Ron Robert - The Price

[1983]

This unknown synth country jam is pretty surprising as I don't think I've  heard anything quite like it. Outlandish synth and fine twangery in a new wave country folk style with a classic rock lead break. The Price sounds like its influenced by Wall Of Voodoo. Makes me wonder why nobody in the Hypnagogic scene ended up going down this path. This could have been the national anthem for synthwave country. Maybe there's a micro-genre that I just don't know about. 

*Virtually no info about this guy on the interwebs. This is the only video of Ron Robert's on youtube. He's not listed on Discogs or Rate Your Music however NTS has one sentence on him which tells me he self released this in 1983. I'm guessing he had an album called Elaine or single of which this was the b-side. Who knows? Then there's the unknown lady singing, who is she? The whole thing could even be fake. It's kinda cool to be this mysterious in the oversaturated digital information age.

Petula Clark - Don't Sleep In The Subway

[1967]

Our Lady of light entertainment with her pretty insane yet lovely slice of baroque pop. It's symphonic, it's pop, it's disjointed, It's cinemascope epic, It's post-Pet Sounds pop perfection. 

The disorientating Don't Sleep On The Subway, penned by songwriting legends and married companions Tony Hatch & Jackie Trent, is a high point in a career of many highlights for Petula. 

Gotta be one of the weirder tunes to make it to number one here in Australia. 

Brian Bennett - Chain Reaction

Brian Bennett - Chain Reaction [1978]

A strange yet beautiful journey into disco. Some funky shit right here folks. I wonder if this ever got played out. Before mutant disco, disco was already mutant making that future genre obsolete before it was invented.

Brian Bennett - The Investigator [1975]

Here's some of the coolest crime funk ever from the guy who played the drums in The Shadows. This library music jam turned up a few years later in the British cop show The Sweeney. 

Apache - The Shadows

[1960]

To get to Telstar you had to have this first. Still sounds sleek and modern, fucking great stuff. I'm wondering if there is a world of Shadows that I've missed out on. I know there's a wide wonderful world of drummer/composer Brian Bennett out there in theme tunes for sports shows, sit-coms, porno and crime dramas. He even played drums on some Walker Brothers and Olivia Newton John records as well as recording the space-age synth-disco-funk cult classic Voyage: A Journey Into Discoid Funk (1978). The other guys in the band though I know nothing about, I mean my old man had some Shadows records but I never paid them much attention. Was this their one great golden moment or...

Apache - Hot Butter [1972]

A year before Incredible Bongo Band made it their own Hot Butter did my favourite version of Apache. It's an outrageously futuristic proto-techno space age electro jam. Add N To X were never this awesome!

Telstar - Tornadoes

[1962]

Before the British Invasion Telstar rocketed up the charts everywhere. This was an even more modern invasion from the British Isles

I feel like Joe Meek must have gone "I really like the futuristic synth-y organ bit in Del Shannon's Runaway. So why don't we do an entire tune in this deliriously upbeat fairground anthem style but even more so." And Meek and The Tornadoes did and it was historic and we're still talking about it today.

A gift to seaside fairs, carnivals, sideshows and amusement parks across the world to this day.

Open Mind- Magic Potion (1969)

[1969]

THE scuzzy drug fuelled sound, the sonic revelation and ace riff-o-rama that preempted Black Sabbath, Hawkwind, Spaceman 3 and all your favourite things that have proto, neo & stoner at start.

A relentless rock'n'roll rocket!

Magic Potion: Yes Please.

Please sir, can I have some more.

Love Sculpture _ Sabre Dance

[1968]

Didn't know this tune til the other day when I began reading Will Hodgkinson's book In Perfect Harmony (2022). My dad had Dave Edmunds records, which I didn't hate, but he didn't have this one. 

This is a blast. The past, present and future all rolled into an energetic metallic rock'n'roll rocket of a space rock surf jam. 

Have I the Right · The Honeycombs

[1964]

Another rockin' pop tune with an unhinged quality. It threatens to go full mayhem but somehow its reigned in. Joe Meek does all sorts of studio trickery to make this insane and electrifying.

Stomping!

Number One in Australia and Canaidia baby!

Maximillian - The Snake

[1961]

The dude Max Crook who played the Musitron, an early synthesiser, on Del Shannon's Runaway did this instrumental that became a classic at mod discotheques and northern soul shindigs. Crazy funky sounds and hand clap-mania! 

Pretty cool. 

Del Shannon - So Long Baby

[1961]

We all love Del Shannon's debut 1961 seven inch single, the international smash hit Runaway but what about his nasty unhinged third single So Long Baby!  It is insane, relentlessly bitter, noisy, bizarre, gleefully spiteful and just brilliant. 

[1961]

Okay okay despite how many times you've heard it you really can't go past this instant slice of pop perfection where rock'n'roll met synthetic electronics for the first time. 

It's the toppermost fairground anthem and the ultimate jukebox selection. That mental space age musitron (a synth prototype) break is unmissable and exciting as is Del Shannon's vocal performance where he goes from rough'n'raspy to falsetto. The mysterious existential lyrics are set to an uncommonly euphoric tone making it the rave anthem of 1961.

Surprisingly still incredible.