May Blitz |
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Certif1ed
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: April 08 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 7559 |
Topic: May Blitz Posted: April 11 2005 at 13:43 |
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I obtained a copy of May Blitz's s/t debut album today, after a recommendation from someone who discovered that I like Leafhound, and it completely blew me away! OK, it's blues in origin, but it's got a large dollop of garage/psychedelia thrown in - and it's very progressive. Anyone else know of this band? I understand the second album "2nd of May" is even more progressive - but I haven't tracked down a vinyl copy of that yet (and I bet it's expensive ). Contenders for the archives? |
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Alucard
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: September 10 2004 Location: France Status: Offline Points: 3888 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 14:24 | |
I saw it quiet often in the expansive japonese mini Lp reedition and I always wondered what they sound like.Nice covers ! Edited by Alucard |
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Certif1ed
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: April 08 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 7559 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 15:17 | |
I guess it sounds a bit like Cactus but closer to the Pink Fairies. Two of the band members were formerly in Bakerloo (another band whose albums are outrageously expensive and hard to come by on their native vinyl format!) - so the sound is naturally fairly close to Bakerloo. I might also compare them to Touch or Quatermass - or even their Vertigo stable mates Black Sabbath, due to the heavy riffs. The guitars are obviously Hendrix-influenced, but there's none of Hendrix's lyricism or virtuosity - although that's not to say there's no inventiveness. The riffs are complex, generally two-parters (ie a riff + an answering phrase in a repeated pattern). The variety in sound of the tracks is stunning - dreamy atmospheric psychedelia that I can't really think of any comparisons to, right up to psychotic wildness - similar in spirit to the Crazy World of Arthur Brown, but possibly wilder! Somehow, it all feels very natural - even when they suddenly break the wildness down to eerie and empty space. Hard to believe it was recorded in 1970. /end mini review
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tuxon
Forum Senior Member Joined: September 21 2004 Location: plugged-in Status: Offline Points: 5502 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 15:26 | |
You've got me curious, with that mini-review Certif1ed. Off to investigate |
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Posted: April 11 2005 at 16:02 | |
God Salvation I was begining to wonder if half the members were behind the door. May Blitz are excellent...So are the first few PATTO albums I'm gonna recommend an album for you Cert... WALRUS debut,lot of brass sound but boy excellent
You may like CLEAR BLUE SKY debut too. Edited by Karnevil9 |
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Certif1ed
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: April 08 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 7559 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 17:13 | |
I'll stick up an mp3 when I get my MiniDisc player back... Talking of MiniDiscs, KE9 - Catapilla? |
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Posted: April 11 2005 at 17:18 | |
Goes with the nature of the creature. |
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tuxon
Forum Senior Member Joined: September 21 2004 Location: plugged-in Status: Offline Points: 5502 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 17:24 | |
only found a 20 second soundclip on this website may Blitz. Sounded ok, but too short to judge. |
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Dick Heath
Special Collaborator Jazz-Rock Specialist Joined: April 19 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 12801 |
Posted: April 11 2005 at 19:27 | |
MB's Tony Newman was Jeff Beck's drummer for Cosa Nostra Beckola, and May Blitz certainly has some element showing some intention of continuing where that album left off. But remember Beck says in putting Truth and then that album together, he was influenced by the heaviness of Vanilla Fudge, which he wanted to add to his blues rock. A pity Beck Bogert Appice was a bit of hit & miss affair. I found both May Blitz albums in a dumper bin at the Elephant & Castle WH Smiths store around in 1971 buying them for a few pence and sold them for 20 quid each about 7 years ago. BGO issued a two for one CD of the pair in 1992 (BGOCD153) |
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Alucard
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: September 10 2004 Location: France Status: Offline Points: 3888 |
Posted: April 12 2005 at 06:11 | |
Great, we should have more of these, I go often to a shop who sells Arcama reissues, mainly 70's but as I have never heard of most of the groups I finally don't buy them . Has anyone heard of Hapshash& the coloured coat ? Edited by Alucard |
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Posted: April 12 2005 at 08:49 | |
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Dick Heath
Special Collaborator Jazz-Rock Specialist Joined: April 19 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 12801 |
Posted: April 12 2005 at 11:00 | |
Yes - unfortunately I have the first album (something like) Human Host & The Heavy Metal Kids, (notable for possibly the first printed use of 'heavy metal'?), bought nearly 25 years after last hearing that album - I must have been pretty gone in the 60's to have had good memories of the record, only to find how amateurish it sounded (in the worst sense) 25 years later. My guess this album was recorded to imitate John & Yoko's Give Peace A Chance? The only professional musician on board I believe was Tony McPhee (notable blues guitarist) but alas playing the bongos. I hear the follow up Western Flyer is a better bet. |
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Dick Heath
Special Collaborator Jazz-Rock Specialist Joined: April 19 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 12801 |
Posted: April 12 2005 at 11:01 | |
BTW I'm completely bamboozled that you can compare the music/sound of May Blitz and Touch
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Certif1ed
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: April 08 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 7559 |
Posted: April 12 2005 at 16:54 | |
Ah - I owe you a PM I'm still a "noob" to this whole heavy blues/psych/garage scene, as I was very young at the time - and these are bands that tended to get known via word of mouth rather than airplay, as I understand. Therefore to me, Touch are similar to May Blitz at their wildest - I've only heard "Down At Circle's Place", which opens the Wowie Zowie sampler I bought on your recommendation Here's the mp3 I promised earlier - I'm determined to drag more folks down with me into the pit of heavy blues/psych/prog/whatever you want to call it It's a "raw" mp3 - I haven't filtered it or tried to doctor any of the static clicks out of it (always a peril with vinyl) - but you get to hear it as close to it's native format as you can get over the internet http://s34.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=32T8TDCID672K2VWWV4G5LXTP K Whaddy reckon - prog or not?
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Joren
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: February 07 2004 Location: Netherlands Status: Offline Points: 6667 |
Posted: April 12 2005 at 17:00 | |
If you register (it's FREE), there are many MANY soundclips. |
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Alucard
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: September 10 2004 Location: France Status: Offline Points: 3888 |
Posted: April 13 2005 at 05:37 | |
Drag on! Birth Control, Cream,Quartermass, Man,Groundhogs (One of my favourite tracks is "Black Diamond", has anyone seen it recently on CD?BTW Tony Mc Phee is the Groundhog gutarist)Atomic Rooster, Steamhammer Edited by Alucard |
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Certif1ed
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: April 08 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 7559 |
Posted: April 13 2005 at 06:46 | |
Ah yes - the Mighty Groundhogs! My favourite album of theirs is "Split". Looks like we should have a thread on these progressive blues and heavy prog bands |
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Hiwatter
Forum Senior Member Joined: March 26 2005 Location: Slovakia Status: Offline Points: 137 |
Posted: April 13 2005 at 07:17 | |
I have both albums from them and the first is better than the second. I like very much the playing on first album. Great guitar and drums. Nice album!
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Dick Heath
Special Collaborator Jazz-Rock Specialist Joined: April 19 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 12801 |
Posted: April 13 2005 at 07:45 | |
I see - what do they say about a swallow and summer??? LOL. Similarly the Genesis track on that album?
Touch shows its references back to psychedelia and I believe more clearly to US early 60's garage - which is reinforced with the knowledge that leader Don Gallucci is common to both Touch and the Kingsmen (of Louis Louis fame). However, with tracks like Down At Circle Place, and the groundbreaking Aleisha & Others/75 (i.e. one track runs into the second), you have a band at the forefront, laying down several of the early rules for progressive rock. Elsewhere there are tracks which in their shortness have less time to provide movements/change within a composition, but still can stand as early straight rock (as opposed to garage). And again to reflect the earliness of the album, listen to the keyboards, dominated by acoustic piano and something that sounds like a Farfarsia (sp?) pushed to its limits - rather like what Keith Emerson was doing to a Hammond at the same time or Marion Varga of the Czech band Collegium Musicum was doing to crude Russian copy of a Hammond in 1972 or '3. The Renaissance label remaster CD release of Touch has bonus tracks (and the label issued a separate CD with further outtakes from Touch, Stray Dog* and Gracious), which Wild Places Records now seem to have the licence.
*This included a stonking tune of blues rock, recorded live during rehearsals for the 1973 Reading Rock Festival - and can be also heard amongst a lot of bonus tracks on the Wild Places Records reissue of their first eponymously titled Stray Dog album (which Greg Lake produced for ELP's Manticore label originally!) |
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Dick Heath
Special Collaborator Jazz-Rock Specialist Joined: April 19 2004 Location: England Status: Offline Points: 12801 |
Posted: April 13 2005 at 08:04 | |
Got to speak to Tony McPhee in the bar of Leicester's DeMontford Hall last summer (he was part of a blues package tour with Alvin Lee and Edgar Winter) - shocked to find after 35 years that he was shorter than me!!! Buy him a pint after a gig and he'll talk to anybody! And he signed my Gutbucket 2 album sleeve, the LP sampler which introduced me to the Groundhogs and a lot of interesting blues - not coming from Blue Horizon! If we are going the rock blues way with this thread - check out the previously mentioned Stray Dog (who surprised me by acknowledging ZZ Top in the 1973 liner notes to their first album), and the greatly neglected Duster Bennett. The late Duster Bennett was the third Brit signing to Blue Horizon records (after Peter Greens Fleetwood Mac and Chicken Shack), and wrote a number tunes for and with Peter Green. The excellent album of outtakes etc., Jumpin' At Shadows , (apparently discovered in tapes stored in the loft of the house owned by Duster's wife), issued by the British label Indigo in the mid 90's, is a must to blues rock fans. Includes a demo of Jumpin' At Shadows (superior to both Fleetwood Mac and Gary Moore's versions, IMHO), some live recordings of Bennett as a onemanband (showing great rapport with the audience), some superb blues harp on Gotta To Be With My Baby Tonight, and a couple of tracks backed by the former Krimson rhythm section of Wallace and Burrell, make this a greatly neglected gem. I regret never making the effort to go see Bennett live, and he tragically was killed while driving his car back south from a Manchester gig in 1976. A pity too that Blues Horizon/Sony have not reissued his albums on CD (there are a couple of atypical singles included on a double CD compilation of Blues Horizon's roster of signings - but then Focus are missing!). |
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