Monday, November 29, 2004
Are Go!
Mighty Recordings, 1997
Who remembers the great lounge music craze of 1997? Hands? No? Okay, you remember the movie Swingers and The Brian Setzer Orchestra and all that shit? Yeah, I was ahead of the curve on that crap. I was picking up Martin Denny and Arthur Lyman CD's in the early 1990's. Why? Because I had bought every other CD ever made.
Anyway, here's a bunch of post-grunge Seattlites who did just about the only "hip" career move they could in the mid-1990's, and that was to stop playing all those crappy original rock songs they had written, and start playing a whole bunch of old, crappy lounge songs they hadn't written! Genius! Then give the band a goofy, retro name! No Dudley Manlove in the group! (Paging Jethro Tull and Pink Floyd!) Not a quartet, they have six members! (Paging Ben Folds Five! Choke! Wheeze! GAG!)
Needless to say, there's absolutely NO REASON for any of this to exist. It's a bunch of cynical, bandwagon-hopping, turgid dung. And that means, of course...I LOVE IT!!!
Thankfully, this is a live recording, since a lounge act needs to be seen in its natural habitat, A LOUNGE. They hit a wide variety of covers here, and I appreciate the variety. It's a veritable CRAP BUFFET! Yes, Theme From The Love Boat, Can't Take My Eyes Off of You, Spanish Flea (the seldom-heard vocal version!), and the Theme From Shaft. We cover Tom Jones (What's New Pussycat), Elvis (Clambake, Suspicious Minds), and The Bee Gees (More Than A Woman - the one cut I would have jettisoned). There's even the Theme From Love American Style, a truly insipid (I meant inspired, whoops) choice out of the Cowsills songbook.
The boys in DMQ have since released two more CDs and I believe they are still gigging. Hoist that Zippo high boys, and keep the cheese flowing! By the way, Dudley Manlove was one of the "stars" of the immortal Ed Wood classick, Plan Nine From Outer Space, and a really lame actor. Plus his name was Manlove.
Rating: Used buy.
Thursday, November 11, 2004
Heaven/Earth
Light in the Attic (Reissue, 2003)
Proof that if you wait around long enough, everything comes around again. The Free Design were a pop group from the late 1960's to early 1970's. Made up of four siblings named Dedrick, they formed in the Summer of Love (1967, natch) and took up that mantle for the rest of their existence in the genre of "soft pop." Although this genre was mostly associated with California, and with groups like The Mamas and Papas and The Fifth Dimension, the Dedricks hailed from that land of sunshine known as Buffalo, New York. They were signed to the Project 3 label, owned by bandleader Enoch Light. in fall '67 they brought out their classic first LP, "Kites are Fun." This is their second LP, and usually considered their best.
As a veteran picker of record stacks, I can assure you that Project 3 releases have not been very desired. That is, until a few years ago, when a certain brand of record collector/archivist began unearthing the remains of the "soft pop" genre. Prices shot up precipitously. Free Design LPs which could formerly be had for a few bucks zoomed up to 30, 40, 50 bucks or more in the best condition. As usual, the Japanese have been in the forefront of such untrammeled '60s fetishism, coveting and seeking out these golden baubles. In the face of such insanity, a reissue label, Light In The Attic has sprung up to make these shiny-shiny gems available on CD for the first times.
As to the music, how is it? Top shelf stuff for the genre, certainly among the best. Kaliedoscopic rainbow candy. If you're a punk rock fan, you just really aren't going to get it. But if you understand what The Polyphonic Spree is all about, if you dig Brian Wilson and know who P.F. Sloan is, then you need this. Highlights are a cover of "If I Were A Carpenter" (not as good as the version by American Blues, but that's nitpicking), and the chipper "2002-A Hit Song." Yes, that title was published in 1968. And now we're past 2002. Go figure. This whole thing reached its logical end when the band reformed to record a new CD about two years ago, their first release in about 30 years. Haven't picked that up yet, but it's on my list. www.lightintheattic.net
Rating: Full Retail.
