VA - We're An American Band, A Journey Through the USA Hard Rock Scene 1967-1973 [2023] (3 x CDs)

 

USA HARD ROCK

VA - We're An American Band, A Journey Through the USA Hard Rock Scene 1967-1973 [2023] (3 x CDs)

Rock & roll went through a massive transition in its first decade-and-a-half, much more so than in the time that has since passed. It's fair to peg the public acceptance of rock & roll with the success of Chuck Berry's "Maybellene" in 1955, and ten years later, rock gained a greater level of sophistication and literacy, with the dawn of the psychedelic age in sight, and after that, all bets were off. Once psychedelia became the order of the day, rock bands sought new ways to and add a trippier edge to their music, and it didn't take long for someone to come up with a simple, brilliantly effective trick – turn up your amps to ten, stretch out your tunes, beef up the low end, and start hitting everything hard. By 1968, bands like Blue Cheer, Steppenwolf, and Vanilla Fudge had pioneered the grubby majesty of hard rock (in turn leading to its demonic sibling, heavy metal), and parents across America were suddenly very sorry they thought the Rolling Stones were as obnoxious as things could get. As hard rock codified itself over the next several years, hundreds of bands were building big, powerful music out of an increasingly diverse range of ingredients, and the British Cherry Red label has fashioned an entertaining and well-curated study of the first era of American hard rock with the 2023 box set We're an American Band: A Journey Through the USA Hard Rock Scene 1967-1973. A careful spin of this three-disc, 62-track behemoth makes clear the main precursors to hard rock were the expanded vistas of psychedelia (the semi-poetic lyric style common to early psych informs a large portion of the tracks here) and the moody sneer of citified blues (one of the set's more remarkable tracks is Muddy Waters' amusing cover of the Rolling Stones' "Let's Spend the Night Together" from his 1968 psych/metal hybrid Electric Mud), as well as the delinquent shrug of the noisier strains of garage rock. There are plenty of familiar names on board (the MC5, the Stooges, Alice Cooper, ZZ Top, Blue Öyster Cult), some stars in waiting (Fuse would evolve into Cheap Trick; Nazz, with a young Todd Rundgren; and Dust, with Marc Bell on drums before he turned into Marky Ramone), some worthy cult favorites (Sir Lord Baltimore, who sound even more proto-metal than Blue Cheer, and Texas psych outliers the Bubble Puppy and Cold Sun), and plenty of utter unknowns whose brief moments of sonic thunder are celebrated at last (solid, previously unreleased tracks from Sudden Death, the Sound Barrier, Gold, and B.F. Trike). There's plenty of good, greasy fun to be had in We're an American Band, and if you're the sort who turns up the car stereo when "Born to Be Wild" comes on, you'll revel in this; it's high time this era got a Nuggets of its own, and this is it. (AMG review by Mark Deming)

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Track lists

CD1

01 Vanilla Fudge - Ticket To Ride 5:56

02 Iron Butterfly - Iron Butterfly Theme 4:37

03 Blue Cheer - Summertime Blues 3:47

04 Steppenwolf - The Ostrich 5:44

05 The Savage Resurrection - Remlaps Cave Part Ii 2:56

06 Fever Tree - Man Who Paints The Pictures 2:37

07 Sound Barrier - Why Should I Care 3:33

08 Quicksilver Messenger Service - Pride Of Man 4:06

09 Easy Chair - My Own Life 4:04

10 Blues Magoos - Chicken Wire Lady 4:09

11 Human Beinz - April 15th 6:57

12 Wildwood - Plastic People 3:16

13 Mass Confusion Rock Band - The War Rages On 3:22

14 Src - Black Sheep 4:43

15 Muddy Waters - Lets Spend The Night Together 3:10

16 Dragonfly - Crazy Woman 2:45

17 Bubble Puppy - Hot Smoke And Sasafrass 2:37

18 Omnibus - Good Morning Day 2:38

19 Societys Children - Mister Genie Man 2:35

20 Darius - Blow My Mind 2:34

21 Kim Fowley - Nightrider 2:24

CD2

01 MC5 - Kick Out The Jams 2:55

02 Stack - Time Seller 5:07

03 Nazz - Under The Ice 5:49

04 Alice Cooper - Fields Of Regret 5:44

05 Stone Garden - Oceans Inside Me 2:36

06 Stooges - I Wanna Be Your Dog 3:10

07 Spirit - Dark-Eyed Woman 3:08

08 Litter - Journeys 2:12

09 Love - Robert Montgomery 3:39

10 Stalk-Forrest Group - Donovans Monkey 3:45

11 Coven - Wicked Woman 2:59

12 Morgen - Welcome To The Void 4:47

13 Conception - Babylon 2:57

14 Frijjd Pink - House Of The Rising Sun 4:45

15 Fuse - Sad Day 5:49

16 Mountain - Mississippi Queen 2:32

17 Gold - No Parking (Live) 6:21

18 Christopher - Dark Road 2:54

19 Brigade - Self-Made God 4:06

20 Damnation Of Adam Blessing - Death Of A Virgin 3:42

CD3

01 ZZ Top - Neighbor Neighbor 2:21

02 Cold Sun - Twisted Flower 3:00

03 Wildfire - Stars In The Sky 5:45

04 Sir Lord Baltimore - Helium Head (I Got A Love) 4:02

05 Bf Trike - Time And Changes 2:42

06 Demian - Face The Crowd 2:59

07 Head Over Heels - Road Runner 3:22

08 Boomerang - Montreal Jail 3:04

09 Cactus - Evil 3:17

10 Bolder Damn - Brtcd 2:56

11 Estes Brothers - Never Coming Down 3:35

12 Blue Oyster Cult - Transmaniacon Mc 3:23

13 Earthen Vessel - You Can 4:41

14 Bang - The Queen 5:25

15 Sudden Death - My Time Is Over 4:38

16 Flow - It Swallowed The Sun 4:54

17 Dust - Suicide 4:36

18 Arthur Lee - Love Jumped Through My Window 2:58

19 Todd Rundgren - Is It My Name 4:03

20 Stray Dog - You Know 3:46

21 Grand Funk - Were An American Band 3:27

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