The Rooster, Man

ATOMIC ROOSTER-Devil's Answer/The Rock  U.K. B&C CB-157 1971

Formed in 1970 the by two ex- member's of the Crazy World of Arthur Brown (organist Vincent Crane and drummer Carl Palmer), the group had one of the most rapidly changing line-ups in British 70's rock n' roll history!  The band's line-up at the time of this single (their third) was : John Du Cann (ex-Andromeda) on guitar/vocals, Vincent Crane (organ) and Carl Palmer (drums).

I discovered Atomic Rooster thanks to the amazing British TV show "Life On Mars" which made use of "Devil's Answer", "The Rock" and "Ear In The Snow".  I was hooked.

"Devil's Answer" is a punchy little number that kicks off with a very cool Hammond intro and then some brass.  The simplistic main riff is catchy because it's forceful, repetitive and has a great beat. Du Cann's guitar solo on it shines because it's short and sweet, not your typical 70's guitar hero crap and sounds straight off of a post freakbeat '68 single.  "The Rock" is a bit heavier. It's an instrumental pierced by Du Cann's guitar and strung together utilizing some soulful brass.


"Devil's Answer" on "Top Of The Pops" July 1971

Hear "The Rock":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYjFm2yQT2g

Both sides have been collected on the essential Atomic Rooster double CD "Heavy Soul".

I like the way this one's been airbrushed, creepily it makes them look like religious icons!

Cool Foreign E.P.'s Part Twenty Four: The Herd & Dave Dee

THE HERD-The Game/Beauty Queen
DAVE DEE, DOZY, BEAKY, MICK & TICH-Snake In The Grass/Bora Bora Mexico Fontana EPF 1613 1969

The Poets Second Brilliant 45!

THE POETS-That's The Way It's Got To Be/I'll Cry With The Moon U.K. Decca F 12074 1965

One of the crowning moment's on the Bam Caruso LP "Rubble 5: The Electric Crayon Set" was this amazing second 45 offering by Glasgow's Andrew Loog Oldham produced Poets.

I've often called The Poets Scotland's answer to The Zombies, I think it's because they both used amplified acoustic 12 string guitars on some of the best records (hear The Zombie's "I Don't Want To Know" for reference) and both group's placed a heavy reliance on heart strung numbers about romantic angst.  February 1965's "That's The Way It's Got To Be" follows the precedent set by their debut 45 "Now We're Thru" (see "Anorak Thing" November 18, 2010) by again utilizing this distinct sound from lead guitarist Hume Patton (who along with lead singer George Gallacher and rhythm guitarist Tony Myles wrote both sides of this 45).  It's also fattened up by some six string bass that rumbles along, esp. effectively during the intro in tandem with the twelve string (the bass was reputed to be played by session player extraordinaire Jack Bruce).  "I'll Cry With the Moon" is more somber but accented by some cool acoustic guitar and has a VERY Zombies feel to it and sits nicely alongside moodier pieces by the St. Albans lads like "I Must Move" or "Don't Go Away".

The Poets, pic courtesy of http://www.rockingscots.co.uk

"That's The Way It's Got To Be" is one of the most reissued Poets tracks having cropped up on the earlier mentioned Rubble volume (and included on the "Rubble One" box set) as well as Decca Deram's "The Mod Scene" and Rhino's essential "NuggetsII: Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969" box set among others.  "I'll Cry With The Moon" is on "Rubble Volume 6:The Clouds Have Groovy Faces" which is is included in the "Rubble One" box set, which is equally essential.  Both sides were also included on the dodgy "In Your Tower" CD comp of their material and the hard to get but much better Poets CD comp "Scotland's No. 1 Group". In 2011 both sides were compiled for CD on The Poet's "Wooden Spoon:The Singles 1964-1967" which is, just that (no bonus cuts unlike "Scotland's #1 Beat Group").
Hear "That's The Way It's Got To Be":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PM5-zF85LE

Hear "I'll Cry With the Moon":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgjaIS9bL3Y

***Special thanks again to Lenny Helsing (Scotland's foremost 60's music expert) for his invaluable information that made this piece possible**************************************************

When I was a lad...........

In the years before 1980 and my "mod epiphany" I was a huge fan of the British Invasion/60's music from 1975 on. A few nights back in conversation (and well into a full bottle of Mouton Cadet) with a British friend of mine a good ten years my senior we began talking about all the cheezy/ cheap LP's of our younger years (he mentioned Pickwick and MFP in the U.K.).  Growing up in a dinky little town nearly all of my records came from department stores that had stuff of similar "cheese", though not always.  The first 45 I ever bought with my own money was The Beatle's "Got to Get You Into My Life" from Two Guys in 1976, the first LP I ever bought with my own money was the octagonal shaped Rolling Stones album "Through the Past Darkly: Big Hits Volume Two" in about 1977 at a JC Penny's store, but usually for nearly all of my records I was reliant on gifts from my family (though my aunt supplied me with loads of her "old" Hermans Hermits, Animals and Billy J Kramer 45's and a Hermits LP and a school friend gave me his dad's Donovan, Byrds, Searchers, Gerry & The Pacemakers and Animals 45's and a Searchers LP).  For my family and the effort's to address my gift requests there was one place they shopped. There was a store called Jamesway, which back in the day was like Target.  They had a record department and they had the weirdest stuff there, lots of U.K. compilation albums and "Best Of.." stuff which immediately caught my eye.  I'd bring a pad shoved in my back pocket and a pen and carefully copy down the LP's title for a "wish list".  For some reason there were lots of import albums there.  I used to make my Xmas gift requests accordingly and my parents and aunt did their shopping there and I wound up with these LP's for Xmas or my B-Day from about 1976 on. Sadly I cannot locate any pics online of The Searchers "Golden Hour Of.." LP or The Dave Clark Five's "Best Of.." on EMI's Starline which would've joined this bunch:

A double Hermans Hermits "Best of.." LP on swindler Allen Klein's ABKCO label.

Sadly this was "Live" not much help for my quest for "On A Carousel" or "Carrie Anne".  I didn't ask for this but my parents got it for me on a hunch, they redeemed themselves with another "hunch" concerning 4 guys from Muswell Hill (see further below).

A Donovan "Best Of.." containing his "folky" stuff.

The back cover of the same Dono LP, I swore he was puffing a "j" in the left pic and I still do!  I always thought the pic of him on the right in the roll neck and shades looked cool as *uck to my 11 or 12 year old mind.

A wiggy U.K. Stones Decca comp of lots of 60's stuff, most of which I'd never heard and heavy on Chuck Berry material.  After my "conversion" I referred to this as The Stone's "Rocker album".

A Yardbirds "Greatest Hits" comp. on Epic, truth be told I never had the LP: my sister bought it for me on 8 track for Xmas and it repeated one track twice for filler and had a sleeve that was a collage of 60's "current events" listed with song titles in between.

A various artists "Mersey" compilation album with Manchester's Hollies and a few Liverpool acts.  It introduced me to The Big Three AND The Swinging Blue Jeans.  Strangely I did not like either until MANY years later........

Another folk era Donovan LP on Hickory with post folkie photo and trippy artwork. There were at least two or three others in the store but this looked coolest after I got the "Best Of.." one.....

I never asked for this one and I'd no idea who The Kinks were but since they were British AND from the 60's my mom and dad took a gamble on it, and of course I was blown away.  Weird anecdote:it was all hits save "Wait Till Summer Comes Along"!

I never got this one, though I REALLY wanted it.  I begged and pleaded for it but the response was "Your sister got you a Yardbirds tape last year and this probably has all of the same song".  My reply (bad move) "Yeah but it's got other songs too".  I bought it in the early 90's just because I couldn't get in as a kid and used the pic of Clapton on the cover in my zine in and then sold it......

When you're 11 and ask for a Byrds LP make sure it's not one of half baked early sh*t......

Craftily Arista launched this LP in 1976 or so as the TV show was running every day after school in 1975 (which in turn led me to discover four guys from Liverpool lurking in my mom's stuff in the attic) and no doubt there were loads of kids like me seeking out The Monkees.  I know two other 9 or 10 year olds who got it for Xmas like me, were you one as well? It contained all their hits and because someone at Arista had a sense of humor "Listen To the Band", which me and all of my friends detested then.

You Should Be Hearing Something Very Soon.................

Not much "modern music" raises an eye brow or pulse with us, but "we" here at "Anorak Thing" (well that means just "me", but I'm such a moody bastard that its been implied that I have a multiple personality disorder so it's always safe to say "we") are avidly awaiting the new LP by our main man of cool in the U.K. Andy Lewis so in the meantime groove on this track from his last long player "You Should Be Hearing Something Now":

We Shall Have No Psychedelia On The Village Green!

THE KINKS-Autumn Almanac/David Watts France Pye 45. PV 15279 1967

One of the things I've always loved about the Kinks is that in the 60's they were much like Ray Davie's proverbial/fictional Village Green untouched by time, the antithesis of the village in Orwell's "Coming Up For Air" where our hen pecked traveling salesman protagonist returns to find the quaint village of his youth changed by the hand of progress and time.  In the post beat-era 60's The Kinks to seemed untouched by time to a degree, sure they weren't knocking out their same raw four chord ravers like they did in '64-'65 but they'd still kept to their own agenda.  For one thing, psychedelia did not envelop The Kinks and save possibly, "Lazy Old Sun" on their 1967 "Something Else.." album the band never flirted with the technicolor wave that washed through 1967 Britain changing music and minds alike.

"Autumn Almanac" conjures, again, the quintessential Kinks era that's encapsulated in a time that perhaps  "never was" as perfectly illustrated the following year in their classic "Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society" LP (in December's issue of "Uncut" Ray Davies said of the "Village Green..." LP: "I was 24 when I wrote that it. That England was evaporating when I was born."). There's something incredibly cheery and cheeky about it, maybe it's the knees up/music hall sing-a;long feel of it with it's "la la la's" and simplistic musical backing (and snippets of backward horns et al, okay maybe the Kinks DID "dabble" in trippiness in their music). Most people would lampoon the working class or seek to escape it, Ray Davies revelled in it:

"I like my football on a Saturday, roast beef on Sundays alright, I go to Blackpool for my holiday sit in the open sunlight.."

 The track also contains one of my favorite lines. Should I someday find a neighborhood that I love and want to live forever in it has already been aptly sung by Ray:

"this is my street, and I'm never gonna leave it, and I'm always gonna stay, if I live to be 99...."

The flipside is equally good and joins the slim volume of Kinks singles where one side  is equally as good as the other. I will own up to being introduced to "David Watts" via The Jam's version on "All Mod Cons" when I scored a cut out copy of the U.S. version of the LP in 1980.  It was not until I saw The Jam live at the Trenton War Memorial in May of 1982 that I heard the original when the day after the gig a DJ on my favorite "local" college radio station (WPRB, Princeton University) played it and said something to the affect of "The Jam played a really good version of this last night" (somehow I heard it despite the ringing in my ears as I'd swear The Jam were the loudest band I'd ever seen...). That fall I borrowed the double LP "Kink Kronikles" from a friend and furthered my mid 60's Kinks education and got me firmly hooked on R.D.D's paean to the head boy at the school who gets all the girls and scores all the goals.  "David Watts" is still one of my favorite Kinks tracks, not because of the Jam cover, but because of it's infectious melody, the "fa fa fa fa.." bit, the driving Nicky Hopkin's piano, Pete Quaife's persistent bass line and Ray's laissez-faire attitude about the song's subject matter.

The "cabaret" era Kinks, probably somewhere "up the North", backstage 1967

Hear "David Watts":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51d9s_MQ6ws

John Barry R.I.P.

THE JOHN BARRY SEVEN-Monkey Feathers/Zulu Stamp U.K. Ember EMB S185 1964

So I've just read that the great John Barry passed way today at the age of 77 (well I'd read it this morning but *%~`<+^! Blogger wouldn't allow my first draft to publish without great bits missing out of it.  Hopefully it'll work this time as I've been messing with this god damn post all freaking day to make it visible, *uckers). Rather than eulogize him in a meandering long winded tribute I thought it would be nice to select my favorite record of his and tell you something about it.

To the world outside our little community of record creepers "in the know" John Barry will always be known for all the film scores he's done, certainly of course, the most famous being his plethora of James Bond film soundtrack work.  Many are unfamiliar with the fact that he briefly had a simultaneous career leading an instrumental rock n' roll combo called The John Barry Seven (see Anorak Thing July, 13, 2010).

Many years ago I bought a 3 CD John Barry box set of dubious nature and it contained a CD of the soundtrack for the film "Zulu", it's bonus tracks were four "beat group" versions of some of the movements from the film score. One of which, "Monkey Feathers" blew me away.  A few years later I scored the single.

"Monkey Feathers" coolness for me, is rooted in the twangy-distorted main guitar lick.  It's got a certain "weirdness" to it that makes it different from the dreadfully boring typical surf guitar "twang" and there's some great punctuated brass/drums bursts that break it all up and these campy flutes that string it all along. "Zulu Stamp" repeats the formula though lacking as catchy a main guitar riff as the A-side it's not nearly as interesting, though there's added saxophones on this track to "duel" with the flutes.

Both sides appeared on the CD compilation "Ember Beat Vol. 1 (1962-64) : Tell Me".

Hear "Monkey Feathers":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wThO3XbwUZg

Hear "Zulu Stamp":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q68n1m_Xrfk