CACTUS — ATCO SD 33-340

Now here’s the kind of album I like to see.

Offkey, out of time, clattering, speeded, clumsy — how can you fault music like that? The instant I heard it I got up and danced a jig.

Cactus is a real wind-up band. No matter how you cut ’em, they can’t lose, because nothing much was ventured in the first place. The formula, see, is take two homeless cats scuffling under the stigma of three years in Vanilla Fudge, bring them in off the street with a guaranteed gig, then find a couple of cats wandering around the Detroit scene, alumni of various bands there. Okay, we gotta group, and even a bonus tinge of the “supergroup” talisman, the hardest part’s over. What about material?

“Uh, how would you boys describe your style? Folk-rock? Acid-rock? Rocknroll Revival... or... ?”

“Man, we play the BLUES, ’cuz that’s where our heads are at, y’know, and ’cuz da BLUES really gets it on, an’ deals with reality, like, uh, drinkin’ muddy water & sleepin’ in a hollow log... However, we’re also gonna evolve, ain’t never gon’ stand still — the BLUES can lead to other things...”

Thus, Cactus, a band in the classic rock V roll mold, with music for TODAY, playing right down with your chops crushed into the street-grit of that old grindstone. The Strawberry Alarm Clock they’re not.

It’s the temper of the time, I suppose. So very little current rock is bearable, and the more seriqus -the intent the less patience I seem to have. Longing for the days of an innocent, imostly meaningless noise, you find yourself never jjuite buying Stage Fright and spending a Whole evening and the next day listening to bubble gum music. As long as they’re no-ktrying to say.anything, as long as their playing gets up and fries to move instead of slumping there in an indecisive puddle or groaning along in slow motion crunches like some clubfooted behemoth, there may still.be some hope-for it. And somewhere, amo'ngst all this ersatz imbecility, just maybe some half-baked adolescent aggregation will rise up to jive with the illiterate and unheavy’d enthusiasm of old.

Cactus isn’t that group by a long shot, but their music is off-hand, sloppy and unpremeditated enough that I kinda like it. Having finally accepted Ten Years After and Led Zeppelin (after all, are either of them gonna come out with Ecology albums with Household Hints for recycling proudly tacked on where liner notes used to be, or start writing songs about the subtle nuances of division between Nixon’s evil pig power structure and our vast festival throngs of beautiful brothers & sisters? Not a chance!), digging Cactus, who are a rather ragtag outfit trotting in Led Zeppelin’s wake like the Baker Street Irregulars, is no great strain. So what if they’re just slightly more musical than a pack of stiff-haired alley cats snarling & clawing next to the din of a metal foundry — I’ve always basicallyliked sheer noise, be it vacuum cleaner or shrill power saw or screaming amps, better than most of the professionally refined pop music going around. Sometimes I just sit back and let Cactus lull me with their sheetmetal drone — better’n Librium.

Cactus’ debut opens with a true prize: a breakneck “Parchman Farm” done so fast they could be a highschool track team ferociously determined to beat that stopwatch and break Ten Year’s After’s inter-league record. These dudes are playing so fast they threaten repeatedly to lose control and tumble into absolute confusion, but somehow they manage to keep their hands on the reins long enough to finish the track (probably because there’s nothing much there to control in the first place — the hysteria of the performance yanks them along, and they couldn’t stop playing if they tried).

Not all the fast songs are that chaotic, unfortunately, but fans discerning enough to have tired of Ten Year’s After’s basically stodgy approach will find plenty platinum in these grooves. While most white blues groups struggle to get their homework down and hold it there like a compass in their guts, first 10 Year’s After and now Cactus had the good sense to realize that any fool can laboriously copy Muddy Waters or B. B. King, and fuming like a yakety noisebox is much more fun, easier and more distinctive too. Also it takes the burden off our Chicago godfathers of having to make albums like Electric Mud — if all white bluesbands played manic noise blues, sullen blues freaks would be forced to listen to those great Chicago Chess sides.

Meanwhile, Cactus can rock on with classics like Bo Diddley’s “You Can’t Judge a Book By the Cover,” which besides having the virtue of sounding nothing like the original boasts some rousing harmonica-cum-leadguitar work that sounds like something you might hear in a local teen club from a group who’d spent much time listening to Five Live Yardbirds, and instead of bothering to plagiarize those old masters as painstakingly as brother bands work on the blues, just got themselves righteously obliterated (so drunk on cheap wine they didn’t know what they were doing would be good) and got on that stage and ground out their crude reflection of that Yardbirds music which, though avant-garde in its own time was itself notably sloppy and out of tune.

From aping stars and woodshedding with their styles it’s just one stunningly simple step to actually writing your own originals! Dig Cactus’ “Let Me Swim” — a mechanical two-chord guitar riff used by every group in the Sixties, a few notes going up and down just a few short steps on the scale — no Burt Bacharach arty stuff for us! — and for the melody, a few words yanked out of the random air: “Let me swim in your ocean, mama - see how good it can be!” Voila! A right-on rocknroll original! And with almost no wasteful expenditure of time, concentration or effort. No pain-in-the-ass Juilliard courses necessary! Of course, there are going to be lots of cynical, malicious people — critics, professional iconoclasts, musical purists who’ll revile and make fun of it and say it’s nothing just because it sounds exactly like a million other groups’ riffs. But fuck them! There’s also always somebody like Lester Bangs who’ll come along and like it, no matter how banal it is, as long as it’s done with a certain rattly flair.

And as for those aforementioned snobs who’ll hold their noses & mutter: “Ugh . .. noise!,” we should win at least a few more of them over with our occasional beautiful ballads. We don’t want the boys to write many because they’re basically a tough, get-it-on kind of gang, & we don’t want too much love mush to make ’em soft. However, even though their music be as hoarse and mechanical as musics come these days, they’ve proved they do have the tender hearts of poets beneath all that wire and chainmail. Just listen to “My Lady From South of Detroit,” a ballad in the great tradition that goes back to the madrigals of Arthurian England, and you’ll get the picture.

So, to conclude, I don’t see how Cactus can be anything but a solid success. Worthy challengers to TYA & the Zep, the little chickies will love them and their shiny clothes, the kids will pack the halls, gobble sacramental Seconals in prepartation for the rites and shove each other right up to a stageside crunch of bodies & bad air so’s to be as close as inhumanly possible to their beloved and ever-loving heroes. Everybody should be happy enough with all that that the cash won’t stop flowing in for a year or so, by which time next fall’s models will be undergoing final groomings anyway, so both Cactus and their fans will have had a (well, almost) free ride and another page in the history of rock ‘n’ roll is turned.

Lester Bangs

96 TEARS — ? AND THE MYSTERIANS -CAMEO/PARKWAY

BROWNSVILLE STATION - PALLADIUM P 1004

LOVE IS ALL AROUND ft THE TROGGS -FONTANA SRF 67576 MONGREL K BOB SEGER SYSTEM -CAPITOL SKAO 499

CRABBY APPLETON - CRABBY APPLETON - ELEKTRA EKS 74067

Each of these albums is part of the quest; they’re some of the finest manifestations of 1965 rock and roll inside 1968-70 albums. Some of it comes through a strange polarity, like the way “She’s Not There” by the Zombies or “The Game of Love” by the Mindbenders affected me at sixteen, fifteen, fourteen, can be the way “Upper and Lower Egypt” or Meditations or Ascension can do it now. And the way a killer ballad like “Sunny” by Bobby Hebb (the killer ballad of ’66) seems to fit right in there alongside Trane’s “Welcome” from Kulu Se Mama. “Welcome” is a single, it’s a hit, you know? I like that kind of music, that is urgent on the radio and you don’t forget it once it’s inside your head.

But it comes from stone simplicity too, the way I think (pretty sure) Miles Davis or Trane were simple, simple in purpose, simple in energy, not simple in thought; you dig, I bought a copy of the Troggs’ “Wild Thing” and took it home and played it and Hendrix BLEW IT RIGHT OFF THE STEREO. But (and this coincidence actually happened, you could ask anybody here) when we wuz drivin’ to the Eastown THAT VERY SAME NIGHT, “Wild Thing” by the Troggs came on and by god, IT WAS ONE OF THE HIGH POINTS OF MY ENTIRE CAREER as a drunken typist for this rag. And the MC5 sure did steal “I Want You Right Now” from the Troggs but you should hear their Love Is All A round album (o.k. now I’m gonna type that up there at the top, along with the ? and the Mysterians thing and we’ll have a FIVE album review, o.k.?)

See this started out to be real simple, I wanted to talk about Crabby Appleton and how great their first hit “Go Back” was and their new one about how “Lucy” tastes real good (just like in “Sock It to Me” or somethin’) and how their occasional pretensions to being actual musicians could be forgiven, cause we all know that, in rock and roll, the most important thing is TO PUT UP A GOOD FRONT and, besides even more than that, Micheal Fennelly had a real cool name and a voice to match. “All My Friends” I like, it’s better than Cocker’s Ringo rip-off and the lyrics are nice. They’re Amerikan and you know how Amerikan I am, I almost seem to disarmingly not like British music no more (ha, ha, except of course the Kinks and the Stones and the Troggs).

The thing about Crabby is that there aren’t very many rock and roll bands around anymore who do 1965 and 1966 stuff... Crabby Appleton is real good and they’re new. Bob Seger is older but also better.

I heard the first Bob Seger record there ever was in a drugstore at ten o’clock on a Saturday morning and boy, was I excited. It was called “Persecution Smith” and god only knows what happened to it. But it was kind of like Bob Dylan’s “Let Me Die In My Footsteps” with an amphetamine guitar riff you would not believe, to this day I can’t get that song out of my mind and I still can’t quite remember the lyrics but it was far out. I always thought of Lil Abner whenever 1 heard it, it was that long ago, about five years, Al Capp was still a liberal (Punch Andrews IS still a drunken frat which is maybe why his bands are so great) and the band then was Bob Seger and the Last Heard and they used to play out by Waterford at Silver Bell which is where Jon Landau co-discovered the MC5 and also at the Hullabaloo club which was either right in Waterford or else in Clarkston, I’m not sure anymore and I was probably too drunk anyway, but they used to play there and all the kids liked them a lot.

Bob Seger then went on to do many records that thrilled me (but none as much as “Persecution Smith”), some of the names of them were “Heavy Music”, “Lucifer”, and “2 + 2 = ?” which should actually be called “2 + 2 Is On My Mind”. He was killer and by the looks of his new record he still is. We stapled a copy of his two songs, “Highway Child” b/w “Big River” to the last issue, you should get a copy of that CREEM for that alone, also you should get this album, if you’ve gotten this far.

This new one can do it to your head just real mice and all but I especially like “Highway Child” ’cause it talks about “I seen ’em. *;4 send up John Sinclair you know 2 joints is all it takes” which is true and also how much me and him and Rudnick and Joel and Janie have all been busted for. But they got Pun and Gary in Traverse City for less than that fi| however, they’ll never get Punch. That’s o.k. I just want the tunes, mostly, even though the social consciousness helps a lot.

I should say somethin’ about Bob Seger’s lyrics here cause it fits right in, right in CONTEXT, and don’t ever forget that word. I haven’t ever since I stumbled over my first issue of Crawdaddy! and that was a long time ago. Do you realize that it is over five years since “Satisfaction” was a hit? But his lyrics are just fine, real fine, I was gonna say they were latent but they’re not, they’re mainstream Amerikan and I love ’em. I love in “2 + 2” where he sings about how they’re gonna kill us all and not only that I believe him a whole lot, too. “I seen ’em send up John Sinclair”! He wasn’t even there but the other side of “2 + 2” is called “Death Row” and George Jackson would even like that one, even Bobby Seale.

You see if you had to deal with actual music with these words, you would go “PRETENTIOUS!” and “shit” but this way, you can dig it without nothin’ in the way.

Bob Seger also has a brother band named Brownsville Station whose first album is No. B.S. Right fucking on! (It isn’t.) (But it is right fucking on.) They do the best“Roadrunner” since the Pretty Things and that’s really goin’ back a long way. Warner Bros, has scarfed these dudes up so you will undoubtedly know soon where to find this, but if I was you I would buy it in a drugstore like you were meant to. Unless you know a gas station that carries records. I met Cubby a couple of times and, besides lookin’ like Russ Gibb, he has good stage presence and I thought the riff was gettin’ a little worn until I heard the record and realized that what they were doing was not a parody of 1956 rock and roll but a parody of 1966 or 65 rock and roll, and goddam! It’s a bit like the Grail, you know, they finally hit what Joe Landowand the MSea Fife and Drum Corpse and the Flamin’ ; Groobies and Sharnarnar ' couldn’t, dig it? They also have the best soiig titles, there’s one of theirs called “Cadillac Express” and better than that even is “Do the Bosco”. That’s like havin’ ah album with Rootie Kazootie on the cover arid someday they will. Also, 1965 is* better than 1956 or even 1967 even if it ain’t as good as, say, Paris in the thirties.

The first time I ever saw these guys was the second day (I think) of the first rock and roll revival of the world in Detroit, June 1, 1969 : and they were the only ones who actually 1 revived anything except the MC5 and the Stooges, even Chuck Berry fucked up (Sun Ra was actually more notable for his. inter-galactic slide show). And they ended up with the killer “Rumble” that ends this record and dedicated to John Sinclair who was there, in the flesh with his shit together.

Now the Troggs. “Love Is All Around” I like very much because it reminds me of “Witchi-Tal-To” in the beginning and later of “Angel of the Morning” which was done by : Angel Food McSpade or somebody and was also great. Sometimes I think Peter Townsend and the Who also stole many riffs from the Troggs but can I be sure? “Gonna Make You” sounds sorta like the Pretty Things with adenoid trouble singing “Not Fade Away” for the second time' in an evening. Also, it sounds something like the Kinks and Them and the Zombies, 1 could think of more and 1 will if I think hard enough. Remember “Do Wah Diddy” by Manfred Mann? “Any Way That You Want Me” was also written and composed separately two other times, once by Tom Rapp arid once by Lou Reed. This is not the best version. But, until Jeff Beck covered Rapp’s ESP version it was.

“66-5-4-3-2-1” was written right after the

second tailed cleft palate operation on the Troggs lead vocalist Reg Presley, who also wrote it It gets better in the middle though, right after he blows his nose. One of the best lines in history comes in on the second side —! “Your socks are low and your hips are showin’ ”, in “I Can’t Control MyselF’. (Also, a great title, you should buy this album soon, you could learn a lot about Led Zeppelin from it)

As you may or may not’ve noticed in their big hit, “Wild Thing”, the Troggs also super-understand sex. I like that, too. Good. That leaves only ? and the Mysterians and the best thing about that record is that the two great Michigan/Mexican compositions “96 Tears” and “8 Teen” are the last and first songs on the second side and they will blow your mind, respectively. Also that there is not one member of the Grand Funk Railroad listed on the back of this album and that should undermine their super-group complex sufficiently.

Fuck Terry Knight! Seize the Time! Bring Back Rock and Roll! Off Music/Kick Out the

Dave Marsh

ARETHA FRANKLIN - SPIRIT IN THE DARK - ATLANTIC SD 8265

One shof singer Arthur Conley knew what he was talking .about 4*hen he-asked:

“Do you like good music?

That sweet soul music? .

Yeah, yeah! Yeah, yeah!”

Man there’s nothing sweeter than. When it’s done right. And since she first burst out with her gospel-tinted blues, there’s been no one sweeter than Aretha Franklin. (Sister Re in experience circles?) ■

After a fallow period of trying to pull “Eleanor Rigby1! out.' Of its 1000th soul rendition (in the firstperson yet) the lady came up with the best rhythm arid blues single followed by the tightest, most soulful lp I’ve heard since the Four Tops became Sammy Davis Jr. in four part harmony, the Temptations became Sly and the Family Stone and the Supremes became the Andrews Sisters.

Like the Beatles or Dylan, Aretha is one of those few whose music chronicles her musical life. Listening to her old gospel lps, brie gets the feeling of that hot, Store-front Baptist church and all those rotund women in their tight blue dresses and massive hats ‘gettin’ the feelin’’. When she sang “I Never Loved A Man”, you could feel just what made her stay with her ex-husband, Ted White, in his “Chain of Fools”.

One can even tell when she didn’t know where she was going, when she was singing what other people wanted her to sing, like “Eleanor Rigby”. But now something happened. Something good, ’cause she’s gone somewhere and gotten herself straight and come back Afro-coiffed with fox fur around her neck. She takes this album so far back down home, you can “taste the pork and beans on her breath.”

To go through the lp and dissect it would be wrong, for it isn’t just a bunch of good singles thrown together, it’s a tight solid album. However, there are a few things that have got to be mentioned. First is the best single she’s had since “Baby I Love You”, “Don’t Play That Song”. For all my non-malicious chauvinism, 1 hate to see a woman done wrong, and when she sings “I remember on our first date, you kissed me and walked away”. Ow! It goes right through, like “the hawk.”

“The Thrill Is Gone” and ‘Try Mattys” are alone reasons to buy this album (for God’s sake, do!). The first one is a remake of a recent B. B. King number (she also does “Why I Sing the Blues”) and though since I was six years old, I never thought anybody could outshine B. B. I’ve got to give this one to the

‘Try Matty’s” is one of her own and I’m not sure what it’s about, because I haven’t stopped shakin’ my head long enough for my ears to focus on the words. What I do know about it is that her piano playing is so fine that it runs me right around the room.

The last time I saw Aretha was on the Tonight show in October. That’s when I figured if there was a Judy Garland of soul music, it would have to be Aretha because for all hew slow down and comebacks I swear that she’s the best thing this little boy has ever heard. Mmmhmm, the thrill will never

Richard A. Pinkston IV

HOLLYWOOD DREAM - THUNDERCLAP NEWMAN - TRACK SD 8264

This is the kind of record you know has to be a joke. and. when you find out Peter Townshend produced it (or got anywhere near) you know what kind. Couple that with the fact that it is the second album ever to be released on Track in this country, and coupled with that is the truth that the other Track record was called The Crazy World of by Arthur Brown. That’s not to say that “Fire” is as good as “Something In the Air”, but “Spontaneous Apple Creation” mostly beats the shit out of the rest of this album.

Unlike the Brown group, where Brown was the primo weirdo with no competition (this is before the Stooges and Iggy wasn’t in the band anyway), these dudes all compete with one another for levels of bizarrity. Thunderclap his self is about 45 and smokes a pipe and listens to Bix Biederbecke records (I hate big band music so much I hope that’s spelled wrong) and plays things on this record like Japanese battle cymbal and three soprano saxophones in harmony. He also plays 3 Bengali flutes in harmony, even though this group is crazy enough on their own without resorting to gimmickry.

Speedy Keen sings and plays drums and also writes the tunes, most of which are kind of dumb but some of which are tremendous. Now “Hollywood No. 1” is a problem since it doesn’t seem to fall into either of the above categories. Perhaps its dumbness is so tremendous that it’s tremendousness is dumb. Because it sounds like what I would hear on one of those nine a.m. movies if I had a tv and not a record player, ’stead of vice versa.

Jimmy McCulloch is only in this band because (even though he’s only 13) he had to play in order to support his father, who used to be Keith Moon’s chauffeur. All of the guys really like him, they even gave him the royalties on “Hollywood Dream (Instrumental)” which has already been played on Radio Geronimo once. That’s on stage; but later on, in the dark of night, they’re really mean to him and make him polish Andy (that’s Thunderclap)’s Indian fingercymbals and wax his. Chinese Temple Block.

Stilly ole Thunderclap and the fellas can bounce back; after the enchanting boredom of “Wild Country”, they come at ya with “When I think of all the times you’ve saved me/From completely blowing out my brain/When I think of all the things you gave me/By myself, I’d think I’d go insane”. Even though the rest of “When I Think” is terrible, that’s the best verse I’ve heard in hours.

And this is really the only band that could’ve done “Something In the Air” and gotten it into two of the worst movies in history (“Magic Christian” and “Strawberry Statement”). Yes, indeed, this is the band’s theme song, ok, “Block off the streets and houses*... Hand out the arms and ammo, We’re going to blast our way through here.”

I wish there was a Liverpool dream, just like there used to be.

Dave Marsh

MELANIE - LEFTOVER WINE - BUDDAH - BDS 5066

To be perfectly honest, I can’t say that I’ve been a great fan of Melanie’s. But, continuing in this honesty, I can’t say that I took a great deal of time to listen to her, either.

I recall seeing her on a local television show where she sang in that unmistakable voice. A voice that can sound like a whimpering five year old child, one moment and a very old woman with a severe chest cold, the next. Somehow, I could picture her turning to the camera, at the completion of her song, and saying in a deep, throaty voice, “I vant to be alone” 5-? then sulking off, like that mysterious Hungarian actress whose name I can’t think of.

To my surprise, I found that Melanie Safka was born and raised in New York City (not Hungary); speaks in a light, pleasing voice (with no accent); writes most of her material herself; and on a close camera shot, displays an adorable, cherubic face (very pretty).

I remember that her version of “Mr. Tambourine Man”, from her first album (BDS-5024), got fairly good air-play and, in my opinion, was a fine interpretation of Dylan’s classic. I remember “Beautiful Peo** pie”, from her second album (BDS-5041) a'nd, of course, her big hit single “Lay Down (Candles In The Rain)” with the Edwin Hawkins Singers. Still, in the field of female artist’s, musically and lyrically, I was into Laura Nyfo and for just plain singing a song the way it should be sung, I guess I’d have to say Linda Ronstadt tops the list. As far as I was concerned, Melanie’s place in my head remained undefined.

I read about Melanie’s concerts Where fans would storm the stage during her performance and shout out their love for her; how they would bring her flowers and gifts. A friend of mine who had been to one of her concerts . described her as a “junior Judy Garland”, in the devotion she brings forth from her audi-

Then, there was this summer — “festival summer ’70”. And there was Powder Ridge; and injunctions and counter-injunctions; and bad acid and bad trips; and frustrations and no entertainment — except for Melanie who performed without pay, with no publicity and with an obviously great love for all the kids

Melanie was, slowly, beginning to assume a meaning for me and I was anxious to hear her first live album, Leftover Wine. The L.P. was recorded at Carnegie Hall, although this information appears only in the liner notes. The front cover of the album states: Recorded Live At Margie’s Birthday Party and, in fact, the record is dedicated to Margie English who wrote an article on Melanie for Look Magazine. Margie also wrote the liner notes for this album.

Leftover Wine opens with “Close To It All,” a song in which Melanie urges her audience to “tear down your walls” and get close to each othei; In “Close To It AD” Mealnie also expresses her own dreams and that sense of vulnerability which is present in so much of her work, once again comes throughMelanie, then, explains that she’s extra nervous about performing in New York, where she grew up. She feels there might be people in the audience she knew, during some part of her life. This leads into “Uptown And Down.” Again the vulnerability is there, as the song tells the story of a young girl, on her own in New York, who puts up a hard front of indifference merely to cover up her deep inner insecurity.

Without introduction, Melanie goes into the penetrating “Momma Momma.”

Momma, Momma

1 fear you reared me wrong.

Sometimes 1 feel

My life has come and then it’s gone.

I live in this world,

But I’m only looking on.

This particular selection denotes the lost, child-like confusion of many of Melanie’s songs.

Melanie then raps about her liking for New York and the East Coast (as opposed to the West Coast), because of the changing seasons which bring back memories and she introduces a new song “The Saddest Thing.” As Melanie sings the saddest thing “is to say good-bye to the ones you love,” she manages to convey a genuine feeling of loneliness and loss. When this song reaches its end, there is a cry from the audience for “Beautiful People.” Then, some guy hollers out, “We love you.” This brings approving cheers from the rest of the audience and Melanie says, “1 never really get sick of singing this song. I’m amazed because I’ve really sung it a lot.” With this as an introduction, Melanie bends to the audience’s wishes and goes directly into “Beautiful People.” I’ve always regarded this as a very naive song - a lovely thought, but so overly simplistic. But the rendition which Melanie delivers on this album, before a live audience, is really very moving. You can almost feel her reaching out to take your hand. She makes it work beautifully.

Closing out side one is “Animal Crackers,” a Melanie-classic which, I must confess, I had never heard before. The title, alone, turned me off. I mean, a title like this belongs in the Tiny Tim Songbook. But, once more, Melanie surprised me. She worked in lyrics about how her mother told her to eat her animal crackers because children were starving in Europe and Asia, but all that happened was - she got fat. At one point in the song, Melanie forgets the words, but she’s quickly reminded by a member of the audience and picks it right up again. As side one finishes, it becomes quite apparent that Melanie is a performer who doesn’t work to an audience, but rather works with an audience to achieve that very special feeling of unity and togetherness. .

Side two begins with Melanie talking about a recent visit to Columbus, Missouri and a cow she met there. She wrote a song for him or, as Melanie herself puts it, “I wrote it, really, for all the cows.” The song (as you may have guessed) espouses Melanie’s vegetarian diet and is entitled “I Don’t Eat Animals” -that’s laying it on the line, alright.

I don’t eat animals,

And they don’t eat me.

1 don’t eat animals

I want nothin’ dead in me.

Melanie, then, announces that this isn’t really a concert; but rather, a birthday party for her friend, Margie. And, everyone gets together to sing “Happy Birthday.” Yes, it’s very corny, but Melanie carries it off extremely well.

The next cut on the album is “Tuning My Guitar.” I had heard this song before, but hadn’t realized its impact. This is a powerful song about the people who make their living off the talents of others. Melanie sings with an almost vengeful intensity.

They hide behind my curtain,

And they hope that I’m a star.

In this age of the rip-off and shadowy figures behind the scenes, “Tuning My Guitar” takes on added relevance. (Shades of Powder Ridge.) This song brings the loudest and longest cheers of the concert.

The heavy mood of “Tuning My Guitar” is broken by a delightful song, entitled “Psychotherapy.” Here, we have one of the best examples of Melanie’s wit and humor; as she adapts her own lyrics to the tune of “The Battle Hymn Of The Republic.”

Glory, glory psychotherapy,

Glory, glory sexuality;

Glory, glory now we can be free,

As the id goes marching on.

Freud’s mystic world of meaning,

Needn’t have us mystified;

It’s really very simple,

What the psyche tries to hide;

A thing is a phallic symbol,

If it’s longer than it’s wide;

As the id goes marching on.

Melanie gets the entire audience to clap and sing along on the chorus of ths number. It’s a real good-time piece and one of the best things on the album.

“Psychotherapy” was apparently scheduled to be the final song of the concert, but the applause roared on and the people mounted the stage asking for more. Suddenly, some fellow screams, “Peace” into an open microphone and the crowd seems to be surging all over the stage chanting for Melanie to come back. Finally, Melanie reappears and from within the midst of the crowd, sings the album’s title song “Leftover Wine.” It’s a song about the loneliness that sets in after the show is over and all the people have gone;.and all she’s left with is the leftover wine. It’s another song that casts Melanie as the vulnerable innocent, afraid and unsure. At this song’s finish, the concert comes to an end, with applause and cries of, “We love you, Melanie” filling the air.

The “live” concert is over, but the album still goes on. For the final cut on the record is a studio-recorded version of “Peace Will Come (According To Plan),” which just happens to be Melanie’s latest hit single. I guess the people at Buddah thought the album needed the inclusion of a hit single, in order to sell. They may be right, from a sales point of view; but artistically, the “live” concert stands up very well on it’s own.

As for Melanie, her place in my mind is now clearly defined. Like the title of her first album suggests, Melanie was, simply, born to be. Born to be trusting and innocent, not naive and unknowing; born to be a beautiful person; born to be a good and close friend. I think of her this way.

Mike Monahan

SOFT MACHINE THIRD*SOFT MACHINE - COLUMBIA G 30339

This is the third Soft Machine effort and their most ambitious and, in the large sense, most successful, to boot. Moving away from the vocal scattings and whines that marred their first two efforts, the group has expanded to include flute, sax (saxello?), occasional trombone and violin, as well as other occasional reeds.

Still, the primary emphasis is on an electric rhythm section, leading to inevitable, unfortunate (for Soft Machine) comparisons to Miles Davis’ recent masterworks. The lack of a lead guitar leads them still further from rock though the oft-times over simplistic drumming tends to be their biggest detriment and it comes straight from rock. Robert Wyatt simply doesn’t have the force to control and move this band, the way that Tony Williams moves the Lifetime or deJohnette moves Davis’ group. And, on the one cut where he attempts, his vocal is a dog-like wail that simply can’t cut it.

For three sides what we have is pretty much adventurous stuff for a bunch of British boys (only Colosseum seems even interested in jazz, aside from rancid big band tunings, over there ... Jack Bruce excepted) even if it

ain’t too adventurous in the context of jazz. The Soft Machine, with a drummer such as Colosseum’s Jon Hiseman, could be quite incredible. Lyn Dobson’s soprano work, though it shows the heavy amount of influence Coltrane and Shorter have made on that most eerie of all horns, is evocative and interesting, like Coltrane moving through a post-bop “My Favorite Things”. Elton Dean’s work on the alto is adequate though one must continue to wonder what the hell a saxello is.

Keyboard man Mike Ratledge’s compositions seem the most successful, encompassing all of sides two and four (“Slightly All the Time” and “Out-Bloody-Rageous.”), each with an electronic .opening so subtle that you’re given over to wondering whether or not the needle is tracking. Dobson again impresses, this time with his magic flute, on “Out”, while the entire band looks desperately for the kind of pitch that Coltrane found in Ascension; it never reaches that level of intensity, nor is the energy level ever so sustaining but they do provide a nice base to explode out of with a Zappa-like theme that ups everything once

For all that, the Soft Machine could’ve easily done with two sides. The Wyatt composition could and should have been eliminated, despite the fact that he is one of the original members of the group (the others are Ratledge, Hugh Hopper [who wrote the side one composition, “Facelift”] and Kevin Ayers [now with the Whole World in Britain]). The theme of Ratledge’s “Out-Bloody-Rageous” is a straight cop from Zappa, though Dobson and Dean save it with some interesting improvisations. Yet, that’s the one cut that is consistently exciting.

For once and for all,jazz maniacs are going to have to insist that they get to hear these tunes on the radio. What with Colosseum, Tony Williams’ group, the Stooges’ second side, Miles and now Soft Machine (along with Fourth Way and the like) there’s sufficient evidence that this music is viable, in fact more viable than ever.

Essentially, you’d still be better off buying Ptah, the El Daoud or one of Miles’ or Pharoah’s crushers though. The Soft Machine is moving in the proper direction but they still haven’t reached it.

Dave Marsh

(UNTITLED) - THE BYRDS (COLUMBIA G-30127)

Where Byrds-music is concerned, I scream so loudly 1 feel like a paid heckler. But that’s natural. For the truly dedicated Byrds-freak, and I number myself among the most rabid of these, there is only one pleasure greater than hearing a Byrds-album for the second or second-hundred time, and that is hearing a new one for the first time. (Untitled) is the Byrds 10th album (a double set, half-‘live’, half-studio) — which is a tribute not only to their longevity but also to the magic, vitality, and sweet-sounding music they have managed to create so consistently. As uncompassionately as possible, they out-do themselves on it — even for me.

What the new album tells me is:

1. The current Byrds (McGuinn,'Skip Battin, Clarence White, Gene Parsons) are a “group,” for real, and not merely a better, brighter, cleaner extension of McGuinn’s eloquent ego.

2. The Byrds remain one of the most genuinely creative studio bands in the history of rock. Their performances are just about perfect.

3. Their live performances, however, still have an inconsistency that leads from brilliance to • choppiness, to oppressiveness, to sluggishness, and only sometimes make it back to brillance.

4. Their new music is “different,” and yet inter-connected with everything they’ve done before: it has assumed an identity, a curious mixture of McGuinn’s driving, buoyant, and maddening genius, rhythms surging just like a benign machine set in perpetual motion, synthesizing folk, rock, and country music with a freshness and spirit all its own.

5. Anything I could possibly write about (Untitled) will be more love letter than re-

6. But there is nothing I can do about it. Byrds-music corrupts my critical sensibilities (as they are), and absolutely beautiful Byrds-music like most of this corrupts them absolutely.

Probably, the best, least passionate, etc. way to get on with this is in a series of additional, random notes. (Let us be terse.)

7. Without Skip Battin, who has been with the Byrds for about a year now (setting some sort of endurance record for Byrds’ bassists), the album would never have reached the heights it does. In countless subtle ways, his playing rivets your attention. He gives the light, sweet Byrds-music body, balance, and rich detail, and with nary a false move goes through his many changes so quickly and expertly that he might well qualify for the pc'2 position at the Indy 500.

8. Parsons (drums) and White (lead guitar) are both perfect (too), but bassists never get the praise they deserve. Usually, they just stand around, in the shadows, open-jawed. Battin doesn’t. Postscript: Clarence coos “Truck Stop Girl,” and plays mandolin and sings the stone-mallow “Take A Whiff.” A few too many whiffs here.

9. “Well Come Back Home,” one of a trio of songs Battin had a hand in, is really a series of short songs (rather, types of songs) within a longer one. At just under 8 minutes, it’s the longest Byrds studio track yet, and moves easily from country-flavored sweetness to complicated cosmic chant. It has the Byrds traditional sense of form, propulsion, and continuity, and though it has every opportunity, it never assaults us with extravagant, superfluous rock music.

10. At just over 16 minutes, the ersatz “8 Miles High” on the live album is extravagant and superfluous, as are the re-hashes of ‘Tamboring Man” et al.

11. Of McGuinn’s 4 songs from his unproduced musical, ‘Trypp,” “Chestnut Mare” hits you first, being the prettiest, nicest, most easily-assessible, easy-to-hum-along-with, most-difficult-to-sing-whilst-keeping-yourwind creation of his tireless, elever, very romantic mind. It’s about a mare, with a spirit all its own, and moves, like most Byrds-songs, to religion and harmony with the universe, one’s-own-head and the land. “Just A Season” is almost as nice; “All The Things,” nearly as pretty; and “Lover of the Bayou” (the only together song on the ‘live’ LP) really rocks.

12. ‘The question of leading tone came up in the class in experimental composition that I give at the New School. 1 said, ‘You surely aren’t talking about ascending halfsteps in diatonic music. Is it not true that anything leads to whatever follows?’ But the situation is more complex, for things also lead backwards in time. This also does, not give a picture that corresponds with reality. For, it is said, the Buddha’s enlightenment penetrated in every direction to every point in space and time.” John Cage.

13. What all this means is that, for me at least, (Untitled) is a loveable album, above most of what anybody could possibly say about it, and perhaps you’ll be second-in-line for the next Byrds album, and what I really wanted to say was, don’t push ...

Michael Ross

WITH A LOTTA HELP FROM MY FRIENDS - JUNIOR MANCE (ATLANTIC SD 1562)

Jazz has fallen upon evil days. Faced with the preeminence of rock, hordes of fine jazzmen have turned to thin, pandering albums in a desperate race to cash in or scuffle. Even the avant-fringe, with brilliant instrumentalists like Albert Ayler recording albums of plodding pseudo-mystical sludge, is learning which side of the artistic tracks the green grows, and few recording jazzmen of any stripe (Roland Kirk comes to mind, a few others) play on unscathed. Not that rock and jazz are so mutually exclusive; it’s just that the audience that buys the hybrids seems largely to prefer pap like Blood, Sweat & Tears and the later work of the likes of Gabor Szabo and Wes Montgomery [r1 mood riffing just a cut above Sergio Mendez — to music with guts and balls and a fiercer heart.

That’s why it’s such a joy to find an album like this one. Junior Mance has been around for years, a top-flight pianist who specialized in the kind of honed ghetto-club funk that slashes beyond the cocktail-hour tinklings and mercenary “soul” dribblings of a Ramsey Lewis. Never venturing into the uncertain chaos-baiting turf of the Cecil Taylor/Andrew Hill avant-garde, Mance remained a fine session man and crackingly percussive soloist, well-respected by critics and true jazzfans but never a great commercial success. Maybe his music was just too black.

This album, happily, should change all that. Junior has pulled off the rare feat of recording a jazz album which reflects implicit rock influences yet retains the distinctive swing and subtlety of the best jazz. No muzak euphemism, no awkward, tacky attempts at Significance or Unprecedented Cultural Synthesis, just Junior laid back, cooking tightly with electric guitar, Fender bass and drums. As Junior himself said in the liner interview: “I was absolutely relaxed, 1 wasn’t trying to be a great piano player or anything like that. 1 was just having fun, and just let it roll and I think this was what everybody else did.” -

And that feeling of assured inspiration shows all the way through the album. It’s complex where complexity makes gut sense, as in “Don’t Rush Us” with its abrupt shifts and rushing accelerations of tempo and its slight bow to the avant-garde as Junior rips off razor arpeggioes while guitarist Eric Gale reels and flashes all around him, edging towards their tonal borders in a manner reminiscent (though not nearly so adventurous) of John McLaughlin’s work with the Tony Williams Lifetime, The song speeds up to a crashing finale with the players’ lines almost tumbling headlong over each other into arhythmic confusion, yet holding it all together with breathtaking professionalism.

Which contrasts well with the simple searing funk of Sly Stone’s “Thank You,” where Junior pounds out that basic soul riff in classic fashion, laying down strong block chords while Gale explodes in. a piercing, white hot high-register solo that reveals the depth and right-on intuition with which he has absorbed the major rock guitar innovations. There’s not a trace in Gale’s work of that anemic, pattering style of playing known to so many jazz guitarists seemingly afraid of the almost overwhelming power of electricity’s possibilities for volume and distortion. He handles his axe with the fierce love, and exudes the thunder, which is rock’s special strength.

Junior also shines on the slow, brooding gospel lament, “Never Saw Naw.” This is a simple style evolved from Jimmy Yancey’s complex yet simple-sounding distillations of sorrow like “How Long Blues,” through Ray Charles’ earthy “Sweet Sixteen Bars” triplets to this music, picking up a bigger sound over the years but never watering down the essential mood of rage and passion deliberately restrained to burn in the near-stillness with a fierce black glow. And I think that of all the pianists currently working funk and blues, Junior Mance carries most deeply the primal emotional purity of Yancey and Charles.

To sum up: this record is a surprise and a delight, guaranteed to satisfy whether you’re a rock fan leery of jazz or, like me, an old jazz fan tired of sellout and contrivance. It rocks, it swings and strikes an effortless balance between impeccable control and vital, slambang looseness. You’re Crazy if you let it go by.

Lester Bangs

BILL COSBY PRESENTS BADFOOT BROWN AND THE BUNIOUS BRADFORD FUNERAL AND MARCHING BAND - UNI 73080

What would you expect if you Heard that there was a new Bill Cosby album and the premise was that Cosby fronted a large group of musicians with the ridiculous name of “Bradford Brown” etc.? Maybe a novelty record, a sort of hip Spike Jones number... or maybe just some unobtrusive music with Cosby running down some monologue over it. How about two long serious (i.e. sincere) pieces of music composed by Bill Cosby, no shuck, no jive, no kiddin’ -that’s what’s here.

Unfortunately (and my hopes weren’t too high anyway) it’s a pretty dull record. The key word here is monotony. On side one every idea that might have been effective is stretched out past the endurance point. On side two all the good ideas are cut short, abruptly; before they even begin to develop.

Side one is supposed to be a dirge and accompanying the actual funeral it might have been appropriate. But the soundtrack to a solemn event is not something you’d want to listen to too many times.

The idea of side two is -that a riff is set up then there’s a series of breaks at which point one of the musicians (all of whom .go uncredited on the album cover) comes in and solos for a few bars. Nothing happens. '

A quote from Cos’ from the liner notes M “I happen to really be interested in this new — you will hear - Miles concept, which I’ve • laid into the Bunious Bradford band,” But only superficially. I can hear the layers of sound and the multi-rhythms but none of the spontaneity or highly creative energy interplay that Bitches Brew achieves. This record is just so straight, so stiff, that’s all I Can tell you.

But I’m sure someone will enjoy it.

Richard C. Walls

VINTAGE DEAD - THE GRATEFUL DEAD - SUNFLOWER 5001

If there’s one thing our generation has not been known for, it’s nostalgia. Yet there are thousands of us who cherish fond memories of two years in San Francisco when the promise of a new world beckoned brightly and our innocent wonder shielded us from all worry and fear. To those of whom I speak, this album will be a source of genuine nostalgia and a half hour’s worth of misty recollection.

Everything about Vintage Dead adds perfectly to the illusion, from the old Avalon poster on the front (“TICKET OUTLETS: Psychedelic Shop . .. ”) with a bottle of Ripple superimposed (designed by Kelly/Mouse - how long since you’ve thought about them?) to the liner notes by Bob Cohen with a taste of psychedelic light show on the back. The only anachronism is the pictures of The Dead, obviously taken recently.

Bob Cohen, a partner in Chet Helms’ Family Dog from the beginning, is one of “-ose ubiquitous figures in the San Francisco scene. Whenever there was music, from the Trips Festival to Altamont, he was there engineering and recording the whole thing. The tapes he must have! From those tapes this album has emerged.

At the time the San Francisco groups began recording, they all had dozens of songs in their repertoires, perfected through hundreds of renditions. Inevitably, between first and second albums new material was conceived, and many of the original songs that we all knew the words to “back then” have been forgotten. The songs on Vintage Dead were among The Grateful Dead’s most popular, and a serious injustice has been corrected with its release.

“I Know Your Rider”, like “Hoochie Coochie Man” and “Codine”, was a mainstay of the early San Francisco groups. The bright-eyed joy The Dead project in the song is contagious even today. And lest we forget, Janis used to sing this song with The Holding Company. For the sake of everyone who never heard it, I can only hope Bob Cohen has a Vintage Big Brother album in the works.

“It Hurts Me Too” contains some of the best examples of Jerry Garcia’s blues style yet .committed to wax. Like “It’s All Over New Baby Blue”, it was played between the more up-tempo numbers, to give the exhausted audience an opportunity to recover from 20 minutes of frenetic dancing. “Dancing in the Street” was one of everyone’s special favorites. The opening notes would be a signal to get up on your feet and head for the dance floor. The relatively brief 8-minute version here helps to recreate the feeling and the message of the song, which was virtually the anthem of the old Haight/Ashbury community.

Side Two is completely devoted to 18 minutes of “In the Midnight Hour”. To be honest, I never got off greatly on Pigpen’s squl imitations. But the little girls with flowers in their hair ate it up. They used to sway as if entranced by his rambling monologues, imagining I suppose that he spoke to them alone. Great! Nostalgia enough for everyone here.

The magic of The Grateful Dead is more evident here than on any of their Warner Bros, albums, including Live Dead. Their play is amazingly together, even for The Dead, and the rapport they establish with the audience extends to the listener, four years and an eon removed. Yes, living in the past can often be a trap. But scrapbooks and old. family albums (like Vintage Dead.) can also be a lot of fun. If you have something worth remembering, you’ll know what I mean.

NOTE: To those interested in the discography of-San Francisco groups', I’d like to mention a few things. An alternate version of Quicksilver’s first album, containing many different songs, was recorded, and exists somewhere. The original Charlatan’s album Kama Sutra is still in the can, and there are tapes in circulation. Frank Werber has a great album by The Mystery Trend, the fust real San Francisco band, sitting around. The entire Trips Festival (1/66) was recorded, and the tapes were super last time I heard them. It would be great if Bob Cohen could follow through and issue some of this stuff, along with other rarities from the old Avalon days, like perhaps a Daily Flash album; but if not, it’s a good opportunity for some enterprising bootlegger. Someone should also reissue the Big Brother bootleg of a few months back, which was never circulated much outside of Marin County. To paraphrase Ron Jacobs, “this isn’t just nostalgia, it’s history!”

Greg Shaw

MILES DAVIS’ GREATEST HITS ^ COLUMBIA CS 9808

This is a perfect record for those of you who have heard Bitches Brew, maybe even bought it, or In A Silent Way, and are now interested in getting into Miles’ music - but don’t know where to begin. Here we have some choice examples of what Miles has been into for the last ten years (he’s been recording for almost 25). Though the “greatest hits” is just a hype, this is an excellent sampler.

“Seven Steps to Heaven” is from the album of the same name — this is the first time (1963) Miles recorded with the rhythm section of Herbie Hancock, piano; Ron Carter, bass; and Tony Williams (of Lifetime fame) on drums. Miles is in top form here with lightning runs and head twisters but the rhythm section steals the show — listen especially to Tony, who was only around seventeen when this was recorded. Unbelievable.

The members of the rhythm section (same personnel) again play their respective asses off on “All Blues” from a live album recorded in 1964 called My Funny Valentine. Fast changing rhythms and extra-sensory interplay pump

blood into the solos — even tenor sax player George Coleman, not known as a particularly exciting or innovative player (at least not in 1964) really gets off here.

I don’t know if Walt Disney would’ve dug this version of “Someday My Prince Will Come” (from ’62) but the main attraction here, apart from Miles’ lovely muted playing of the melody (which is not in the least maudlin), is a beautifully understated solo by the under-rated tenor sax player, Hank Mobley. And to be an under-rated jazz musician is to exist in the pit of American obscurity. Maybe that’s why Hank’s in Europe, last I heard.

“Walkin’,” from the Miles Davis In Europe album (’63), my all-time personal favorite, has been edited down to about a quarter of its original length. George Coleman’s tenor solo and Tony Williams’ drum solo have been cut out altogether srwhich is a damn shame ’cause Tony’s spot was a bitch. But even from this brief sampling you get the feeling of fire and group energy that permeated the album. Never miss a chance to hear Tony Williams. Learn how lame (in comparison) Ginger Baker really is,

“My Funny Valentine,” from the album of the same title, has been edited down to; even less than a quarter of the length of-the original release. But the best is here. Listening to Miles’ slow and so totally expressive improvisations on the melody is almost painful. Relax, Then listen. If this doesn’t move you in some way, then forget it.

“E.S.P.” is the title tune from the first album Miles made with Wayne'"Sh6fter on tenor sax (’65). I can think of some more interesting and appealing cuts I would have picked to represent that album, but there is a good Shorter solo and also the ever popular Tony Williams.

“‘Round Midnight;” from ’62 and the album ’Round About Midnight, is the famous Theolonious Monk ballad and features Miles’ famous muted handling of ballads. Less painful than “Valentine,” more pure perhaps, a light dark mood. An added' attraction is a John Coltrane solo, Trane at his most melodic, a side of him many of you may not have

“So What,” from Miles Davis at Carnegie Hall (’61) has also been edited to fit this anthology. Wynton Kelly’s piano solo is, sorely missed. A few somber chords from Gil Evans’ orchestra then the quintet enters to cook on what has become a classic performance of a classic piece. Miles literally bounces through

the medium up-tempo tune, then ends his solo with some very low dark notes to remind you of the always present bittersweet aspect of his conception. Again, the under-rated Hank Mobley, a lot more bluesy than Miles, but boppish enough to throw in a quote from “March of the Siamese Children,” no less. Then the melody again and out.

Like I said, a good chance to get into Miles’ music, to see if there’s anything there for you. If you’re already into Miles; you no doubt have most of the sides represented here. But the rest of you clowns, spread your minds out a little. Add some more colors. This will just be the beginning.

Richard C. Walls

SOLID BOND H GRAHAM BOND -WARNER BROTHERS 2555

This could be called the first rock supersession record. Except that these musicians hadn’t reached the status of super-stars when this record was made. But now everyone on this record is a s*t*a*r (as John Sinclair would put it) of some kind, with Bruce and Baker graduating to Cream and then to the Miles Davis band and Airforce respectively. John McLaughlin has played with Miles and the Tony Williams Lifetime and Dick Heckstall Smith and Jon Hiseman are in Colosseum,

This record was recorded in two separate sessions. The first was recorded at Klooks Kleek (??) in 1963 with a quartet of Bruce, Baker, Bond and McLaughlin. The tunes are basically jazz of the hard bop-funk style that was popular just before the advent of Ornette Coleman & Co. (and can still be heard in slightly updated fashions, i.e. they now play Beatle tunes instead of Rodgers and Hammerstein, on most of your local “jazz” stations). The second set includes some instrumental r & b tunes ala Booker T. & the M.G.’s, while the third is vocal r & b ala Graham Bond. These last two sets were recorded in the studio in 1966.

For mercy’s sake I think it best if I t'lk about the worst'of the record first and save the best for last so that you will finish this review. The worst music is the vocal r & b, and the crime can be pinned on Graham Bond’s voice. For weeks I’ve, been trying to figure out who Graham Bond sounds like and suddenly it struck me: David Clayton Thomas, In fact, the likeness is almost scary. I don’t care much for either' voice, however. Both are coarse and in Bonds case; flat much of the time. Also, where Thomas makes an attempt to sound like a jazz singer, whatever fantasy he identifies with), Bond doesn’t try to sound like much of anything. And he succeeds.

The instrumental backing on the songs, is, thank goodness, very good. It seems that the band realizes the quality of Bond’s voice and

try their best to save the song. Sometimes they even succeed, as in “Springtime - in the City”. The instrumental r & b on the record is superior to the vocals, but not as good as the

With a little overdubbing, and Jon Hiseman’s drumming, “Green Onions” is turned from a good piece of rhythm and blues to a jazz like shell for Dick Heckstall Smith and Jon Hiseman’s playing. Except for these two men, the song is nearly overweight and showy, and because of Hiseman and Smith, it doesn’t - completely fail, but it’s just barely

But the very best of the record comes with side four. These two tunes have the Bond,. Bruce, Baker, McLaughlin quartet, with Bond on alto.

“Grass is Greener”, is a tastefully fluid piece with exceptional alto work from Bond. It also has some of the best work Baker and McLaughlin have on record. Jack Bruce plays upright bass and though he does nothing extraordinary, he is very refreshing. Ginger Baker is the best he’s ever been, both on “Grass” and “Doxy”: Some of the things he can be heard doing here made “Toad” sound elementary. McLaughlin is simple, i.e., the style, is more direct and quiet than what we normally hear on his “Devotion” or with Tony-Williams.

Compared to “Grass” the version i f Sonny Rollins’ “Doxy” is something of a letdown. John McLaughlin’s solo is good, however, and so is Baker, sounding vaguely like Elvin Jones.

These two tunes from side four are the only fulfilling music on this record for me. It’s good to hear how some English white boys played Black music before they discovered that singing it was where the money is.

As for the record as a whole, there is so little music on all that plastic, and records cost too much. I really don’t know if it’s worth it

Geoffrey Jacques

LEE MORGAN - THE SIXTH SENSE (BLUE NOTE BST 84335)

This record represents no great artistic endeavor on the musician’s part, nor is it about to change any of you in any profound way. But there are some very pleasant moments on this disc, with not so many bad ones. That is probably what makes this worth writing

Even though this record was made about three years ago, it was just recently released. The music is typical of the current mainstream of jazz that is played on most pop jazz radio stations, that is, a sort of post-hardbop-funk type of music. Actually, most of the music on The Sixth Sense sounds either too familiar, or the tunes all sound vaguely the same. But on the whole, it is unoffensive and quite listenable.

Most of the good qualities found on the record are due to the excellent personnel that make the music. The two stars are (for me) Jackie McLean and Billy Higgins. Jackie’s solos are really “funky” (whatever that means) and bring some of the tunes to their fullest potential. His solo on “Psychedelic” is one of the best examples of this.

Billy Higgins is very prolific, utilizing all sorts of rhythms in the midst of these basically bland tunes. He seems to be soloing constantly, sometimes saying more than the soloist who is currently out front.

Other than McLean and Higgins, the other four members of this sextet aren’t that exciting. Cedar Walton, though, does deserve an honorable mention for some of his very good work in some spots.

As for the tunes themselves, like I said, many sound either too familiar, or they all sound alike, but side two, especially “Afreaka” and “Anti Climax” are pretty good. “The Cry of My People” is an unmoving ballad dominated by Lee Morgan.

This is a nice record. That’s all, just nice.

Geoffrey Jacques

DORIS TROY - APPLE ST 3371

I dreamt Allan Klein was the worm in the apple and Mr. Peanut lopped his head off with his cane ... Actually, I’m a little fed up with that adroit business concern on the other side of the pond re-minting and huckstering our black American artists, as if we didn’t know...,

I dreamt that someone who did the arrangements for Doris had been listening to The Original Delaney and Bonnie, but not closely enough. I dreamt this album won an award for the Little Finish.

I dreamt this record was released with a day-glo orange sticker that said: “Includes the Mr. Peanut Pick Hit: Ain’t That Cute?” (Historical note: “Ain’t That Cute” was released as a single [Apple 1820] with George Harrison credited as producer.)

I dreamt George Harrison (disguised as Eric Clapton) played guitar and arranged “Ain’t That Cute” and “So Far” and then lost interest in the album. Too bad... I dreamt that George Harrison steals ticks from Leon Russell, which is to say that his record outta be good.

I dreamt that Merrie Clayton, Doris Troy, and Dorothy Morrison tried to' beat up Bonnie Bramlett in the Soul of the Seventies Sweepstakes, but Eric Clapton came to the rescue with chitlins and sweet potato pies. 1 dreamt I had a cream separator and skimmed the four or five good tracks off this record, and fed the rest to the help.

I dreamt Peter Potter gave this album a 75.

•Sometime ago in my youth, I dreamt a rumor that Doris Troy was a big star on the R & B circuit.

I dreamt that all the cuts were as good as “Ain’t That Cute” and that’s where I went wrong. ATC is the hottest thing on the record, and maybe the toe-tappin’ will last from the first cut to the end of the first Little Finish ... or then again: maybe spastic Amerika will toe-tap all the way thru, or maybe disc jockeys will use the cream separator, or then again: maybe they’ll play one of these tracks along with one from The Original Delaney & Bonnie, and then, it will be released how stock and unoriginal these arrangements are...

I* dreamt the ads read: “Another Toe-Tapper from Doris Troy” (with a picture of Mr. Peanut stomping on Allan Klein’s head?)

I dreamt that Mr. Harrison’s name would make this record, but then he goes and takes it off the credits, leaves Doris alone in the studio with some songs by Stills, Harrison, Starkey, Lomax,' ahd Voorman and some unnamed arranger, and then, right at the end of the last track on side two (“Jacob’s Ladder”) the voice (American accent) of the producer (band-leader?) comes in right after that terribly un-together ending and remonstrates with the back-tip singers that they have to watch Doris and (presumably) sing along with her; but the final result is that they allowed this out-take on the record anyway, and I don’t suppose it will hurt much; if the listener gets that far he won’t

mind, but on first listening I though the guy said: “Let’s got outdoors” and — say hey! — that wouldn’t be a bad idea.

Anywayanywayanyway, the rating: B, with one A+ track, two A minuses and some B’s and C’s and an E for effort for trying to turn “Games People Play” into a soul number.

Profile: contains the (un) hit single, “Ain’t That Cute”, this album outta do for Doris Troy’s career what the Apple record of Billy Preston did for his.

I dreamt that the reviewer who writes: “Such and such a track is worth the price of the record” would reveal what the record cost

Ooops! Maybe that’s Klaus Voorman doing the Leon Russell cops. Mr. Peanut

IRON MAN - ERIC DOLPHY (DOUGLAS SD 785)

I’m not positive when this record was released —, I’m pretty sure it was during the last year. It doesn’t matter. Douglas records have decided that we’re ready now for this sampling of Eric Dolphy 1964 (Eric died in ’64). Many of us were ready then. But why bitch about the biz — it just goes on.

First off this is the best Dolphy record I’ve ever heard.

The fiery alto, the deep expressive bass clarinet; the dry ice flute - it’s all here with a most sympathetic rhythm section, pushing and joining, creating a celebration that you should color your living room with. (By the Way Folks: I was talking to Bud Spangler, who has an excellent show on WDET-FM in Detroit Saturday at midnight and Monday at nine p.m.; talking about how people have trouble getting to jazz. Quote Bud, “Don’t they realize that it’s melody?” Quote Walls, “I wonder what they think it is?”' ’— we couldn’t imagine.)

The compositions are typically Dolphydsque - seemingly at first to be composed of different disjointed parts put together - later as you listen again you hear a total whole, a

There is one cut here which alone is worth the price of the album, as they say — “Come Sunday.” Duke Ellington’s lovely melody played by Eric on bass clarinet and Richard Davis on arco bass, alone together^ First the melody is played straight and then tenderly explored by the two iron men — to return again for another soft statement, then finale. Dolphy’s bass clarinet speaks (I would refer you to a record called Mingus Presents

Mingus, particularly to a cut called “What’s Love?” where Mingus and Dolphy converse with their instruments — not merely in an abstract sense but by using actual speech inflections. Fantastic).

Dolphy’s brilliance blinds me to the other participants here. But I should mention Bobby Hutcherson — his comping is extraordinary (not all vibists are up to it) and his crisp solo sound flows energetically.

This is some of the most vital, exciting music available. It may be difficult to hear at firstbut “realize that it’s melody” — and all the things you bring to it.

Don’t be afraid to buy this album.

Richard C. Walls

DON’T CRUSH THAT DWARF, HAND ME THE PLIERS - THE FI RESIGN THEATRE (COLUMBIA C30102)

George Tirebiter spends the night watching himself on television. That’s the plot

All the rusting (it has been raining you know) superlatives come to mind when it gropes to describe the Firesign Theatre - brilliant, inventive, innovative, groonkish, etc. Or how’s this: four mod geniuses (or genii), deranged and desperate because through some inexplicable time warp they find themselves stuck in 1970 (the year of the quiet savage) in a record studio no less — trying to break out (or is it in) of (or is it to?) the warp and simultaneously trying to make the. savage speak, they utilize the antiquated media implements of the 1970 record studio. Do they succeed and return to whence they did not come? Does the savage speak? Who’s in control here? George Tirebiter or the four mad geniuses (or genii)? Are they four and the same? Are you?

And I’m perfectly straight, I swear.

There’s more. One liners (a few of which can even be interpreted on only one level). Slapstick (via sound effects). A heavy undertaking and exploration of the humor of disorientation (light up ■— or better yet, walk down the street). Reoccuring motifs — literary students take note. Your days are numbered.

There’s intelligence behind this, the record, this review, it isn’t nonsense. There’s nonsense

behind this, the record, this review, it isn’t ingelligence. But is it Art? Or merely George again?

What fun. Listen to the madcap capers of these amiable zanies and ask yourself — why am I laughing? You savage.

Richard C. Walls

THE BEGATTING OF THE PRESIDENT -ORSON WELLES - MEDIARTS 41-2

I love Orson Welles. I love his voice. I love the nuances of vocal and facial expression he uses to make his characters come alive, to invest them with a range of emotion that is. always compelling. I think Citizen Kane and Touch of Evil must be two of the finest films ever made anywhere in the world. And Mr. Arkadin is an unforgettable character. Harry Lime in The Third Man is an unforgettable character. I love Orson Welles, the director, the writer, the actor, and the raconteur.

But I don’t like this record.

Now here’s a long parenthetical consideration — (It should be known that Mr. Welles did not write or produce this record. Assuming that he possesses integrity [I desperately want to presume that] then I assume that he approves of the material he is given here to work with - still, it’s a well known fact that Mr. Welles has done a number of stints in films of dubious nature, giving rather dubious performances mainly so he could get enough bread together to put into his projects (which are invariably brilliant). His involvement with this record may be along those lines. Though the politics involved are close to his own, the artistry involved is a far cry. But this is speculation and speculation is a luxury without conclusions.)

O.k. the main complaint. The style. The idea of telling the recent history that lead up to the Nixon regime in Biblical (with a, few Shakespearean) terms and analogies soon becomes boring. There is a certain cleverness in telling the story this way but its like the cleverness of a juggler — think of a juggler — dull and always pointless. We know the government is, has been, and will remain corrupt — we know the power play that took place in Chicago — we know the blandness of Nixon’s image, ludicrous on the one hand, horrifying on the other. So this subterfuge for condemnation and attack is no longer cute or amusing. Or how about putting it this way: the satire is much too mild.

What a disappointment this record is. But forgive Orson. He’s a past genius and he’ll do more in the future.

Meanwhile listen to A Night At Santa Rita. And for right on satire check out Dick GreS°ryRichard C. Walls

MARION BROWN - WHY NOT - ESP -DISK 1040

I t’s incredible that there is so much beautiful music in the world and so little time to listen to it and so little money to pay for it One’s record collection is never satisfied, and if you are like me and rarely have money to buy new records (and much of your private music consists of $1.98 drug-store jazz), the few new records you buy are usually several months to a year old by the time you get to

I first heard Why Not about a year ago while half asleep and listening to one of Bud Spangler’s late night jazz shows. My immediate reaction was that I was hearing one

of the most beautifully sweet pieces of music ever recorded. During this summer.I was. staying in Ann. Arbor and had the money to buy this record. I did so, brought it back to the pad and played it continuously for several days afterward.

Marion Brown could be said to be a leading member of what some people would call a “post Coltrane” school of saxaphonists. He seems to be more interested in developing a fine lyricism in his playing, developing his sound more on the melody instead of using the blues-influenced shouting of someone like Ornette Coleman or Archie Shepp. Nevertheless, the blues is still an important part of his playing, but that is only part of this record.

The music is powerful, yet there is something unassuming in this power. He does not overwhelm you with waves of energy. Rather, he speaks softly, telling you to relax, take off your shoes, sit back, and let the music he creates speak.

Many people see contemporaty jazz as a music too full of rage, hate and anger. There is no denying that these elements exist in the music (for obvious reasons) but this music is hardly about rage. The themes expressed are morelike love or beauty. There is a heavy emotionalism in Brown’s music that is hard to ignore. But it is by no means taxing.

The sidemen on the lp are among the best to be found, and are excellent in the context of the music. Stanley Cowell is very quiet and powerful. And moving. Rashied Ali is content to. mumble underneath Browns’ singing for most of side one, not letting us realize his might until side two.

It’s hard to pick the best tune on the record. But some of the most exciting music isvon side two. Both tunes give the musicians a chance to stretch out, with Cowell playing some blues on “Homecoming”. The title tune also features some very good bass and drum

Geoffrey Jacques

TRANSITION - JOHN COLTRANE (IMPULSE AS-9195)

This is a good record for those of you who have found that Meditations (1966) was too much, too fast, too loud and without reference - and who have found that Giant Steps (1960) was too boringly complex, too swift, and also without reference. No reference is needed this time - if you can’t hear this music now, finally, then forget it. You’ll probably never know the depth of your loss, anyway.

There are times here, particularly on the title cut, when you can actually feel Trane pushing out, making the transition before your very ears - the long high wailing passages as he enters another purity, his last (unfortunately) phase, a period of totally uncompromising self-revelation. The endless search and the countless discoveries (Meditations,. Om and more.

The rhythm section is at its peak here (they were always at their peak). McCoy’s long swirling lines are incredibly beautiful, aiid if his comping sometimes disappears beneath Trane’s power it doesn’t make a damn bit of difference. Because you know he’s there. His quieter moments are a puzzle to me ... how can he play that way in this context without sounding maudlin? He does it

Then Elvin Jones, the monster. Bashing, crashing, multidirectional, but never chaotic or senseless. The power, the physical (and spiritual) strength that moves the music (not “carries,” my friend, do not misunderstand me — the words, as always, are weak when confronted with the music ).

Jimmy Garrison is perfect (here). It’s a dangerous thing to accuse a man of perfection. But this is a dangerous record — John Sinclair has elaborated enough on that...

It’s strange that this record was in the vault for so long. Very strange. It’s even stranger that you haven’t bought it yet.

Richard C. Walls