The Green Future

Among the first American new wave acts to break through to mainstream visibility, the B-52s became one of the biggest success stories to emerge from the American underground in the late '70s. Making music that was full of quirks but also sounded friendly and fun to dance to, the B-52s filtered surf music, '60s pop, vintage soul, and low-budget sci-fi soundtracks through a pop culture kaleidoscope, with vocals laid over the top that suggested someone had been listening to a lot of Yoko Ono and Yma Sumac records…

Eighteen months after his last long-player, ‘Reunited’, the acclaimed British guitarist Snowy White presents his new album containing 12 new tracks. Once again, Snowy called on his musical collaborators and friends, including Max Middleton (piano/keys), Ferry Langendrijk (keys), Jessica Lauren (keys), Kuma Harada (bass), Walter Latupeirissa (bass), Juan van Emmerloot (drums) and Jeff Allen(drums). Since the late 1960s, Snowy and his characteristic guitar-playing have made their mark on tasteful blues rock. Whether as a member of Thin Lizzy (on the albums ’Chinatown’ and ’Renegade’), working with Peter Green (Fleetwood Mac), as an indispensable tour musician for Pink Floyd and later Roger Waters, or as a highly-respected solo artist: Snowy has always remained true to his love for excellent, handmade music.

Although it ironically coincided with the compact disc format's slow but inexorable march toward likely extinction, the third millennium's first decade witnessed an incredible boom in CD reissues of obscure ‘70s hard rock bands; bands whose careers quickly floundered or never even took off due to any number of reasons, like the subject of this review, London's Steel Mill. Like many of these commercially failed entities, Steel Mill made the fatal mistake of attempting to partake in the relatively isolated worlds of both progressive and heavy rock, instead of committing to just one or the other, and so their sole LP, 1972's Green Eyed God, fell through the cracks of consumer tastes and wasn't even released in the U.K. until 1975, three years after the group's demise. Be that as it may, few heavy prog bands favored such a dramatic clash between their artier musical pretensions and more visceral instrumental instincts than this London quintet, resulting in fascinatingly schizophrenic numbers boasting as much inner city grime and bluster as they do pastoral purity and whimsy…

Official reissue of this underground cult classic of early 70's British Progressive Rock.
Tone-setting opener "Blood Runs Deep" alternates between the bludgeoning Neanderthal riffing of Black Sabbath and the horn- and keyboard-sparked refinements of a Genesis or Atomic Rooster; "Mijo and the Laying of the Witch" moves from portentous King Crimson horn lines to a North African Bedouin camp luau before settling into an insistent heavy trudge marked by histrionic vocals à la Sir Lord Baltimore; the title track prefaces its own proto-metallic freakout with a pagan toast featuring wooden blocks and woodland flutes sounding like Jethro Tull at their most eerie, and these qualities are also shared with the pernicious bolero "Black Jewel of the Forest"…

Grant Green - The Main Attraction (1976) {CTI-Epic-Legacy EK 86145 rel 2002}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 213 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 89 Mb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (png) -> 145 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1976, 2002 Kudu Records / CTI / Epic / Legacy / Sony Music | EK 86145
Jazz / Soul Jazz / Jazz Funk / Guitar

Quite an unusual album from Grant Green – a record that's quite different than his earlier records for Blue Note, but still pretty darn great overall! Grant's working here in a large group – Kudu style – with arrangements by David Matthews, but a sound that's still pretty lean overall! There's a fair bit of great players in the lineup – including Jon Faddis on trumpet, Hubert Laws on flute, and Joe Farrell on tenor – and the horns soar out nicely to set the scene over some tightly stepping backings – all served up with plenty of room for Grant to solo spaciously on guitar! The title track – "The Main Attraction" – is nearly 20 minutes long – and the other two tracks, "Creature" and "Future Feature", both approach the 10 minute mark themselves!

This is Barry Levenson's (Canned Heat) second Rip Cat Records release, featuring newly written and recorded songs. With special guest Billy Price. The Visit is Barry Levenson's tribute to the artists who set him on his musical path. Across a selection of the four cover songs (the first he has recorded), the guitarist puts his mark on material he learned from recordings by Albert King, Bobby "Blue" Bland, Lightnin' Slim, and Otis Rush. Original compositions make up the balance of the album. Levenson's instrumentals build on a foundation of T-Bone Walker, Magic Sam, Grant Green, Ike Turner, Mickey Baker, Freddy King, Kenny Burrell, and others, with results frequently unique - no one else could have imagined "Last Train to Nowhere" or "The Visit" - and always astounding.

8CD box set that includes remastered versions of all seven studio albums the band recorded between 1969 and 1974. After Mick Fleetwood, Peter Green, John McVie, and Jeremy Spencer started Fleetwood Mac in 1967, they quickly found an audience eager for their British-style blues. Over the next seven years, the band would sign with Reprise Records, release seven studio albums, and release many classic tracks that are still beloved today. Fleetwood Mac’s early rise to fame takes centre stage on two upcoming Rhino releases that spotlight the group’s deep-blues roots.

Grant Green - The Final Comedown (1971) {Blue Note Japan, Paper Sleeve, TOCJ-9522 rel 2003}
XLD rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 237 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 87 Mb | Artwork | 5% repair rar
© 1971, 2003 Blue Note / Toshiba-EMI Japan | TOCJ-9522 | 24bit by RVG
Jazz / Jazz Funk / Soul Jazz / Guitar

The Final Comedown was Blue Note's first film soundtrack and a departure for both the label and Grant Green. True, many of Green's sessions from this period dipped into funk and R&B, but most of the tracks heard here are pensive mood pieces, conceived as the backing tracks to the blaxploitation film of the same name. As can be expected, there are a handful of cuts – "Past, Present and Future," "Slight Fear and Terror," "Battle Scene" – featuring things like staccato horn punches, dramatic tympani, and little in the way of instrumental soloing – standard fare for the genre.