June's Picks



1. RONNIE LANE-"Evolution"
A groovy, simple little track, just vocals with acoustic guitar. A rambler of Ronnie's tucked away on Pete Townshend's debut solo LP "Who Came First".

2. THE AMAZING FRIENDLY APPLE-"Magician"
One of the crown jewels of 1986's "The great British Psychedelic Trip" (quite possibly the best British 60's psych comp ever) is this busy little number.  Full of Mellotron, swirling organ, horns and soulful vocals it reminds me a lot of The End meets The Left Banke.

3. THE MOVE-"Useless Information"
An archetype first line up Move classic from their debut LP with all the necessary ingredients: thundering bass, intricate layers of harmonies and frantic but disciplined drumming!

4. THE STOICS-"Enough Of What I Need"
Classic snotty U.S. 60's garage tune with some haunting backing vocals ala The Kinks, first introduced to me via a cover by the Creatures of The Golden Dawn.

5. THE TAGES-"My Home Town"
Cool little ditty from my fave non U.K. 60's band, Sweden's Tages. It concerns a guy on a train on his way to meet his family and a delegation, keys to the town, speech w/ the mayor etc but when he arrives no one is there?  Wrong time or a daydream?

6. THE PRINCIPALS-"I Can't Stop"
The thing I've always loved about mid 60's bands from Australia and New Zealand was that a fair amount of them sounded like a great amalgamation of cool U.K. 60's savage beat/freakbeat crossed with the snottiness of U.S. 60's garage and this gang of Kiwis have it down: a punky fuzz bass, high Who style backing vocals with mod/power pop freakbeat power chords and a freaky little fadeout!

7. THE BOGEYMEN-"Love And Hate"
These guys were sort of like a mid 90's French version of The Prisoners meets the Clique (U.K. 90's) and they cut a few LP's, though the one this came from , "Action Time" was their best.

8. THE GUESS WHO-"This Time Long Ago"
The vocals and the chord changes on this groovy little light number always remind me of the '66 Who in between "My Generation" and "A Quick One", especially the brilliant sonic harmonies at the intro and outro that recall "Glow Girl".

9. THE JAMES TAYLOR MOVE-"Magic Eyes"
A great Aussie 60's pastiche of "I Feel Free" with enough "la la la's" to give it this great mod/pop feel with an equally cool blistering guitar solo from the essential "Peculiar Hole In The Sky" Big Beat CD comp.

10. DAVID BOWIE-"Station To Station (Live)"
Powerful version from the "Stage" LP finds the Dame in fine form with some telling lyrics offering glimpses to his personal madness: cocaine, love and possibly even  fascism.