Fever Tree - Creation (Uni 73067,1969 US TX..Psychedelic mind dream!)

...perhaps , from the best 60's albums made ever!

Dennis Keller - Vocals

Michael Knust - Lead Guitar

Rob Landes - Keyboards

E.E. Wolfe - Bass

John Tuttle - Drums

The Fever Tree - Creation (1970) -

A lot less imaginative record than the previous two, this is still a fairly strong effort. Less San Francisco influenced than before, the band belted out a collection of pre-progressive rock tunes. This album also featured a guest appearance from guitarist Billy Gibbons, later of ZZ Top fame. Although commercially it failed miserably, it's still a decent album, with a few great tunes among some rather mediocre ones.

Bioagrphy

A minor, if reasonably interesting, late-'60s psychedelic group, Houston's Fever Tree is most famous for their single "San Francisco Girls," with its dramatic melody, utopian lyrics, and searing fuzz guitar. Most of their best material, ironically, was written by their over-30 husband-wife production team, Scott and Vivian Holtzman, who had previously written material for Tex Ritter and the Mary Poppins soundtrack. These odd bedfellows produced some fairly distinctive material with more classical/Baroque influences and orchestral string arrangements than were usually found in psychedelic groups. Their pretty, wistful ballads (enhanced on their first album by arranger David Angel, who had also worked on Love's classic Forever Changes) endure better than their dirge-like fuzz grinders, which epitomize some of the more generic aspects of heavy psychedelia. Releasing four albums (the third of which, Creation, included guest guitar by future ZZ Top axeman Billy Gibbons), their records grew weaker and more meandering with time, and the group disbanded in 1970. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide

Although a Texas, USA-based act, Fever Tree made its mark with a tribute to the Summer of Love's host city with their 1968 anthem "San Francisco Girls (Return Of The Native)". Comprising Rob Landes (keyboards), Dennis Keller (vocals), E.E. Wolfe (bass), John Tuttle (drums) and Michael Knust (guitar), the psychedelic band formed in Houston, Texas, in the mid-60s as Bostwick Vine. The name change came in 1967 and the band subsequently signed with the Chicago-based Mainstream Records. Two unsuccessful singles were recorded, and the unit then signed to Uni Records, and recorded their self-titled debut album in 1968. "San Francisco Girls (Return Of The Native)" was penned by Vivian Holtzman, one of the band's producers. Although only a minor chart hit, it received much airplay on the new USA FM rock stations and on John Peel's Top Gear radio programme in the UK. Fever Tree recorded four albums, three of which charted in the USA, before splitting up in 1970. Interest in the band was renewed in the mid-80s psychedelic revival, and compilation albums were issued in both the USA and UK.
Source: The Encyclopedia of Popular Music by Colin Larkin. .
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Melanie - Born To Be (1969 US Folk )

Melanie Anne Safka-Schekeryk (born February 3, 1947 in Astoria, New York City) is an American singer-songwriter.
Usually known professionally as Melanie, she is best known for her hits "Brand New Key," "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)," and "Look What They've Done To My Song, Ma." Melanie has sold over 25 million records over the course of her career

Born to Be is singer Melanie's debut album, released on Buddha Records in 1968.
Following Melanie's success at the Woodstock Festival in 1969 Buddah re-packaged and re-issued the album as My First Album

SIDE 1
1. IN THE HOUR (3:04)2. I'M BACK IN TOWN (2:17)3. BO BO'S PARTY (3:58)4. MR. TAMBOURINE MAN (4:20)5. MOMMA, MOMMA (4:00)

SIDE 2
6. I REALLY LOVED HAROLD (4:05)7. ANIMAL CRACKERS (2:12)8. CHRISTOPHER ROBIN (IS SAYING HIS PRAYERS) (2:35)9. CLOSE TO IT ALL (3:22)10. MERRY CHRISTMAS (2:50)

All songs written by Melanie, except track 4 written by Bob Dylan and track 8 written by A. A. Milne and Melanie

Produced By: Peter Schekeryk

Recorded at Allegro Sound Studios

Engineer: Bruce Staple
US LP released November 1968 on Buddah Records
BDS 5024

Early career(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Melanie grew up in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens in New York City.[1]
She made her first public appearance at the age of four on the radio show Live Like A Millionaire performing the song "Gimme a Little Kiss". She was a student at New York's American Academy of Dramatic Arts when she began singing in the folk clubs of Greenwich Village and signed her first recording contract.
Initially signed to Columbia Records in the United States, Melanie released two singles on the label. Subsequently she signed with Buddah Records and first found chart success in Europe when her 1969 song "Bobo's Party" reached Number 1 in France. Her debut album received rave reviews from Billboard Magazine which heralded her voice as "... wise beyond her years. Her non-conformist approach to the selections on this LP make her a new talent to be reckoned with."
Later in 1969 Melanie had a hit in the Netherlands with "Beautiful People" before performing at the Woodstock Festival. The inspiration for her signature song "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)" apparently arose from the Woodstock audience lighting candles during her set. A gospel-boosted genuine one-off, that combined high drama with Melanie's trademark hippie sincerity, the recording became a hit in Europe, Australia and the United States in the spring and summer of 1970. The B-side of the single featured Melanie's spoken-word track "Candles in the Rain". "Lay Down" became Melanie's first Top Ten hit in America, peaking at #6 on the Billboard singles chart, and a worldwide success. Later hits included "Peace Will Come (According To Plan)" and a cover of the Rolling Stones' "Ruby Tuesday". In 1970 Melanie was the only artist to brave the court injunction banning the Powder Ridge Rock Festival, playing for the crowd on a homemade stage powered by Mister Softee trucks. She also performed at the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 where she was introduced by Keith Moon and received four standing ovations.
Melanie was also the artist who sang to herald in the summer solstice at Glastonbury Fayre (later the Glastonbury Festival) in England in June 1971.
After leaving Buddah Records, because they insisted that she produce albums on demand, Melanie formed her own label, Neighborhood Records, in 1971 with her producer-husband Peter Schekeryk.
It was on the Neighborhood label that Melanie had her biggest American hit with the novelty-sounding 1972 number one, "Brand New Key" (also mistakenly known as "The Roller Skate Song"). "Brand New Key" sold over three million copies worldwide and was featured in the 1997 movie Boogie Nights.
When first released, Brand New Key was banned by some radio stations due to the lyrics being interpreted as being sexual innuendo:
"I got a brand new pair of roller skates / You got a brand new key / I think that we should get together and try them out you see / I been looking around awhile / You got something for me / Oh! I got a brand new pair of roller skates / You got a brand new key. / I ride my bike, I roller skate, don't drive no car / Don't go too fast, but I go pretty far / For somebody who don't drive / I been all around the world / Some people say I've done alright for a girl..."

http://www.melaniesmusic.com/

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Silly Wizard "So Many Partings" (Scottish Folk 1979)

Andy Stewart (vocals, tenor banjo),

Phil Cunningham (accordion, tin whistles, Overton low D whistle, Moog synthesizer, electric piano, vocals),
Martin Hadden (bass, harmonium, guitar),
Gordon Jones (guitar, mandola, bodhran),
John Cunningham (fiddles, vocals)

(Highway Records SHY 7010, 1979)

Another one album by Silly Wizard, first time posted by time has told me by lizz.)

Silly Wizard were a highly acclaimed Scottish Folk band, forming around a nucleus of musicians in 1971 in Edinburgh. The founder members were two like minded students - Gordon Jones (guitar, bodhran, vocals, bouzouki, mandola) and Bob Thomas (guitar, mandolin, mandola, banjo, concertina) who were later joined by a rather youthful Johnny Cunningham (fiddle, viola, mandola, vocals) still studying at school at the time. They ran and performed at the Triangle Folk Club for a time, then went on a tour of France in 1972. Soon after, they signed to Transatlantic Records to record an album with Maddy Taylor, who had sung with them on the tour. The album was recorded but has never been released.
The band then added Phil Cunningham (accordion, tin whistle, harmonium, synthesizer, guitar, vocals), Alastair Donaldson, Martin Hadden (bass, guitar, piano) and Andy M. Stewart (vocals, whistle,banjo). Their first LP to be released was Silly Wizard, and they began touring throughout Europe. There were some line-up changes prior to recording their second LP, Caledonia's Hardy Sons (Highway Records). Silly Wizard played a variety of Scottish folk music, both instrumental and vocal, from fast jigs and reels to slow airs. While the majority of the items they played were traditional songs or tunes, the band did write many compositions of their own. Phil Cunningham wrote generally instrumental music centered on the accordion, and Stewart wrote several songs in a style often distinctly traditional. Once Andy's singing and the driving, impassioned instrumentals of the Cunningham brothers had established themselves at its centre, the group's overall sound changed little until their final album, A Glint of Silver, which introduced the synthesizer as a prominent part of the band, giving them a slightly New Age sound. It can be said, though, that certain albums (e.g. "So Many Partings" and "Wild And Beautiful") show a thematic or musical development that makes them more than an arbitrary succession of tracks.
They continued recording until the late 1980s, when the band decided to dissolve after performing for seventeen years and releasing nine albums. Johnny Cunningham died on December 15, 2003 in New York.
In Scots Trad Music Awards 2003 Silly Wizard were nominated for the best folk band award.
Members of Silly Wizard played at Celtic Connections in Feb 2007. (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Silly Wizard's "Official" History Pages

Some of Silly Wizard's recordings

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Dulcimer - Rob's Garden (UK Folk 70's (c) & (p)1995) President Rec.

- Dave Eaves - vocals, guitar

- Pete Hodge - vocals, guitar

- Jem North - vocals, bass

There's a flood of UK folk-rock available, most of it largely unknown in the States. That said, like any commodity, much of it is over-hyped and not particularly impressive. Here's one of the exceptions.
Dulcimer consisted of Dave Eaves and Pete Hodges on vocals and guitar, and bassist Jem North. Finding a mentor in the form of producer/manager Larry Page (yes, the guy who was behind The Troggs), 1971 found the trio signed by the small UK Nepentha Records (Mercury acquiring American distribution rights). Produced by Page, the trio debuted with 1970's oddly titled "And I Turned As I Had As a Boy". Best described as acoustic folk-rock, Hodge and Eaves-penned material such as "Pilgrim from the City", "Morman's Casket" and "Fruit of the Musical Tree" is full of pretty melodies and a weird series of mideaval and mythological lyrics (check out the bizarre "Ghost of the Wandering Minstrel Boy"). To give you some frame of reference, to our ears much of the set recalls early Al Stewart. Elsewhere, actor Richard Todd recites some hackneyed poetry on "Sonnett To the Fall" and "Caravan". Highlights include the pretty ballads "Glochester City" and "Starlight" (the latter featuring some nice electric bass from North). All told, the set's pleasant and never less than enjoyable, though nothing here is particularly original. Interestingly, the UK pressing (which is what we're offering), is far rarer and sought after than the US Mercury release. (The album was originally released with a gatefold sleeve.)
"And I Turned As I Had As a Boy"
The early-'70s saw the See For Miles label reissue the album in CD format (SEE CD 266).
While we've never seen or heard them, the trio released two other LPs. The band's 1971's follow-up "Room for Thought" was immediately shelved and didn't see a release until 1992 when the small Background label acquired rights to it (Background catalog number HBG-122/6). There's also a self-financed 1980 reunion "A Land Fit for Heroes".(BadCatRecords)

1.: Rob's Garden
2.: Across The Fields
3.: Silver On White
4.: Smoke
5.: Mean Old Girl
6.: Creation (Poet And The Firebird)
7.: Indiana Jones
8.: Army Boy
9.: Martin Hussingtree
10.: Come The Day
11.: Shining Way
12.: Ghost Of England

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Sam Mitchell - Art of Bottleneck Slide Guitar (UK Folk Blues1991)

Sam was one of Europes finest bluesmen. His slideguitar playing was: Mean, witty, rough, soft, melodic. He turned me and a lot of other Danes on to blues and slideguitar. Sam was a fine musician. Where ever you are Sam I want to thank you for some damn fine music. (Finn Bjerke)

Sam Mitchell b. 1950 in Liverpool d. June 15, 2006 in Liverpool

dedicated to the memory of Sam Mitchell ,who passed away in 2006

Acoustic Guitar forum

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The Habibiyya - If Man But Knew - UK 1971 Island Rec. “Eastern-influenced hypnotic psychedelic music”

“Eastern-influenced hypnotic psychedelic music” – The Tapestry Of Delights''

Ian Whiteman
Piano, Shakuhachi, Oboe, Liner Notes, Pipe Organ, Vocals, Producer

Conrad Archuletta Banjo, Shakuhachi, Zither, Vocals

Susan ArchulettaGuitar, Viola, Koto, Vocals, Shakuhachi

Michael Evans Guitar,Mandola,

Roger Powell Sufi Drum ,DrumsThe Habibiyya’s sole album stands as one of the earliest and most beautiful pieces of world music ever recorded in Britain. The musicians involved (including three members of UK underground legends Mighty Baby) had been profoundly affected, both musically and spiritually, by visiting Morocco in 1971, and became adherents of the sufi faith. Upon their return to London they made If Man But Knew, featuring exotic instruments such as koto, shakuhachi and mandola alongside guitar, organ and drums, conjuring a hypnotic, other-worldly ambience in the process. It makes its long-awaited CD debut here, accompanied by detailed liner notes, previously-unseen photographs, five rare bonus tracks and an introduction by the group’s leader, Ian Whiteman. (Soundlink)

Ian Whiteman

THE HABIBIYYA: IF MAN BUT KNEW psych LP Ex MIGHTY BABY

http://www.ianwhiteman.com/index.html

The story goes like this.
In 1971 a group of young British psyche musicians went on holiday to Morocco, as so many people in search of mysticism and hash were doing back then. There in al-Maghrib they became enamoured of Sufism, with its trances, its poetry and music, its shrines and dervishes, its theories of purified psychospiritual universal holy unity. They converted to the religion and returned home. Back in the UK, inspired by their new faith, they put out this album.
The story sounded to me like religion tourism. I imagined them bringing home Wahdat-ul-wujood like a souvenir tea towel. I thought: “Some impressive-looking bearded person in Morocco must have said to them, ‘All things are one, the world is unified, this is Sufi,’ and they got excited and rushed home and grabbed a mish-mash of exotic-sounding foreign instruments and chucked them all together in a big, messy splurge to show that all countries should come together under God and they put it on a record and gave it a hark-ye title and now I have to listen to the thing.” So I listened to the thing.
What I had imagined would be overblown was, in fact, an intelligently serene album with a good, fruitful underlying tautness. Even when the group was at its most openly mystical, singing, “I am a bird of God’s garden, I do not belong to this earthly world,” over tabla-style drums and the hum of an instrument that appears in the credits as a ‘bina organ’ and is possibly a harmonium, there was no sense that the musicians were straining after a poetic effect. Ian Whiteman’s delivery is honest and simple. “What’s his secret?” I wondered, and then I realised that he was singing these lines, which look as if they were borrowed from Sufi poetry, with the direct and plaintive yearning of an English folk singer, more Martin Carthy than Nusrat Fatah Ali Khan. It is this easy reconciliation of his home country and his adopted faith that makes me want to re-evaluate my feelings about the tea towel and agree that they were more than just curio-peekers trying on a new religion.
The Sufism is surprisingly unobtrusive. There are stylistic touches that suggest Morocco, and the percussion at the end of “The Eye-Witness” speeds up and seems to whip around in circles like a Sufi dervish, but if you hadn’t heard the story about their holiday then you’d think they had been inspired by Japan. Two shakuhachi flutes come in at the opening of the album and it’s this short duet that sets us up for the rest. If Man but Knew has an undercurrent of reserve that feels classically Japanese.
It’s when they’re adhering to this undercurrent that they’re at their best. It is the album’s skeleton, the frame that helps it stand. It gives us a reason to forgive If Man its weakest track, “Peregrinations Continued”, a jam that lumps along for seven minutes until the shakuhachi sounds shrill and bored, as if this long stretch of purposeless fiddling around is giving it a stress headache. The spontaneity they must have been trying to find in this track comes across more effectively in “Procession of the God Intoxicated”, which is, interestingly, the more structured song. The plucked strings suggest processional dancers, the flutes are like streamers in the air, and the percussion makes the parade complete. A track like “Fana-Fillah” brings the strings and drums more closely together, layer upon layer, and if you listen carefully you can hear a very faint background drum so soft it’s almost like blood fluttering in the veins, the noise you’d hear in your head in the middle of the night, in the dark, one ear pressed into your pillow, that faraway, muffled percussion of the heart.(Sunbeam-by Deanne Sole)

Mighty Baby

see Habibiyya - If Man But Knew on psychprog

Vinyl Track Listing: 1971LP

1. Two Shakuhachis
2. Koto Piece
3. The Eye-Witness
4. Mandola
5. If Man But Knew
6. Fana-Fillah

======================================================

unfortunately, No Bonus tracks 2007 Reissue 2LP & CD
7. Procession of the God Intoxicated
8. Peregrinations
9. Peregrinations Continued
10. Another Ode
11. Bird in God's Garden

Buy now sunbeam records
First official CD release
Mighty Baby-related
Five bonus tracks
Detailed booklet with band history / rare photos

in loving memory of Mike Evans R.I.P.



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The translation of the ode is as follows:







The Eye-witness


Oh you who desire the presence of clear witnessing, rise above the spirit and the forms.
Cling to the original void - and be as if you were not, oh annihilated one!
You will see true existence by a secret whose meanings have spread in every age.
Forms of action and being do not multiply the actor in any way.
So whoever rises above every vanishing thing sees existence with­out, duality.




Oh the victory of one who has come to witness a Lord who is compassionate, persevering and near.
He accepts whoever comes as a poor one who has turned in recourse from his state of darkness.
So the turning away (from wrong action) of the slave designates him for the presence of love and drawing-near.




Remembrance of Allah while witnessing His bounty brings about luminous inspiration.
Whoever is safe from his own self is safe from creation.
So oppose the self in its desires and seek the company of a gnostic of Allah.
He will show you the hidden faults of the self, he will heal you with a spiritual remedy.
He acts gently towards you on the journey and has compassion for the people of trial and those who lose direction.


He will annihilate you through dhikr in the reality: and he reminds the heart with the Quran
He will refresh the spirit with instruction so that meanings are manifested in it. .


Oh Lord, bless the Prophet as long as the Suratul Mathani is recited.
And his Family and Companions as long as people profit by Iman.


I ask of the Real - bliss and contentment - for all whom my era encompasses

St.Kilda's Island history (Rare Footage Film 30's)

OSSIAN - ST KILDA WEDDING (Scottish- Celtic Folk - Iona Records 1978)

A brief history of St. Kilda Island

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Kilda,_Scotland

The song, says Fraser, humorously told of the marriage ritual on St. Kilda before a permanent church was established there. According to the notes on Ossian's album, the last wedding that took place in St. Kilda was in 1926, for the remote island was evacuated in 1930. Fraser sneers that the tune is "murdered" in Macdonald's collection, while his father's set corresponds "with that of Miss Macleod of St. Kilda, now in Edinburgh." Christine Martin (2002) says the strathspey “St. Kilda Wedding” is often played as a reel. Sources for notated versions: Francis MacDonald (b. 1940, Morell Rear, North-East Kings County, Prince Edward Island) [Perlman]; Winston Fitzgerald (1914-1987, Cape Breton) [Cranford]. Cranford (Winston Fitzgerald), 1997; No. 93, pg. 39. Fraser (The Airs and Melodies Peculiar to the Highlands of Scotland and the Isles), 1874; No. 7, pg. 3. Hunter (Fiddle Music of Scotland), 1988; No. 251. Johnson (The Kitchen Musician's No. 10: Airs & Melodies of Scotland's Past), 1992 (revised 2001http://www.ibiblio.org/fiddlers/ST..htm

Ossian are a Scottish traditional music group, formed in 1976.

The initial line-up brought together Billy Ross and former members of the group Contraband, Billy Jackson, John Martin, and George Jackson. One of their earliest gigs was at the 1976 Kinross Folk Festival.
Each of the members was a multi-instrumentalist and singer. Their arrangements of songs, slow airs and dance tunes were meticulous, almost a chamber music approach to Scottish Music. They sang in both English and Gaelic. Billy Jackson's wire-strung harp, the clarsach, featured in most pieces but he also played Uilleann (Irish) pipes and whistles. John Martin, who played fiddle and cello went on to become a member of The Tannahill Weavers. George Jackson (brother of Billy) played guitar, cittern, mandolin, fiddle, whistle and flute. Billy Ross was the main singer who played guitar, dulcimer and whistle.
Their first two LPs were remarkably popular and influential; Ossian (1977) and St Kilda Wedding (1978). Like Iona, a similar band, their albums sold well in specialist Christian rock shops. Billy Ross left the band and was replaced by Tony Cuffe as lead vocalist also playing guitar and whistle. Iain MacDonald joined playing highland pipes, flute, whistles and Jew's harp. They broke up in 1989, but reformed in 1997.(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ossian

http://www.iona-records.com/

Ossian, named after the legendary 3rd century Celtic bard and folk hero, was formed in 1976, and this was their first ground-breaking album of Scottish / Celtic music. The band went on to record a series of albums on their own Iona label. All four members of the band were from Glasgow, but George and Billy Jackson were both of Irish extraction and they developed a taste for Celtic traditions on the family croft in the Donegal Gaeltacht. John Martin comes from a long line Aberdeenshiure fiddlers and still plays the fiddle owned at one time by his Grandfather. Billy Ross has his roots in Skye, and from this background he inherited his love of Gaelic song.
The band play a wide variety of mainly Scottish traditional music ranging from their lively jigs and reels to the plaintive 'Oh My Country', a sad tale of an emigrant from Uist who arrives in Manitoba to find a cold and hostile land.

http://www.footstompin.com/artists/ossian

Side One: The St Kilda Wedding/Perrie Werrie/The Honourable Mrs Moll's Reel; Gie Me a Lass Wi a Lump O' Land; Iomramh eadar Il' a's Uist (Rowing From Islay to Uist)/The Source of Spey; Dean Cadalan Samhach; Gala Water/Major David Manson

Side Two: 'S Gann Dirich mi chaoidh; Farewell to Whisky; My Love Is the Fair Lad/The Forth Bridge/Pretty Pegg; The Braes o' Strathblane; More Grog Coming/Tilley Plump/Da Foostra

The Ossian Family Tree

St. Kilda Wedding

Release Date: 1978

1. Perrie Werrie 4:28

2. Gie me a lass wi a lump o' land (song) 2:25

3. The Source of S 4:07

4. Dean Cadalan Samhach (gaelic lullaby) 3:43

5. Major David Manson (song 4:09

6. 'S Gann Gunn Dirich mi chaoidh (gaelic song) 3:10

7. Farewell to Whisky (slow air) 4:21

8. The Forth Bridge 3:39

9. The Braes o' Strathblane (song) 4:35

10. Tilley Plump 3:17

Billy Jackson (Celtic harp, Uillean Pipes, whistles, vocals),

John Martin (fiddle, cello, vocals),

George Jackson (fiddle, cittern, mandolin, fiddle, flute, whistle, flute, vocals), Billy Ross (lead vocals, guitar, dulcimer, whistle)

http://www.tradmusic.com/groupinfoa.asp?groupID=965

fixit!

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 THE LAST OF THE ST KILDANS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Kilda,_Scotland

The history of a remote Scottish island archipelago has been celebrated in an opera performed simultaneously at six venues across Europe. [BBC - Alba 2007]

Were they any happier when they left their island?

What a haunting place. Is there anywhere else in our world like St. Kilda?

Minimalist approch this time round just to post this song. There is a video of some film taken some hundred years ago "A large rowing boat approaches the quay on the Island of St Kilda. Men on the quay watch the boat and throw down a line to tie up the boat. Dogs run around while the fishermen unload their fish. Landing on the Bird Rock, a man is seen swinging round a rocky crag on a rope, while below a small rowing boat bobs on the waves.

St.kilda wedding-Ossian ~ A Gaelic lullaby.