What Are You Listening To?

[Jerome]

Counting Crows - August and Everything After. Hmmmmmm - this one takes me back to a certain babe who shall remain nameless.......... Funny how certain albums just trigger the memory banks.

[Jerome]

Tori Amos - Scarlett's Walk - a masterpiece. Pure and simple.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

GOLDEN AVATAR  "a change of heart"  vinyl, 1976:

one of the second hand vinyl's I purchased today...
knew nothing about the band, never even heard of them but I liked the cover art...
took some research on my part to find info on this band, but I managed to get some...
ok...a Ruby type epic post......!
i'll explain shortly, but on one hand after two listens I found this to be a work of genius,
whilst on the other hand an album that wants to be all things to all people thus sounding disjointed in the process...
so,
the album starts...
quite folky at the beginning, hearing shades of early George Harrison in the style, then I hear David Gates in the vocals...
by track four im hearing Moody Blues and further on im hearing Cat Stevens type pop/folk....
all good so far...
then I listen again, it is a bit of this, a bit of that, and some of the other, we have tracks that build with guitar solo's
reminiscent of Prog Rock but as soon as they appear theyre winding back to vocals again....
so im not sure if theyre really in the Prog zone or teetering around the edges simply getting their toes wet in the pond....
on to the album itself...
debut set....
apparently it was never available in store back in the day because it was what ne review calls "a musical enterprise by the Hare Krishna"
church....they apparently used to sell it on street corners to promote their religious beliefs, and this is where the George Harrison comparison I mentioned further up the page comes in, he was into that spirituality for a long long time, and the similarities are in the the lyrics of both Golden Avatar and some of GH's material....
no, there are no Hare chants on the album nor are there weird and wonderful instruments because the HK's were trying to get their message out to the populous...
still not sure what to make of the album even as im writing this, I guess "intriguing" would be the best word to describe it though and its probably worth a listen or two if you get the chance...

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one of the uptempo ones that sound like Moody Blues to me:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLjooXYYVF8

and my favourite a folky tune with Cat Stevens overtones:

[Jerome]

I'm willing to take a bet that there isn't a single person on this forum that's heard of this album - including me. Every now and then a really rare album turns up out of nowhere. This is one of those few and far between times. Will give it a whirl later. Got to finish doing some home repairs today. My number one pet hate.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

I'm willing to take a bet that there isn't a single person on this forum that's heard of this album - including me. Every now and then a really rare album turns up out of nowhere. This is one of those few and far between times. Will give it a whirl later. Got to finish doing some home repairs today. My number one pet hate.

yep...
it could well be right up your proverbial alley Jerome, but on the other hand.....

[Ruby]

^^I don’t know this record or Golden Avatar at all, but your description makes me think of one by an obscure band called Ananta – Night and Daydream. It was distributed on the streets by Hare Krishna’s mostly, I think – never sold - made in 1978. The chief songwriter was a Krishna devotee – a Venezuelan muso named Ilan Chester who is still knocking around the biz and doing quite nicely thank you, but who has since moved on from, while remaining inspired by Krishna principles.

Someone had plenty of dollars – it’s a ‘benefit’ album yet well put together and packaged, and there’s quite a line-up. I listened to it a couple of weeks ago after many years – don’t like the music and it’s easy to discern the underlying messages under the guise of being a contemporary ‘rock’ album (some people called it prog - I don’t agree). I always feel a bit insulted when people want to slide their beliefs in through the back door, so to speak - don't do that - it's rude, and it's insidious (and widely practiced in all walks of life, I know). They were even opportunistic enough to add a little note on the back which is quite misleading -  “For their inspiration and help with our Worldwide projects, special thanks to Carlos Santana, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Neil Diamond, Stevie Wonder, Bob Marley". None of whom had anything at all to do with the music or the album! Anyway - rant over and IMHO the best track on it ... hear those little bells?? 

[CRAZY-HORSE]

track would have fitted well on the Golden Avatar album Ruby, thanks for the share and making us aware that Golden Avatar wasn't the only leap into popular music that their devotees ventured

[Jerome]

I vaguely remember seeing this album back in SA at some point.

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Mike Oldfield - Islands

[CRAZY-HORSE]

LARRY WILLIAMS  "the very best of..." cd,  2004:

cousin of Lloyd Price...
Larry had a handful of minor charting hits in the US but released a lot of singles...
this album is a 2cd set which contains thirty of his singles (A and B sides) so calling it "the very best of..." is way more accurate
than calling it "greatest hits"...
was only aware of a few of his songs prior to buying this disc a long time ago but its pretty good...
yes, he sounds like Little Richard at times and being billed as such probably stunted his career...
he died aged forty of a gun shot wound to the back of his head in his home, but the experts couldn't agree whether it was
self inflicted or homicide...

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my favourite of his...

[CRAZY-HORSE]

THE KINKS  "everybody's in show-biz"  cd,  1972:

the band's tenth studio album...
the first in a line of concept albums...
the title explains the concept adequately, I needn't explain it for you, need I???.....
originally a double set on vinyl, the first album new studio songs, the second live tracks...
this one, my version has the double album on one disc, I have a second discs worth of live tracks,
but none of the second disc tracks are from the album, would have thought it would have made more sense
to incorporate complete package...
almost vaudevillian in places, music hall in others, a touch of rock in a place or two...
album failed to chart in their homeland and scraped the bottom of the charts in the US...
classic album, without a doubt, my favourite of theirs, I guess it simply wasn't understood back in the day...

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superb live version of my favourite Kinks song of all time: