The James Gang was a rock band formed in Cleveland, Ohio in 1967. Though the band was not a huge commercial success, except in the Northeast Ohio area, the fame garnered by guitarist Joe Walsh has since made the group more notable. The original band members were drummer Jim Fox, bassist Tom Kriss, guitarist Ronnie Silverman, keyboardist Phil Giallombardo, and guitarist Greg Grandillo, who was quickly replaced by Dennis Chandler. Bill Jeric replaced Silverman when he entered the service. After Chandler left, the group featured Glen Schwartz. However, none of the early line-ups released any material. In January 1968, Joe Walsh replaced Schwartz after Schwartz had left the band the previous month to move to California, where he ended up forming Pacific Gas & Electric. The band continued as a five piece for a short time until Giallombardo left to become involved in other pursuits. Jeric and Walsh worked together on guitar parts, but Jeric ended up leaving as well in the spring of 1968. He was then replaced by Ronnie Silverman, who had been discharged from the service. James Gang Live in Concert is a live album by the James Gang, released in September 1971. It contains highlights of performances at Carnegie Hall, New York City. This album is the last to feature Joe Walsh as guitarist and vocalist and Bill Szymczyk as producer and engineer. 01 - Stop 02 - You're Gonna Need Me 03 - Take A Look Around 04 - Tend My Garden 05 - Ashes, The Rain And I 06 - Walk Away 07 - Lost Woman LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
Morning was a Rural-Rock/American Roots/Country-Rock band, formed by Barry Brown (guitar/drums/vocals), Jim Hobson (piano/organ/vocals), Jay Lewis (guitars/banjo/vocals), Jim Kehn (drums/guitar/vocals), Bruce Wallace (electric bass/string bass), and Terry Johnson (guitar). A fine Los Angeles-based group, originally known as The Morning and The Evening. The group was formed after Jay Lewis, also known as Jay Donnellan, had been fired from Love by Arthur Lee. Jim Hobson also appeared on Love's Out Here. When the band signed a recording contract with Vault they retained complete control of the writing, engineering, arranging and producing of their first album, which is an underrated folk-influenced gem. It has a crisp, yet often sleepy sound, which is at its best on And I'm Gone and Sleepy Eyes. The album closes with a ninety second country gem Dirt Roads (the only track written by Jim Kehn) which is worthy of comparison with the title track of Quicksilver's Happy Trails. 01 - Angelena 02 - Early Morning 03 - Tell Me A Story 04 - Easy Keeper 05 - Roll 'em Down 06 - Sleepy Eyes 07 - New Day 08 - As It Was 09 - Time 10 - It'll Take Time 11 - And I'm Gone 12 - Dirt Roads LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
Gale Zoë Garnett is a New Zealand-born Canadian singer best known in the United States for her Grammy-winning folk hit "We'll Sing in the Sunshine." Garnett has since carved out a career as a writer and actress. Garnett was born in Auckland, New Zealand. When Garnett was 11, her family moved to Canada, and she made her public singing debut in 1960, while at the same time pursuing an acting career making guest appearances on television shows such as 77 Sunset Strip. She made her "New York nightclub debut" in 1963, and was signed that same year to RCA Records. In the fall of 1964, Garnett scored a number four pop hit with her original composition "We'll Sing in the Sunshine" (also #1 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary singles chart for seven weeks and a Top 50 country hit), and recorded her debut album, My Kind of Folk Songs, for RCA Victor. Riding the success of "We'll Sing in the Sunshine," which won a 1965 Grammy for Best Folk Recording, Garnett continued to record through the rest of the 1960s with her backing band the Gentle Reign. Garnett delivered a notable performance in the Rankin-Bass feature Mad Monster Party in the late 1960s, with the memorable tunes "Our Time to Shine" and "Never Was a Love Like Mine." At this period she had begun to be more influenced by the counter-culture and had embraced psychedelic themes to some extent. In the late 1960s she recorded several albums of psychedelic-inflected music with the Gentle Reign. An Audience With The King Of Wands from 1968 is the seventh album By Gale. 01 - Breaking Through 02 - Fall In Love Again 03 - Mini Song #1 Ophelia Song 04 - Ballad For F.Scott.Fitzgerald 05 - Big Sur 06 - Mini Song #2 Tropicana High 07 - That's Not The Way 08 - A Word Of Advice 09 - Believe Me 10 - Mini Song #3 Lament For The Self Sufficient 11 - You Could Have Been Anyone 12 - Bad News 13 - Dolphins 14 - Mini Song #4 Tropicana Low LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
The Five Man Electrical Band was a rock group from Canada's capital city of Ottawa, best known for their 1971 hit single "Signs" written by Les Emmerson and reached #3 on the US Billboard Hot 100. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the R.I.A.A. in August 1971. Ted Gerow (keyboards), Brian Rading (bass), Rick 'Bell' Belanger (drums), Les Emmerson (vocals, guitar) and Mike 'Bell' Belanger (2nd drums). Although they never achieved lasting success, The Five Man Electrical Band was one of Canada's best loved and hardest working rock and roll bands of the sixties and seventies. Originally formed in Ottawa, Ontario in 1964 as the Staccatos (Rick Belanger, Les Emmerson, Brian Rading & Vern Craig), the group first gained national recognition in 1967, when they recorded an album for Quality Records called, "A Wild Pair', shared with The Guess Who. The L.P. had some success in Canada, and later that year a single was released by Capitol Records called "Half Past Midnight" which sold around 25,000 copies. Basing themselves in Los Angeles in 1968 as The Five Man Electrical Band, the band toured extensively in the late 60s early 70s, sharing the stage with some of the major acts of the era such as The Allman Brothers, Sly & The Family Stone, Jefferson Airplane, BTO and many others. The album, "Coming Of Age" was released in January 1972 and contained the band's second hit single, "Absolutely Right", which sold 750,000 copies and reached #26 on Billboard. Disbanded in 1975. 01 - Coming Of Age 02 - Find The One 03 - Absolutely Right 04 - Country Girl 05 - Julianna 06 - Friends & Family 07 - Isn't It A Long Hard Road 08 - Me & Harley Davidson 09 - Whole Lotta Heavy (Reprise) 10 - Signs (Bonus Track) LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
Listen To The Sky is a fascinating journey through the changing musical landscape of the '60s as realised by a group of young musicians from Richmond, Surrey. Influenced by local heroes The Rolling Stones and The Yardbirds, they started out as The Others in 1963. Their guitarist had been kicked out of Hampton Grammar School for wearing his hair too long and they were soon signed up by the Bryan Morrison/Jimmy Duncan agency in London, home of The Pretty Things. With their R&B credentials in place, their first single was a respectable reading of the Bo Diddley staple "Oh Yeah" in 1964. Sadly, various band members were pressured into quitting the band and continiung their studies and the band was reborn with a more pronounced Who/pop-art influence, first as The Army, then as Sands. They were managed by the Marquee Organisation and enjoyed a residency at the esteemed London venue in late 1966/early 1967 before being snapped up by Brian Epstein and Robert Stigwood at NEMS who put them on stage at his one of their infamous Saville Theatre nights as support to Cream and Edwin Starr. By the time they came to record their next single, Sands had lost band members to the Jeff Beck Group and Procol Harum (then at number one!). Stigwood insisted they record "Mrs Gillespie's Refrigerator", a tune by his new darlings The Bee Gees but the B-side, "Listen To The Sky", is all their own work... with a little help from Holst's "Mars God of War" from The Planet Suite. Following Epstein's death, interest in Sands disappeared and half the band quit, leaving just two members to forge ahead as Sundragon. Signed to MGM and assigned to producer Derek Lawrence, they were convinced to cover The Lemon Pipers' recent US smash "Green Tambourine" as their debut and Sundragon's excellent version became a minor UK hit in 1968. This compilation have the original '60s releases by The Others, Sands and Sundragon.(R-O) 01 - Oh Yeah 02 - If You Don't Come Back 03 - Smokestack Lightning 04 - I'm Taking Her Home 06 - Mrs. Gillespie's Refrigerator 07 - Listen To The Sky 11 - Seventeen 12 - Peacock Dress 13 - Five White Horses 14 - Far Away Mountain 15 - Blueberry Blue 16 - Love Minus Zero 17 - I Need All The Friends I Can Get 19 - Empty Highway 20 - Look At The Sun 21 - Drivin' Drivin' Drivin' 22 - Bring Back That Love Again 23 - Hey, Hey, What Did You See LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
This is the 2nd and last album by the excellent but little known and short-lived British Blues-Rock band Tramline, which included the extraordinary guitarist Mick Moody, who would later become famous as member of such bands as Juicy Lucy, Snafu and Whitesnake. The other band members were vocalist John McCoy, bassist Colin Hodgkinson and drummer Terry Popple and on this album are supported by a brass section on several tracks. The band, in contrast to most other Blues-Rock outfits at the time, played mainly original material, which was quite excellent. This little gem was completely lost in the vaults for many years and this reissue gives us the opportunity to appreciate it, saving it from oblivion. A classic!(J) 01 - Pearly Queen 02 - Sweet Satisfaction 03 - You Better Run 04 - Grunt 05 - Sweet Mary 06 - I Wish You Would 07 - Good Morning Little Schoolgirl 08 - Harriet's Underground Railway LINK (RS) or LINK (FS)
