The James Gang: Bang or Miami

They actually tried to get Tommy Bolin to sing more songs.

 

Why didn't he? He had a good voice

 

I may be mistaken but i thought I recall reading somewhere he had to be convinced to do the vocals on Teaser. Anyone?

 

This is what I read re his vox on Teaser (from tbolin.com);
Bolin did another album at this time for Dr. John (The Night Tripper), but it was never issued. Finally Atlantic offered him a solo album deal. He had it all planned, one side vocal songs, one side instrumentals, but the project was shelved when Atlantic began to dictate to him about producers. As a result, he decided to record his own demos and try and get a deal elsewhere. These were done at the Beach Boys’ studio and Bolin ended up doing the vocals himself on the advice of some of the Boys, who helped with suggestions on technique, etc. It was these demos, done with the aid of various friends from his Zephyr and Energy days, which Nemporer Records hears, offering Bolin a contract at once. It was April 1975, he got himself a manager and signed.

 

Lol, yes of course, how could I forget - I should have said Purple without Blackmore ;-)

Now to get the discussion back on track, for any fans of Bang & Miami I thoroughly recommend the BGO records 2fer1 remaster. As I discussed with another member here, it's not an earbleeder, just an overall better sounding disc than the original cd releases of the two albums.

 

In general I agree with you 100% and I do take each band lineups on their own merit etc. I am still a fan of Sabbath without Ozzy (the Dio albums but don't like much of the Tony Martin stuff and hate the Gillan album Born Again), I still like Deep Purple's various phases (although some of the albums I am not a fan of, like say Bananas), or many many other bands with lineup changes, but to me Joe WAS the JG. Lead singer, lead guitarist (and one of my favorite guitarists of all time), contributing to some of their best songs with either songwriting or just being "Joe" (singing & guitar slinging). Without Joe they don't sound anything at all like JG (whereas those other bands still do to various degrees, for example Iommi's guitar playing still shines through on any Sabbath album no matter who the singer is and I can recognize who the band is even if I didn't know it in advance).

But in this case without Joe, it just ain't so. (Sorry I couldn't resist). And I am a huge Bolin fan btw. And I just don't like the JG albums without Joe, regardless of the name - they do nothing for me.

As far as JF's comment about Thirds, I agree it is a very weak album overall, especially compared with Yer Album or Rides Again. But Walk Away IMO is better than any song that came later by a huge margin. I'd even say Midnight Man (or anything from the LP side 2) beats any of the later songs. But it is all a matter of personal taste. I used to have the JG Bolin albums but I cannot name (or even recall) a single song from any of them.

Tommy in Deep Purple though? I LOVE Come Taste the Band and have no gripes about digging a non-Blackmore non-Gillan non-Evans, etc etc "Deep Purple" album

 

Lol, love the chair - you better watch out lest us Bang & Miami fans tie you to it & play the albums relentlessly until you repent!
However you do love CTTB so there is your redemption
Did you like the Kevin Shirley remix?

 

I do have that but don't remember it being anything revolutionarily different that made me either love it or hate. Kind of in one ear and out the other I guess, did not have enough time to digest it. I do like stuff like that on general principle though (hearing songs I already dig either as different mixes or even redone entirely by a band like 20 years later).

 

Yes it's interesting to hear different takes or how songs developed. I now happily love both versions of CTTB.