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...the cleanliness and godliness skifflers were a folk/ country folk/ hokum/ jazz ensemble specialising in combining all the above labels into one whole LP, their only LP under this name, which is an entirely satisfying half hour of string strumming grooves...there's a fine good humour pervades throughout, dig the title, getting into all corners, everywhere there's a good buzz going down...terrific playing but not at all studied, well suited to being on the vanguard label, and not so on elektra, that label though magnificent tended to come on a as somewhat serious organisation, vanguard always had room for a smidgen of fun at least in amongst all the worthy folkies and balladeers...the masked marauders disk came to life via strange circumstances, starting off as no more than a review of a fictitious album involving such luminary cats as mick jagger/ john lennon/ bob dylan all knocking out some tunes in the studio, for fun and no more...the review, basically making fun of the new bootleg record craze that was happening with everyone falling over themselves to get some unheard dylan tracks, or get hold of the beatles album that apple won't release, driving themselves crazy with desire for this new form of record (illegal)...when the review was published in 'rolling stone' magazine cats started wondering where they could get this disk and after some enquiries at the magazine office came to no avail it was decided that may be it didn't exist...then out of nowhere appeared this strange looking record accredited to the masked marauders so it did exist after all, only this didn't have dylan/lennon/jagger exalting in the wax, but it did have the cleanliness skifflers cutting a few tunes in the style of the 'superstars' (a seriously big hit of hash is needed to really think this has bob/john/mick on it)...it did not sell anyway as the vibe for the disk had depleted in a few weeks and so it went to the cutout bin and into obscurity, surfacing in the late seventies during the punk years but to no real applause, just another hippy prank...
...if a quick piece of journalistic shorthand can be employed for sake of brevity the notes represent nothing less than a hippyfied amalgam of american musics of the twentieth century (and by extension back aways before the dawn of the nineteen hundreds)...jug band and blues rub noses with jazz (both old and modern get a look in), bluegrass twang, plus a liberal dose of hokum, with lyrically this being a solid gasser, dope humour falling over itself with cool fun...these cats get nice and blurred in the studio with copious green being consumed to get that tight but mellow vibe, it's all flowing with groovy karmic vibrations to give the righteous cat a kiss on the chakra, these cats are solid players but never to the point of staid, there's a loose feel hanging over the preceedings...produced by no lesser personage than sam charters, bluesologist and country joe / fish studio handler, this wax has a few hippy tricks up its sleeve, fazing and echo to name but two effects that come on most welcomely, nicely nice...this was the only long play record they managed to get out but a small and beautifully formed masterpiece of late sixties frisco counter culture rock...
...the marvelously named ph. phactor were one of those 'frisco' bands that were on the periphery of the transition from folk rock to ballroom psych, the place where early dead / !great society! / early big brother meet...hailing from further up the west coast the phactor got themselves hooked up with the hippy explosion coming from the acid soaked streets of san francisco and managed to parley their jug band shenanigans into a one off single 45 deal, choosing to cover an old country blues standard, 'minglewood blues' which went promptly into obscurity with the band, after a few gigs to their name, following closely behind...what did eventually turn up in the late 70s was a semi bootleg LP of italian extraction (copywrite laws not applying in this 'forward thinking' country) consisting of a few tunes they managed to lay down before oblivian called as it did for so many cool combos at the end of the 'sign a hippy band' record company frenzy...a very nice assortment of sounds all based around the blues/jazz/hokum/psych axis, all given a shot through with some righteous reefer humor, making for a good feeling each and every time its spun...
...these cats seem to have the right idea when it came to laying down the tuneage and that's to keep any pretentions of 'production' and any other such fangly-dangly ideas of 'improvement' well away from the case in hand...with the tweedys they come into the room, switch the tape on and record the racket, that's all that's needed with them, it's already in the sound, the vibe is locked into how they play, the right combination is stirred in at source point, not after or during recording...it's only combos who ain't sure of their worth that need help in the sound dept....here's a right nice amalgam of beatnik folk and goodtime vibes fed through a kaleidoscope of grooves taking in such high priests of swill as the elevators and the velvets and mixing it with some hep gaggle from such chilled combos such as 'everpresent fullness'/'notes from the underground'/'charlatans'...failing to schmooz any and all record co. cuboids or parlez their wares into some stretched out ballroom psych has ensured they've become enshrined in west coast mythology...came in a box as we all know, good things come in small packages...
...the cleanliness and godliness skifflers were a folk/ country folk/ hokum/ jazz ensemble specialising in combining all the above labels into one whole LP, their only LP under this name, which is an entirely satisfying half hour of string strumming grooves...there's a fine good humour pervades throughout, dig the title, getting into all corners, everywhere there's a good buzz going down...terrific playing but not at all studied, well suited to being on the vanguard label, and not so on elektra, that label though magnificent tended to come on a as somewhat serious organisation, vanguard always had room for a smidgen of fun at least in amongst all the worthy folkies and balladeers...the masked marauders disk came to life via strange circumstances, starting off as no more than a review of a fictitious album involving such luminary cats as mick jagger/ john lennon/ bob dylan all knocking out some tunes in the studio, for fun and no more...the review, basically making fun of the new bootleg record craze that was happening with everyone falling over themselves to get some unheard dylan tracks, or get hold of the beatles album that apple won't release, driving themselves crazy with desire for this new form of record (illegal)...when the review was published in 'rolling stone' magazine cats started wondering where they could get this disk and after some enquiries at the magazine office came to no avail it was decided that may be it didn't exist...then out of nowhere appeared this strange looking record accredited to the masked marauders so it did exist after all, only this didn't have dylan/lennon/jagger exalting in the wax, but it did have the cleanliness skifflers cutting a few tunes in the style of the 'superstars' (a seriously big hit of hash is needed to really think this has bob/john/mick on it)...it did not sell anyway as the vibe for the disk had depleted in a few weeks and so it went to the cutout bin and into obscurity, surfacing in the late seventies during the punk years but to no real applause, just another hippy prank...
...the marvelously named ph. phactor were one of those 'frisco' bands that were on the periphery of the transition from folk rock to ballroom psych, the place where early dead / !great society! / early big brother meet...hailing from further up the west coast the phactor got themselves hooked up with the hippy explosion coming from the acid soaked streets of san francisco and managed to parley their jug band shenanigans into a one off single 45 deal, choosing to cover an old country blues standard, 'minglewood blues' which went promptly into obscurity with the band, after a few gigs to their name, following closely behind...what did eventually turn up in the late 70s was a semi bootleg LP of italian extraction (copywrite laws not applying in this 'forward thinking' country) consisting of a few tunes they managed to lay down before oblivian called as it did for so many cool combos at the end of the 'sign a hippy band' record company frenzy...a very nice assortment of sounds all based around the blues/jazz/hokum/psych axis, all given a shot through with some righteous reefer humor, making for a good feeling each and every time its spun...
...these cats seem to have the right idea when it came to laying down the tuneage and that's to keep any pretentions of 'production' and any other such fangly-dangly ideas of 'improvement' well away from the case in hand...with the tweedys they come into the room, switch the tape on and record the racket, that's all that's needed with them, it's already in the sound, the vibe is locked into how they play, the right combination is stirred in at source point, not after or during recording...it's only combos who ain't sure of their worth that need help in the sound dept....here's a right nice amalgam of beatnik folk and goodtime vibes fed through a kaleidoscope of grooves taking in such high priests of swill as the elevators and the velvets and mixing it with some hep gaggle from such chilled combos such as 'everpresent fullness'/'notes from the underground'/'charlatans'...failing to schmooz any and all record co. cuboids or parlez their wares into some stretched out ballroom psych has ensured they've become enshrined in west coast mythology...came in a box as we all know, good things come in small packages...
hi cat, the design should deserve, reading id difficult with so small lettering and bold yellow; have a fine day
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