February 29, 2016 - Roy Orbison - Crying (1961)

Get out the kleenex. Waaaa... What a lovely song, so beautifully recorded but so sad and full of regret. Don't know what you got til it's gone. Well, I think in most cases time heals all wounds and the narrator will recover, but at the moment he is distraught, barely keeping it together.

Musically, everything hangs in there with Roy, gently walking along with him, building up with him to the emotional end. Angelic choir, strings, tom toms, marimba, I wonder how Joe Meek would have recorded this. It probably would have sounded like Sky Men (see Feb 27 entry).

February 28, 2016 - Pink Floyd - See Emily Play (1967)

1967, the year of fantastic British psychedelia, bands dressing in Edwardian ruffles and singing childlike songs devoted to journeys of the mind. And Syd Barrett fit right in there, a little too well actually. This is a very trippy and surreal song, filled with weird keyboards, esoteric lyrics, and a crazy middle section.

February 27, 2016 - Geoff Goddard - Sky Men (1963)

More Joe Meek! More more more!! Geoff Goddard's Sky Men is completely cheesy but I love it. How can you not love the alien spoken word message: 'Children of Earth, be not afraid, for we come in peace.' Hooray, we are being visited by nice aliens not ones that want to destroy us. Where do they come from? Where are they going to? Will our military still try to destroy them? I think that would be a bad idea. The Sky Men sound polite but I bet they could kick ass if necessary.

February 26, 2016 - The Monks - Monk Time (1966)

The Monks were a band of American GIs stationed in Germany in the early 60s. They all gave themselves tonsures. There is a great documentary about them called

Monks: The Transatlantic Feedback

They only made one album, Black Monk Time. It had a significant role in the development of krautrock and is a classic of garage punk. 

Monk Time is the opener of the album, I like songs that groups sing about themselves, like the theme from The Monkees, or Village People, or the song Living in a Box by Living in a Box from the album Living in a Box.

Crazy organ, amplified banjo, fuzz guitar, and Gary's shrieking vocals. A great anti-war statement. It's hot time, it's Monk time!

February 25, 2016 - Apollo 100 - Joy (1972)

What to say about this one? It's a classic instrumental one hit wonder, the archetypal breezy cheezy 70s pop AM radio hit. I love the fade in, the organ, and the rhythm guitar. I especially love the electric guitar solo, it has that recorded in a cave reverb quality. Not crazy about the horns during the song, but I love them during the build up at the end. And the tiny one second drum break around 2:01 is cool. I don't know if Bach would have liked it, but I think it's a pretty cool arrangement and from a long gone era in pop music when hit songs were allowed to be unapologetically geeky and joyful.

February 24, 2016 - Keith Hudson - Depth Charge (1974)

A sweet little dub for ya, mon...Pick A Dub is a sensational album, among the best of the dub genre. Depth Charge is my favorite track from the album. Cool phased echoing drum hits, piano and guitar.

February 23, 2016 - Lyn Taitt - To Sir With Love (1967)

I never cared much for the Lulu recording or the movie for that matter. I mean, Sidney Poitier was his usual magnetic self, but the rest of it was pretty lame. And Lulu's voice is so laced with saccharine it almost makes me uncomfortable hearing it.

Lyn Taitt's instrumental makes me forget all that other stuff. Really, just give any bad song the sweet rocksteady treatment and it becomes better. He had such a special technique and style, lots of quick little stabs at high notes and a cool solo of acrobatic chromatic statements. The sax sounds good too.