Psychedelia Original Album Series / Various

For a kid growing up in California, I had never heard these albums in full. There are a few familiar songs, but not the entire albums. And all five are incredible! Not sure why these didn't make their way across the pond. Love them ...

Two of the albums here, July and the Idle Race, are pretty hard to find and are utterly solid. July in particular is one of the great relatively unsung psych albums alongside its' spiritual brother SF Sorrow by the Pretty Things. The Idle Race album is famous for being Jeff Lynne's project prior to ELO, but stands magnificently as a quirky and utterly tuneful psych-pop effort. The Tomorrow record is justifiably praised as well, just not as obscure as July or the Idle Race. The remaining two albums seem, IMO, to be there to make a 5 disc set. The Gods album is fairly average, and the Yardbirds disc here is kind of a dud from a very well known and important band.For what this set costs though? Absolutely worth it for July and Idle Race. If you're not familiar with this series of CD sets, they're really no frills. They're kind of like mini LP jackets, I guess, with no liner notes and generally not any bonus tracks. Can't really get too upset about mastering anomalies (was July ever NOT mono?) on these ancient artifacts. As another reviewer pointed out, it IS rather amusing how many people that were huge megastars of rock appear on these often really loopy albums.

This is a great set of rare psychedelic albums. Tommorow, July, and The Birthday Party are all really incredible albums. Genesis and Little Games are not quite as good but still an enjoyable listen.

Great $ great sound

LOVE THESE! A STEAL!

This title five-disc set of obscure yet collectable discs is like time travel. Your memories are better than the actual experience when you return. Mastering is spotty throughout the set. Four of the discs are from groups that would be considered footnotes in rock history...know more for where their players went than with these discs. The one group most people have heard of, The Yardbirds, suffers from a lack of direction. All in all...a historical piece worth the non-Amazon price. However not worth the $45 Amazon price.

Each of these albums are terrific examples of British Psych. On the negative side, the Tomorrow has the same couple of horribly rechanneled tracks. "My White Bicycle" and "Revolution" are still just as unlistenable as ever.The July album is still 100% mono.There's no extra tracks and you'll need a magnifying glass to read the tiny print.

Excellent Music. Fast delivery!

Todo bien

Tomorrow and July are both psychedelic classics, with a more ramshackle feel than some of the bigger albums of the period. This is especially true of the July album, which often sounds like there are only about two instruments being played at one time, but is none the worse for that.Tomorrow's track 'Revolution', not the Beatles' song, could easily have graced that band - on the Lennon side of psych - but their cover of 'Strawberry Fields Forever' sounds like it was recorded with much less extravagant production and with far less time, which is not really surprising at all.Jeff Lynn's band The Idle Race favoured a whimsical music hall feel throughout their Birthday album, which makes Tomorrow's songs about dwarfs and white bicycles sound almost Kafkaesque in comparison. The sixties seems like a very long time ago indeed.The Yardbirds had started playing some future Led Zep tracks live by the time they were releasing the Little Games album, and though It has some of Jimmy Page's power, the lyrics and many of the songs sound like they're about to give up - which they were. The excellent single of that period 'Think About It' is also missing, as often was the case.The Gods don't quite live up to their name - who could? - and without the superstar leaders of the two lesser CDs included here, it is possibly the least interesting, and also the least psychedelic. But it does pack a punch, an organ-powered punch, and if you like the way music was being led post-psychedelia by the likes of Procol Harum it could well be of interest. And they do a mean 'Hey Bulldog'.So, you WILL like July and Tomorrow, and depending upon your particular disposition, you may or may not like the other three whilst acknowledging an overall very agreeable psychedelic experience.

Einmal mehr bietet die Serie "Original Album Series" viel Musik zu einem günstigen Preis. Das Thema diesen Box-Sets: Psychedelia.Alle 5 Bands bzw. Alben sind angesiedelt im Bereich des britischen 'Psychedelic Rock & Pop'. Die Original-LPs wurden in den Jahren 1967 und 1968 veröffentlicht. "Sie fügten sich bestens ein ins psychedelische England der Jahre 1967/68, als unzählige Bands die Insel mit der britischen Flower-Power-Variante überzogen" [Reclam Rock Klassiker]. Viele der beteiligten Musiker sollten sich im Lauf der Jahre in bekannten Bands einen Namen machen (dazu später mehr).> Informationen zum CD-Set:Wie üblich alle CDs in einfachen Papphüllen mit dem Original-Album-Cover. Keine Booklets. Bei diesem Set diesmal keine Bonus-Tracks. Die Laufzeit der einzelnen CDs ist angesiedelt bei 35 bis 40 Minuten (wie man es von der guten alten Vinyl-LP her kennt). Hinweise auf ein "Digitally Remastering" kann ich nicht entdecken.> Mein Fazit:Für Liebhaber des frühen britischen Psychedelic Rock & Pop eine sehr interessante Sammlung zum gewohnt sehr guten Preis.> Nachfolgend zu den einzelnen CDs [Bandbesetzung + Songliste] :CD 1: Tomorrow - Tomorrow [1967 / 1968]Band: Steve Howe (guitar) [später > "Yes"] // Keith West (vocals) [> später bekannt geworden durch seinen Welthit "Excerpt From A Teenage Opera" ... auch bekannt als "Grocer Jack"] // John "Twink" Alder (drums) [> "Pretty Things", "Pink Fairies"] // John "Junior" Wood (bass).Songs: [1] My White Bicycle (3:17) // [2] Colonel Brown (2:51) // [3] Real Life Permanent Dream (3:15) // [4] Shy Boy (2:26) // [5] Revolution (3:48) // [6] The Incredible Journey Of Timothy Chase (3:17) // [7] Auntie Mary's Dress Shop (2:44) // [8] Strawberry Fields Forever (3:58) // [9] Three Jolly Little Dwarfs (2:26) // [10] Now Your Time Has Come (4:51) // [11] Hallucinations (2:37)°°°°°°°°°°**********CD 2: July - July [1968]Band: Tom Newman (vocals) // Tony Duhig (guitar) // Jon Field (keyboard, flute) // Chris Jackson (drums) // Alan James (bass).Songs: [1] My Clown (3:21) // [2] Dandelion Seeds (4:29) // [3] Jolly Mary (3:20) // [4] Hallo To Me (2:56) // [5] You Missed It All (2:48) // [6] The Way (3:20) // [7] To Be Free (2:46) // [8] Move On Sweet Flower (3:23) // [9] Crying Is For Writers (2:34) // [10] I See (2:59) // [11] Friendly Man (3:09) // [12] A Bird Lived (2:38)°°°°°°°°°°**********CD 3: The Gods - Genesis [1968]Band: Joe Konas (guitar, vocals) // Ken Hensley (guitar, percussion, keyboard) [später > "Uriah Heep"] // John Glascock (bass, vocals) [> "Jethro Tull"] // Lee Kerslake (drums) [> "Uriah Heep"].Songs: [1] Towards The Skies (3:25) // [2] Candles Getting Shorter (4:28) // [3] You're My Life (3:20) // [4] Looking Glass (4:14) // [5] Misleading Colours (3:40) // [6] Radio Show (3:11) // [7] Plastic Horizon (3:26) // [8] Farthing Man (3:30) // [9] I Never Knew (5:41) // [10] Time And Eternity (2:43)°°°°°°°°°°**********CD 4: The Idle Race - The Birthday Party [1968]Band: Jeff Lynne (vocals, guitar, piano) [später > "Electric Light Orchestra/E.L.O."] // Dave Pritchard (guitar, vocals) // Greg Masters (bass, vocals) // Roger Spencer (drums, vocals).Songs: [1] Skeleton And The Roundabout (2:26) // [2] Happy Birthday (0:23) // [3] The Birthday (3:00) // [4] I Like My Toys (2:12) // [5] Morning Sunshine (1:48) // [6] Follow Me Follow (2:48) // [7] Sitting In My Tree (1:59) // [8] On With The Show (2:22) // [9] Lucky Man (2:38) // [10] (Don't Put Your Boys In The Army) Mrs. Ward (2:14) // [11] Pie In The Sky (2:23) // [12] The Lady Who Said She Could Fly (2:22) // [13] End Of The Road (2:09)°°°°°°°°°°**********CD 5: The Yardbirds - Little Games [1967]Band: Keith Relf (vocals, harmonica, percussion) [später > "Renaissance", "Armageddon"] // Jimmy Page (guitars) [> "Led Zeppelin"] // Chris Dreja (bass, backing vocals) [> "Box Of Frogs"] // Jim McCarty (drums, percussion, backing vocals) [> "Box Of Frogs"]Songs: [1] Little Games (2:25) // [2] Smile On Me (3:16) // [3] White Summer (3:56) // [4] Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor (2:49) // [5] Glimpses (4:24) // [6] Drinking Muddy Water (2:53) // [7] No Excess Baggage (2:32) // [8] Stealing, Stealing (2:42) // [9] Only The Black Rose (2:52) // [10] Little Soldier Boy (2:39)[Reinhard Busse]

que de fraicheur.

Manchmal muss man im Leben was riskieren, und sei es nur ein Exemplar der "Original Album Series" aufs gerade Wohl zu kaufen. Bekannt waren mir vorher nur die Yardbirds, und die auch nur vom Namen, der Rest? Nie gehört. Und dann bekam ich 5 echte Sahnehäppchen. Das Ganze ist nachträglich aber gar nicht so überraschend, spielten doch in diesen Bands manche Herrschaften, die später noch Karriere machen sollten.Bei "Tomorrow" hört man nach wenigen Klängen schon, wer die Vorbilder dieser Gruppe waren, nämlich die Pilzköpfe aus Liverpool. Zur Ehrenbezeugung haben sie auch deren "Strawberry Fields forever" gecovert. "My White Bicycle" und "Auntie Mary`s Dress Shop" sind allemal hörenswert. Ein zwingender Auftakt.Richtig schräg wird es mit "July" und ihrem gleichnamigen Album. Die ausschweifenden Melodien reinigen die Gehörgänge, Vergleiche mit ähnlichen Gruppen fallen mir nicht ein, "July" sind sicherlich nicht jedermanns Sache, mir gefällts.Bei "The Gods" spielten spätere Musiker von Jethro Tull und Uriah Heep mit, unter anderem der kreative Kopf von Uriah Heep in deren Glanzzeiten, nämlich Ken Hensley. Dass dieser die Orgel stark einbindet, war bei den "Gods" schon so, und erst recht später bei Uriah Heep. Ein besonderer Anspieltipp ist "Candles getting shorter", auch auf Youtube zu hören, Heep-Fans werden dieses Album sicherlich mögen.ELO-Chef Jeff Lynne verehrt die Beatles, las ich mal. So hören sich dann auch "The Idle Race" an. der Albumtitel gibt die Richtung vor, hier hört man vor allem sehr fröhliche Musik, waren ELO Vollprofis, so handelt es sich bei dieser Gruppe hier um waschechte Amateure, aber im positiven Sinn, mit viel Liebe und Herzblut am Werk. Wenn man schon einen Song besonders hervorheben will, dann das kuriose "Sitting on my Tree".Den Abschluss machen die Yardbirds, die in ihrer Zeit schon kommerziell erfolgreich waren und mit ausgefeilter Musik beeindruckten. Hier klingt die Musik schon sehr professionell, immerhin spielten in dieser Band unter anderem Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck und Jimmy Page. Das spricht natürlich für Qualität.Den Machern dieser Sammlung sei gedankt, dass man auf diese Art und Weise Gruppen kennenlernt, die man sonst nie entdecken würde, was hier für alle vertretenen Gruppen gilt. Man kann nur hoffen, dass die "Psychedelia"-Serie fortgesetzt wird, das wäre dann ein absoluter Pflichtkauf.Jede Gruppe hat hier 5 Sterne verdient.