Category Archives: compilation

Jun 24 2023
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box set, CD, compilation, Limited Edition, vinyl

The Teardrop Explodes • Culture Bunker 1978-82 [CD, LP]

You’d have to be completely off your rocker to add THE TEARDROP EXPLODES’ Culture Bunker 1978-82 to your music library. A 6CD set (also available in truncated vinyl form), this compilation includes a truckload of the obscure UK band’s even more obscure recordings – along with their semi-known “hit” singles – in a handy set that will sit alongside your other box sets crying out for your attention for years to come. I’m not saying you won’t occasionally pull it down from the shelf, look over its contents, and wonder if there’s time to dig in… because you will. But it could very well be that you’ll only play Discs 1 and 2: the ones with the familiar album and singles tracks that are really, truly, what keep you interested in The Teardrop Explodes in the first place.

As I sit in my chair (it’s not a rocker, incidentally) writing these words I’m actually listening to The Teardrop Explodes’ Wilder album, their second LP (from 1981). It’s easier to write about Julian Cope’s band by listening to the more tuneful stuff. What’s on Culture Bunker that is worth checking out is, I’m afraid, going to be appealing only to the most hardcore Teardrop fan, and quite possibly only once or twice in this lifetime. For instance, the live tracks on Disc 3 (entitled From Drug Puritan to Acid King; very apropos) are from the band’s very first gigs and have an annoyingly monotonous vibe – you know, the kind of gig you go to where you can tell the band is still trying to find its sound. The Teardrop Explodes were capable of coming up with some awfully great tunes, actually, like most of Wilder, so Culture Bunker serves what may be its ostensible purpose of showing how Cope & Co. got from point A (forming in Liverpool in 1978) to point B (breaking up in 1982), with a couple of handfuls of both highlights and turmoil in between to keep the thing afloat.

“What highlights are to be found in the Culture Bunker?” you ask. Well, there are multiple versions of Teardrop classics like “Sleeping Gas,” “Treason” and “Read It in Books” (original single and live versions), demos of later Julian Cope tunes “Screaming Secrets,” “World Shut Your Mouth” and “Pussyface,” and a rare cover demo of The Zombies’ “Butcher’s Tale.”  Naturally, there’s the stone cold killer “Passionate Friend,” and further good ones “Like Leila Khaled Said,” “Bouncing Babies” and “Reward.” In all there are 95 tracks on the CD version (and 81 on the vinyl) and nearly half of them are unreleased.

Do you need Culture Bunker? No. You need food, air and water. And friends. If you’re already a Teardrop Explodes aficionado, though, you may want to snap this box set up before they’re gone. Rumor has it that it is extremely limited, which isn’t surprising when you consider the cost of keeping something like this in print. The label could make a lot more money off of some Elton John/Rolling Stones/Beatles/insert-some-other-classic-rock-band box set; Culture Bunker is the kind of thing that gets released because some A&R person in charge of “catalog” has a hard-on for putting out something like this. I guess we should thank goodness for hard-ons, then. – Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Universal Music Recordings 3585940, 2023)

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Dec 21 2021
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box set, compilation, Skratchdisc

Big Star • Keep an Eye on the Sky [Box Set]

[Review originally published 12/10/2009 on Skratchdisc]

It’s about time they dedicated a box set to BIG STAR. Keep an Eye on the Sky is a 4 disc set featuring most of their two classicos supremos, #1 Record and Radio City, plus a good helping of Sister Lovers and a ton of demos, live tracks, and more. In fact, disc 4 is solely dedicated to a show recorded in Memphis in January of ’73, and it’s both captivating and sad. There’s hardly anyone there, from what you can detect, though the band is in great form. Luckily some cat with a tape recorder got it down for us to enjoy thirty something years later!

If you’re not already indoctrinated you may want to buy the single CD/double LP reissue of the aforementioned albums, but to those of us who already know of the power pop perfection that Alex Chilton & Co. delivered to almost no one at the time, this box—which comes in a deceiving 7″ form factor—must be opened and enjoyed. Sound quality is ace and there’s enough delectable rarities to make it well worth getting your wife pissed that you “blew 60 bucks on a fricking box set!” – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (Ardent/Rhino R2 519760)

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Nov 04 2021
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box set, compilation

The Jazz Butcher • Dr Cholmondley Repents: A-Sides, B-Sides and Seasides [4CD Boxset]

R.I.P. Pat Fish (1957-2021)

No, I didn’t actually know THE JAZZ BUTCHER – neither the man nor the band that shared his nom de rock – but I kinda felt like I did. There’s definitely an empty spot in my music-lovin’ soul now that he is gone. Dr Cholmondley Repents, a hefty box set compilation of his band’s singles and rarities, was just about to be released when Fish passed away in early October. It is the third in a series of tasty 4-disc compilations (the other two comprising four albums each of his Glass Records and Creation Records releases), and now that “Butchy” has left our midst, takes on a much larger responsibility than it was originally charged with. In many ways Dr Cholmondley does a better job of summing up what The Jazz Butcher was about than any single album or other box set could.

Much has been written – at least by me – on The Jazz Butcher (see my various posts here) and its/his humor and cleverness, let alone the sheer variety of styles the band/man took on in their/his day. And nowhere is that more in evidence than on this multi-disc set. Subtitled
“A-Sides, B-Sides and Seasides,” Dr Cholmondley neatly covers everything (but the original albums) that made The Jazz Butcher so important to those who appreciated the breadth of their work. Disc A, the A-sides, is just that: A collection of singles, many of which did not originally appear on non-compilation albums. (As the group’s output has been compiled many times in the last near 40 years, much of what is here has appeared on CD before now.) You’ve got the cutesy, silly early things like “Marnie (Miaow Mix),” “Southern Mark Smith” (the original, faster version), and their rollicking cover of The Modern Lovers’ “Roadrunner,” as well as the later, more mature sides like “Angels” and “Girl Go.” Funny, sad, poignant – no angle is left uncovered. Move on to Disc B, the B-sides, and you’ll discover much of what first caught my ear. By way of a 1986 North American and Australian compilation called Bloody Nonsense, songs like “Death Dentist,” “The Devil Is My Friend,” “Grooving in the Bus Lane” and the liquid doubleheader “D.R.I.N.K.” and “Rain” became earworms in Jazz Butcher fans’ collective ears some time ago, but since that particular comp never made it to CD, their appearance here is much appreciated.Disc C – what you could call “C-Sides” (actually a second disc of B-Sides) – continues down my own memory lane but also takes in many even more obscure tracks only found on various artists compilations or European 12″ singles that rarely made it across the water back then. “Lost in France,” “The Hairbrush and the Tank” and the homage to “Peter Lorre” are here, though the super-duper-difficult-to-find “Christmas With the Pygmies” is unaccounted for.* And yet, the covers “May I?” (Kevin Ayers), “Speedy Gonzalez” (from the American cartoon), and “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” are – thankfully! Move along to the fourth disc (“Seasides”) and you get a super cool live concert (though recorded in the studio) broadcast over KCRW radio in Santa Monica, California (which is, ahem, seaside). The dozen songs here were recorded there in 1989 and sound like they were dubbed from a cassette of the presentation. It’s not the greatest sounding concert, but it IS a dynamite collection of the wide variety of styles The Jazz Butcher nimbly made their own. Despite its sound quality, this disc may be the one that you end up playing the most.

Very rarely in the world of rock ’n’ roll does someone come along with such a unique, three dimensional way of putting his songs – his vision – across. It’s no wonder that Patrick Huntrods (aka Pat Fish aka The Jazz Butcher) remained relatively unknown his entire life; not many music fans want their “pop star” so un-pigeonhole-able. For those of us who do – like me, maybe like you – The Jazz Butcher was at the center of a conspiracy designed so we could keep one fantastic little treasure to ourselves. Now that he’s gone, I think we can let others in on the secret. – Marshall Gooch

* In a Facebook post a few months ago I asked Pat if that song would be on the upcoming box set, and he informed me – and whoever else read the post – that that mega rare 7″ was meant to be a special something for the earliest Jazz Butcher fans and was, therefore, not being included here. I was bummed. Luckily, another of Pat’s social media friends provided me with an MP3 of “Christmas With the Pygmies” so I could, at least, hear it. Thanks, Kevin C.!

5/5 (Fire Records FIRECD565, 2021)

Below is the very latest thing The Jazz Butcher released, within a few days of Pat’s death, and so far only on the internet. Let’s hope a final album (or at least a 12″) is forthcoming.

 

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May 24 2021
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CD, compilation

The Palace Guard • All Night Long: An Anthology 1965-1967 [CD]

Given the legend that surrounds Emitt Rhodes – he being considered a pop genius a la Alex Chilton or Harry Nilsson – one would expect THE PALACE GUARD to be a necessary addition to the psych/garage pop canon. Rhodes, after all, formed The Merry-Go-Round (“Live,” “Time Will Show the Wiser,” covered by Bangles and Fairport Convention, respectively) and went on to make an acclaimed platter eponymously titled Emitt Rhodes (1970) when that band broke up. After Rhodes’ ’73 LP, Farewell to Paradise, failed to engage the pop public, he basically bid his own farewell and ceased releasing longplayers. Eventually, in 2016, Rhodes put out a followup to Paradise, Rainbow Ends, that garnered the same kind of critical praise that his self-titled ’70 LP did. Unfortunately, Rhodes passed away last year in his sleep.

But let’s get back to this CD, All Night Long, which gathers all six of The Palace Guard’s singles. The band was formed in Hawthorne, California by brothers Don, John and David Beaudoin, bass guitarist Rick Moser and Rhodes on drums. Their half dozen singles (so make that twelve songs in total) make up their discography, and all of them are pretty hard to find. Omnivore has brought us this spiffy collection and, while it has its strong points, it’s not what I would call a must-have. Nuggets fans, West Coast pop fanatics, and those who just plain favor obscure 45s will enjoy moments of this short disc. Their second single, 1965’s “A Girl You Can Depend On,” is pretty cool, in a semi-minor-key way, and their version of “Saturday’s Child” (released about the same time as The Monkees’ superior take) is worth a few listens, but the remaining songs are fairly forgettable. If it wasn’t for the fact that Emitt Rhodes emerged from this band – in which he played drums only and hadn’t gotten to demonstrate his later legendary one-man-band talent – they’d probably be remembered by only the most knowledgeable and esoteric pop-aholics. (You know, the kind of guys that would know, for instance, that TV’s Don Grady [Robbie on My Three Sons] sang lead on their final, 1966 single “Little People”.)

The thing is, there are plenty of pop fans who will eat up this release and there’s plenty of room for The Palace Guard in their diet. There’ll always be those of us who are interested in these obscure records and will be willing to give them a spin. All Night Long – save for its liner notes, oddly narrated by bassist Moser in third-person – is worthy of a place on the Rhodes scholar’s shelf. – Marsh Gooch

2.5/5 (Omnivore Recordings OVCD-424, 2021)

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Feb 21 2021
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CD, compilation

Edgar Jones • The Way It Is: 25 Years of Solo Adventures [3CD]

You may not know who EDGAR JONES is. You may not know him by the most well-known of his pseudonyms, Edgar Summertyme, either. Hell, you might not even know him from his superb early ’90s UK garage trio, The Stairs. So three CDs of a guy you don’t even know might seem like way more than you’d want to sit through just to figure him out. But Jones – a multi-instrumentalist who tends to play bass guitar when playing for people like Paul Weller, Johnny Marr or The La’s – has so many sides to him that The Way It Is only begins to give you an accurate picture of this unique musician.

Starting back from where most of us know him, Jones/Summertyme was the bassist and lead singer of The Stairs, who came along from Liverpool about the same time as The La’s. Both bands were signed to a hip indie label called Go! Discs (that also featured Billy Bragg, The Housemartins and Paul Weller on its roster). The Stairs was a real compelling throwback to UK psychedelia, using fuzzed-out guitars, loud amps and amped up arrangements that gave songs like “Weed Bus” and “Right in the Back of Your Mind” just enough of a modern twist that the youngsters of the ’90s probably had no idea that Summertyme and his mates were both paying tribute to and parodying the great indie rock of 25 years earlier. Jones/Summertyme sang in a growlly, animated voice that sounded just exaggerated enough to keep some people from taking his band seriously. Yet, if you had a deep enough knowledge of Sixties rock (see how I patted myself on the back there?) you “got it,” and The Stairs’ supreme and supremely overlooked Mexican R’n’B was as overplayed as “that’s what she said.” (Forget about the fact that the UK version of that compact disc had four or five more songs on it than the US one.*)

After The Stairs wound down, Jones went on to dip his fingers into all kinds of different concoctions. Whether he was fronting a soul/R&B combo, another garage unit or a smooth pop group (even a jump blues thang!), he brought a distinct Edgar vibe to his music. The Way It Is tries to distill all of this into a three disc anthology that at once does a great job and at the same time comes up short. How? Well, this set features 70 tracks! It’s near impossible to digest it all in one go, especially when you consider there are so many genres of rock represented that you can’t possibly keep track of where it starts, where it gets to, and where it ends up. That being said, if you like The Stairs, there’s a fair bunch of tracks to keep you goin’, especially those by his groups The Big Kids, The Joneses and The Edgar Jones Free Peace Thing, which grabbed that ’60s garage thing and added some trippy soul a la “Grazing in the Grass” (either Hugh Masakela’s or Friends Of Distinction’s arrangements). Noel Gallagher liked them so much he had them open for Oasis on their 2009 European tour. The tracks that originally appeared under Jones’ own name are more soul- or pop-inspired and may not float your boat, but then again: You can put on The Way It Is, any disc you like, and it’ll feel like you stumbled upon some free-form radio station from another decade where the DJ’s really killin’ it. I mean, killin’ it! – Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Cherry Red CDTRED805, 2021)

(* Cherry Red put out a 3CD reissue a couple years ago that is essential for Stairs fans. How I didn’t get around to reviewing it, I still can’t recall…)

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Aug 26 2020
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colored vinyl, compilation, Limited Edition, record store day, reissue, vinyl

The Kinks • The Kink Kronikles [2LP]

The Kink Kronikles is one of my favorite kompilations of any of those in my kollection. In 1972 THE KINKS had recently moved on from their original US record label, Reprise, to the hopefully greener pastures of RCA Records, so the wise guys in their former A&R department decided to put together a kollect… okay, I’m gonna stop with the “’k’ in place of ‘c’ thing” now… collection of a bunch of great singles and pair them with tracks – primarily B-sides – that they hadn’t yet released on album on this bounteous 2LP set, which has just been re-released for Record Store Day 2020.

One of the smarter things the label ever did was to draft rock critic and Kinks fan John Mendelsohn to not only compile the tracks, but annotate the package. What he put together, selection-wise, is an exemplary survey of what made the band so great. And his liner notes, which take up the entire inside of the gatefold cover, are an illustration of the fine art of putting someone on a pedestal and trying to knock them off of it at the same time. Mendelsohn’s twisted love of The Kinks is no secret (he later even penned a book about them), and neither was his sarcastic yet spot-on writing about rock music. They don’t make ’em like him anymore.

Remaining in Reprise’s catalog for many years, The Kink Kronikles was a valued 2LP set for the group’s hardcore US fans despite it being compiled and released without any input from the band. This, certainly, had been par for the course at Reprise. Just like The Beatles, The Stones and The Who – and pretty much all of the British bands – The Kinks had had their albums sliced ’n’ diced at will by the powers-that-had-been because those bozos presumably thought they knew better what would fly in the good ol’ US of A than their counterparts in the UK. And by that, I mean, you know, “We’ll cut a few songs from this 14-track album, take the tracks from some of the singles – hell! – even include a coupla tracks that were on the last album and bang! We got another way to make money off of these funny sounding English guys who probably won’t be around next year anyway.” The thing is, this compilation had so many sought after songs on it – lots of rare B-sides and songs lopped off their UK LPs – that the album became a pretty good seller, quite likely even cannibalizing sales of RCA’s current releases of new Kinks material (’71’s Muswell Hillbillies and ’72’s Everybody’s in Show-Biz).

I don’t have an original copy of The Kink Kronikles to compare this new Record Store Day version to, but it sounds pretty phenomenal, cats. Besides that, the collection itself is a great mix of familiar and obscure tracks. Sure, you get “Victoria,” “Days,” “Waterloo Sunset,” “Lola” and “Sunny Afternoon,” but you also get once-super-hard to find goodies like “She’s Got Everything,” “Big Black Smoke,” “Mr. Pleasant,” “Berkeley Mews” and the then-unreleased “Did You See His Name?” There are 28 tracks here and they’re all worthwhile. Yes, today in 2020 they’ve pretty much all been added to the appropriate reissues of the band’s original albums, so if you’ve got the multi-CD sets of Village Green Preservation Society, Arthur or whatever, you have a good number of what’s here. But that’s no reason to pass on this limited edition, red vinyl reissue that’ll probably be deleted before you can say “Kinks reunion” for the umpteenth time. – Marsh Gooch

4.5/5 (Sanctuary BMGCAT436DLP, 2020)

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Aug 24 2020
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7" vinyl, compilation, record store day, reissue

The Soft Boys • I Wanna Destroy You (40th Anniversary Double 45) [2×7″]

Forty years ago hardly anyone knew who THE SOFT BOYS were. These days there are plenty of people, highly schooled on obscure rock bands, who know that the band was a late ’70s British “punk” group fronted by Robyn Hitchcock, who later went on in the ’80s to front a group called The Egyptians and then out on his own to continued relative success as a relatively eccentric singer/ songwriter. I Wanna Destroy You is a 40th Anniversary double 45 package of The Soft Boys’ two 1980 singles, whose A-sides – “I Wanna Destroy You” and “Kingdom of Love” – were two of the best tracks on their Underwater Moonlight album, and whose B-sides weren’t part of that album. Now you can get a real handy 2×7″ set that replicates those two singles as one of this year’s Record Store Day releases.*

“I Wanna Destroy You,” of late, has become a bit of a political song thanks to it being used as a theme for those wanting to sack certain US presidents (including our current leader, He Who Shall Not Be Named, But It Rhymes With DUMP). This hard-rockin’, Byrds-meets-punk tune still thrills me, some 35+ years after I first heard it. B-side “I’m an Old Pervert (Disco)” is a slightly different take or recording of a tune that appeared as just “Old Pervert” on the aforementioned LP. Not a bad song but definitely a flip side. Meanwhile, Near The Soft Boys was a 3-track 7″ EP that contained not only the A-side/LP track “Kingdom of Love,” but a strange little ditty called (natch!) “Strange,” and a real hot cover of a never-officially-released Pink Floyd tune, penned by the strange Syd Barrett, called “Vegetable Man.” What made this cover tune so great were these two factors: 1) Only the most hardcore of Floyd fans knew about it, as it had only been available on pretty bad sounding bootlegs, and 2) The Soft Boys’ version really fleshed out the song with a complete arrangement including harmonies and the lot. When I first got a hold of this single (a battered copy, I might add), I assumed it was a Soft Boys tune, despite the writer credit inside – I was still a novice Pink Floydian at that point. This version is so good, it’s a wonder that Syd’s band never finished it and put it out as a single. Well, I mean, the chances of a song called “Vegetable Man” becoming a hit might have been slim and none, then and now, but you get what I’m saying.

Anyway, this I Wanna Destroy You double-7″ is available at independent record stores this Saturday, 8/29/2020, and after that, wherever you can find a copy in-store or online. Though the five songs are now readily available on CD, this is a nice package that also includes a digital download card in case you wanna add them to your iTunes library – which you will, unless you’re some kinda vegetable man… or woman. – Marsh Gooch

5/5 (YepRoc YEP2693, 2020)

* Record Store Day 2020 has been split into three dates, the first being 8/29/2020 with the next two to follow in September and October, thanks to this year’s coronavirus pandemic.

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May 27 2020
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box set, CD, compilation, punk

Buzzcocks • Sell You Everything 1991-2014 [8CD]

Is 8 CDs too much for a one-artist box set? It depends. 8 CDs of who? How about BUZZCOCKS? If that’s a resounding “Not at all,” then you’re gonna want Sell You Everything 1991-2014, an all encompassing set of (I’m pretty sure) every last minute Manchester’s finest punk band ever recorded up until then. Though this set starts after the legendary group’s heyday, there’s a lot to recommend it.

Sell You Everything’s first disc is called The 1991 Demo Album and is just that: thirteen demos the band recorded prior to their reunion album (and Disc 2 of this set), 1993’s Trade Test Transmissions. These demos sound really rockin’ and it’s surprising that they actually went and re-recorded them. (This disc has also been released as a standalone vinyl album.) Some of the demos were featured on a preceding EP (’91’s Alive Tonight) and the rest turn up on the ’93 album mentioned above. That album is a great one and was a welcome addition to the band’s oeuvre. The next few discs are all of varying quality – and that is, good to great – and include 1996’s All Set, ’99’s Modern, 2003’s eponymous Buzzcocks, and 2006’s Flat-Pack Philosophy. All of the albums themselves feature some beefy, bang-up Buzzcocks material, and all of these discs contain bonus tracks culled from various singles and other sources.

2011’s A Different Compilation, despite the excellent songs themselves, is a mixed bag. Buzzcocks had already released two albums on Cooking Vinyl and someone had the bright idea at this point to have them re-record some of their greatest tunes. Maybe it was a case of the band wanting to have control of their classic material for use in other media (movies, television, etc.), maybe it was, “if this sells we’ll be willing to let them record all new material for the next album,” maybe it was any number of other semi-plausible ideas. Whatever the case, it’s another example of interpretations (basically, cover versions) that are too much like the originals to warrant their existence for all but the band’s biggest fans. I mean, it’s not like you can’t get the original recordings on any number of compilations that are still available if you don’t already have them. Hearing the band thirty-something years later doing “Boredom” or “Why Can’t I Touch It?” for instance, is jarring because though they’re trying to sound like they did back then, their voices just don’t sound like what they once did and so the songs end up sounding like inferior versions of classic tunes. And who wants to listen to that? (For the record, I’ve heard bands like Blondie, Squeeze and Cracker cover their own material and I’ve not been impressed by any of them, either.)

Thankfully, for the band’s final album represented here, 2014’s The Way, Buzzcocks are back to doing new music. It’s another fairly solid album; “Keep on Believing” is a good song with trademark razor sharp guitars, but “People Are Strange Machines” is a bit on the pedantic side. In other words, there’s some good stuff here and some okay stuff, too.

Buzzcocks’ Sell You Everything is a twenty-five year survey that gives you all of the studio material from the second half of their lifetime and it’s eight discs of some damn good punk rock from one of the top British punk bands. Yes, it might be easier to sift through, say, a 3CD compilation of the best of that material, but as usual Cherry Red gives you so much value for the money that you might as well get the complete albums and their singles’ b-sides in one handy box set. After all, one person’s “best of” choices aren’t everybody’s so you may as well decide for yourself what’s great and what’s just good.  — Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Cherry Red CRCDBOX93, 2020)

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May 25 2020
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CD, compilation, live, punk, reissue

Phast Phreddie & Thee Precisions • Limbo [2CD]

Every city’s punk scene has bands that made it and are renowned the world over, and every city has local legends who never made it beyond the confines of their own particular scene. Los Angeles, being a big city that spawned many legendary bands (X, Weirdos, The Blasters, et. al.) had its share, and one of them has finally had its day in the reissue ring. PHAST PHREDDIE & THEE PRECISIONS’ entire discography is now available as Limbo, a 2CD set named after one of their records and containing much, much more.

The first disc of this set is made up of Phast Phreddie’s debut, the 1982 live EP West Hollywood Freeze-Out, and their lone album, 1984’s Limbo. These are twenty songs of souped up, angular jump blues/R&B played by some of L.A.’s finest alternative musicians, recorded cheaply and quickly (“live to two-track, no remixes, no overdubs, what you get is what went down”) and with a decidedly punk feel. That’s partly thanks to the velocity of the songs, and partly to the attitude. The Phreddies were actually part of L.A.’s punk scene, so even though they don’t sound “punk” they were part of that world. In fact, read any book on any of the punk bands already named here – and many that aren’t – and Thee Precisions will not only be namechecked but held in high esteem. So, imagine my surprise when I finally heard the band (I was already familiar with their name) and couldn’t decide whether I liked them or not! Maybe it’s one of those cases where, if you were there at the time, you get it, and if you weren’t, you don’t, or maybe it’s just that I can’t get past Phast Phreddie’s singing voice. I’m not sure how to describe it… he sounded like the kind of smart ass who might have instigated more than his share of bar fights, someone who probably lost more of ’em than he won. Regardless, my first spin (through disc one only) left me questioning what all the fuss was/is about. Yes, the band is good. Yes, the band’s saxophonist is Steve Berlin, whom you’d know from both The Blasters and Los Lobos (though his name pops up on a zillion L.A.-based bands’ records). And yes, the guest list is also notable (D.J. Bonebrake, Peter Case, Marty Jourard of The Motels)(and that’s just the guests on Disc One!). But so far something was lacking… and then I put on Disc 2.

It’s got to be Phast Phreddie & Thee Precisions’ live shows that made their reputation, because the live stuff (recorded at different live shows and band rehearsals) is what makes this set worth checking out. The sound quality isn’t all that great (what we would have called “a good audience tape” back in the day) but the performances sure are. I’ll bet if I could find some video of them performing it would all make sense. I really like “Only Lovers Left Alive,” their covers of “Peaches En Regalia” and “Hungry Freaks Daddy” (Zappa/The Mothers) and “Stone Free” (Hendrix), and one called “Empty Feeling.” With another twenty songs on the second disc, it’d be easy to get lost among Phreddie’s snotty-soundin’ vocals and the slightly dissonant saxes – not to mention the killer guitar of Harlan Hollander. But after a few listens to this compilation I can tell that those who praise this group aren’t wrong: these guys had to have put on one helluva show.

With Limbo you get, as the lead singer himself exaggerates in the liner notes, “more Phast Phreddie & Thee Precisions than anyone could ever want.” Phans of the L.A. punk scene ought to pick this up just to understand what all the phuss is about.

3/5 (Manifesto MFO 46701, 2020)

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Apr 23 2020
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CD, compilation, reissue

The Box Tops • The Letter/Neon Rainbow–Cry Like a Baby–Non Stop–Dimensions [2CD]

I approach these “lots of albums on one or two CDs” collections kind of cautiously. After all, if the albums were so damn good, wouldn’t people be willing to pick them up as separate discs? Case in point: THE BOX TOPS’ The Letter/Neon Rainbow– Cry Like a Baby–Non Stop–Dimensions. This new 2CD, four album release comprises all of the band’s studio albums in one handy set, and it’s definitely a hit and miss affair.

You may remember a few of The Box Tops’ bigger hits, such as the once ubiquitous ’60s AM radio staples “The Letter” (“Give me a ticket for an aeroplane…”) – a Number One, mind you – and “Cry Like a Baby,” both of which we still hear today in movie soundtracks in order to set the time period or to establish some sort of emotional vibe for people of “a certain age”. The band weren’t a slapped together group or a studio concoction, exactly, but were made up of a Memphis group called The Devilles who added 15 year old local Alex Chilton as lead singer, recorded a cool new song in a local studio, and then went on to fame (but apparently not much fortune) and the pop radio tour circuit. Chilton himself later joined Big Star, another Memphis group that went on to acclaim as a cult power pop band. (See my coverage of them here.) After that, Alex went solo and on to college radio stardom (as in, culter-than-cult status) before the 1990s when Big Star finally had its day. All types of fame are relative, of course, so what you know about any of these groups’ band or solo discographies depends on how you like your pop music. Regardless, Alex Chilton was one of those guys who had fame on about every level a musician can – except maybe without the cold, hard cash that typically comes with it. Anyway, back to The Box Tops…

The four albums that make up this set are of your typical Sixties variety, being made up of a hit single or two and then another ten or so songs good enough to help pad out an LP. A few songs on each of these records stand out a bit more than the rest, but basically, after the hit singles there’s not a lot here to get your everyday music fan excited. Sure, guys like me will be interested in, for instance, other songs that the guy who wrote “The Letter” wrote, or The Box Tops’ version of Vanilla Fudge’s cover of “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” (not that different from the Fudge’s), but after that even I have to call “time” on things. Yet, for £9.95 plus shipping, this 2CD is worth the price. IF you really dig Alex Chilton, that is.  — Marsh Gooch

2.5/5 (Beat Goes On BGOCD1400, UK, 2020)

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