Cocoon Beautiful Thingz

The Peppermint Trolley Company are quintessentially '60s Southern Californian, capturing the soft fallout of folk-rock and psychedelia, all wrapped up in the studio gleam of Hollywood. Tinsel Town played a large role in the group's existence as they became best-known as the singers of the theme songs for the Brady Bunch and Love, American Style, gigs they received because they had a sweet commercial sound that should have hit the Top 40 even if it never did (the closest they came is with the minor hit "Baby You Come Rollin' 'Cross My Mind," a bubblegum spin on Glen Campbell). The Peppermint Trolley Company's problem wasn't a lack of good collaborators - on their eponymous 1968 debut, Chad Stuart of Chad & Jeremy, provided arrangements, Roger Nichols appears on his song "Trust" - or a dearth of material but that they lacked a strong identity, too easily moving from lite psychedelia to gently rolling folk-pop to slightly tougher rock…

Demon Music are releasing a new Suede compilation called Beautiful Ones: The Best of Suede 1992-2018 which will be available as a 4CD, 6LP vinyl and 2LPs packages.

Grant Green - Green Is Beautiful (1970) {Blue Note Japan, Paper Sleeve, TOCJ-9545 rel 2003)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 247 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 90 Mb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (jpg) -> 33 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1970, 2003 Blue Note / Toshiba-EMI Japan | TOCJ-9545
Jazz / Jazz Funk / Soul Jazz / Guitar

The second album of Grant Green's thorough jazz-funk makeover, Green Is Beautiful finds the guitarist growing more comfortable with harder, funkier R&B than he seemed on the softer-hued Carryin' On. The switch from Fender Rhodes electric piano back to the more traditional Hammond organ certainly helps give the session a little extra grit, but it doesn't return Green to the land of soul-jazz by any means. Green Is Beautiful is still explicitly commercial and accessible to non-jazz audiences, and (purist objections notwithstanding) that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Unique album that combines the different artistic characters of the band members in a very harmonic way. Melodic, powerful metal with a beautiful female voice will be lifted into a new dimension with this album of Beautiful Sin. "The Unexpected" is an excellent surprise! Highly recommended! Nowadays this band is history.

This is a definitive best-of from the scathingly satiric, invariably tuneful band that arose from the ashes of The Housemartins. Sadly, Paul Heaton and friends have always been too twee and clever for the colonies, though classics like "My Book" and "Old Red Eyes Is Back" deserved better. A lovely, sing-along new track, "One Last Love Song," sounds like a farewell to arms, while the limited-edition disc of B sides proves that only XTC can match them in terms of high-caliber throwaways.