Rocks In The Attic #102: The Jimi Hendrix Experience - ‘Smash Hits’ (1968)

I remember buying my first Hendrix record - the mid-90s compilation entitled The Ultimate Experience - which I played to death on a winter holiday in Scotland. There have been many Hendrix compilations, but this one - 1968’s Smash Hits - was the first.

This is the kind of behaviour that exists nowadays - bands releasing greatest hits when they’ve only had a couple of albums out - and given the fact that this album collects Hendrix’s first four singles - including the b-sides - and a raft of album tracks, you do get the idea that the record company was scraping the barrel slightly while waiting for the band to finish Electric Ladyland.

Hit: Purple Haze

Hidden Gem: 51^st Anniversary

Rocks In The Attic #82: Simon & Garfunkel - ‘Bookends’ (1968)

The cover to this album always makes me laugh, being the prime example that Frances McDormand’s controlling matriarch uses in Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous to prove that rock musicians are on drugs (“Look at their eyes!”). I guess she’s right - they look pretty wasted.

I love this album. It sounds, to me, slightly out of its time with the electronic noises at the start of the album dating it later than April 1968 when it was released. I have the Spanish version of this album, which means that although it looks (and plays) the same as the international release, the song names on the label in the centre of the record are in Spanish - such as Viejos Amigos (Old Friends), El Dilema De Punky’s (Punky’s Dilemma) and La Oscura Sombra Del Invierno (A Hazy Shade Of Winter).

Hit: Mrs. Robinson

Hidden Gem: At The Zoo

Rocks In The Attic #66: Various Artists - ‘The Best Of Bacharach’ (1968)

He can write a tune and a half, Burt.

The instrumental versions of Bacharach / David songs prove that music and melody is far superior to the written word. Although when you really think about it, is the instrumental version of Do You Know The Way To San Jose just as catchy because we all know the words anyway? Who knows...

I’ve always scratched my head when you hear about bands’ royalty payments being weighted towards the lyricist of the band - which confuses me even more when you see behind-the-scenes footage of albums being made, and the so-called poets of the band are rushing around trying to think of a couple of syllables to fill a line in a song. There will be suicidal teens somewhere, poring over these lyrics and at the end of the day they’ve used purely to plug a gap, with no thought behind them.

Which isn’t to say that Hal David is guilty of this. Although maybe he is. And maybe the musical equivalent of this is when a composer of a song builds in a small section of music to join two existing pieces together, which probably happens more often.

Perhaps I should stop thinking too deeply about all this and just listen to Burt. Pass the brandy, will you?

Hit: I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself - Dusty Springfield

Hidden Gem: The Look Of Love - Dusty Springfield

Rocks In The Attic #61: Jeff Beck - ‘Truth’ (1968)

It took me a long time to track this down on vinyl. If Led Zeppelin albums are numbered, this could almost be titled Led Zeppelin 0.

Released a couple of months before Led Zeppelin (I) was recorded, this also features heavy blues arrangements by an ex-Yardbird (Jeff Beck), and a soulful white singer (Rod Stewart) providing vocals. It also features a reworking of the Willie Dixon song You Shook Me, which would also grace the first Zeppelin album.

Apparently Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page fell out over that one - with Beck claiming that Page stole his idea to do a heavy blues version of You Shook Me. You can understand this - even if Jimmy Page did come up with that idea first, Beck beat him to the punch and Page simply shouldn’t have put it on the first Zeppelin album.

Rounding out Beck’s  band are Ronnie Wood on bass, and noted blues explosion drummer Mick Waller.

You can’t help but compare the two albums - they’re very similar - but for me the first Zeppelin album is slightly more cohesive, but only just. Page even features on the Truth album, credited as the writer of Beck’s Bolero - an instrumental with Beck and Page on guitar, John Paul Jones on bass, Keith Moon on drums and Nicky Hopkins on piano.

At the end of the day, I’m not a huge fan of either album. There’s something very dirge-like about both albums, as though both architects are trying to outdo each other with a (very) heavy blues album, and without the adequate quantity of light (to balance out the shade), they can both be very hard to listen to.

Hit: Shapes Of Things

Hidden Gem: Beck’s Bolero

Rocks In The Attic #30: The Beatles - ‘Yellow Submarine Songtrack’ (1999)

It’s odd that they released this, as though admitting that the original Yellow Submarine soundtrack released in 1968 was a bit of a mistake. That album has four previously unreleased songs of varying quality on one side, bookended by the title song and All You Need Is Love; with the flipside covering George Martin’s orchestral score for the film. Of the studio albums in their official cannon, this has to be the weakest as half of it isn’t them playing, and the rest is half-hearted, at best.

Released in 1999 to promote the re-release of the animated film, the Yellow Submarine Songtrack tries to wrong those rights by removing the George Martin tracks and filling the album out with the other Beatles songs that appear in the movie.

Hey Bulldog takes pride of place as the first song on the album (after the title song), and this was released as the only single from the album. Of those 4 previously unreleased songs that appeared on the original soundtrack, it’s clearly the best one - a nice little riff-driven rocker by Lennon that wouldn’t have been out of place as a B-side around the time of The White Album when it was recorded.

This is a nice addition to my Beatles collection - the tracks are fully remixed from the original multitrack tapes (something that they didn’t even do for the 2009 remasters), making it a pretty unique release. And of course it’s on yellow vinyl, and who doesn’t like coloured vinyl?

Hit: Yellow Submarine

Hidden Gem: Hey Bulldog