Le Pop: Les Filles
Various Artists
Le Pop Musik LPM 20-1
2008
I am a big fan of French pop in the 1960s and early 1970s but I haven't kept up with their music scene since then. What I've seen in French films and the occasional TV show (my wife used to subscribe to a French cable channel) did not make me think I was missing much. However when I stumbled across a bargain-priced copy of this album, I picked it up to see what was going on over there. It is part of a series of albums issued by a German record company that survey contemporary French music. This one offers a generous sampling of 16 tracks focusing on female singers. I'd only heard of two of them prior to buying this album - Coralie Clément who I know as an actress and Mélanie Pain who I know from the group Nouvelle Vague which I am a fan of. My favorite track is Poney Express' "Paris de Loin" which is pure indie rock driven by a great bass riff. It has a lot of pop appeal and it gets me bopping. The group is a duo featuring Ana Berthe on vocals and Robin Feix on bass. My other favorite song is Fredda's "Barry White" which features a slinky vocal over a hypnotic melody as she recalls her youth dancing in discos in Marseille. I also really like Barbara Carlotti's "Mademoiselle Opossum" which benefits from a propulsive rhythm track and some sensuous horn work that supports her alluring vocal. Coralie Clément sweetly croons "So Long Babylone" over a chunky rhythm track and a charming ukelele riff. The song was written and produced by her brother, Benjamin Biolay. Mélanie Pain's "Celles de Mes 20 Ans" sounds nothing like her work with Nouvelle Vague. It is poppy folk-rock that her breathy vocal invests with feeling. "Je Ne Te Quitterais Jamais" by a duo called Doris Park is a lovely, atmospheric song delicately sung in French and English by the group's lead singer, Maria Törnqvist who is Swedish. "Cupide et Stupide" by Austine is charming twee indie pop with a jaunty melody that makes me happy as I listen to it. The liner notes compare the song to Belle and Sebastian, but I think Camera Obscura is a more accurate comparison. "Les Hasrads" by C++ is perhaps the most interesting track on the record being a swinging smorgasbord of 60s pop and synth pop driven by surf guitar and proggy mellotron over which Charlotte Gérand coolly sings. Several tracks sound like traditional French pop most notably Loane's waltz-like "Petit Bonheur," Maud Lübeck's low-key "Le Parapluie," Marianne Feder's jazzy "Toi Mon Indien" and best of all Marianne Dissard's "Les Draps Sourds" which mixes Chanson with Western Swing, it sounds like Edith Piaf performing with Bob Wills. She seems to be singing about an orgy, I wish my French was better, ha-ha. There are a few duds on the album. Constance Amiot's "Clash Dans le Tempo" is mild-mannered French hip-hop that bores me. Julie B. Bonnie's "Bonjour Monsieur" is a collaboration with Kid Loco. It has a strong beat but I find it monotonous. Françoiz Breut has a beautiful voice but her New Age-ish "2013" is tedious to me. If you really want to hear what she is capable of, check out her great 2001 song "Si Tu Disais." According to the liner notes, Jeanne Cherhal's "Si Tu Reviens J'Annule Tout" is "scandalous" because it is based on a message that Nicholas Sarkozy sent to his ex-wife prior to marrying Carla Bruni. Maybe you have to be French to find that shocking, I just hear a dull ballad. Aside from Poney Express' track there is nothing on here that knocks my socks off, but I like just about every song although not enough to run out and buy a bunch of French records. It rarely rocks, but it rolls pretty well and has a nice mellow vibe to it. Recommended to Francophiles who dig Isobel Campbell and El Perro del Mar.
Fuzz, Flaykes, & Shakes Vol 1: 60 Miles High
Various Artists
Bacchus Archives BA1140
1999
I like 60s garage band comps. I'm not obsessive about them but I pick them up when I see an interesting one or a bargain. This series however I actually went after aggressively because of its reputation for quality. After the Rhino "Nuggets" series it is my favorite series of comps. It is amazing to me that despite there being so many of these types of comps out there, that people are still digging up so many quality tracks from obscure bands. I guess it is a testament to the richness of the era that even unknown bands on obscure labels could still produce so much good music. I had only heard of three of these bands, prior to buying this record - the Magic Mushrooms, the Palace Guard and the Stained Glass. The Mushrooms' track, the folk-rockish "Let The Rain Be Me," does not sound anything like their cut on "Nuggets", the crazed "It's-A-Happening", I would have thought it was a different group entirely. My favorite cut is the Band of Wynand's "Day-time, Nite-time" which takes a jangle pop base and adds psychedelic guitar and organ with impressive results. The Gregorians' (what a great name) "Dialated Eyes" [sic] has the most extraordinary lyrics you are ever likely to hear from a garage band backed with a very compelling and sophisticated melody. I really like the Search's "Climate" with its interesting tempo changes and its hypnotic organ work. Soul Inc.'s "60 Miles High" is the most overtly psychedelic song on the record with lots of effects and trippy lyrics, a really nice cut. The prize for trippy lyrics probably goes to the Society's "High & Mighty" which is full of psychedelic cliches and a nice driving beat. This is really a worthwhile album, 18 uniformly good songs and excellent liner notes, these guys really know their stuff. Also the sound quality is excellent, which anyone who listens to a lot of these garage band anthologies knows is pretty unusual. Recommended for garageheads who are tired of the bad sound and mediocrities in the "Pebbles" comps.
Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era 1965 - 1968
Various Artists
Sire SASH 3716-2
1976
This is a reissue on Sire of the original Elektra release from 1972. It has a different cover than the original, in this case a cool psychedelic cover by Kelley Mouse Studios reminiscent of their work for the Grateful Dead. Rhino Records took the original Nuggets concept and expanded it hugely over numerous CD box sets many of which I happily own, but this original record still shines in its beauty and purity. It is an incredibly important record for me, my rock bible. It changed my life. I barely knew what a garage band was when I bought it, I think the only group on the record that I had ever heard of was the Blues Project (hardly a garage band, their inclusion on this record is debatable, but I'm not complaining.) The idea that a bunch of teenage punks could make better records than the Eagles or Peter Frampton never occurred to me, the garage bands at my school just played crappy covers by BTO or Neil Young, I couldn't conceive of anything good coming out of them. Then I heard this and I realized how much the Eagles and Frampton actually sucked. The music on this record blew me away. Well before I heard the Ramones or any new wave bands, this record showed me that short, fun and fast rock songs trumped the pretentious and bloated music I was hearing on commercial radio stations or watching on "Don Kirshner's Rock Concert." After I heard the Standells and the 13th Floor Elevators, how could I possibly want to listen to Styx or Kansas or any other crummy 1970s band? This was the real thing, the holy grail of rock. A relentless stream of classic music flowed from the turntable when I put this on. I instantly became a fan of Nazz, the Electric Prunes, the Remains, the Chocolate Watch Band, the Mojo Men and the Leaves. I've loved these bands with a passion ever since. Every song on here even the most obscure and silly ones appealed to me. From the Magic Mushrooms to the Castaways, there is not a dud on here. The fact that so many of these songs barely charted and were largely ignored by the oldies stations, showed me that there was another rock music, the one that wasn't on the radio and or in the chain record stores, but rather the one that existed in used record stores, college radio stations and in the collectors magazines. This record opened up the idea of alternative music, it paved the way for the punk revolution. In fact this record's liner notes were the first place I ever encountered the term "punk rock." This album is a model of its kind, the perfect compilation album. It has a point of view, it is brilliantly curated and features wonderful and humorous liner notes from Lenny Kaye that I basically memorized from reading them so often. It taught me so much, it influenced me so deeply, I'll always cherish this record. Even though I own just about every song on it on a CD or a vintage vinyl album, I'll never part with it. Recommended for classic rock fans who don't know what they are missing.
Get It Together!
Various Artists
RCA Special Products DLP2-0045
1973
The first rock album I ever owned, it has immense sentimental value for me and was highly influential on my early record collecting. I was a child of the 1960s but I barely remember the 1960s at all. I have plenty of memories from then, but they might as well be from 1950s or 1970s. I lived 20 minutes away from Haight-Ashbury in 1967 yet I never knew the Summer of Love even happened until the mid-1970s. I had two hippie uncles but I just thought they were scary and I wouldn't go near them. My only memories of the Beatles during their lifetime as a band was their cartoon on Saturday morning. I didn't know about the anti-war movement until Kent State happened. My parents and my neighborhood were as square as they come. My Dad liked Sinatra-style crooners and mariachi music, my Mom liked classical music and mainstream jazz like Shelly Manne and Ella Fitzgerald. The only rock record my Dad owned was the first the Mamas and the Papas record and he got that after they had already broken up. I associated the 1960s with kids songs like "Puff The Magic Dragon" and "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport" and the Monkees. By the time I owned my own radio, it was the 1970s. Then in 1973 I started seeing television commercials for this record and it blew my mind. I heard excerpts of "Get Together," "Somebody To Love," "Born To Be Wild" and "White Room" and they thrilled me. I realized there was a lot more to music than the crap I was listening to on the local top 40 radio station. Plus it had "Daydream Believer" on it and at the time the Monkees were completely out of print, my record store didn't even carry the old Colgems comp. I had to have this record. My parents had just gotten divorced and money was really tight at my house, but my mom finally agreed to shell out the $5.99 plus shipping and handling and I'll be forever grateful. When this double record set arrived, my world had changed forever. I listened to this over and over, mesmerized. I suddenly hated the music on the radio, I was only interested in the music of the 1960s. This record became my road map into what is still my favorite era of music. After hearing their songs on this comp, I started buying albums by the Who, Jefferson Airplane, Cream, the Rascals and the Kinks. Ultimately I ended up buying albums from every artist on here except Music Explosion and Buddy Miles. I probably will end up with those two as well, I'm just not in any big hurry anymore. Admittedly I ended up with a few lemons, the Zager & Evans album is pretty awful, but for the most part the original albums were worthwhile. I doubt that I ever would have bought the John Fred album "Agnes English" were it not for his inclusion on this record and it is a real gem. I can't really recommend a 1960s comp that claims to represent "The New Rock Music" but has nothing from the Beatles, Beach Boys, Dylan, the Byrds, the Rolling Stones, Zombies, Grateful Dead, Hendrix or CCR to name a few, yet features no less than 3 songs by the Guess Who as well less than essential artists like Four Jacks and a Jill, Los Bravos, and Zager and Evans. Nonetheless I do love this record and I still play it occasionally, not just as an exercise in nostalgia, but because it is a nice mix of music. You could do a lot worse than this as far as 1960s comps go, especially one that was sold on TV. Recommended to people who don't know the music of the 1960s very well but stumble across this at a garage sale or a flea market.
