VARIOUS ARTISTS Eddie Piller Presents British Mod Sounds Of The 1960s Vol 2: The Freakbeat & Psych Years
Mod’n’roll part two.
For the sequel to the highly rated ‘British Mod Sounds’ collection, acid-jazz maestro and broadcaster Eddie Piller has hand-picked another clutch of classic and rare tracks, this time tracing where the mods went next. The R&B train as they describe it splits roughly into four sections: harder freakbeat/garage, Eastern-influenced psychedelia, pastoral folk and jazz-progginess. As with the previous release, arrangement isn’t by chronology or musical progression. Some tracks slot neatly into the aforementioned styles, but a few defy categorisation. In that respect it’s not unlike the Island Records samplers of the late ’60s in that it embraces a diversity of artists under a single canopy. Again the Stones and Beatles are noted absentees (the latter represented by a cover of Taxman), but in a way that’s the point of this four CD/ two-LP collection: it’s a good method of releasing all those sparks of brilliance from the shadowy beatnik cellars that didn’t make the charts.
Setting the scene on the freakbeat path we find The Fairies with a Pretty Things soundalike song, plus cult classics from The Birds and Fleur De Lys. Psych stalwarts include John Peel fave raves The Misunderstood, plus a host of one-off stunners such as Save My Soul by Wimple Winch and Dream On My Mind by Rupert’s People, to name but two killer riffs.
In the baroque/strings corner — the train’s quiet coach — we have the Ivy League’s The World Fell Down and Scott Walker’s Montague Terrace. Heading down the siding marked ‘Black Sabbath’ is Jason Crest with Black Mass and The Open Mind’s Magic Potion.
Honing their chops for future rock greatness are The Gods (future Uriah Heepsters), the soon-to-be-Sensational Alex Harvey, and Sam Gopal featuring Lemmy. Among the hidden gems is Diamond Joe from Art Wood’s ‘Quiet Melon’, a staging post for Rod and the future Faces. Likewise, the Small Faces’ rock belter Me, You And Us Too is a forerunner to Humble Pie. One of the few gutsy female voices to cut through is Julie Driscoll, here with organist Brian Auger.
It’s all accompanied by a long essay with contributions from scene maker Jeff Dexter and band leader Zoot Money.
Some of our heroes went on to fame and fortune, while others were flash-in-the-pan, but this wondrous collection takes us down all the best twists and turns and proves that an amazing journey can be as enlightening as the destination.