It’s 8.30 on a thoroughly wet Tuesday morning and I’m jumping all around the room to the first track ‘My little red book’. There is no way you can keep still whilst this is playing. And it sets the tone. Not bad for an old Burt Bacharach number, though you wouldn’t know it unless you were a BB aficionado.
It sometimes surprises me how bands don’t mature and improve in their song-writing. Should we not get better at what we do as in other careers? Granted, some bands do but many have their best works at the outset of their careers. And this is no exception. There are some cracking songs on here which, had it been released 5 years later, would have resulted in 5-6 minute songs. The only criticism I have is that I want more of each song. Many end way too quickly, sample ‘Softly to me’ and ‘Mushroom clouds’. But what you also get are some lovely, very 60’s style intros with an unaccompanied guitar kicking the track off. I love that sound.
Love were a car crash waiting to happen. Eventually recording three LP’s, substance abuse, conflict within the band and I guess just being around SF in the late sixties, the promise shown on this LP was strong. ‘Signed D.C.’ and ‘A message to pretty’ showed they were more than a psych rock band. Various incarnations with Arthur Lee at the forefront had Love playing for many years after their official break up but this, together with their other two offerings was a showcase of what might have been. Instead Bryan Maclean (a dead ringer for Bryan Jones perhaps?) ended up broke and releasing Christian songs not many years later. I guess a band to file under ‘what happened in the 60’s in the music industry’. But you will not be able to get through a day without going back to the first track.
