BOOTLEGS AND BARGAIN-BIN OLDIES

IMPORTS BOOTLEGS and BARGAIN-BIN OLDIES RECORDS

BARGAIN-BIN VOCAL GROUP LPS I HAVE KNOWN by Thomas Bingham

Like it or not, the vocal group (in which most of the members do not play an instrument) has played an important role in the histories of rock and its brother, soul. Not suprisingly, these hundreds, perhaps thousands, of mostly oneor two-shot groups have been grossly ignored by researchers and analysts, especially the groups after 1959, the year �There Goes My Baby� marked the effective end of early rock-and-roll. Before anyone makes any Great Pronouncements concerning the grand bulk of the Post-5 0�$ vocal groups, it is first necessary to become familiar with the music itself. This extended review hopes to be a step in that direction. The fifteen albums chosen for this alphabetically arranged survey have one major factor in common — they are available in many variety store bargain bins (two, bucks or less) throughout the U.S.

The first two Cadet albums by the Dells seem to pop up with increasing regularity. There Is (Cadet LPS 804) has a little �psychedelic� hanky-panky which is decidedly out of place, uneven engineering whibh leaves much to be desired in many spots, and a few trivial songs, all of which is pressed on the usual Cadet sandpaper. Nevertheless,' the album is a must,^because it contains the best group singing since the Dells (1956 variety). Included is their classic 6-minute remake of their old Vee-Jay �Stay in My Corner,� worth the price of the album alone.

The Dells Musical Menu (Cadet LPS 822) comes in a vulgar, tasteless, double-fold cover, which my warped mind tells me is quite funny. This LP is much better written, engineered, arranged, and produced than the preceding one. Unfortunately, the arrangements are too good, at times drowning out even the gruff shouting of lead singer Marvin Junior. The group singing is not nearly so good as on There Is. The rest of the group serves only as a background chorus for Junior (which looks terrible), except for the too few ballads. If you like There Is, you might want to pick this up on your next trip to the bargain bins, but be warned, it is dispensable.

Also in the bins these days is Back tp Back (B. T. Puppy BTPS 1002), by the Happenings and the Tokens, who do play their own instruments, but are clearly in the vocal group tradition (especially the Happenings, a Four Seasons type). This is definitely a Top 40 LP with appeal mostly to teenyboppers. However, it is excellently arranged and performed. Better than 90% of Top 40, just totally irrelevant in 1971. The Tokens have side 1, the Happenings side 2, a curious form of packaging which never caught on, though Stax tried it with Booker T. and the M.G.s and the Mar-Keys (but not on a side-each basis). Perhaps new groups without enough good stuff to stretch out a whole LP should consider reviving this form of merchandising.

The New Born Free {Kapp KS-3548) was the Hesitations� second album. They have tremendous harmony, a marvelously raucous lead singer (whom I believed was killed in a freak gun accident, though it may have been another member), and one of the strangest production jobs in the history of recorded music. All the songs begin with a nice, full orchestration which gets progressively weaker, until at the end of the song the only accompaniment is bass and drums (sometimes with-the orchestra faintly heard in the next studio). Whether it was poor mixing, careless production, or intended to be that way, it gives an otherwise blockbuster album a great sense of incompleteness. What could have been an excellent $4.98 LP is an excellent $1.57 LP. Pay no more.

Sorry (I Ran All the Way Home) by the Impalas (Cub 8003) is a sort of Dion and the Belmonts with a black lead. Leroy Holmes* (!) brass-heavy arrangements keep this out of the �50�s group tradition (it came out about 1959), though it is good-old-r-and-r. Many of the songs (all written by Zwirn - Giosasi) are embarrassingly trivial, including (believe it or not) �how much wood could a woodchuck chuck,� etc. However, their hits, �Sorry,� and �Sandy Went Away,� are included, making this a very recommendable bargain bin album. Incidentally, the lead singer�s name is Joe Frazier. Heavyweight Joe Frazier also sings. Same guy?

I picked up Innocently Yours by the Innocents (Indigo IND-LP 503) for 41c a few weeks ago, It came out about 1961.1 was 13, a little patriot and model citizen. All the kids would hang out in the park while I was collecting quotes by famous Americans for a junior-high project. One of my favorite songs that year was �Honest I Do� by the Innocents. It now sounds as relevant as that project and just as amateurish. The album is so typical of what vocal group rock-and-roll had degenerated to by 1961, that it would be laughable if it didn�t bring back so many memories of happier days; the Kennedy days, full of idealism and dreams that had to come true, now as forgotten as this record. I play this album constantly, fully aware that its musical content is nil. Worth 41c of anyone�s money, if only to see what we had for music a decade ago. Liner notes by the label�s girl singer, Kathy Young (�A Thousand.Stars�). I had a huge crush on her. Where is she now? She must be all of 26 or 27 by now. Ah, 1961...

If I can pull myself together, I�ll tell you about The Mad Lads in Action (Volt S-414). Just a second (wipe those tears from my eyes;i that reminds me of a song . .. ) Okay, back to today. The Mad Lads are still here. They have received a small share of acclaim, but nowhere near as much as they deserve. Undoubtedly, it�s the name — who believes a ballad group named the Mad Lads? Also against them is the vulgar, tasteless album cover, which even my warped mind tells me is not funny. The music is unique and excellent as befits a Stax-Volt record of the mid-�60�s. Lead singer John Gary Williams� voice may surprise you at first, but don�t let that put you off. Buy it.

The Manhattans and their showy dance routine are also still with us, despite the recent death of lead singer George Smith. The Manhattans Sing For You and Yours (Carnival CLPS 202), their second album, from 1968, is perhaps The All-Time Post-�50�s Vocal Group Album. Except for one clinker, a dull Christmas song called �It�s That Time of the Year� (�onward Dancer, onward Prancer� etc.), the songs (all original) are all good for the genre, all well-sung and well-arranged. Everything fits and everything works. Nevertheless, the appeal, may be limited to soul fans. Others proceed at their own risk..

The Miracles Greatest Hits From the Beginning (Tamla 254) includes one record of their old Chess material and one record of early Motown. We�ve all heard the early Motown, but the Chess oldies are rarely heard. It�s a shame, as it�s good �50�s vocal group stuff; not as professional as on the second record in the set, but perhaps more honest. List is $5.98, so if your drugstore doesn�t have it for $1.97, buy it for $4.57 or whatever.

At tlie Hop With the Sherry s (Guyden GLP 503) is a typical Philadelphia disc of the early �60�s, sounding very much like a product of Jamie-Guyden�s stionger rival, Cameo-Parkway. You remember them — Chubby, Bobby, DeeDee, the Orlons, and even a group called the Hippies, except it meant something else back then. The Sherrys, three high school girls whose hit was �Pop Pop Pop-Pie,� are no worse than a lot of others of the era, and not too much better. The arrangements and songs were What sold these records. The songs are typical dance songs, the arrangements sax-and-drum dance arrangements. This stuff died years ago. I like it, it�s fun, but I can hardly recommend it to anyone except nostalgia seekers. (Thought -Whatever happened to those Philly drummers, e.g., Bobby Gregg? Them cats was HEAVY.)

I�ve often wondered how the face of soul or Top 40 music would look today if Berry Gordy hadn�t seen the dollar signs and moved his stars from the Apollo to the Copa. Fortunately, we still have the old Supremes (meaning Diano, Flo, and Mary) on vinyl to remind us of the last stages of the big beat r&b Motown once gave us. I am particularly thinking of The Supremes A � Go-Go (Motown 649) and The Supremes Sing Holland-Dozier-Holland (Motown 650). Both albums are uneven. The H-D-H album is easily the better of the two, depending less on other people�s hits to carry the load than does Supremes A� Go-Go does. If Motown had stayed like this, perhaps we would not have h ad such a great need for the musical alternative which was already developing in those long-ago mid-�60�s.

Last, and certainly least, Sittin� In At the Court of Love by the Unifies (Kapp KS-3582), I tried so hard to enjoy this album, mainly because �Court of Love� is one of the super-cosmic singles (it must be; every Top 40 fan I know hates it). The album is split 5-5 between Ed Sullivan Show arrangements of pop hits (including, get this, �Harper Valley P.T.A.,� which is humorous once, and only once) and soul tunes written by producer Guy Draper. I paid 99c and figured 5 good soul cuts for 99c wouldn�t be too bad. Unfortunately, even a couple of the soul tracks are wasted. Alas, I can not find it in my heart to like this LP by a very talented group. I hope they do better now that they�ve signed with the new Memphis label. In the meantime, try to find the �Court of Love� single. If you don�t like it, you can give it to a Top 40 fan you hate.

And that�s how it goes with vocal group LP�s, and that�s why it�s so hard to come to any conclusion about them in general. It�s a gamble — you uncover some gems, you waste a buck or two on others. For every Manhattans, there�s a Unifies. Vocal groups are not my specialty by any means. I�m a Soft Machine — Pharaoh Sanders — Karlheinz Stockhausen man myself. But I�ve found a mail-order store that�s selling the LP�s by the Esquires (�Get On Up�) and the Jaynetts (�Sally Go Round the Roses�). Maybe they�re both losers, but you can bet I�m going to send in my buck apiece to find out.

VERY ALIVE/KNOCKIN� �EM DEAD -ELTON JOHN (BOOTLEGS OF WABC-FM LIVE BROADCAST)

�Why Elton John?� you probably ask yourself if you are a typical CREEM reader. You occasionally flip on �Amoorenna� from the Tumblewood Connection album and listen to �No Shoe Strings on Louise� from the first record wondering what the big deal.

And if your only exposure to Elton John has been through the two Uni albums, you are probably mystified by the ecstatic raves which came out of Los Angeles and New York last summer. You�ve got Elton pegged as another pop troubadour, who, depending on the strength of the Taupin lyrics for any given song, is either mildly pleasant to listen to or sort of a sugary drag.

But see, that isn�t true. Elton John is a closet-rocker. Once up on stage in his striped underwear and old basketball jersey, magic lightning strikes, transforming him from the be-spectacled Mr. FM-SugarPop into the funkiest and most energetic rock n� roller since Jerry Lee Lewis. If you don�t believe me, I suggest you pick up on one of the two bootleg recordings of his live radio concert, broadcast over WABC-FM last fall. Then you�ll discover the custard-pie flinging wonder who duplicates the sound of the Rolling Stones rhythm section with one hand tied behind his back.

There are currently two stereo bootlegs of the ABC Broadcast available. Both have slightly less than professional sound quality (mild hiss and surface noise), but are miles better than any other bootleg to date. Very Alive is an edited 45 minute version of the performance on Key-Lo. (The very same one which was sneered recently in the pages of a well known Fan Magazine). But if you can find it, the one to get is a complete two record set called Knocking 'Em Dead which contains the entire tape as far as I can see.

About half of the performance duplicates songs from the two Uni albums (�Amoorenna,� �Your Song�, �The �Boredom Song�� (as Elton refers to it in his intro) etc.). Some of them are done with solid rock n� roll arrangements, minus the elaborate production work of the first Uni record. The songs seem to contain previously unnoticed springs of energy which are triggered by impromptu bursts of rapidfire drumming and co-ordinated bass work. �Sixty Years On� (not present on the Key-Lo recording) is really good, ascending to the level of the Grateful Dead on a good night. Both recordings contain an extended 25 minute rock n� roll medley which begins with �Bum Down the Mission� and segues into �My Baby Left Me� and �Get Back�. Elton plays piano in ecstatic triple-time surges, tapering off to rest while the rhythm section takes over and screaming �Rock n� Roll!� at the top of his lungs as he plunges in again.

Both records also feature a few new songs which were written for the soundtrack for the Paramount film, Friends. These are mostly ballad style with piano accompaniment. �Can I Put You On� is semi-rock, very similar to �Amooreena�. The official version on the soundtrack (still unrealeased) sounds about like you�d expect it to. The bootleg version is faster and more energetic.

�Honky Tonk Woman� is also on both records, sung in a goodhumored off-hand sort of way-which characterizes the feeling of the entire broadcast. Elton was obviously having a good time and it shows in his introductory raps and his singing. At one point he announces that he�s going to sing a new song which will soon be bootlegged (loud guffaws from audience) and advises people to go to the bathroom because it�s long and quiet.

There�s a lack of pretension about the whole thing. No one takes anything very seriously and the audience & backup musicians share in the enthusiasm for just cutting up and making music.

If you hurry, maybe you can take your copies of Elton John and Tumbleweed Connection down to that Special Record Dealer in your neighborhood and trade �em in for Knockin� �em Dead. (Or Very j\live if you want a pretty yellow day-glo record to stare at). They don�t have any moog synthesizers or violins on them, but I don�t think you�d miss them very much.

Len Bailes

RED HOT �NT ROCKIN� - THE WILD ANGELS - ENGLISH - BCM 102

If there�s any place in the world where old rock & roll is appreciated as much as in Detroit, it�s got to be England. Their approach is very different, though — there�s no such thing as an �oldies fan� in England. The guys who are into it grease their har back d.a. style, wear blue suede shoes, and tefu up the place whenever a favorite band such as the Wild Angels appears.

The Wild Angels have been together 3 years, but their first 2 albums both came out in 1970. The first, Live At the Revolution, (BCM 101) was such a success that Rei^Hot �N� Rockin�, was released with an advance order of 27,000. And what a scorcher it is! These are no effete �rock scholars� — they belt out those 1956 Memphis rhythms with a style that would make Elvis crings in envy. Mai Gray has a classic rockabilly voice with an edge the equal of any Sun artist on record; Bill Kingston might as well be Jerry Lee Lewis the way he pounds the ivories, and John Hawkins plays a hot guitar like nobody�s business.

The first song is �Little Queenie� and they rip into Jerry Lee�s arrangement with rare gusto. There�s not a moment�s rest as we are treated to �Stuck On You�, Eddie Cochran�s great �Somethin� Else� and two Ronnie Hawkins killers, �Forty Days� and �Odessa� in rapid-fire succession. Then on to side 2 with �High School Confidential� (you remember, �boppin� at the high school hop!�), more vintage Elvis on �All Shook Up�, a beautiful �Rave On� and then on through �You Ain�t Got Me�, �I Need Your Love Tonight� and �Bullmoose� until, blood boiling, you have to turn it over to hear the first side again....

These guys have really got it. I don�t know if the �Mod/Rocker� business is coming back, but if it did I wouldn�t care to be a Mod with the Wild Angels on the scene! The liner notes are packed with gems such as: �Unlike many of today�s laff-promoting, noise-making practicioners of electrified rock �stunned slug� music�.... �the Wild Angels put today�s bearded, mangy-maned, ohm-burning artillery units — guitar clanking clods, who think baths and haircuts are out Cff style — in the shade when it comes to giving out with a thunderous rock �n� roll blast that�ll rip at you like a tidal wave of steel balls hurled from a thousand catapults!�

�Waxie Maxie� at B&C Records (they have �company rockers� in England like we have �company freaks� here...) tells me the Wild Angels are scheduled for an American tour soon. So you folks better order this album posthaste from your favorite record importer, and prepare to be devastated by the roughest slam-bang rock �n� roll outfit around rthe Wild Angels!

Greg Shaw

MORE RECORDS

THINKS: SCHOOL STINKS - HOTLEGS -CAPITOL ST587

As with many cross country travelers whose cassette recorders broke down, in August of 1970 Anne Murray, Mungo Jerry, Bobby Sherman and Hot Legs left an incredible impression. Murray and Sherman have been washed away or repressed by newer versions of the banal. Mungo Jerry, despite a farily good LP, has gone to that land reserved for one-hit wonders with talent. Hot Legs, of �Neanderthal Man� fame, has cast its fate upon the fatal waters of album production with School Stinks. This effort is not without its highpoints, although Hot Legs do get hung up with the primodal sound of their �hit.� �Neanderthal Man,� for those who have forgotten, is permeated with a primitive congo drum which accompanies the chant �I�m a Neanderthal man, you�re a Neanderthal girl...� Lyrically, Hot Legs obviously will not threaten the better rock songwriters. Having said this, School Stinks is not a poor or even dull album. When not doing the Marathon Oil bit, Hot Legs is a rather pleasant English trio which does harmony well and utilizes the clear guitar strums associated with �early� Beatles records. �How Many Times� and �Take Me Back� show a great resemblance to the �Norwegian Wood,� �John and Yoko,� and �Working Class Hero� style. Naturally the lyrics are not as good, but the primitiveness does at times transcend the rather simple-minded material, particularly in the �Suite F.A.� which offers no challenge to �Tommy� or any other rock-opera.

From this maiden LP it appears that Hot Legs can go either in one direction or its opposite. They can, and probably will, continue to do the teenybop �Neanderthal� sound, or they can further explore the softer and more sophisticated harmonies developed by the Beatles, Mamas and Papas, and today, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Hopefully they will choose the second alternative.

R. Serge Denisoff

SOURCE POINT - JOHN HAMOND -COLUMBIA C 30458

I once had a friend who had gone on a prolonged, totally committed Dylan fetish jag. He felt graced by the almighty for the role, having been generously endowed with curly hair easily teased, and a slightly curved beak of a nose. He was a Gemini. He spoke straight Californian, but could affect with ease a flat midwestern accent that turned into outrageous Hillbilly when he was loaded. He was a specialist, not an indiscriminate �Dylanologist� smeared with dog guano; no, he crystallized the protean Dylan during the master�s legendary days singing Woody�s songs in the Village. (The period brought roughly down to us on his first two albums.

My friend would go to parties, and civil rights rallies with his hair frizzed out, wearing THE cap, a turtleneck sweater, toting his guitar and aluminum harmonica halter. There he would proceed to give endless renditions of �talking blues� songs made up on the spot. Everybody loved him.

There is something to be said for the kind of artistry that John Hammond epitomizes. He has developed a kind of style that is the distillation of the finest guitar sounds in the world. You could say that John Hammond is up there with the great black bluesmen, except for the fact that he is white.

That is not unusual. White rock bands have been emasculating the black musical heritage for years, turning genius into cliches. What makes John Hammond unique is that he is not one of the musical Huns, he is a settler, an immigrant in Delta Bluesland. He has one ambition, to emulate as exactly as is humanly possible the styles of those old masters. The liner notes on this album tell how back at Gerdes Folk City, back around 1961, John Hammond mesmerized the place with his repertoire of old blues songs. Such ethnic material must have been heady stuff to the folkies who ruled the musical roost at the time.

John Hammond then signed with Vanguard records, the foremost expositors of folk music in the country. John joined a roster of artists which included Joan Baez, Doc Watson, the Weavers, the Greenbriar Boys, Sandy Bull, Odetta, and Buffy St. Marie. It was a veritable army of musical purists, and Vanguard Records held the reputation of cultural superiority over record companies that put out more rock and roll.

John went to work industriously fulfilling his destiny. He was like an expert counterfitter, minting out perfect approximations of the old men�s songs. John Hammond was BLACK! He was the blackest muddah you ever heard. HE was perfect for all the liberals who were willing to embrace spade music in theory. All his albums were filled with photographs of himself looking the very picture of excruciating sincerity. He could be seen surrounded by black side men, or gazing wistfully off into the distance, or playing intently, soulfully emoting the blues.

It was ironic then, when during the sixties, rock bands took that same music, altered it, and produced a hybrid sound with more vitality, and excitement than anything that J ohn Hammond could ever emulate. By conforming too much to the forms of the blues, Mr. Hammond totally missed the feeling and point of the music. Hammond�s blues renditions have the lifeless quality of museum pieces, sung with no depth, and no emotion except his all fired earnestness. Rock, however was off on an adventure that astounded the world, changing forever the context in which people would accept music. A decade passed, monstrous and beautiful permutations of every type of classical, folk, and pop forms emerged, and John Hammond still sounded like he just wanted to go down to the Mississippi river delta and die.

Source Point is as good a Hammond album to pick up on as any. His style remains as it has always been. His sincerity is just as great, and his selection of songs is true to form. �I Got Love If You Want It,� �Hoodoo Blues,� �Takin� Care of Business� reinforce Hammond�s self defined image of the down and out soulman to such an extent that purists should be pleased. In this uncertain world, it must be gratifying that the old time bluesman tradition will go on. John Hammond could probably keep this up forever. Too bad the original artists won�t.

I hadn�t seen my Dylanized friend for about a year, or more, until I met him at this guy�s house. His guitar, and harmonica were gone, and his curly hair, which had been totally shaved off, was just starting to grow back. In place of the Dylan cap, he had a scalplock which hung down the back of his neck in a long braid. He had given up music for the contemplative life, and had gone off to England to join a mystical religous sect. I asked him why he was back in the States.

�I was in with the group for about nine months when I found out that the order was going to marry me off to a 60 year old nun. I couldn�t take that, so I left the order and returned home.�

Oh well, I guess we all have identity problems.

Robert Houghton

ONE WAY ... OR ANOTHER - CACTUS -ATCO SD 33-356

I really tried to approach this latest offering from Cactus, objectively. Initially, I tried to completely forget their first album. I tried to remember how fine a guitarist Jim McCarthy was in the Detroit Wheels. I recalled how clear and biting his style was on those first Mitch Ryder albums. Never being one that was that turned-off by the Fudge, I did think Tim Bogert was a pretty damn good bass man. Anyway, he sure was flashy. I had no real opinion of Carmine Appice other than remembering a boring drum solo at a Fudge concert. I was not familiar with Rusty Day until Cactus.

Well now, I�ve gotta lotta respect for Lester Bangs. His tastes run similar to mine although his are more expansive and refined. So, when I saw his favorable review of Cactus� first, I prepared myself to listen hard to their second. But doggone, this one just isn�t gonna make it either, at least for me.

One of the main problems with Cactus are the vocals. I don�t know why Rusty Day left the Amboy Dukes, but if it was because of his inability to carry a tune, I understand. His harp playing leaves something to be desired, too. Seemingly trying to sound like a cross between the Wolf and Rod Stewart, he fails on both counts. Instrumentally, Cactus is listenable. In fact the best song on the record is an instrumental. But they still insist on sounding �SO-O-O HEAV-EH.� Jim McCarty has some fine moments. His playing is sharp, clear, but sporadic. His style fits in much better in a rhythm & blues band than with Cactus. Still, he retains something that keeps him from falling into that purgatory of repititious solo-freaks. The mix on the album has buried Tim Bogert and that�s a shame. He really does have a knack for playing bass like a lead and still stay tasteful.

Another major problem are the lyrics.'Of the 8 cuts, 6 are Cactus originals and each song is credited to the group as a whole. So the blame cannot be directed to one particular member for such classic bursts of poetry as — �Take my hand, there�s a long night ahead/and I want you so badly lyin� bare in my bed.� Of if you prefer — �Yeah, I like to rock and I like to roll/Most of all, darlin�, I like to ball.� Most incredibly, Cactus choose to print the lyrics on the back, of the cover. Thishelps the listener catch each socially relevant verse, I guess. But what�s a real shame to an old fifties freak like me, is what they do td the classic �Long Tall Sally.� Slowing the rhythm to a dirge and following a display of the snazziest possible feedback, we get 6 minutes of Rusty Day in his most irritating �Blues� (?) voice improvising the original words into something more �today.� — � ... saw Aunt Mary cornin� and she balled him in the alley.� � „

So there we have the latest from Cactus. Maybe the fans will love it, demand a couple more encores at the concerts, and excite a lot of girls. As for me, though, I got a pretty good deal. I traded this album to a kid down the block for an obscure Sir Douglas Quintet �45 that his sister didn�t want, and I�m real satisfied.

Curt Eddy

THE DAY THE WORLD TURNED BLUE -GENE VINCENT - KAMA SUTRA KSBS 2027

Back in the good old days when Elvis was King, Capitol Records organized a talent contest to find �another Presley�. The lucky winner was Gene Vinceiit, who had a hit with �Be-Bop-A-Lula�, followed it up with several more, and then faded into obscurity via weak songs. Gene was hired as a rocker, but he had a penchant for softer songs; �Somewhere Over The Rainbow� shoed up on each of his first three albums.

Gene is back, and although he isn�t trying for Judy Garland�s crown, he still suffers from his love of ballads. His voice lacks emotive power, sounding too much like the music behind him. It�s pleasant to listen to, but it doesn�t move. The same trouble exists on the rockers., he just doesn�t have the emotion and power to climb above the music and really wail. This is a problem with most of the 50s rock stars still cutting records. Their voices have lost the power they had, and consequently the producer buries it inside the music, hoping no-one will notice. Check the recent records of Clyde McPhatter and Elvis for examples. The Tom Jones crowd may like it, but it�s a,depressing end to *Kings* of rock and roll. Haven�t they ever heard of Buddy Holly and Eddie Cochran? Why don�t they follow?

Jonh Ingham

LOVE IT TO DEATH - ALICE COOPER STRAIGHT WS 1883

It has been an uneasy relationship, that between Alice Cooper and their potential audience (generally, those who savor the outrageous and the flamboyant in dress and demeanor, who are not satisfied by a rock �n� roll band wno stands around and plays its songs without moving one muscle more than it has to, who once thought the Doors might someday break on through and do something really revolutionary for the development of rock-as-theater, and for whom there could be no greater pleasure than to delight to the Bonzos� surreal vaudeville show or gape in awe at the fiery apocalypse of Arthur Brown.) That audience has not rushed to embrace Alice. They have grown a bit wary after so many unfulfilled promises and abortive beginnings, and so the prevailing attitude has been �OK Alice, you come on so damn strong, let�s see you really do something. Prove to us that you�ve got something going that will make the time we spend on you more worthwhile than the time we wasted on the Doors and the like.!�

The attitude is understandable, if not excusable. After all, Alice does come on strong and challenging, and, with their flowing lame robes and oh so tight glittering girls� pants and low-cut narrow-strapped peek-a-boo tank tops and the jpwelry and the made-up faces and the hair that�s too fucking long and the perverted mincing and faggot posturing and ostentatious AD/DC sensuality, they challenge the most unliberated areas of even the most radicalized denizen of the counter culture, namely the sexual'identity. Their very presence has a surprisingly upsetting effect on your average rock audience whose vehement expression (ranging from catcalls to various forrrts of physical abuse) recalls the response of the general populace to long hair of any kind-five or six years ago. If nothing else, Alice is turning the spotlight back on a supposedly free segment of the population and showing them (if they will look) that, in many ways they�ve still got a way to go.

That �Prove Youselves� syndrome is largely inspired by that threatening presence which has made Alice Cooper a unique entity among performers of rock music. The creative history of the group is the story of their attempt to meet that challenge and, overall (until now) their failure to satisfactorily prove anything to anybody except that they have as yet neither squandered nor developed their potential. Their bizarre stage act, if uncompelling at times, has always had something about it that makes you want to stick with it, and so most observers have been content to postpone a final judgement until Alice makes it or blows it. On the recording side of the ledger, however, their lack of success has been most flagrant, and their failure to have anything of significance to show in this important category is probably responsible more than anything else for the prevailing lukewarm attitude. �If only they could come up with an album of sufficient strength and depth to turn people�s heads and open their eyes to just what it is that Alice Cooper is about!� mourns the frustrated devotee. .

Voila! Love It To Death is here.

Even if the devastating impression it first leaves is slightly ameliorated by the passage of time and the exposure of many listenings, the album�s consistency, strength, energy and occasionally unqualified brilliance remain undisturbed. Alice�s inability to come across on previous albums has been due mainly to the fact that their musical personalities were smothered under the prevailing mechanical slickness which was the negative side of the incredible musical tightness that is their trademark. On Love It To Death, producers Jack Richardson and Bob Ezrin have taken that tightness and breathed into it the breath of life, imbuing it with spontaneity and power while sacrificing not a trace of that hairline precision. The result is a highly-charged, compact, almost claustrophobic sound, the ideal complement for the group�s psychotic musical vision, with a raw power that hammers that vision home.

Alice Cooper�s songwriting has also taken several strides in the right direction, and if several cuts can be considered �filler material,� it is extremely admirable filler material, solidly conceived and executed and judiciously placed throughout the album Things like the opener, �Caught in a Dream,� �Long Way To Go,� and �Is It My Body� are driving, solid, simple rock �n� roll, the kind of music that you don�t want to listen to too much because after a short time it has already slipped full-blown into your musical consciousness. It would be a sorry album without them, and they can be called | secondary only in the sense that they are not expressions of the more iqtriguing aspects of the Alice Cooper personality.

�I�m Eighteen/� their entry in the top 40 race, straddles the line between the simpler rock material and that unique personality, as well as drawing a bit on the Stooges� aesthetic of rock-as-the-adolescent-primal-scream: � .. . I�ve got a baby�s brain and an old man�s heart/Took 18 years to get this far.� Slugging along in an appropriately mindless and heavy | manner, the song does a respectable job of pulling together some of the conflicting and contradictory threads that are woven into that very strange time of life; for, on the heels of those lines that tell of being �in the middle of doubt,� and after desperate cries of �I�ve got to get out of this place,� Alice ends up with a repeated, obsessed chant: �I like it, I like it, I like it. .. � If it is not the definitive musical study of late adolescent psychology, it is at least a satisfying expression of what it might mean to be that age in these odd times. �Black Juju� is the other distinctively Alice Cooper track on side one, and, while it sorely misses the visual element that makes it one of their more memorable live pieces, it does a good job of creating an eerie atmosphere, with its long percussion fade-in and the shifts from heavy rock arrangement to dark,' organ-punctuated open spaces and that hypnotic, droning �Bodies'.... need .... rest ... Bodies ... need . . . rest . . . Bodies;.. ; need . . . rest.� In structure it�s like the good old Doors� �When the Music�s over,� but it is handled with a good deal more finesse (the less-than-obvious, but unforced way they break out of the subdued middle section, for instance) and a whole lot less pretension..

It is on side two, and particularly in the final three songs, that Love It To Death asserts itself as an album to be reckoned with. Following the opening �Is It My Bo.dy,� �Hallowed Be My Name�� gives the first taste of that blend of the decadent and the psychotic in which Alice1 loves to grovel. �Gathef round madmen and hear me whisper/The words of the prison, the words / of laughter,� it begins, then, with a mad gleam in its eye and a classic Hollywood maniac laugh thrown in to get us under way, propels to that concluding trilogy, which begins with �Second Coming.� Here Alice�s singing (which has been excellent up tiil now, if-limited to straight rock shouting and his own characteristic hypnotic twang) really begins to shine: Over a quiet piano-drum accompaniment, his voice leaves that heavily styled world and suddenly breathes with life and expression; strong and plaintive, cracking emotionally here and there, slamming home on the hard rock sections, it does full justice to the surprisingly lovely tune (strong melodies actually mark all of the album�s best material) as Alice assumes the role of the dethroned Jesus: �It would be nice to walk upon the water/To talk again with angels at my side.� Then a neat segue into �The Ballad of D|wight Fry� (Dwight Frye you may recall, played the loony, spider-eating Renfield in the Lugosi Dracula), a brilliant piece of music spun from the mind of a straight-jacketed madman and narrated from the confines of his cell. It features a thunderous chorus (�See my lonely life unfold/I see it every day /See my only mind explode/Since I went away�) that rolls in at regular intervals like a multi-levelled tidal wave, more beautiful singing by Alice (actually he�s aljnost acting, playing the protagonist with Peter Lorre inflections and histrionic, claustrophobic, gasping screeches — �I want to get out of here, I want to get out of here I want to get out of here Iwanttogetoutof here . . .�), and all softs of wonderful, ostentatious gadgets that are so sadly are so sadly out of vogue these days — explosion sound effects, spoken intervals, et. al. The song leaves you with that disturbed feeling of unease that you get from a lingering bad dream, and Alice Coopery would end up on a lot of people�s bad trip lists were it not for the culminating tour de force, a piece whose selection is as brilliant as its subsequent execution: It�s �Sun Arise,� that Rolf Harris single "of several years back that you loved but nobody else could stand because it was so weird; |and with it AC pulls us out of that dark night into a new day. The arrangement is breathtaking, building from a simple, measured beginning tq a finish that has to be heard to, be believed, a multi-part vocal round that fills the head with a stunning cascade of voices as the song fades into the distance. It is a glorious finishing touch to an album that is a liberating and, in its own roundabout way, an affirrriing experience.

If Alice Cooper does make it someday, it will be for the important reason that they avoid the fatal flaw of taking themselves too seriously, thereby eliminating the preterision that so often goes hand in hand with the kind of thing they are doing. Their murky madness doesn�t snarl and shout at you, but smiles that far off insane smile that is a hundred times more real and frightening than a scream. This ability to keep themselves in perspective might be their chief means of dissolving that challenge to �prove� themselves. For that kind of challenge is effectively dispersed when aimed at someone who laughs at himself; and once it is shown up for what it is, it will bo longer be hurled. Sometimes it just takes people a long time to see what�s going on, that�s all,

Richard Cromelin

THE GOOD BOOK - MELANIE - BUDDAH

You know about Melanie. She�s that beautiful/terrible flower child/manufactured hype who kisses cows in the liner notes; heir to the' Joni Mitchell position as* cojnmander-in-chief of the Doug Weston Dream-Squad and sometime funky folksinger. What movies are you watching these days? Are you through with Elf-Children vs. the Plastic Mummy and on into Revenge of the Culture? If so, then you�re probably sickened by Melanie and won�t even cop to having all those Donovan records gathering dust behind your couch.

I like Melanie. Honesty Counts, and so does that singing voice, which is occasionally the female counterpart of 1962 Bob Dylan and other times reminiscent of Piaf and Dietrich. The Good Book, her latest, is a very irritating record, suggesting that something is wearing thin in the Golden Girl trip which Buddah has been fostering. I should think that this record would produce a very unsettling effect on any hard-core Melanie devotee who listened carefully to the words; being told that they�re'cattle and sheep and all. �Tell us you love us, so we don�t feel alone.� Melanie is aware of her relationship to the people who buy and sell her records, and has more or less set down her feelings about it in The Good Book. Most noticeable is a little girl�s resentment and sarcasm toward the �image� which sells her to the public. This resentment is expressed in a simple childlike way in �The Prize � and �Nickel Song�. Melanie is still very much caught up in the myths of the street, but I don�t think she intends to trade on them for commercial purposes. She probably really does cry all the Wy to the bank.

'Melanie�s greatest talent may be her ability to adapt other people�s songs to her unique scraggily voice and bring something new ‡0 them. Her versions of �Mr. Tambourine Man� and �Ruby Tuesday� on previous albums were both standouts. .On this record she does an audacious �Sign on the Wiqdow� which js probably the best thing dn the record. She cuts through the superficial optimism which many people derive from Dylan�s performance and gets down to the core of the song. Only the first and last verses are included and in place of the Raelettes type chorus she substitutes a country banjo break and turns the thing into down-home Flatt & Scruggs. Cheeky, is what it is. Her voice quavers with uncertainty ground the affirmation of Utah cabins and rainbow trout as lifels highest goals. �That must be what it�s all about... I wanna find out what it�s all about, I wanna find out what it�s all about,� she sings. Hey, Bob, there must be more to it than that! The same feeling Which is implicit in Dylan�s performance is made explicit here.

She�s not as successful in her attempt to steal Judy Collins� �My Father.�* The arrangement is over-tinkly and it comes off like rabbit-poaching. There�s something that rings true, for a change, in Judy�s version that can�t be copied.

Ochs� �Chords of Fame� fits in perfectly with the tenor of the rest of it. What have they done to her song? Well, she could�ve stayed home at the cabin with the kids. You can�t have it both ways, Melanie ... that�s how it is up on housing project hill. You must choose one or the other

Len Bailes

RASTUS - GRT - G2T30004

It�s really a shame that it isn�t Christmas, becuase if it were, this would make such a nifty album for just about everybody from Paul Butterfield devotees, to Cream addicts, to Chicago and Blood Sweat and Tears fans, to Buddy Miles freaks^ to James Brown slaves, to Miles Davis followers, to John Coltrane edifiers, to Steppenwolf fans, to Mitch Ryder groupies, to Sons of Champlin lovers, to Grateful Dead people, to just about everybody. It�s a block buster of a double album complete with two sides recorded in concert in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and a whole second record of them in a studio so we can get the full range of their sound.

Rastus busts loose with a sound too big to be fitted into any regular sized group. Theirs is one 6f the big band sounds that is taking America by storm. Their horn section alone consists of two trombones, and three saxaphones. They have one base, and two guitars to give the group more of its incredible push. And although the drummer is an incomparable artist, they could use another one to make sure that when the band swings, they will never lack for a rhythm section.

The album itself is as tasty a piece of confectionary as you could ever hope to see, with each member of the group radiating outward like rays from a sun sign logo on the cover. The back has a photograph of them rockin out in concert. You can almost hear them.

They start out the first side with a song called �Black Cat,� which has an outasite drum solo that lasts for about five minutes. On the very first song, yet. It�s amazing! Just listen to it a few times, and you will realize how very accomplished their drummer really is. That is followed by �Texas/The Bells,� a medley with some good layback blues and horn solos that conjure up the great old Chicago Jazz sounds of yore. They play a Graham Bond tune on the second side that sounds like Saxaphones Inc. only much more impressive. The second record begins with a horn tribute to the Wizard of Oz, and proceeds to knock off a series of shorter songs that are basically nondescript in themselves, but build nicely because it is the SOUND that matters. That great, piercing collection of orchestrated horns, and high flying guitars of the big band sound that is taking America by siege. v

This group is made for* the summer rock festival circuit. They sould hit every open air concert, and festival in the country cutting loose to all the stoned heads, and seconal freaks of the Woodstock nation. Then they should end their tour with a month long engagement at the Whisky. On the last night of their engagement, they should combine with Blood Sweat and Tears, Chicago, the Buddy Miles Express, Ambigress, Ginger Baker�s Airforce, if it is still around, in a tremendous jam session crushing the stage and with it all the groups that push the big band sound that is taking America by nausea.

Robert Houghton

STRANGE LOCOMOTION - SIREN -ELEKTRA 74087

The following was submitted as a prize-winning composition from our Creem Literacy and Erudition Program, class of 1971.

SIREN by Mike Saunders

How long has it been since you�ve heard a group that was almost completely lacking in any technical proficiency whatsoever, and nevertheless really good, not in spite of it but perhaps because of it — a band coming right under Lester Bangs� sagacious comment, �Who are those guys? How do they get away with that shit?�*

Well, Siren is just such a crew ■— a group mind you, not an obnoxious collection of superegos or Superstar Smith & his Three-Ring Circus - and they�re good in one of the weirdest ways I�ve heard yet. Basically their material (95% �original�) consists of two styles: (1) uncanny blues items, toned down and often accompanied only by acoustic guitar, featuring lead singer Kevin Coyne�s absolutely amazing ability to soipid just like a 60 year-old emaciated Excello Records blues veteran, closest perhaps to Lonesome Sundown�s high-pitched voice flanked by a bad cold (2) great 1965 Eric Burdon quasi-R&B ripoffs, Coyne this time around not only singing and phrasing like that whitesoul boy wonder of yesteryear, but the material and playing also sounding suspiciously like the old Animals (lyrics, too: �Well forget about the waltz and the ballet line/Do a dance that�s called the stride/Yeh, yeh, yeh, stride/C�mon baby, there ain�t much time, stride�).

When a couple of cross-breed numbers, part 3-chord R&B and part rocknroll, are added, the group shows their true colors: with Nick Cudworth�s great Fats Domino-ish piano playing especially featured in the instrumental lineup, the end result conjures up but one solitary word to one s ear: unique. Siren s piano-bass-dru,ms nuclei combined with the relaxed style of the music, the undeniable lack of emphasis on instrumental polish, and the throwback drumming, all give the music something startling: that loose, spontaneous spirit of so much 1950�s rocknroll, applied contextually to a 1971 blooze (well, kinda) group that not only eschews offensive leaden white-boy blues, but even has to bring in an outside guitarist to play lead guitar on their •albums! Parodies notwithstanding, Siren" then proceeds to make one of the whole dismal ^ genre with their slow blooze number �Fetch Me My Woman,� during which their own guitarist takes the spotlight to play some of the most banal and inept blues licks I�ve heard since I myself last picked up my trusty guitar. It�s really quite funny in a bizarre way (the song, not my guitar playing). All put, the first side of the LP is remarkably fine, the .second (the one with the parody) is eminently worthwhile, and the album as a whole marks a step upward* in quality from Siren�s first x album, one which earned accolades from such well respected gentlemen as Ed Ward, Sylvia J. Gootch, and The Famous Alaska King Crab (�I�d eat it with maple syrup, and then I�d run out and buy another one�).

So by me Siren has a really fine second album with Strange Locomotion, which sounds like a classic Little Eva move — �Loco-Motion� not only made No. 1 smack dab in the middle of 1962 (8/25 to be exact)* as the first entry ever from Dimension Records, but Dimension was Nevins-Kirshner run and we know who they were, while ironically at the same time furthering the careers of Goffin-King, enabling Carole King to cut some smashes of her own, an.' Little Eva had been Gerry and Carole Goffin�s babysitter in the first place, y�know, but another time and place for all that — and without a doubt they make the New Starz On The Horizon slot for the month. Maybe Carole King aught to write a song for them to complete the historical circle, we�ll just have to wait and see.

It�s like this: there are a bunch of good rock groups around you don�t hear a helluva lot about, at least not if all you follow are the Top 200 LP charts; and Siren is in with this select group of the underground rocknroll elite, or maybe it�s a congnoscenti*, but you know what I mean. A Brownsville Station they�re not, nor are they the likes of an exciting hard rock band like the Shocking Blue. And then the Flamin Groovies defy comparison with anything or anyone, including the Wild Angels, but that�s neither here nor there. Siren, I suppose, comes under the category of Tongue-In-Cheek Blooze And Etc. Extrapolatory Entries, where it looks like they�re sitting pretty at No. 1 for the time" being: they�ve got no competition.

*Creem, Dec. 1970, p. 45.

*Also known as the Johnny Thunder reversal 1 move: he had a Top 10 hit, only to never again make the top 100. But Siren have gotten better, you see.

*Billboard Magazine, forgot the page.

* Webster�s New World Dictionary, Vol. XI, p. 284. Looked it up.

P.S.: Do I pass?