About Girls'. Abbott and Flinders had a left the group following a disagreement with Tolby and manager Ron Roupe over financial matters, and so a new line-up formed in late 1968 for a short period of time, with Danny Phay, the group's original vocalist in its 1965 inception, re-joining the band, alongside guitarist Ned Torney, while Flores Tolby from the 1967 line-up remained. A third studio album, 'One Step Beyond', was recorded with Cobb again using session musicians, but it was a commercial failure, except for the songs written and sung by David Aguilar that were added to the album from past recording sessions. The Chocolate Watchband finally called it a day in 1970, but previously unreleased material has surfaced over the years and been added to various re-issues of their albums, and this post collects together all those rare tracks, along with a single by the pre-Watchband group The Hogs, their contributions to the soundtrack of 'Riot On Sunset Strip', and some non-album singles and their b-sides.

Track listing

01 Blues Theme (single by The Hogs 1966)
02 Loose Lip Sync Ship (b-side of 'Blues Theme')
03 Sweet Young Thing (single 1967)
04 Baby Blue (b-side of 'Sweet Young Thing')
05 Misty Lane (single 1967)
06 She Weaves A Tender Trap (b-side of 'Misty Lane')
07 Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying (previously unreleased 1967)
08 Since You Broke My Heart (previously unreleased 1967)
09 Don't Need Your Loving (from the soundtrack of the film 'Riot On Sunst Strip' 1967)
10 Sitting There Standing (from the soundtrack of the film 'Riot On Sunst Strip' 1967)
11 Till The End Of The Day (previously unreleased 1967)
12 Milk Cow Blues (previously unreleased 1967)
13 In The Midnight Hour (unreleased single version 1969)
14 Psychedelic Trip (b-side of 'In The Mignight Hour')

Brooke Valentine - Physical Education (2009)

Kanesha Nichole Brookes was born on 5 October 1984 in Houston, Texas, and is better known by her stage name Brooke Valentine. She started her career as a member of the female group Best Kept Secret, but after leaving them, she moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue a solo career, linking up with producer and Subliminal Entertainment CEO Deja the Great, and signing to Virgin Records. Her first single was 'Girlfight', featuring Lil Jon and Big Boi, which was a surprise hit, peaking at #23 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also succeeded internationally, breaking the Top 50 in Australia and Ireland, and Top 40 in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. She then released her debut album 'Chain Letter' in 2005, which debuted at number 16 on the US Billboard 200, and she followed this with another single, with 'Long As You Come Home'. After a collaboration with rappers Fabolous and Yo Yo on the single 'Boogie Oogie Oogie' for the soundtrack to the 2005 film 'Roll Bounce', she started work on her second studio album, 'Physical Education'. The set's lead single 'D-Girl' featuring Pimp C was released later that year, followed by 'Pimped Out' featuring Dem Franchize Boyz, but neither really caught the attention of the public. In 2008 Virgin Records merged with Capitol Records, and many albums were put on hold, including 'Physical Education'. Subliminal Entertainment CEO Deja the Great then acquired the masters and the contract rights from Virgin Records, and material from the project was released independently on the Physical Education Mixtape in 2009. Following this disappontment, Valentine took a break from music, during which time time she gave birth to her first child, a son named London. She did eventually return to the music business with her 2013 EP 'Love Letters', which was released to a positive response, but this post is about that cancelled release, and so here is what would have been her second studio album in 2009. 

Track listing

01 Pimped Out (feat. Chamillionaire)
02 Make It Drop
03 Do Me Shorts
04 Cars (feat. Wifyi)
05 Gold Diggin
06 South Side (feat. The Great)
07 Dr. Do Right
08 Thug Passion
09 Ghettolicious

Idlewild - Great Times Wasted (1997)

Idlewild formed in December 1995 in Edinburgh, Scotland when a 19-year-old Roddy Woomble met drummer Colin Newton at a party. The two discovered that they had much in common, including similar musical interests and record collections, and by the end of the night they had discussed forming a band together. On the same night, the two were introduced to guitarist Rod Jones and the three kept in contact afterwards, meeting up to listen to music. The trio were soon writing songs together, and as they needed a bassist, they brought in Phil Scanlon into the fold as he owned ones. They named themselves Idlewild, after the quiet meeting place in 'Anne Of Green Gables', and after playing their first show in early 1996, they srated gigging around Edinburgh throughout the course of the year. By May the band had over twenty songs written, and so they entered Split Level Studios to record some of them, with the resulting tape earning the band many bookings at various venues around Scotland, including Glasgow. Scanlon decided to leave the band in February 1997 to concentrate on his studies, so Woomble asked Bob Fairfoull to replace the departing bassist, and this new line-up recorded the band's debut single 'Queen Of The Troubled Teens, which was released on 17 March 1997, and built upon the chaotic reputation of their shows. It was supported by BBC Radio Scotland DJ Peter Easton, and influential Radio One DJ Steve Lamacq, who was so impressed with the track 'Self Healer' that he asked on air if anyone knew anything about the band, and that they should contact him. 

In the summer of 1997, Idlewild played their first London shows which were attended by the likes of Lamacq, and representatives from Deceptive Records, and they were later asked to record a single for Fierce Panda, and to record an EP/mini-album with Deceptive Records. In October 1997, the band spent six days with producer Paul Tipler in South London, and the result was 'Captain', which the band describes as "an innocent, frank nugget of noise pop magic". After the release of the 'Chandelier' single, the band signed a deal with Food Records/EMI in December 1887, and the following year was when the public became actively aware of Idlewild, who kicked off the year with their first UK tour, supporting the band Midget. The release of 'Captain', on 18 January, received positive reviews in the NME, Melody Maker and Kerrang!, and in February the band re-entered the studio, again with Paul Tipler, to record their first full-length album for Food Records. Two singles were released before the album's release, 'A Film For The Future' and 'Everyone Says You're So Fragile', and alongside notable appearances at summer festivals the helped expand the group's fanbase. October marked the arrival of their debut album 'Hope Is Important', which was followed by tours supporting Ash, Placebo and Manic Street Preachers. 

Idlewild eventually returned to Edinburgh in 1999 to begin writing new songs, and contacted engineer Bob Weston, who recorded six songs with them in London. These songs held a more aggressive, emptier sound than those previously, and the band were pleased with the results, although they remained unsure of their direction. During the summer they were invited to play at the opening of the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, which was a momentous day for Scottish history. They soon returned to the studio with producer Dave Eringa and recorded 'Little Discourage' and 'Roseability', and being happy with the results they continued to record what would become their second full-length album, '100 Broken Windows'. In March the following year the band released 'Actually It's Darkness', and embarked on their biggest UK tour to date, where it was noticeable that their sound had evolved from simplistic punk-rock to a more mature sound resembling R.E.M., Echo & the Bunnymen, and The Smiths. When it was released in 1999, '100 Broken Windows' reached silver status in the UK and the band went on tour in Europe and North America. As 2001 began, they re-entered the studio, this time with producer Stephen Street, to record songs written in the last half of 2000. In the meantime '100 Broken Windows' was released in America in April, and received other rave reviews in the American press. 

Eventually moving up to the highlands of Scotland, they began writing and demoing songs for the follow-up to '100 Broken Windows', and the remainder of the year was spent recording and mixing the new album in various locations with producer Dave Eringa. The first single from the album, 'You Held The World In Your Arms', entered the UK Singles Chart at number nine, and marked the band's biggest hit to date. On its release in 2002, 'The Remote Part' entered the album charts at number three, and was considered a record of considerable depth, as well as one of the most melodic records of the year. The album went gold in the UK and a third single, 'Live In A Hiding Place', was released as the band embarked upon a four-month European tour in September. In October 2002, Idlewild officially announced the departure of Fairfoull due to "personal problems", with him having become increasingly distant from the band, and his drinking habits were having a negative impact on his bass playing. On 20 November, Idlewild unveiled Gavin Fox of the Irish band Turn as their new bassist, with touring guitarist Allan Stewart also becoming a permanent member of the group. 2002 was Idlewild's most successful year, with 'The Remote Part' entering many 'Best Of The Year' lists, and after its US release in March 2003, the band embarked upon a cross-continent, nine-week headline tour, playing their biggest US shows in New York City and Los Angeles. 

As 2004 began, Idlewild spent the first four months of the year writing and demoing new songs up in the Scottish Highlands, and in Roddy's flat in London, and they then flew out to Los Angeles and spent the next three months recording and mixing the new songs. They finished the record in October 2004 in New York, and after living with the album for a few months, they titled it 'Warnings/Promises' at the end of the year. The first single appeared in February, and 'Love Steals Us From Loneliness' became Idlewild's fourth Top 20 hit, with the album following two weeks later, and debuting in the UK Top Ten. In November, the band announced that they had parted ways with their record company Parlophone after being with them for eight years, leaving them without a record deal, but at the same time denying rumours that they were breaking up. The year ended with a Christmas show at Barrowlands, a famed Glasgow venue and the band's "spiritual home", after which Fox left the band, with Woomble citing his reluctance to be in a touring rock band. The band then spent many months writing new material, which was recorded with producer Dave Eringa in their rehearsal room, and the resultant album 'Make Another World' was released on 5 March 2007 by 1960s label Sequel, which was reactivated by music group Sanctuary. The band continued to play more gigs while working on their next album, and after a new song, 'City Hall', appeared in a setlist, the band entered the studio in January 2009 for more recording. 

On 21 November the band sent an email to fans on the mailing list offering them a chance to pre-order the new album, and those who did would have their name appear in the CD booklet and on a roll call on the band's official website. 'Post Electric Blues' was eventually mailed out on 10 June 2009, two months later than fans had expected, and it was officially released in October, preceded by the single 'Readers & Writers'. In April 2010, Woomble announced that the band would enter a hiatus following the band's tour in support of 'Post Electric Blues', and would not be writing and recording any new material. This lasted until September 2013, by which point Gareth Russell and Allan Stewart had left to be replaced by multi-instrumentalist Luciano Rossi, and they started recording a new album in January 2014, with 'Everything Ever Written' being released in February 2015. Idlewild continue to tour and record new music, with their last album 'Interview Music' appearing in 2019, but their most productive period was the decade between 1997 and 2007, during which time they released over 40 non-album tracks on the b-sides of their singles. This post collects them all together in one place, showing their progression from the edgy and angular sound of their early material, to the sweeping, melodic rock that was displayed on 'The Remote Part' and 'Warnings/Promises'.   

Track listing

Disc I - 1997-1999
01 Queen Of The Troubled Teens (single 1997)
02 Faster (b-side of 'Queen Of The Troubled Teens')
03 Chandelier (single 1997)
04 I Want To Be A Writer b-side of 'Chandelier')
05 House Alone b-side of 'Satan Polaroid' 1998)
06 Mince Showercap (Part 1) (b-side of 'A Film For The Future' 1998)
07 What Am I Going To Do? (b-side of 'A Film For The Future' 1998)
08 Mince Showercap (Part 2) (b-side of 'Everyone Saya You're So Fragile' 1998)
09 Theory Of Achievement (b-side of 'Everyone Saya You're So Fragile' 1998)
10 Mince Showercap (Part 3) (b-side of 'I'm A Message' 1998)
11 This Is Worse (b-side of 'I'm A Message' 1998)
12 (1903-70) (b-side of 'When I Argue I See Shapes' 1999)
13 Palace Flophouse (b-side of 'When I Argue I See Shapes' 1999)
14 Chandelier (10.15 Version) (b-side of 'When I Argue I See Shapes' 1999)
15 A Tone (b-side of 'Little Discourage' 1999)
16 Broken Windows (b-side of 'Little Discourage' 1999)
17 You Don't Have The Heart (b-side of 'Little Discourage' 1999)
18 1990 Nightime (b-side of 'Little Discourage' 1999)

Disc II - 2000-2002
01 Meet Me At The Harbour (b-side of 'Actually It's Darkness' 2000)
02 West Haven (b-side of 'Actually It's Darkness' 2000)
03 Forgot To Follow (b-side of 'Actually It's Darkness' 2000)
04 It'll Take A Long Time (b-side of 'Actually It's Darkness' 2000)
05 There's Glory In Your Story (b-side of 'These Wooden Ideas' 2000)
06 When The Ship Comes In (b-side of 'These Wooden Ideas' 2000)
07 Rescue (b-side of 'These Wooden Ideas' 2000)
08 Thousand (b-side of 'Roseability' 2000)
09 I've Only Just Begun (b-side of 'Roseability' 2000)
10 A Distant History (b-side of 'You Held The World In Your Arms' 2002)
11 I Was Made To Think It (b-side of 'You Held The World In Your Arms' 2002)
12 All This Information (b-side of 'You Held The World In Your Arms' 2002)
13 No Generation (b-side of 'You Held The World In Your Arms' 2002)

Disc III - 2002-2007
01 Poor Thing (b-side of 'American English' 2002)
02 These Are Just Years (b-side of 'American English' 2002)
03 The Nothing I Know (b-side of 'American English' 2002)
04 We Always Have To Impress (b-side of 'American English' 2002)
05 Great Times Wasted (b-side of 'Live In A Hiding Place' 2002)
06 Everything Flows (b-side of 'Live In A Hiding Place' 2002)
07 I Found That Essence Rare (b-side of 'Live In A Hiding Place' 2002)
08 Hold On To Your Breath (b-side of 'Love Steals Us From Loneliness' 2005)
09 Pleasure And Pain (b-side of 'I Understand It' 2005)
10 The Work We Never Do (b-side of 'I Understand It' 2005)
11 The Bronze Medal (b-side of 'El Capitan' 2005)
12 Winter Is Blue (b-side of 'El Capitan' 2005)
13 Lookin' For A Love (b-side of 'No Emotion' 2007)
14 Hidden Ways (b-side of 'No Emotion' 2007)

The Blue Things - One Hour Cleaners (1967)

The Blue Things formed as The Blue Boys at Fort Hays State College, from the remnants of a Hays R&B band, the Barons, who provided Mike Chapman (lead guitar and vocals), Richard Scott (bassist and vocalist) and Rick "Laz" Larzalere (drums and vocals). With a summer tour booked, the trio decided they needed a fourth member, and soon found a lead singer and rhythm guitarist in Chapman's roommate, Val Stöecklein, who had previously released an album with a college folk group, the Impromptwos, and he had also cut a demo of two original compositions, 'Desert Wind' and 'Nancy Whiskey', with another group, the Hi-Plains Singers. On their ensuing summer tour, the band hired Jim Reardon as manager, who in turn got the band signed with John Brown's Mid-Continent Co. booking agency. Reardon used what was left of his old sweatshirt business to manufacture Blue Boys sweatshirts, in addition to starting a fan club, complete with membership cards, and keeping true to their name, the Blue Boys wore matching blue suits and played blue guitars. Although their live set was mostly Top 40 and British Invasion covers, Stöecklein, Scott and Chapman began composing songs for the band to record, which they did in late 1964 at Damon Recording Studios in Kansas City. The five Stöecklein originals and two covers attracted the attention Texas' Ruff Records, who subsequently signed the group to their label. 

In December 1964, the Blue Boys cut their first single for Ruff at Gene Sullivan's studio in Oklahoma City, but before their cover of Ronnie Hawkins 'Mary Lou' could be released in February 1965, they had become The Blue Things, in order to avoid confusion (and possible legal wrangles) with the late Jim Reeves' backing group. The single charted in the Top 40 in Oklahoma City, thanks to local radio station KOMA, and their next single, 'Pretty Things-Oh', was once again a hit in the Midwest. After recording another six-song demo in Texas (this time with only two Stöecklein and one Scott originals), the band left Ruff Records over a royalty dispute. At this point, John Brown managed to get the Blue Things a deal with RCA Records, but before they could record for the label, drummer Rick Larzalere left the band to focus on school, and after several unsuccessful replacements, Bobby Day from Salina, Kansas, was chosen. The Blue Things' first RCA single, 'I Must Be Doing Something Wrong', was written by the three remaining band members, and was released in October 1965. A session drummer was used for the single sessions, as Day had yet to join, but once again, the single charted locally, but failed to chart outside of the Midwest. 

The following single, while repeating the chart action of the band's previous RCA single, at least gained the band some notoriety, as 'Doll House' sympathetically told the story of a prostitute, and criticized the role of brothels in society. Although it was a bold statement at the time, the single struggled after TIME magazine did a feature on supposedly obscene lyrics in rock music, citing 'Doll House' as an example. The album 'Listen And See' was released shortly after the 'Doll House' single from June 1966, and while it was popular with Blue Things fans, by the time it came out the band had moved past the folk rock/Merseybeat sound that RCA favoured, to a more psychedelic sound. Their January 1967 Nashville session, which was to be last with Stöecklein, produced the psychedelic single 'Orange Rooftop Of Your Mind' b/w 'One Hour Cleaners', after which Stöecklein left for a solo career, signed with Dot Records and released the album 'Grey Life' in 1968. The remaining Blue Things moved to California and continued to perform concerts, also signing with Dot Records and touring for 14 months before disbanding entirely. Although they are fondly remembered by fans of 60's folk-rock, and also in their later incarnation by psyche aficionados, their sole album is not really representative of their sound, as 1966 was a transitional time for them, moving from the folk-rock of their early singles to a more mature sound, which was never really evidenced on record. This album is therefore the unreleased follow-up to 'Listen And See', featuring the band's more psychedelic leanings, and could have come out some time in 1967.   

Track listing

01 The Orange Rooftop Of Your Mind

02 Since You Broke My Heart

03 Twist And Shout

04 One Hour Cleaners

05 Can't Explain

06 You Took The Flight

07 Pennies

08 I Can't Have Yesterday

09 Hey Joe

10 Alright

11 Caroline

12 Baby, My Heart

13 Yes My Friend

14 High LIfe

15 You Can Live In Our Tree

Amari - Sunshine (1998)

Amari was an R&B group who were signed to Tommy Boy/Elektra Records in the 1990's, featuring members Sneezy, Sheri and Pooh. They released their debut single in 1998, with 'Callin' (Will You Players Ever Learn?)' featuring on the soundtrack to the US comedy film 'Ride', and attracting some praise from Billboard magazine. They band recorded an album for Tommy Boy in 1998, and a second single was extracted from it, with 'Get Down With Me' also featuring on a film soundtrack, this time for the 1997 thriller 'Nothing To Lose'. Their 'Sunshine' album was due to be released in July 1998, but it seems that the limited success of the singles meant that the record company lost faith in the group, and the album was shelved, but we can still enjoy it for the fun R&B/rap album that it is.  

Track listing

01 Callin' (Will You Players Ever Learn?)
02 You're All I Need (feat. Lost Boyz)
03 Would You Mind
04 What You Gonna Do 
05 Sunshine
06 Funk You Up
07 I Don't Mind
08 Loddi Doddi
09 I Like It
10 I've Heard That Shit Before
11 Get Down With Me (feat. Buckshot)
12 My Own Thing
13 Be Out
14 I See No Reason (feat. Mtume)
15 I Got Love On My Mind

The truth about Cirdan

Hopefully anyone into classic progressive rock has listened to the recent post from Cirdan, so it's now time to come clean about this band. The idea for this album came to me a few months ago, while I was trawling Youtube and I found that a number of people were posting songs created entirely by AI. I searched for progressive rock songs made by AI and found a number of tracks which were quite impressive - apart from some unconvincing lyrics, some of them could have passed for an actual 70's prog rock band. I downloaded my favourites, and visited Youtube regularly for new posts, and before long I had 40 minutes worth of music, so putting it together as an album was a no-brainer. With a bit of editing and tweaking of the running order, I had quite a nice-sounding album, and I named it after the best of the tracks that I'd found online. All I needed now was a name for the band, and so where do a lot of prog rock bands look for their names, but 'Lord Of The Rings'. A quick search of names mentioned in the books found that Cirdan the Shipbuilder had never been picked for a rock band, and so all my album needed now was some cover art. I searched online for AI-generated prog rock album covers, and one Reddit post had a dozen to choose from, so I picked one I liked the look of, and my album was now complete. After playing it for a few weeks, I sent a copy to a mate in the US, longtime fan of the blog Fredrick Beondo, and between us we knocked it into shape, until we had a really convincing prog rock album. Eventually, I thought that it was too good to keep to myself, so I decided to post it on the site, possibly on 1st of April, as that seemed the perfect date for it, but for that I would need a biography of the band. Logging onto ChatGPT, I asked for a biography of the fictitious prog rock band Cirdan, and in less than 10 seconds it had produced a history of a band that never existed. With just the slightest of editing, I was able to post my album of progressive rock, where no human was involved in either the making of the music, the artwork, or the history of the group, other than a few prompts to the AI that made them, and my choosing of the band name. As an example of just what AI can do, this is an extremely interesting experiment, and while I am still in two minds about whether AI is going to be a boon for mankind, or eventually rise up and take us over, the musical side of it is progressing in leaps and bounds, as it stores more and more information from the entire history of music. The worrying thing is, will there soon be a time when a song is released with no human involvement, and no-one will actually be able to tell the difference?

Track listing

01 Nautilus
02 Eternal Wanderings
03 Age Of Wonders
04 For The World Outside
05 Eclipse Of The Mind
06 Where Dreams And Hope Once Danced
07 Just Hold On

Music posted by:
01 NeonCube's Song Factory
02 AI Generated Mega Hits
03 Quadrivo
04 VFOLD
05 Satoritei
06 A-Eye Musix
07 NeonCube's Song Factory

Album cover from Reddit

Biography by ChatGPT

Band name from J. R. R. Tolkien

The Modern Lovers - Dignified And Old (1973)

Jonathan Richman was born in Boston on 16 May 1951, and after he dropped out of school, he whiled away some time in Andy Warhol's formative Factory as a messenger, before returning to his beloved Boston. After seeing The Velvet Underground more times than any of its members, he decided that his future lay in rock 'n' roll, and in 1970 he formed The Modern Lovers. In early 1971, the band's membership was settled as Richman, Jerry Harrison (keyboards), Ernie Brooks (bass) and David Robinson (drums), with Richman's next-door-neighbour and original band member John Felice joining them occasionally as his school commitments allowed. By the autumn of 1971, through their live performances in Boston and New York, they had begun to attract the attention of several record company A&R men, including Stuart Love at Warner Brothers and Alan Mason and Matthew Kaufman at A&M. The band made their first recordings for Warner Brothers at the Intermedia studios in Boston in late 1971. and the following April they travelled to Los Angeles where they held two demo sessions. The first was produced by The Velvet Underground's John Cale for Warner Brothers, while the second was produced by Alan Mason and Robert Appere for A&M. The band were initially undecided over which record company to sign with, so returned to Boston and did some recordings organised by Kim Fowley and produced by Stuart "Dinky" Dawson. Eventually, in early 1973, they signed with Warner Brothers and agreed that John Cale should produce their debut album. 

Returning to California in the summer to work with Cale, it became apparent that there were personality clashes between some of the band members, and that Richman now wanted to take a different approach to his songs, making them much more mellow and easy-paced rather than the earlier aggressive hard rock. The sessions with Cale were terminated before any new recordings were completed, and Warner Brothers then engaged Kim Fowley to work with the band, but by this time Richman refused to perform some of his most popular earlier songs live, and the sessions with Fowley were aborted. Warner Brothers withdrew support from the band, and in early 1974 the original Modern Lovers split up, with Jerry Harrison moving on to Talking Heads. After the split, Richman continued recording on his own, eventually moving to California in 1975 to work with Beserkley Records, but he never returned to the Velvets-inspired sound of the original Modern Lovers. In 1976 Beserkley Records compiled a posthumous LP from the first two demo two sessions, and issued it on their Home Of The Hits subsidiary. The album was simply titled 'The Modern Lovers' and included celebrated tracks such as 'Roadrunner', 'She Cracked' and 'Pablo Picasso'. Richman did not recognise this compilation as his "first album", preferring to consider 1976's 'Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers' as his debut, as it pursued the lighter, softer direction he had in mind with a completely different band. The Modern Lovers have always been considered as an integral part of the start of the US punk scene, alongside Talking Heads, Ramones, Blondie and Television, and so I was astounded to find out that The Modern Lovers pre-dated that scene by a good half decade, and even more amazed that many of those early demos had survived, and so here are the best of them that didn't make that 1976 album, along with a couple of 1971 live recordings, and alternative versions of two that did. 

Track listing

01 Ride Down On The Highway
02 Such Loneliness
03 Womanhood
04 A Plea For Tenderness
05 A Song Of Remembrance For Old Girlfriends
06 Modern World
07 Fly Into The Mystery
08 Hospital

09 Dignified and Old
10 Cambridge Clown
11 I'm Straight
12 Government Centre

Merrell And The Exiles - Let The Time Go By (1964)

Merrell Wayne Fankhauser was born on 23 December 1943 in Louisville, Kentucky, and after his family moved to San Luis Obispo, California while he was in his teens, he began playing guitar, and got his first break playing in movie theaters and talent shows. In 1960, after one of these shows, he joined local band The Impacts as lead guitarist, and their Ventures-influenced sound developed a strong following at the start of the surfing scene. In 1962 he met Norman Knowles, who was the saxophone player from The Revels, and he convinced The Impacts to record a session with Tony Hilder at a backyard studio in the Hollywood area. As much as this seemed like a notable event for the band, it was more of a lure than a lucky break, as after recording twelve tracks, including Fankhauser's own 'Wipe Out', as well as 'Blue Surf', 'Impact', and 'Sea Horse', Knowles and Hilder took the tapes to to Del-Fi Records, where owner Bob Keene signed the album for immediate release as the 'Wipe Out!' album. Knowles and Hilder never revealed to the band how much money they made by doing this, and they also tricked the young band into signing a contract for one dollar, meaning that the band was unable to collect royalties on this music for 36 years, as Hilder and Knowles claimed both artist and publishing royalties with Del-Fi Records. In late 1963 Fankhauser left the band and moved to Lancaster, California, where he met Jeff Cotton (later of Captain Beefheart's Magic Band), and in 1964 they formed The Exiles. 

With the addition of Greg Hampton on drums and Jim Ferguson on bass, they started paying local gigs, and record label owner Glen MacArthur heard them and offered to record them in his Palmdale studio. Their first single under their new name was 'Too Many Heartbreaks', a song that Fankhauser had written in 1961, backed by a new song called 'Please Be Mine', and it was released on Glenn Records in March 1964, reaching number 9 on the local KUTY radio chart. This coincided with The Beatles' invasion of America, and Merrell And The Exiles were the Antelope Valley's answer to them, going on to record five singles for Glenn Records. Later in 1967 Fankhauser moved back to the California central coast, and formed another band with his old guitar playing friend Bill Dodd, who had taken over from him in The Impacts when he left. After playing with several drummers and bass players as Merrell And The Boys, they decided one night that they needed a new name for the band, and as this was the beginning of the psychedelic era, they felt they needed a more far out moniker, so he took the two letters from each band members last name and put them together FA (for Fankhauser), PAR (for Parrish, bass player at the time), DO (for Dodd)  and KLY (for Dick Lee, the drummer), and Fapardokly was the result. He was contacted again by Glen MacArthur who wanted to release an album with some singles and unreleased Merrell And The Exiles songs that he had on the shelf, and so the band drove the two hundred miles from the coast over to the desert and recorded enough songs to complete the album. 

The 'Fapardokly' album was released on UIP Records in 1968, and has since gone on to become one of the most highly sought after and valuable albums from the late 1960's, with a sealed copy going for over $1,000. At the time, however, it was not a success, and so Fankhauser and Dodd then formed another, more overtly psychedelic, band with Jack Jordan on bass and Larry Meyers on drums, naming it HMS Bounty. They won a recording contract with Uni Records, and their self-titled album was released in 1968, followed by the single 'Tampa Run', a remake of another old Exiles song. However, success was again thwarted by personal and record company problems, and the band split up. Reuniting with Jeff Cotton in 1970, Fankhauser then formed Mu, and in 1971 their first album was released and became a radio hit. Increasingly fascinated by legends of the lost continent of Mu, Fankhauser then relocated to the Hawaiian island of Maui in February 1973, where he has continued to record, releasing over two dozen albums as Mu and under his own name. This post collects together some of the recordings that they had made for Glen MacArthur which were not then released as singles on the Glenn Records label, showing that Fankhauser was a prolific writer from the start of his musical career, and they had enough material to be able to release an album as early as 1964 had they wanted.  

Track listing

01 Ready To Roll
02 Run Baby Run
03 She's Gone
04 Long Time Gone
05 Exiles Blues
06 Don't Let Go
07 Remember Me
08 The War
09 Yes I Love You
10 Be A Good Neighbour Week
11 Pain In My Heart
12 Let The Time Go By
13 Let Me Go
14 Shake my Hand
15 Please Be Mine
16 Don't Call On Me
17 Send Me Your Love

Jazmine Sullivan - Break My Little Heart (2004)

Jazmine Marie Sullivan was born on 9 April 1987 in Philadelphia, and her mother was a former backup singer for Philadelphia International Records. She began singing as a contralto in the children's choir, and later in the adult choir, and so her exposure to secular music was initially limited, but despite this she signed a record deal with Jive Records at aged 15, and while there she provided vocals for Kindred The Family Soul's song, 'I Am', as well as background vocals on the song 'Party's Over', and the title track to their 2003 debut 'Surrender To Love'. During these sessions she first met rapper Missy Elliott, who went on to produce the majority of the songs on Sullivan's debut album, which was recorded for Jive, although she did work with producers Cool & Dre on a song titled 'Say I', which was later given to Dre's then-girlfriend Christina Milian for her third album, 'So Amazin''. As well as being produced by Missy Elliott, Sullivan's debut album, 'Break My Little Heart', was to have included vocal arrangements and beat-making credits from the likes of Timbaland, Swizz Beatz, Kev Brown, Cool & Dre, Tweet and Marsha Ambrosius of Floetry, and would be heralded by the Missy Elliott-produced title track serving as the lead single. However, due to lack of promotion and the single falling silent via radio, the album was ultimately shelved, with some of the content intended to be retooled and considered for her official first album 'Fearless', which was released on J Records in 2008. However, in the end only one track survived, with just 'In Love With Another Man' appearing on 'Fearless', meaning that there was a full album of recordings which were scrapped, and have since remained unheard. Sullivan's breakthrough song was 'Need U Bad', which was released in May 2008, and which topped the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs for 34 weeks, leading to the release of the 'Fearless' album in September 2008, and the start of a relatively successful career over the following 15 years. However, the music from that shelved album has remained unheard for many years, and so now is the time to bring it out and to hear what could have been Jazmine Sullivan's debut album in 2004.

Track listing

01 Music, Part 1 (feat. Floetry) 
02 Say I (feat. Dre of Cool & Dre) 
03 Break My Little Heart (feat. Missy Elliott) 
04 Season 2 Love 
05 Where Did He Go? (feat. Missy Elliott & Tweet) 
06 Feel Nice (feat. Missy Elliott)
07 Lovin' You 
08 Backstabbers (Brush Ur Shoulders Off) (feat. Missy Elliott) 
09 Don’t Let Me Get Started (feat. Missy Elliott) 
10 Braid Your Hair
11 The Club
12 Who Said (feat. Cassidy) 
13 Always Have Jazmine 
14 Music, Part 2 (My First Love Mix) 

Cirdan - Age Of Wonders (2018)

Cirdan is a progressive rock band formed in 2013 in the vibrant city of Amsterdam, Netherlands, which draws influences from classic prog acts like Yes, Genesis, and King Crimson, while infusing modern, experimental elements. The band was formed by guitarist Lucas van der Meulen, keyboardist Emma van Dijk, bassist Rico Janssen, drummer Timo Nissen, and vocalist Sanne de Vries. The band name, inspired by a character in J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium (Cirdan the Shipwright), reflected the band’s love for fantastical and philosophical themes. Initially, Cirdan started playing in local clubs, refining their sound by blending traditional symphonic prog with elements of jazz fusion and post-rock. The band’s first release, 'Beyond The Horizon', was a self-produced demo in 2015, which gained them a dedicated underground following due to their high-energy live shows and sophisticated musical arrangements. In 2018, Cirdan recorded their debut full-length album, 'Age Of Wonders', which was met with critical acclaim. The album’s centrepiece was the 15-minute title track, which took listeners on a journey through the depths of space, both metaphorically and musically. The album's success led them to tour across Europe, performing at major progressive rock festivals like the ProgPower Europe Festival and the Meltdown Festival in the UK. The band continues to tour internationally, keeping their fans engaged with both new material and old classics, and plans are in force for a follow-up album to' Age Of Wonders'. The line-up remains largely unchanged, with Lucas van der Meulen and Emma van Dijk still the core songwriters, while Sanne de Vries's haunting vocals continue to be a central aspect of the band's identity.

Track listing

01 Nautilus
02 Eternal Wanderings
03 Age Of Wonders

04 For The World Outside
05 Eclipse Of The Mind
06 Where Dreams And Hope Once Danced
07 Just Hold On

Carol Connors - Big, Big Love (1967)

Carol Connors was born Annette Kleinbard on 13 November 1941 in New Brunswick, and after leaving Fairfax High School, Los Angeles in 1958 she formed a pop vocal trio with her friend Phil Spector, who wrote a song specifically to showcase Kleinbard's singing voice. 'To Know Him Is To Love Him' became The Teddy Bears' best-known and most successful recording, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in late 1958, and granting Kleinbard the honour of being the first woman to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. After their initial hit, the trio disbanded because of the failure of their follow-up singles 'Don't Go Away' and Oh Why', a car accident that injured Kleinbard, and the fact that Spector preferred working behind the scenes to performing. In January 1960 she released the 'Alibi' single on Imperial Records, before legally changed her name to Carol Connors, apparently because she did not want her first name to be associated with Mousketeer Annette Funicello, and she signed to Columbia Records. 'My Diary' was released in March 1961, followed by 'Listen To The Beat' in September, but after one more single she left the label and signed to Era Records. 1962 saw two singles released on the label, with 'Big, Big Love' appearing in July and 'Tommy Go Away' following in November, before another label change to Capitol. Around this time she began writing songs, and in 1964 she wrote 'Hey Little Cobra' about the Shelby Cobra car, which was recorded by The Rip Chords, who were made up of Terry Melcher and Bruce Johnston. 

Buoyed by the success of a car song, in 1964 she released a single promoting the Yamaha motorcycle, with 'Yum Yum Yamaha' being credited to Carol Connors And The Cycles, before returning to her solo career with her only Capitol single 'Angel, My Angel'. In February 1965 she was picked up by Colpix Records for the 'Go Go G.T.O.' single with her sister Cheryl, before releasing her final 7" in 1966, with 'My Baby Looks, But He Don't Touch' appearing on Mira Records. Connors wrote many of her later singles, and so when she stopped recording as a solo artist she wrote and performed songs for several films, including the 1967 beach-party film 'Catalina Caper', performing her 'The Book Of Love' in the movie backed by the Cascades. Later song-writing successes include her co-write with Ayn Robbins and Bill Conti on 'Gonna Fly Now', the theme song from the film 'Rocky', which earned her an Academy Award nomination. She also sang the theme to the film 'Orca', 'We Are One', and co-composed three songs with Ayn Robbins for the soundtrack of the 1977 Disney film, 'The Rescuers'. In 1983 she was nominated for a Golden Raspberry Award for the 'Worst Original Song' for 'It's Wrong For Me To Love You', from 'Butterfly', which she co-composed with Ennio Morricone, but for this post let's concentrate on her best work, which is this great collection of 60's pop. 

Track listing

01 Alibi (single as Annette Bard 1960)
02 My Diary (single 1961)
03 You Are My Answer (b-side of 'My Diary')
04 Listen To The Beat (single 1961)
05 My Special Boy (b-side of 'Listen To The Beat')
06 What Do You See In Him (single with Hank Levine & His Orchestra 1962)
07 That's All It Takes (b-side of 'What Do You See In Him')
08 Big, Big Love (single 1962)
09 Two Rivers (b-side of 'Big, Big Love')
10 Tommy Go Away (single 1962)
11 I Wanna Know (b-side of 'Tommy Go Away')
12 Yum Yum Yamaha (single as Carol Connors And The Cycles 1964)
13 Angel, My Angel (single 1964)
14 Never (b-side of 'Angel, My Angel')
15 Go Go G. T. O. (single as Carol And Cheryl 1965)
16 Sunny Winter (b-side of 'Go Go G.T.O.')
17 My Baby Looks, But He Don't Touch (single 1966)
18 Lonely Little Beach Girl (b-side of 'My Baby Looks, But He Don't Touch')

19 The Book Of Love (from the film 'The Catalina Caper' 1967)