Not Forgotten: Brainchild – Healing of the Lunatic Owl
Purchased, simply because I was flicking through the racks at Record Collector, took one look at the cover and declared that, regardless of the music it contained, I simply had to own an album called The Healing of the Lunatic Owl, Brainchild’s sole long player to date delivers. Then again when you have the combination of a …
Not Forgotten: Grand Funk – Grand Funk
With a fuzz bass sound to die for high on their list of priorities, and critical adulation low, Grand Funk (Railroad) blazed a trail across America from the late 60s and way into the mid 70s, playing their crowd pleasers to packed out venues regardless of what the critics of the era had to say. Rising to …
Classic Compilation: Talkings Heads – The Best of
Rhino have always had a reputation for putting together some damn fine compilations which work as ideal introductions to the bands in question. The Best of Faces – Good Boys … When They’re Asleep and Permanent Record: The Very Best of Violent Femmes have been much-needed single disc introductions to two bands that may otherwise have remained permanently …
Classic Compilation: John Cooper Clarke – The Very Best Of
Lydon, Shelley & Diggle, Strummer and Jones. They were the great punk poets weren’t they? The less cliched among us would cast the net further and point to the genius of Ian Dury, a superior lyricist in every way to his punk peers. And then there was John Cooper Clarke, not a lyricist, but a …
Classic Album: Pink Floyd – The Wall
Has there ever been another album quite as unrelentingly miserable as The Wall? It first entered my life back in 1998, when I was suffering from a bout of not inconsiderable self-doubt and struggling to connect with anything or anyone. Knowing that I was a Pink Floyd fan, my Uncle loaned me his old vinyl …
Not Forgotten: Neil Young – Live Rust
One of the things that strikes you when you look at Neil Young’s extensive discography is just how many live albums he has put out over the years. No matter how much his muse has waxed and waned over the last thirty years, Young has always remained a brilliant live performer and his live albums …
Book Review: The Ballad of Jethro Tull
Despite being one of the biggest acts of the 70s, Jethro Tull are not a band that have ever enjoyed career reassessment and rehabilitation by subsequent generations. Sure, they have enjoyed steady sales to this day, and there has even been a string of hefty box set reissues which have seen their classic albums remastered …
Classic Compilation: Clifford T Ward – Gaye and Other Stories
The aging process is a strange thing and effects us all in different ways. Some of us barely notice it, there are those that do all they can to hold back the ravages of time, and there are those that accept it with a wry smile and open arms. There was a time when the …
Album Review: Bang Bang Romeo – A Heartbreaker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Bang Bang Romeo’s debut album is a genuinely difficult one for me to review. When I first unexpectedly encountered them back in March 2014 tearing up the stage of The Leadmill mid-way down a card of mixed ability local talent, Bang Bang Romeo were a thrillingly raw four piece that were still exploring the parameters …
Not Forgotten: Creedence Clearwater Revival – Willie and The Poor Boys
For years I unfairly dismissed Willie and the Poor Boys as one of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s weakest albums. I can’t explain why this was the case, as it came smack bang in the middle of the band’s red-hot streak through 1969 to 1971. Perhaps it was the slightly rootsier rocking which I reacted against, as if CCR decided …