Josh Rouse - 1972

The softer side of the "Me" decade is running rampant in the Forest. The aging, macrobiotic, yoga-stretching inhabitants are waving their freak flags of mellowness. Strum on!

Josh Rouse is a fine singer songwriter. A couple of years back he hit the same phase our contributers have and produced this completely irony-free homage to that time and its music. It's gorgeous and was on regular rotation for me for a long time after its release. I sent it to the Curry yesterday to feed his habit (he'd never heard it) and found myself luxuriating in its beauty once again.

Though the music is pitch perfect, finding its foundation in the stylings of that era, its content is sometimes darker and often more intelligent than the standard fare upon which it's based.

No other artist has mined the 70's soft rock material so well without hedging his bet with the all too common smirk or the annoyingly requisite wink.

This really is a great record.

amg:

Josh Rouse's 1972 gives away the game in the first line of the first song, the exquisite title track, when he name-checks Carole King. The record is going back in time and it is going to have fun doing it. Rouse's records have always been highly literate and highly musical, but they have never been fun like this, and make no mistake, 1972 is a fun record. Rouse sounds as loose as a goose and the songs reflect that. Not always lyrically, as some of the songs touch on such non-fun subjects as loneliness, repression, and bitterness, but definitely musically. To that end, Brad Jones' production is spot-on perfect — not an instrument is out of place and the whole record has a jaunty bounce and a lush dreaminess. 1972 is coated with sonic goodness: fluttering strings, piping horns, cotton-candy sweet flutes, funky percussion, handclaps, and great backing vocals. Rouse and Jones find inspiration in all the right places: in the laid-back groove of Al Green, the California haze of Fleetwood Mac, the dreamy melancholia of Nick Drake, the sexy groove of Marvin Gaye, and the wordy lilt of Jackson Browne or James Taylor. The songs are the strongest batch Rouse has written yet. "Love Vibration" is the hit single; it has everything a hit single needs: musical hooks, lyrical hooks, vocal hooks, a smoldering sax solo (optional), and a groovy video. Other songs that are sure to be in heavy rotation are "James," a funky ballad that shows off Rouse's wonderful falsetto (as does "Comeback [Light Therapy]") and takes time for that most elusive creature, a good flute solo; "Under Your Charms," a sultry, sensual ballad that takes a potentially squirm-inducing subject and actually does it right, Marvin-style; and "Rise," a beautifully orchestrated epic that ends the record on a perfect note. 1972 should vault Rouse to the forefront of intelligent pop alongside kindred spirits like Joe Pernice and Kurt Wagner (of Lambchop). If you say you've heard a better pop record this year, you are lying.


And to my fellow Forest posters, most of whom are younger than I by a decade or so and have perhaps fewer memories of the original ride, these lyrics from the title track might speak to your current obsession:

We're going through some changes
hopin' for replacement
until we find,
a way out of this hole

Hear

Here's a nice stripped-down acoustic performance of Love Vibration.

Spirit - Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus [1970]

Along with a few other Forest denizens I recently turned two score years old, which apparently makes you reflect the fuck on your life and your entry into the world and what was going down at that point—if only to stave off the answer to the question at the other end of the spectrum. Suddenly you adore all of the soft rock of your youth. You hope it's just a short-lived phase, but you just don't know. The questions begin: "Are my Wings clipped? Is my America disappearing? Is my Steely resolve to be Grateful that I'm not Dead done, Dan?"

I think I'm going to pull out of it, but it's going to take a lot of Slayer and Jesus Lizard on the other end of this tunnel.

I've absolutely been obsessed with Spirit lately; they have been carrying me through the darker parts of the tunnel. I've long loved 1970 musically and Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus is quite a stunning window into the psych-country-prog-metal-jazz-soul that encompasses the spirit of Spirit. I'm sure you are familiar with "I've Got a Line On You" and "Nature's Way", but their entire catalog bears investigating if you like what you hear here and are not already deep with the Spirit. I find this album to be pretty flawless other than the Kenny Logginsesque parts of "Animal Zoo", which mar an otherwise excellent tune. Randy California was definitely fond of studio chicanery, so cue this up on some cans and enjoy the details. "Love Has Found A Way" is a fine mindfuck and seems to be pretty advanced production-wise for the time. David Briggs is twisting the knobs and your mind on this one, as he did for Neil Young, Nick Cave, Alice Cooper and Royal Trux.

Apologies for becoming pedestrian, predictable and sappy in old age. Just to prove that I'm intolerable and cranky I think I'm going to keep harping on 1970 for a bit with a flurry of posts. Wait until you see the next one...it's a doooooozy. Quite frightening actually, at least initially, but please, stay with me.


Come bask in the heavenly Spirit


[Note: Trax 13-16 are bonuses from the 1996 reissue where this stems from. "Soldier" is intended to be the twelfth and final dream in the original release.]

America - Homecoming

The Forest's founder has, of late, developed a compulsive obsession with the "healing powers of 70s soft rock." We hope he'll recover his senses soon, but until then I offer him this.

Their lyrics were about as stupid as anything ever produced in that decade ("The heat was hot"?! - Christ!), but their music - their bouncy, jaunty, wistfully optimistic music - could be pretty damned memorable. These three guys spent much of their youths overseas as army brats. That experience seems to have weasled its way into their melodies and adds a quality that embodies American expats' uniquely idealistic view of home. The music carries an intrinsic sense of homesickness (and by association nostalgia) for the ole USofA - the actual real estate; not the nation - that can be winning on a sunny afternoon with the top down cruising the PCH.

They had their freaking hits, but they were usually surrounded by crappy filler on their LPs. This is as close as they ever came to making a complete album. And it has Ventura Highway on it, which alone forgives a multitude of their sins.

So heal thyself, Forest boy, and then for God's sake, move on.

amg:

Homecoming, America's finest album, refines and focuses the folk-pop approach found on their debut release. The songs here are tighter and more forthright, with fewer extended solo instrumental sections than before. The sound quality is clear and bright; the colorful arrangements, while still acoustic guitar-based, feature more electric guitar and keyboards. The performance quality is more assured, among the most urgently committed the group would ever put on vinyl. Verses are still sometimes banal and clunky ("You can't disregard your friends/But life gets so hard when you reach the end") or cryptic ("Sorry, boy, but I've been hit by purple rain"), but a number of the song subjects here exhibit a yearning sense of wanderlust and love of the outdoors that proves to be highly evocative and compelling (particularly on "Moon Song," "Ventura Highway," "California Revisited," and "Cornwall Blank"). Chordal progressions are sophisticated and contain many subtle surprises. A few new style wrinkles can be seen in the country-influenced "Don't Cross the River," the drivingly gutsy "California Revisited" (perhaps the hardest-rocking song the group would ever produce), and the hushed yet mildly funky "Head & Heart." Chart hits from this release include "Ventura Highway," "Only in Your Heart," and "Don't Cross the River," but each song here has something to recommend it. This top-flight album is a very rewarding listen.

Hear

RIP - Pete Quaife

Pete Quaife, co-founder of the Kinks but wise enough to hit the bricks when the Davies boys made it awful and money became far too important, died last Thursday in Denmark after a long fight with kidney disease.

He had been a successful graphic designer after leaving the band and played music only when the mood struck him.

He was 66.

Metal Urbain - Panik

we are working on some new approaches at Pulpit Central.

24-Carat Black - Ghetto: Misfortune's Wealth (1973)

(aka: the Dale O. Warren story)

I just SO adore that Charmaines take

on the timeless standard

(Charlie Chaplin composition)

"Smile"

[see Midwest 45s].

Turns out that the lovely wah guitar is by none other than Dennis Coffey.
But the real discovery for me was the producer /arranger Dale O. Warren.
-- turns out this dude arranged that track, this album and so much more...

allmusic saith: Dale Warren (sometimes credited as Dale O. Warren) was a classically trained musician who made his mark as an arranger and conductor in soul music, first in his native Detroit working for various labels (including Motown) and later, much more visibly, at Memphis-based Stax Records.

His first notable work for the latter was on Isaac Hayes' version of "Walk on By," and its success and the impact of the resulting album soon made Warren into a mainstay of the company's production department.

He subsequently served as an arranger for Billy Eckstine, the Staple Singers, and Albert King, among many others, but his greatest triumph was probably his string arrangement for Hayes' soaring rendition of Jerry Butler's "I Stand Accused," from 1970. Warren's most visible contribution to music came two years after that, at the Wattstax Festival.

He was heavily featured as a composer and conductor at the legendary Wattstax concert and on one of the albums and in the movie that followed — he conducted what was billed as the Wattstax '72 Orchestra and also wrote the extended instrumental piece, "Salvation Symphony," that opened the event (a portion of which, eight minutes long, was included on one of the eventual album releases from the event).

He also took under his wing a Detroit-based group

called the Ditalians

renamed them 24 Carat Black,

producing one stunning album

entitled Ghetto: Misfortune's Wealth

Sad to say, Warren also suffered from various personal problems, including alcoholism — he was known for showing up at sessions with a supply of gin on hand, and apparently, if all accounts are to be believed, was drunk at some live engagements — that made him unreliable. His fortunes faded after he left Stax Records in 1974, that year did see Warren earn his first (and only) screen credit as a musician, for his work on the scoring of the drama The Klansman (1974).

He lived only just long enough to see this album turn into a cult favorite, embraced by hip-hop artists of the next generation, and to witness the first phase of the full-scale revival of interest in Stax and its history.

HEAR

Jules And The Polar Bears - Got No Breeding

For somebody who loves pure powerpop there's no finer example what it is that fuels the passion than this little gem. A classic case of wrong place/wrong time ended up burying it, but over the years it dragged itself from the grave and got recognized for the perfection it is.

amg:

Jules and the Polar Bears' debut album, Got No Breeding, fell into a commercial twilight zone shortly after its release in 1978; the music was too quirky and the wit of the lyrics was too curious for the mainstream rock audience, but the band's approach was too firmly rooted in mainstream pop for the new wave crowd, who Columbia thought would be the record's likely target audience (and the shaggy picture of Jules Shear and his bandmates on the cover wasn't likely to encourage the skinny-tie wearing record buyer). However, in time Got No Breeding became a cult favorite, and with good reason — it's a superlative collection of smart, well-crafted pop tunes played with enthusiasm and élan by a great band. The studio-savvy guitar work of Richard Bredice and Stephen Hague's piano have one foot in mainstream rock & roll, but the slightly strangled cry of Shear's vocals takes these songs into another place, though he's able to keep up with the band when they shift into high gear on tunes like "Convict" and "Driftwood from Disaster," and he generates some genuine soul on "You Just Don't Wanna Know" and the title cut. Shear's songs also take a skewed but heartfelt look at life and love in the Modern Age, and there isn't a less than memorable tune in the bunch; close to thirty years on, Got No Breeding's fusion of polished studio craft and idiosyncratic pop experimentation sounds prescient rather than eccentric. Got No Breeding is where Jules Shear's career as a cult hero really took off, and with good reason — it's a thoroughly enjoyable album and one of the finest records his name has ever been attached to.

Hear

Audio Sports - Strange Fruits

Smoother, slicker than Baywatch's preceding post of Era. Bigger jazz influences. It still gasses.

I actually prefer this one, but just by a little bitty bit.

Hear

Audio Sports - Era of Glittering Gas, Eat+Buy+Eat (1992)

!!!REBOOT!!!

this is not really a new post, but a repost.

see I

was hanging with my pal The Hen t'other night

in my kitchen, when he requested, as he always does

to hear Audio Sports. I've come to realize that it is the only

record in my collection he does not possess but wishes he did...

and so we listened to it and it sounded as fine as ever

but then today when i wanted to hear it at work

i tried pulling it offa the froxx here, alas

only to find my link was crossed

with a Sonny Sharrock boot

well, hah and lol

sorry!

it's been fixed

now

i urge you

to check this out

if you have not yet

+++

the beats are smoof

and eye's rhymes flow

in a most pleasant mode

Trouser Press: For fans of space-a-delic rap, Audio Sports resembles nothing so much as the Beastie Boys being choreographed by a tag team of Neil Tennant and John Zorn. With its surreal cutting (provided by DJ Kool Jazz Takemura) and stun-gun BPM levels, Eat+Buy+Eat uses basic hip-hop elements as a base for wiggy gibbers and rasps that effectively skewer consumer culture icons. Yamatsuka is less of a presence on Era of Glittering Gas, but his hijinks add an edgy goofiness to the maliciously playful "Outlaw in Wonderland."

HEAR

COIL - Musick to Play in the Dark (1999-2000)

Coil

was an English cross-genre, industrial experimental music group

formed in 1982

by John Balance and his partner

Peter Christopherson, aka "Sleazy".

The duo worked together on a series of releases before Balance chose the name Coil,

which he claimed to be inspired by the omnipresence of the coil's shape in nature.

Today, Coil remains one of the most influential and best known industrial music groups.

Although Coil expressed interest in many musical groups,

they rarely, if ever, claimed to be influenced by them.

Coil explicitly stated the influence of such non-musical sources as

William Burroughs, Aleister Crowley, Bryon Gysin and Austin Spare.

Furthermore, the group were friends with Burroughs and owned some of Spare's original artwork.

Coil's worked in such genres as

industrial,

noise, ambient

dark ambient, neo-folk,

spoken word, drone music,

and minimalism,

creating what Balance explicitly referred to as

"magickal music".

Balance described the early Coil work as "solar"

and the later work as "moon musick".

~~~

Musick to Play in the Dark Vol. 1

is one of two albums attributed purely to a style called "moon musick",

which signified their change from a "solar" to a "moon" group.

Musick to Play in the Dark Vol. 2 is the sequel album.

Hear Vol 1

Hear Vol 2

Steely Dan - Can't Buy A Thrill (1972)

I don't know what it is,

but I've been fiending

for all kinds of Steely of late.

We've got the AJA pinnacle up,

so why not this here Debut?

lyrically idiosyncratic

melodically shimmering

dark and druggie

unrepentant hippie-haters

Steely Dan

blah blah blah

The ultimate punks?

this is hilarious.

this too.

allmusic: Walter Becker and Donald Fagen were remarkable craftsmen from the start, as Steely Dan's debut, Can't Buy a Thrill, illustrates. Each song is tightly constructed, with interlocking chords and gracefully interwoven melodies, buoyed by clever, cryptic lyrics. All of these are hallmarks of Steely Dan's signature sound, but what is most remarkable about the record is the way it differs from their later albums. Of course, one of the most notable differences is the presence of vocalist David Palmer, a professional blue-eyed soul vocalist who oversings the handful of tracks where he takes the lead. Palmer's very presence signals the one major flaw with the album — in an attempt to appeal to a wide audience, Becker and Fagen tempered their wildest impulses with mainstream pop techniques. Consequently, there are very few of the jazz flourishes that came to distinguish their albums — the breakthrough single, "Do It Again," does work an impressively tight Latin jazz beat, and "Reelin' in the Years" has jazzy guitar solos and harmonies — and the production is overly polished, conforming to all the conventions of early-'70s radio. Of course, that gives these decidedly twisted songs a subversive edge, but compositionally, these aren't as innovative as their later work. Even so, the best moments ("Dirty Work," "Kings," "Midnight Cruiser," "Turn That Heartbeat Over Again") are wonderful pop songs that subvert traditional conventions and more than foreshadow the paths Steely Dan would later take.

Personally

my real favorite here is

"Only a Fool Would Say That"

[removed per DMCA complaint march 7, 2011]

U Roy - Natty Rebel

If reggae music was an energy bar this would be a Powerbar.

You can almost smell the dude on the cover.

_______________


Allmusic.com: Still recording with producer Tony Robinson, with whom U-Roy cut 1975's Dread Inna Babylon album, for the follow-up Natty Rebel, the DJ enlisted the services of bassist/backing vocalist Lloyd Parks, drummer Sly Dunbar, and singers Barrington Spence and Flip Wilson. As one would expect, Parks and Dunbar filled the album with deep, rootsy rhythms, with the latter clicking away like a human metronome on "Badie Boo." Robinson was particularly adept at turning rocksteady classics on their head; his studio trick of fading the vocals out in a stutter of reverb gave these oldies a fresh, dubby feel that was further accented by the rhythm section. But around these rootsy beats and style, U-Roy created a kaleidoscope of moods and styles with the help of a heap of backing tracks. Compared to the more radicalized Dread, Rebel has a jauntier, easygoing air that permeates virtually the whole disc. It's particularly noticeable on "Do You Remember," where the DJ launches into the track, and chatters along non-stop, as light and breezy as a spring day. Yet, U- Roy has total control of the rhythms, never misplacing a single syllable, whilst sounding so relaxed as to make you believe he recorded this impromptu in one take. The album's most talked about song was inevitably the title track, a version of the Wailers' "Soul Rebel." In truth, though, the original is so powerful that U-Roy does little more than echo the lyrics. Perhaps Robinson should have stripped off the vocals and given the DJ more room to maneuver. The highpoint, then, belongs to the exuberant "Babylon Burning," a song loosely based on "Proud Mary," which in a burst of inspiration the DJ resurrected in a Rastafarian mode and gained another deserved hit single.
HEAR

Various Artists - Survival Sampler SR-1A (1984)

"Warner Bros. Records' Survival Sampler SR-1A is a portable compendium of the best of British and Australian new music. The complete version, commercially available only on cassette, is 56 minutes in length and features twelve artists from eight different labels. Designed to enhance and perhaps extend human life, the Survival Sampler comes in a can."

this came our way via one BobAvocado:

Guys of ForestRoxx,

I thought you night be interested in an almost all digital source copy of the 1984 Warner Music Survival Sampler SR-1A Sound Rations - I get the sense from your blog that you are approximately my age and might recall this sampler that came in a cold war appropriate army drab can.

I cobbled this together from my CD's except for The Assembly song which seems never to have been released in North America digitally - so its an audio rip from a You Tube video. I do have a vinyl version of the song on a 6 track radio station promotional EP for said sampler (no ability to rip from the vinyl at the moment).

Regards,
BobAvocado



Track List:
01. The Smiths - What Difference Does It Make
02. The Church - Electric Lash
03. China Crisis - Wishful Thinking
04. Scritti Politti - Wood Beez (Pray Like Aretha Franklin)
05. Carmel - More More More
06. King Crimson - Sleepless
07. Aztec Camera - Pillar To Post
08. The Cure - The Caterpillar
09. The Bluebells - I'm Falling
10. Modern English - Rainbows End
11. The Assembly - Never Never
12. Depeche Mode - Everything Counts

HEAR

(password: survival)

[link removed per DMCA complaint 10/10/10]

Fred Wesley And The J.B.'s - Damn Right I Am Somebody

My car trips tend to be short and so the ipod never gets its due. As a result I tend to stick to my subscription audio. My preference of late while cruising in my automobile is the funky and soulful Soul Town channel on Sirius/XM.

The other day as I delivered my boy to his preschool a piece of this beast spun up and I pulled over to the side of the road to let the track finish and give my boy a better education than anything he would have received in "circle time." The sinuous groove was greasy and unrelenting. My kid got funkier than any little aryan has a right to be in a carseat. All was right with the world.

'Firm it.

All Music:

Damn Right I Am Somebody captures the J.B.'s at the apex of their extraordinary powers. This James Brown-produced set is both their most fiercely polemical and their most musically daring, incorporating otherworldly electronic elements, eccentric time and rhythm shifts, and idiosyncratic studio effects to brilliantly articulate the increasing turmoil and insanity of the times. It's quite possibly the most challenging record ever released under the Brown aegis, favoring open-ended grooves and epic solos rooted in avant-jazz. The rhythms remain surgically precise and hypnotically intense, however, and every cut here, from the funk juggernaut "I'm Payin' Taxes, What Am I Buyin'?" to the righteously mellow "Same Beat," is a marvel. This is funk at its heaviest — musically, yes, but intellectually as well.

Hear

Grateful Dead - American Beauty

I've been unable to exorcise this record from my heavy rotation for the past few weeks. Something about summer and a heretofore under appreciated Dead studio record. On the advice of a trusted comrade and once stalwart committed head, I've dedicated the majority of my listenings to the live boots. I'm late to the Dead thing, having shun it in it's 2.0 and 3.0 versions in the 80s/90s due largely to the caliber hombre who called it their own. Confirmed: I can dick-out like that. The 80s burb hardcore kid in me wanted to take the jackboot to the peace/love/cardiologist daddy sect.

Okay so now I'm a straight 40, still kinda angry, kinda hypertensive, with kid and home and cat and an old car... I've been left with no alternatives - embrace it.

This record came out not too long after me and many of my friends were born. I won't claim that this has any cosmic significance other than to be a screen cap for the time.

All in all it's pretty much a brilliant record if only on the merits of Ripple alone.

Garcia hung on my wall as a young young kid. Just thought he looked wild and scary. Call it a full circle jerk?

Allmusic.com:A companion piece to the luminous Workingman's Dead, American Beauty is an even stronger document of the Grateful Dead's return to their musical roots. Sporting a more full-bodied and intricate sound than its predecessor thanks to the addition of subtle electric textures, the record is also more representative of the group as a collective unit, allowing for stunning contributions from Phil Lesh (the poignant opener, "Box of Rain") and Bob Weir ("Sugar Magnolia"); at the top of his game as well is Jerry Garcia, who delivers the superb "Friend of the Devil," "Candyman," and "Ripple." Climaxing with the perennial "Truckin'," American Beauty remains the Dead's studio masterpiece -- never again would they be so musically focused or so emotionally direct.


HEAR

The Ventures - Guitar Freakout/Wild Things!

Welcome Summer.

I listen to this while playing a surfing game on my iPhone. I'm usually more fulfilled than this.

Allmusic: Not the first but definitely the most popular rock instrumental combo, the Ventures scored several hit singles during the 1960s -- most notably "Walk-Don't Run" and "Hawaii Five-O" -- but made their name in the growing album market, covering hits of the day and organizing thematically linked LPs. Almost 40 Ventures' albums charted, and 17 hit the Top 40. And though the group's popularity in America virtually disappeared by the 1970s, their enormous contribution to pop culture was far from over; the Ventures soon became one of the most popular world-wide groups, with dozens of albums recorded especially for the Japanese and European markets. They toured continually throughout the 1970s and '80s -- influencing Japanese pop music of the time more than they had American music during the '60s.

The Ventures' origins lie in a Tacoma, Washington group called the Impacts. Around 1959, construction workers and hobby guitarists Bob Bogle and Don Wilson formed the group, gigging around Washington state and Idaho with various rhythm sections as backup. They recorded a demo tape, but after it was rejected by the Liberty Records subsidiary Dolton, the duo founded their own label, Blue Horizon. They released one vocal single ("Cookies and Coke"), then recruited bassist Nokie Edwards and drummer Skip Moore and decided to instead become an instrumental group.

The Ventures went into the studio in 1959 with an idea for a new single they had first heard on Chet Atkins' Hi Fi in Focus LP. Released on Blue Horizon in 1960, the single "Walk-Don't Run" became a big local hit after being aired as a news lead-in on a Seattle radio station (thanks to a friend with connections). In an ironic twist, Dolton Records came calling and licensed the single for national distribution; by summer 1960, it had risen to number two in the charts, behind only "It's Now or Never" by Elvis Presley. After Howie Johnson replaced Moore on drums, the Ventures began recording their debut album, unsurprisingly titled after their hit single.

Two singles, "Perfidia" and "Ram-Bunk-Shush," hit the Top 40 during 1960-61, but the Ventures soon began capitalizing on what became a trademark: releasing LPs which featured songs very loosely arranged around a theme implied in the title. The group's fourth LP, The Colorful Ventures, included "Yellow Jacket," "Red Top," "Orange Fire" and no less than three tracks featuring the word "blue" in the title. The Ventures put their indelible stamp on each style of '60s music they covered, and they covered many -- twist, country, pop, spy music, psychedelic, swamp, garage, TV themes. (In the '70s, the band moved on to funk, disco, reggae, soft rock and Latin music.) The Ventures' lineup changed slightly during 1962. Howie Johnson left the band, to be replaced by session man Mel Taylor; also, Nokie Edwards took over lead guitar with Bob Bogle switching to bass.

One of the few LPs not arranged around a theme became their best-selling; 1963's The Ventures Play Telstar, The Lonely Bull featured a cover of the number one instrumental hit by the British studio band the Tornadoes and produced by Joe Meek. Though their cover of "Telstar" didn't even chart, the album hit the Top Ten and became the group's first of three gold records. A re-write of their signature song -- entitled "Walk-Don't Run '64" -- reached number eight that year. By the mid-'60s however, the Ventures appeared to be losing their touch. Considering the volatility of popular music during the time, it was quite forgivable that the group would lose their heads-up knowledge of current trends in the music industry to forecast which songs should be covered. The television theme "Hawaii Five-O" hit number four in 1969, but the Ventures slipped off the American charts for good in 1972. Instead, the band began looking abroad for attention and -- in Japan especially -- they found it with gusto. After leaving Dolton/Liberty and founding their own Tridex Records label, the Ventures began recording albums specifically for the Japanese market. The group eventually sold over 40 million records in that country alone, becoming one of the biggest American influences on Japanese pop music ever.

Nokie Edwards left the Ventures in 1968 to pursue his interest in horse racing for a time, and was replaced by Gerry McGee; though he returned by 1972, Mel Taylor left the group that year for a solo career, to be replaced by Joe Barile. (Taylor returned also, in 1979.) By the early '80s, the Ventures' core quartet of Wilson, Bogle, Edwards and Taylor could boast of playing together for over 20 years. Though Edwards left the band for good in 1984 (replaced again by Gerry McGee) and Mel Taylor died mid-way through a Japanese tour in 1996 (replaced by his son Leon), the Ventures continued to pack venues around the world.

HEAR