Читать книгу The Mojo Collection - Various Mojo Magazine - Страница 137

Record label: Mercury

Produced: Abe ‘Voco’ Kesh

Recorded: Outside at Gate 5, Sausalito, and Muir Beach, California; Pier 57 (Department Of Marine And Aviation), New York City; studio sessions recorded at Pacific Recorders, San Mateo, California; A&R Studios, Olmstead Studios and The Record Plant, New York City; early 1968

Released: August 1968

Chart peaks: None (UK) 90 (US)

Personnel: Dickie Peterson (b, v); Leigh Stephens (g, v); Paul Whaley (d, v); Ralph Burns Kellogg (k); Eric Albronda (v); Eddie Kramer, Hank McGill, Jay Snyder, Tony May (e)

Track listing: Feathers From Your Tree (S); Sun Cycle (S); Just A Little Bit; Gypsy Ball; Come And Get It; (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction; The Hunter; Magnolia Caboose Babyfinger; Babylon

Running time: 33.10

Current CD: Akarma AKO12CD

Further listening: Vincebus Eruptum (1968); New! Improved! (1969)

Further reading: www.bluecheer.us

Download: Not currently legally available

Blue Cheer’s fearsome reputation as one of the founding fathers of the metal genre is largely due to the ferocity of their bombastic Vincebus Eruptum debut. A fine example of cro-magnon hard rock, it featured a deranged reworking of Eddie Cochran’s Summertime Blues along with a similarly crazed cover of Mose Allison’s Parchment Farm. While Vincebus can be seen as reflecting the growing sense of social unrest and violence fuelled by the escalation of the Vietnam conflict, it also happens to sound one-dimensional when placed alongside Blue Cheer’s second effort, Outsideinside.

The album’s intriguing title is down to the fact that the threesome of Dickie Peterson, Leigh Stevens (as he’s credited on the sleeve, despite spelling his surname Stephens) and Paul Whaley elected to record half of the album outdoors. Rock mythology suggests that this occured after the band’s use of excessive volume caused too much damage to assorted studios.

The result adds a melodic edge to Blue Cheer’s patented sonic assault. Tracks like Sun Cycle and Gypsy Ball, for instance, both bear testimony to Jimi Hendrix’s influence on the trio, the latter nodding in the direction of The Wind Cries Mary and making the most of the newfound joys of stereo panning.

High-octane tracks like Come And Get It point the way forward for the likes of the MC5, Just A Little Bit boasts a similar feel to Hendrix’s reworking of Fire, while the fantastically titled Magnolia Caboose Babyfinger is an instrumental piece of proto-grunge which Mudhoney would later cover. Elsewhere, Blue Cheer attempt to emulate the success of their Summertime Blues cover by turning their hand to a version of the Stones’s (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction, delivering it at double the speed. Album closer Babylon is a further slice of funky, cowbell-banging hard rock.

Virtually ignored on its release (most UK publications didn’t even bother to review the album), Outsideinside just about managed to sneak into the Billboard 100 in the US. A remarkable dip in form when you consider that Vincebus … managed to peak at Number 11 less than 12 months earlier.

Outsideinside remains a criminally underrated second effort from a band whose legacy is substantial but who have yet to receive the credit for embarking on what Leigh Stephens describes as ‘a violent and frightening trip’.