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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (May 14, 1975)
Page 6 THE BATTALION WEDNESDAY, MAY 14, 1975 Overlooked promo albums miss garbage can By JOHN VANORE My last review was supposed to have been last week. But then I looked around my room and noticed that I had nearly a dozen promo albums that record companies sent us. Sol decided to do a series of cap sule reviews for this mostly over looked material. Lots of the promos are throw aways — things that won’t sell very much on their own, so the record companies send them out for a little free publi city. Some of them are pretty decent, though. Granted, I wouldn’t pay cur rent record prices for them, but that’s usually due to their lim ited appeal. 'Vi. i cr GENESIS Take Genesis, for example. Atco sent us what I believe is that band’s third album, “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.” It’s a double in the rock opera genre about a Puerto Rican kid named Rael on the streets of New York, and it relates a series of adventures, real or imagined, that he undergoes. The album is very strong on key boards, and, to a lesser extent, on guitars. The vocals are well-done throughout, although the lyrics tend to get jumbled a bit. All in all, it’s a pretty good set. TANGERINE DREAM Virgin Records, a subsidiary of Atco, submitted “Rubycon,” the latest offering from Tangerine Dream, a keyboard band coming in a wave of German bands collect ively referred to as Krautrock. Ed gar Froese, the band’s leader and driving force, diverges occasionally on guitar, and, once in a while someone smacks a gong, but other wise it’s all keyboards. Here’s a listing of the keyboard instruments they play on this album:organ, piano, mellotron, electric piano, double moog syn thesizer, synthi A, vcs 3 synthi, and ARP 2600. The album is divided into “Ruby- con Part I” and “Rubycon Part II,” which are sides one and two re spectively. “Rubycon,” thus, is a fitting , culmination of their current musical evolution. At times the music may sound like anything from the Transylvania Philharmonic to the sound track for “Star Trek” or “The Twilight Zone.” But it never stops being good or interesting. Their greatest accomplishment, however, is to show what electronic music can sound like, thus allaying fears of immensely complex noise. It makes the synthesizer far more palatable as an instrument in its own right rather than being relegated to a backseat role as an amusing gim mick. Tangerine Dream is without a doubt on the rise as an important band, and as forerunners in the electronic field, taking second to Emerson, Lake and Palmer. “Rubycon” is an equally impressive album, and a fine showcase for the band’s diversified talents. If you like keyboards, it’s definitely worth looking into. AMON DUUL II Amon Duul II is another German group, albeit somewhat more con ventional. Maybe that’s where their mistake lies. After I got done listen ing to “Hijack,” their latest release, my first impression was that Duul should have been spelled Dull. It’s probably the most boring album I’ve heard in a long time. The songs all basically sound alike, and it’s my understanding that even Amon Duul fans can’t tell the difference between one of their albums and the next. I suppose I could sum it up like this — the instrumentals are pathet ically unimaginative and the singing is flat in every sense of the word. In short, this is one band to avoid. GOLLIWOGS The last offering in the rock category is a collection dating back to 1964, when Creedence Clear water Revival was called the Golli wogs, of all things. The album, “Pre-Creedence,” is truly a gem in that it represents the roots of a group in a way that we very rarely see or hear. The fourteen short cuts (no song is longer than 2:49) are the A and B sides of seven singles re leased in the winter of 1964-65. Usually an artist’s early works bear a good deal of resemblance to his accomplishments in his heyday, but this is an exception ... in spades. The numbers are all Golli wogs originals, but they have abso lutely nothing in common with “Bad Moon Risin’ ” or “Down on the Bayou.” — there is a lot of Beach Boys, Beatles, and Four Seasons (sans Frankie Valli) influence. I even picked up some riffs that sounded like they were borrowed from the Stones. Only on “porterville,” one of the last cuts, does a trace of later Creed ence come through. It’s evident in John Fogerty’s vocals and lead guitar, and it doesn’t seem to be a very far cry from the days of “Suzie Q.” HEARTWOOD Now we move to the softer stuff Heartwood is a group which hails from North Carolina, and they pur port to play in a soft, mellow, pseudo-country style. In actuality, they come across on “Nothin’ Fancy” sounding like a watered- down combination of the Eagles and the Grateful Dead. They describe themselves as a musical comprom ise between the harder Led Zeppe lin extreme and Seals and Croft, who are diametrically opposed to the Zep in style. They’re right on that count, but still their music is nothing spectacular. GUILLORY Isaac Guillory, on his debut al bum simply titled “Isaac Guillory,” treats us to some very pleasant mu sic indeed. On “St. Peter,” the first cut, he tends to style his singing after James Taylor. The instru mentals, which he handles for the most part, are original and much better. After that opener, however, he develops his own identity in an acoustic/folk style. Guillory is an accomplished mu sician, and gives a fine accounting for himself here, especially on guitar. He’ll probably be moving very soon from the depths of ob scurity to achieve status on a level with his abilities. MIKE GREENE BAND “Pale, Pale Moon” is another de but album, this time by the Mike Greene Band. The head honcho, Greene, has organized a Traffic- style band very strong on wood winds. This is the nice, mellow stuff. They also manage to be dy namic and forceful in their own way; the title track, an instru mental, is a fine example. Greene, on saxes, switches back and forth with guitarist David Michael to keep the sound fresh and crisp. Probably my biggest gripe is thal the vocals get cluttered pretty often — Greene is trying to say too much in too little space, and the ruslifi: lyrics detract from the musiti beauty. Offhand, I’d say that Greenti next album will be worth loolaif into, after he and his band smooll out the kinks in their music. Well, this is it for the sew After floating around with the Nan in the West Pacific for six week I’ll resume sending in columns(o: the summer edition of the paper Until then, happy listening, a«l Gig ’em! S FT HUBEI SPRINKLER HOSE 1” 11 "sunbeam HEDGE TRIMMER -25 9S ' SUNBEAM SHRUB HEDGE TRIMMER s |jj» SUNBEAM DUCK t DECKER SUNBEAM GRASS SHEAR GRASS SHEAR HAND CULTIVATOR Ell @99 ^ ||| IS REGENCY SUPREME PLASTIC PRESSURE SPRAYER ELECTRIC FAN WATER DOY cw«irr OBl s |299 2 41 L’OREAL ULTRA RICH CONDITIONING SHAMPOO LEMON LIME 1601 L’OREAL ULTRA RICH HAIR CONDITIONER .LDEE WITH C DORtAL cone*. Ultra REGULAR TRdi J| & EXTRA NDT JSSLm BALSAM SK5 noees 16 OZ. 100 B COMPLEX VIT C CAPSULES PARKE DAVIS VIT. C I mOO M TABLETS r r On the contrary, these songs are all perfect for a new band circa 1964