sleeve note compiler Stan Cronyn pointed out. ‘But this was The Beau Brummels who flew down to meet the younger Nashville musicians on common ground.’
‘We arrived in a Chrysler and all the Nashville guys had Cadillacs,’ recalled Sal. Musical differences were also on the cards when they sat down with the local musicians and unveiled their songs. ‘It was a 180-degree shift from what Nashville was about.’
The venue for the showdown was, of course, Bradley’s Barn and the resultant collection, although not the style-shattering opus the press and public at the time were led to believe, is an exceptional example of roomy country playing which envelops Valentino’s rich, resonant voice. Cronyn’s notes conclude that ‘In Bradley’s Barn a pop album was created in a hush!’ and indeed the far-reaching effects of this mild-mannered country rock can’t be underrated. Bradley’s Barn is as much about the ambience of its setting as anything else. In that, it’s a quiet classic.
The Insect Trust
The Insect Trust
Hippy visionaries who deserve to be in the dictionary under ‘eclectic’.
Record label: Capitol
Produced: Steve Duboff
Recorded: 1968
Released: 1968
Chart Peaks: None (UK) None (US)
Personnel: Bill Barth (g, Swiss warbler, pc); Bob Palmer (as, alto & soprano recorders, clarinet, pc); Trevor Koehler (bs, piccolo, sewer drum, thumb piano, upright bass, ar); Nancy Jeffries (v, pc); Luke Faust (banjo, banjo guitar, v, pc); Buddy Saltzman (d); Bernard ‘Pretty’ Purdie (d); Hugh McCracken (g); Joe Mack (b); Chuck Rainey (b); Steve Duboff (conga drums, pc)
Track listing: The Skin Game; Miss Fun City; World War I Song; Special Rider Blues; Foggy River Bridge Fly; Been Here And Gone So Soon; Declaration Of Independence; Walking On Nails; Brighter Than Day; Mountain Song; Going Home
Current CD: Currently unavailable
Further listening: Hoboken Saturday Night (1970)
Further reading: www.furious.com/perfect/insecttrust.html
Download: Not currently legally available
Even by the standards of an era that constantly broke down musical boundaries, The Insect Trust were quite extraordinarily unusual, being described in Rolling Stone at the time as ‘absolutely original and unique’. Combining elements of rock, jazz, bluegrass, soul, Dixieland, folk, raga, blues and – well, practically every genre of music there is – they made two visionary, under-appreciated albums that still sound truly unlike anything else.
Every member of the band had a varied and scholarly musical background. Forming in New York in the mid 1960s, after spending time soaking up influences in Memphis they decamped to Hoboken, New Jersey and moved into a large tenement together. After landing an unexpected $25,000 advance from Capitol Records through contacts, they set about synthesising their extraordinary range of experience into an album. This classic debut, recorded in 1968, shows up one major difference between them and almost all other major US bands of the time. While the majority were in thrall to Eastern sounds, The Insect Trust sound resolutely homegrown. Banjos, clarinets and saxophones were of far greater interest to them than sitars or tablas. Their obviously deep love of traditional American music shines through in the beautiful bottleneck guitar on Going Home and the fiddle and banjo exchanges on Foggy River Bridge Fly. But that is not to say for a moment that they sound old-fashioned: whilst rooted in their country’s musical heritage, The Insect Trust sounded contemporary.
Take the opening track, The Skin Game, for example. Starting with a mellow acoustic guitar and Nancy Jeffries’s delightful voice, it unexpectedly veers off into squalling guitar and avant-garde saxophone, anchored only by echoing cowbell – and then, as abruptly as this interlude has begun, it ends. The acoustic guitar fades back up, Jeffries resumes her glorious singing, and the listeners are left to ponder whether or not they actually heard what they just heard.
Tuneful, intelligent and highly musical, The Insect Trust truly forged something new out of the past – and what makes the success of their experiment particularly extraordinary is that they had no permanent rhythm guitarist, bassist or drummer, employing instead a variety of session players. In fact, that was one of the major factors in their split. Despite universal critical acclaim, when few bought their records it became increasingly hard to support the cost of a hired rhythm section capable of keeping up with them, especially for their sporadic concerts. Coupled with certain members’ overly enthusiastic drug use, they finally called it a day in 1971, leaving behind them two of the most beguilingly strange and original rock albums ever recorded – a claim that few of their far more successful contemporaries can make.
The Open Mind
The Open Mind
London hippies make the world’s first heavy metal album.
Record Label: Phillips
Produced: John Franz
Recorded: Stanhope Place Studios, London; summer 1968
Released: 1969
Chart Peaks: None (UK) None (US)
Personnel: Terry Martin (g, v); Mike Brancaccio (g); Timothy du Feu (b, p); Philip Fox (d); Kiki Dee, Maggie Bell (bv)
Track listing: Dear Louise; Try Another Day; I Feel The Same Way Too; My Mind Cries; Can’t You See; Thor The Thunder God; Horses And Chariots; Before My Time; Free As The Breeze; Girl I’m So Alone; Soul and My Will; Falling Again
Current CD: Sunbeam SBRCD5019 adds: Magic Potion; Cast A Spell
Further listening: This was pretty much everything they recorded give or take a few B-sides
Further reading: An interview with bassist Timothy du Feu: www.pooterland.com/index2/looking_glass/open_mind/ open_mind.html
Download: Not currently legally available
As The Beatles bowed out and Led Zeppelin took off, many other excellent bands slipped between the cracks. Amongst them The Open Mind are prominent – and some would say pre-eminent. In 1969 they released a thunderously heavy psychedelic album and a legendary 45, both of which vanished so completely that mint copies now fetch truly terrifying sums on the collectors’ market.
Their roots lay in London’s fertile blues scene, where they gigged for years as The Drag Set before embracing the emerging psychedelic scene in 1966 and becoming a fixture in underground clubs such as the Middle Earth, the UFO and The Marquee. ‘Bluesy bands started to go psychedelic, and we were no exception’, says Tim du Feu, their bassist. In keeping with the changing times, they rethought both their name and image. Far from the standard hippy threads on show all around them, The Open Mind opted to reflect their proto-metal psychedelia in the leather suits they always wore. ‘It was very unusual at the time’, he continues. ‘You could say that we started the look that people like Iron Maiden took up later.’
Their music was evolving as well. ‘The later it got at gigs, the wilder things became, and we’d experiment’, says Tim. Playing alongside such legends as Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd and The Electric Prunes, by 1968 they were red-hot and ready to record. Landing a deal with Phillips, they made their sole album that summer.
Standing today as an unquestionable high point of UK psychedelia, it’s arguably the first album in the style that came to be known shortly afterwards as ‘heavy metal’.
Album completed, the band returned to the live circuit and eagerly awaited its release.