Here are the Crown Jewels of my Record Collection
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13th FLOOR ELEVATORS Psychedelic Sound of (International Artists 1A No 1 (MONO)) « Fueled by a madness brought on by excessive acid use, the unhinged garage-rock and mind-bending, sometimes harrowing, psychedelia of ’60s pre-punk trailblazers The 13th Floor Elevators looked out over the edge and leaped — sanity and safety be damned. Few others, if any, followed their lead. They were too afraid. » S-E-M-I-N-A-L |
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The BACHS Out of the Bachs (1968, Roto Records PR-1044) « [...] quite simply the greatest 1960s private press side of all time. Much more than simply another garage punk album, Out Of The Bachs is the holy grail of post-acid teenage satori [...] The sound on this record so completely approximates my fantasy idea of what the ultimate 1960s USA garage band would sound like that I sometimes wonder if I dreamt it up myself. » |
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VASHTI BUNYAN Just Another Diamond Day (1970, Philips 6308019) « [...] a wonderfully warm & intimate atmosphere is evoked , as if the listener is reading pages from the dairy to someone deeply attuned to nature & the truly important things in life [...] Vashti was one of the few people surprised when the Observer voted it one of the best British albums of all time. » |
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The CAN Monster Movie (1969, Music Factory SRS 001) « Monster Movie is a stone classic. There was still no visionary in any big record company willing to put money into the new W. German sound. But when Monster Movie was released on Music Factory Records in August 1969, the tiny 500 pressing sold out immediately and changed the whole W. German rock scene. » |
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TECHNICAL SPACE COMPOSER’S CREW Canaxis 5 (1969, Music Factory SRS 002) « Comprised out of two side long compositions, being the stunning “Boat-woman Song” and “Canaxis”, Czukay and Dammers succeed in fusing and simultaneously surmounting genre restrictions such as avant-garde, psychedelic, tape music, musique concrete, trance, field recordings, world music and experimental music, blending all into a melting pot of mind melting beautiful sounds. » |
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MYSTIC SIVA s/t (1971, V.O. Recording S-19713) « Mystic Siva is a quartet from Detroit that created one of the most popular psychedelic-underground artefacts from all-time. Their legendary « Orange Album », recorded in 1971 on one day. « Awesome US psychedelia Masterpiece: Spooky go-go organ, acidy guitar lashes, strong powerfull vocals » |
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RANDY HOLDEN Population II (1969, Hobbit HB 5002) « LOUD. Very LOUD. Louder than Blue Cheer, who were louder than god. But Population II were gods one louder: a Power Duo with their amplifiers set at eleven [...] He had a vision, felt the music and played it at a volume excruciatingly high for any age. » « Recorded in an opera house on 20 Sunn amps wired in parallel (‘It was the only place we could rehearse that would carry all the amplification’) [...] I mean, Holden had to rent an opera house in order to just rehearse, as each speaker could handle 200 watts. » |
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INDEX s/t (1967, « Dwight Conger » DC Records DC 71) « The lo-fi sound, amateur vocals and smoke-thick atmosphere have an instantaneous jaw-dropping effect [...] Incredible primitive surf-garage-psych with off-key teenage vocals and an unreal soundscape; imagine Dick Dale jamming with 1966 Velvet Underground in an airplane hangar after a night of booze & Quaaludes. Great band originals share the stage with unparalleled Byrds deconstructions, while some of the feedback and drone passages are bordering on avant noise. A true missing link item bridging the early and late 60s sounds. » |
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LAMONTE YOUNG/MARIAN ZAZEELA The theatre of Eternal Music (1973, Shandar 83 510) « Frequencies and voltages of the sine waves generators were determined and tuned by La Monte Young using oscillators custom-designed by sound technician Robert Adler to generate specific frequencies and voltages of great stability. The sine waves produced are such that they interfere with each other, creating changes of volume both in time and space that can be experienced either walking within the room or staying put. If one chooses to walk, he will change the sound experience of other people in the room by moving the molecules of air. » |
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LEAF HOUND Growers of Mushroom (1971, Decca SKL-R 5094) « The Album starts off with a bang, a sharp repetitive and overall memorable riff kicks it off, reminiscent of Black Sabbath’s debut sped up a few measures. Freelance Fiend set the album up to be a true great. The solos cut a harsh rift through the music that perfectly complements Peter French’s vocals that rock, roll and soar throughout the album while still remaining gritty and unpolished. » « Le disque démarre par un titre d’une violence ultime, à faire passer « Good Times Bad Times » pour une bluette easy-listening: « Freelance Fiend ». » |
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MONKS Black Monk Time (1966, Polydor International 249 900) « NO-ONE ever came up with a whole album of such dementia. The Monks’ Black Monk Time is a gem born of isolation and the horrible deep-down knowledge that no-one is really listening to what your [sic] saying. » « It starts off with the singer yelling « Hey, my name’s Gary… » and I think to myself, Hey, that’s my name, too… » |
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NICK DRAKE Five Leaves Left (1969, Island ILPS 9105) « It’s little wonder why Drake felt frustrated at the lack of commercial success his music initially gathered, considering the help he had on his debut record. Besides fine production from Joe Boyd and assistance from folks like Fairport Convention’s Richard Thompson and his unrelated bass counterpart from Pentangle, Danny Thompson, Drake also recruited school friend Robert Kirby to create most of the just-right string and wind arrangements. » « He was very secretive. I knew he was making an album but I didn’t know what stage of completion it was at until he walked into my room and said, ‘There you are.’ He threw it on to the bed and walked out! » « To see a world in a grain of sand/And a heaven in a wild flower/Hold infinity in the palm of your hand/And eternity in an hour » |