What great band or musician did you discover purely by happenstance?

As a BKG music club member, I was sent a freebie Drive-By Truckers CD, Decoration Day, with an order. I'd never heard of them, and now they're one of my all-time favorites. Anyone else care to share a quirky way they discovered great new music?

 

Cactus

Not too long ago I picked up the first Cactus record (1970) on vinyl. Those guys were masters of hard rock boogie......wow! The rhythm section of Tim Bogert and Carmine Appice are amazing. And Jim McCarty is a master of some serious boogie blues riffs. Rusty Day on vocals is mighty fine as well. I have not heard any of their other albums but I understand they are as good as the first. I have the new Rhino Handmade Live boxset on order. Can anyone comment on it? What about the Cactology compilation?



Jeff

 

Pardon the long story, but it does have a point...Let's just hope I don't get busted 34 years after the fact for telling it...

When I was at college in the early 70s, the college radio station had an AM and FM side -- neither one of which actually programmed to the student community. The FM side offered primarily public service programming for the indigenous population in the surrounding, largely poor counties. The AM side played classical music.

My roommate and I were poking around one day and found a large closet literally piled to the ceiling with unplayed rock albums. We reasoned that these albums were never going to be used by either radio station, so we decided they needed a good home. We brought in two large suitcases and proceeded to stuff them with as many albums as they'd hold, then snuck out with them. Amazingly, we got away with this without being discovered and bringing our college careers to a premature end. The percentage of albums we took relative to the total number in the closet was so small that they were never missed.

Amongst this stash was a promo copy of Primordial Lovers by Essra Mohawk. I've been deeply in love with this album ever since, and there's no way I would have known anything about it until years and years later, when I saw a copy in a used record store (the only other time I've held a copy in my hand -- and even then I wouldn't have known what it was).



In these next two cases, I would have discovered these artists eventually anyway, but again by grace of working in radio, I got a big head start. And again in both cases, the radio stations had a format that would never have played these albums, so I didn't feel bad about giving them a home!

Nick Drake -- A promo copy of his self-titled first US album, which combined tracks from Five Leaves Left and Bryter Later, came in to a radio station I worked at in the summer of 1971. Fell in love with him immediately.

Big Star -- The number of people who knew of them when they were actually an existing band is pretty limited. But again, a station I was working at in 1973 got a promo copy of #1 Record in 1973, and I was astounded. Some 31 years later, I'm still astounded -- as you can see!

(BTW, I still have that promo copy; did I read elsewhere on this forum not long ago that the mix is different on the promo edition? If so, I'm gonna have to do some serious A/B-ing.)

 

João Gilberto.

Thought I was buying an album by Astrud - not having looked too carefully at the cover - and got a surprise when I plonked the needle in the groove and this bloke started singing...

 

Amongst this stash was a promo copy of Primordial Lovers by Essra Mohawk. I've been deeply in love with this album ever since, and there's no way I would have known anything about it until years and years later, when I saw a copy in a used record store (the only other time I've held a copy in my hand -- and even then I wouldn't have known what it was).
[/QUOTE] If you like Primordial Lovers by Essra(which I most certainly do), you should try and check out her debut album when she was known as Sandy Hurvitz....SANDY's ALBUM IS OUT AT LAST on Verve. The only way I can describe it is as acid damaged singersongwriter but full of adolescent angst and longing. Very deep and very trippy. Some of Frank Zappa's sidemen at the time perform on it. She, herself, was in Frank's Mothers of Invention for awhile and he monikored her Uncle Meat(for whatever reasons). My own fave rave artist who fate intervened to introduce me to is Jimmie Dale Gilmore. One evening long, long ago my wife and I tuned in to catch the last 15 minutes or so of the Tonight show while Johnny Carson was still the host and were immediately and totally entranced by this incredible one of a kind voice coming out of this most unusual looking singer. This was before he had ever had a major label contract and the Tonight show appearence was probably his initial national exposure. Wev'e been faithful fans of Gilmore ever since including both his solo work on a variety of labels and with the reunited Flatlanders.

 

All are good.The live set is great,it features the original line-up's last gig in Dec 71.I've always loved their skull crushingly heavy version of Howlin' Wolf's "Evil".It's on Cactology,it's where I got into them.

 

Crabby Appleton -Led by ex-Millennium member Michael Fennelly.They should been huge.Great power pop/rock.

Jim Ford - Made only one album for White Whale in '69.Sounds like country soul swamp.It has superb work on bass and guitar from Pat and Lolly Vegas(later of Redbone)

 

Cactus absolutely rocks! The American Led Zeppelin, imo, more boogie-based than blues-based. Debut album is my least favorite, simply because Rusty hadn't learned how to sing yet and the band's arrangements weren't as tight. "One Way.. Or Another" was brilliant American rock, and the lyrics are a snapshot of the era. "Restrictons" had some brutal hard rocking tracks, but the friction in the band - Rusty's drug use and McCarty vs Bogert (who plays lead Timmy, you or me??) - was starting to tear it apart.

You saying Rhino has a live boxset of Cactus?? My Rhino guy knows how much I wanted to hear those tapes. Dangit Mike, you forgot to tell me?? hmph!!

Anyway, yeah, get the other two available Cactus albums, you'll absolutely love them! Cactology is good, but you need to hear everything.

 

The MFSL Aluminum CD of Matsui Project w/ Robben Ford Standing on the Outside was one that I figured ok, let's check this out. What a shocker! Absolute sweet and stellar guitar playing.

 

Oh yes, I'm very aware of Sandy's Album Is Here at Last, and love it too. Both albums have been a part of my life for a very long time now. There's absolutely no one quite like Sandy/Essra. Thankfully, Rhino Handmade finally reissued Primordial a few years back.

I also have a CD of the Sandy album on Edsel, though indications are this was taken from an LP copy rather than master tapes.

Essra is still active and making music. Her 1995 album Raindance has some good moments.

 

That track absolutely burns! I went online and ordered the two sets from Rhino, I wonder if the set of all studio tracks was remastered? *Really* looking forward to hearing these...

 

Yep !! I've got both sets.The studio set tacks on unreleased tracks from the album sessions.

 

I caught an episode of Austin City Limits on tv some years ago where he performed and was taken by his voice.

As I got into the albums (I think I have 5-6 on cd), I became more impressed by some of his lyrics, they have a poetic genius rare in music. Trying to describe him, I sometimes offer " a Roy Orbison voice, with Hank Williams thoughts"

I've never tried the Flatlanders though, because I don't know how much Jimmie Dale figures in their work. Does he sing or write for them?

I never thought I would ever see someone like him in person, living as I do in Canada. Then two years or so ago he appeared at the Ottawa Blues Festival, which was kind of a stange sad thing, in that I had moved from Ottawa the year before!

 

Well, I wouldn't say they are a great band, like the Beatles or something. But I found out about the band Ruth Ruth (who I like) in an unusual way.

I work in video post production and about five years ago I was doing a supervised dub of a feature. Film companies sometimes request supervised dubs of features that haven't been released yet, so that they can be sure no illegal copies are made at the same time. I guess it would suck for there to be an illegal DVD of a movie floating around the NYC streets six months before the movie comes out.

The feature I was dubbing was really long, like two hours plus. So the client and I got to talking. We were discussing famous people we'd seen around Manhattan, and I told her about the time I got into an elevator with Barbara Feldon and could only manage to say "hi". For those of you not familiar with her name, she played Agent 99 in the TV show Get Smart. The client told me that her husband was playing in a band that had a song called "Agent 99". I tracked down the cd a few weeks later and really liked it.

 

Hardly the Crime of the Century. But are you really sure the Statute of Limitations is expired on this one?

 

Around 1975 0r 76 a buddy who lived down the street let me borrow his car one morning to get to work...my ****** '73 Pinto was broke down again.In his 8 Track player he had Feats Don't Fail Me Now by Little Feat...I had heard of these guys before,they were a band included in one of those Warner Bros. promo LPs you would see advertised in the inner sleeve of all their albums...also,I had seen them on The Midnight Special tv show once but for some strange reason I can't quite understand now,they left no lasting impression at all.So I stuck this tape in and I could not believe my ears!This was some of the greatest music I had ever heard in my life!How did I not discover this band sooner?These guys had the chops and the creative brain both...what a superb album...to this day one of my all-time favorite albums and one of my all-time favorite bands...I think the hand of God must've slipped when it was pouring talent into Lowell George.
I actually saw them live a couple of years later at a college gym in a small town(Marietta,O.) near where I lived...they were fabulous.This was around the time of WAITING FOR COLUMBUS...could not believe they came to this little town/college!

 

The rekkid police are watching.

I discovered BR549 when they opened for Brian Setzer Orchestra locally about five years ago; they were also giving out a sampler cassette at the exit. Now I'm hooked.

 

I was talking with an on-line buddy from another forum and he had asked me if I had ever heard of Kitaro. I told him no, so he sent me some unopened Japanese vinyl pressings that he had received from someone in his vinyl club. Both my wife and I absolutely are mesmerized by his music.

 

Scissor Sisters - just within the last month, I heard "Take Your Mama" on Music Choice cable radio and the song got my attention by it's great melody and overall catchiness, so I looked them up, read some reviews, bought the CD, posted about them here to a surprising amount of responses and next thing I know they're the musical guest on SNL and I had never heard of them prior to hearing the track just a few weeks ago.

 

Back in '68 or'69 (I was 15), some friends and I were at our favorite record store, which we would visit once or twice a week. I had money in my pocket (rare) and a determination that I would buy a couple of albums. But I guess that I already had in my collection everything that I had meant to buy. So I picked up two albums solely by how the covers looked. One was the first Steppenwolf album, which impressed me because it had a foil layer on the sleeve. And the second was White Light/White Heat, due to its all black sleeve.

I had never heard of either band. We all listened to the local underground radio stations (Los Angeles), so I guess neither band had broken yet. Although I remember Sookie Sookie, Born to Be Wild, and The Pusher airing later, I can't ever remember anything from WLWH on the radio.

While I enjoyed both albums a lot at the time, WLWH is the one that still gets played today. I don't think I've heard the Steppenwolf album since the early '70s. Anyway, that's the only time I ever bought a record solely on looks, and it worked out well.

 

Virgil Donati, the incredible drummer.

I was browsing on a car audio messageboard about 3 years ago and noticed a thread about fusion jazz and progressive rock music so I clicked it to read. I read the posts and copied some of the band and artist names into notepad so I wouldn't forget them, Virgil Donati being one of them. I happened to have WinMX opened up so I searched for the names and got some results. I 'borrowed" ( ) some songs and started listening and within, literally, 5 seconds of hearing the opening of the track "Alien Hip-Hop' I knew it was going to be good. I found the rest of the tracks from the disc and listened in amazement to his amazing drumming. Since then I've bought the cd and a couple others of his and I'm still just as amazed by his drumming as I was when I discovered him 3 years ago.

 

Paul McCartney & Wings.

Huh?

This is true - I was a kid. I saw the movie "Oh Heavenly Dog!" on television and heard a track that I later found out was called "Arrow Through Me" by Wings. I connected to that song on a deep level - it was more than just a catchy song to me - it was the first song I ever thought - "Well this is just great - I wish I could hear it again right now!" I didn't know anything about looking at the end credits to see who sang it and buying the record, too.

Anyway, my sister had gotten a record player so I wanted a record. I was at a used LP kiosk at an outdoor flea market and I saw this weird looking album with people looking down at earth from what looked like a spaceship. Not knowing what it was, I bought it. I was really young - a kid.

I listened to the record and almost had a heart attack when I heard "Arrow Through Me" on there! What a weird, weird coincidence!

I fell in love with this Wings group and eventually bought the newest McCartney CD - "Flowers in the Dirt." I later found out he was in The Beatles" and bought their used LPs, too. I transferred them all to cassette and brough them to camp with me.

Seriously, I was never referred to Paul McCartney - I stumbled on him. Crazy, man.

I stumbled onto the Beethoven of Pop - and I sincerely believe he is the greatest composer of all time. What are the odds?

Same thing with Brian Wilson, strangely. Not knowing he was a Beach Boy, I hear this song called "Let's Go To Heaven In My Car" over the end credits of "Police Academy 4" - loved it on a deeper level, too. Well, I didn't search out the single because I was a dumb kid I guess - or ignorant rather. Didn't know the songs existed or could have existed outside the movie. Forgot about the song until I bought the "Brian Wilson" 2000 reissue - another coincidental delight!

JEFF!

 

like others responding here, i, too, worked at a college radio station many years ago and discovered a FRED FRITH album entitled "gravity" on ralph records. there were few, if any, stations that would play this LP, but it started a life-long appreciation of the man's music for me. in fact, i played east side digital's CD re-issue just a few days ago and it's as beautiful and joyous as i remember. a great record.

later, chris