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Demons, Fairies & Wailing Guitars: The Best 100 Obscure Rock Acts 1968-1976 by Ra’anan Chelled

March 8, 2013 by A.S. Van Dorston

Demons, Fairies & Wailing Guitars: The Best 100 Obscure Rock Acts 1968-1976 by Ra'anan Chelled (2012)I’ve been exhausted this week from staying up too late every night reading a book originally written in Hebrew. No, I’m not studying the Torah, but I am worshiping a certain variety of gods in the form of Demons, Fairies & Wailing Guitars: The Best 100 Obscure Rock Acts 1968-1976In the past few days I’ve gone to church via my headphones and listened to over two dozen albums I’ve never heard before. While there are plenty of bands that I’m not only familiar with, but are old favorites like Amon Duul II, Atomic Rooster, Bang, Blue Cheer, Budgie, Buffalo, Captain Beyond, Dust, Jericho, Flower Travellin’ Band, The Groundhogs, Hawkwind, MC5, Nektar, Sir Lord Baltimore, Wishbone Ash and relatively recent favorites like Blues Creation, Josefus, Leaf Hound, November and T2, I had never heard of nearly half of them. Ra’anan Chelled may have missed a handful of key bands I kind of expected to see in there like Stray, High Tide, Blackwater Park and Night Sun, his tastes are impressively informed and on point for someone who just started discovering the albums at least 35 years after they first came out. 

Socrates Drank The Conium - On The Wings (Polydor, 1973)One of my favorite new discoveries among many from the book so far is Socrates Drank The Conium, a Greek band that started out obscure by necessity, as they had to perform in secrecy in the dark, literally underground clubs and basements of Athens to avoid unwanted attention from the military Junta. Influenced by Hendrix, Cream and the blues, they released two solid blues rock albums in 1971 and 72, but really took off on their third, On The Wings (1973) which incorporates more progressive rock elements while also unleashing more convincingly unhinged performances, with Yannis Spatha truly wailing on his guitar. “Death Is Gonna Die” was even a minor hit despite the decidedly anti-rock culture at the time. After the dictatorship disintegrated in 1974, they collaborated with Vangelis for one last masterpiece on Phos (1976).

Chelled first got the idea for the book when he wrote a piece for his University’s weekly called “The Best Bands You’ve Never Heard About” in 2003. After positive feedback he wrote some more, and after discovering a new favorite band in Leaf Hound, realized there could be many more hidden treasures to be discovered. Originally published in Hebrew, he translated it himself and printed 100 copies, a few of which are still available directly from the author via email (raanan78 at gmail), and made available as an Amazon e-book on October 30 of last year, coincidentally a week after nominations closed for the  1970-1979 WTF – The Hard ‘n’ Heavy ‘n’ Loud + Krautrock, Arty, Noisy, Weird, Funky, Punky Shit – Albums Poll! – Closes Mar 8th 11.59 PM UK Time – All ILXORS/LURKERS WELCOME which I ended up helping out with on ILM. Many of the bands from the book were included in the poll, but I wish I had access to it in time to nominate the aforementioned Socrates along with Steamhammer, Gracious, Armaggedon (the German one), Cargo, Incredible Hog and Garybaldi. The book includes some artwork, photos and posters which probably look much better in the print edition than the electronic versions. The triple fold-out art for Italian band Garybaldi’s Nuda (1972) reminds me of the lush artwork by John Dyer Baizley of Baroness:

Garybaldi - Nuda (CGD, 1972) - Front

While there are understandably some grammatical errors due to the solo translation job and lack of a professional editor, the writing is actually pretty good, offering some startlingly refreshing approaches to describing much of the music. Challed spends more space than necessary to talk about the market value of original LP pressing, which are typically ridiculously high, and appeal to a pretty tiny audience of collectors. The rest of us just want the music in whatever form we can get it. While there are features typical of many music reference guides – band members, list of albums, “If you dig:” descriptions and recommendations of other similar bands, the  meat of the entries are substantial, sometimes including well done interviews with surviving band members. It’s impressive that he tracked down so many people from bands that were often unknown to begin with.  A common thread seems to be stories of all the obstacles and hardships that contributed to the bands being mostly obscure, along with the many tragedies that followed, almost reading like a dark Russian novel. But as is often the case when art and tragedy collide, works of incandescent and/or brutal beauty are often left behind. And even without the interviews and stories, that’s what truly makes this book a precious resource.

At the end, Challed included plenty to chew on for listophiliacs like myself. Here’s one example. “Some bands with extensive discography (at least 3 albums) but all you really need is this one amazing album:”

Frijid Pink – Frijid Pink (fuzzed out bluesy hard rock)
Perth Country Conspiracy – Does Not Exist (theatrical folk rock)
Chicken Shack – Imagination Lady (blues rock)
Trapeze – Medusa (hard rock)
Beggar’s Opera – Pathfinder (progressive rock)
Lucifer’s Friend – Lucifer’s Friend (hard rock)
It’s a Beautiful Day – It’s A Beautiful Day (psychedelia)
Earth & Fire – Earth & Fire (psychedelic progressive rock)
Pescado Rabioso – II (heavy prog)
Audience – House on the Hill (progressive art rock)
Dzyan – electric Silence (krautrock)
Vox Dei – La Biblia (heavy prog)
Meic Stevens – Outlander (folk rock)
Catherine Ribeiro + Alpes – Paix (krautrock-like folk)
Blackfeather – At the Mountains of Madness (heavy prog)
Pop Masina – Kiselina (psychedelic hard rock)
Los Dug Dug’s – Smog (heavy prog)
Rita Lee – Hoje e o Primeiro Dia Do Resto De Sua Vida (tropicalia)
The Blue Effect – Meditace (heavy psychedelia)
Alice – Alice (progressive rock)
Spooky Tooth – Spooky Two (soulful blues rock)

Bands covered: Aguatrubia, Almendra, Amon Duul II, Anonymous, Armageddon (German), Arzachel, Atomic Rooster, The Bachs, Il Balletto Di Bronzo, Bang, Danny Ben Israel, Black Merda, Blue Cheer, Blues Creation, Brainticket, Broselmaschine, Budgie, Buffalo, Bunalim, Burnin Red Ivanhoe, C.A. Quintet, Cactus, Captain Beyond, Cargo, The Churchills/Jericho Jones/Jericho, COB, Comus, Lula Cortes e Ze Ramalho, Cressida, Crucis, Damnation of Adam Blessing, Damon, Darius, De De Lind, Dragonfly, Dust, Far Out, Felt, Flower Travellin’ Band, Fraction, Fraser & DeBolt, Freedoms Children, Gandalf, Garybaldi, Gila, Gracious, Granicus, The Groundhogs, Group 1850, Hawkwind, Randy Holden, D.R. Hooker, Incredible Hog, It’s All Meat, Josefus, Juan De la Cruz Band, Ladies W.C., Leaf Hound, Perry Leopold, Garrett Lund, MC5, Mighty Baby, Modulo 1000, Morgen, Morly Grey, Museo Rosenbach, My Solid Ground, Necronomicon, Nektar, November, Old Man & the Sea, The Open Mind, Orange Wedge, Orang Utan, Pappo’s Blues, Pentagram, Linda Perhacs, Phoenix, The Plastic Cloud, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Relatively Clean Rivers, La Revolucion de Emiliano Zapata, Rodriguez, Sir Lord Baltimore, Socrates Drank the Conium, Skip Spence, Steamhammer, Stonehouse, Stone the Crows, Stonewall, Sweet Smoke, T2, Tomorrow, Trees, Twenty Sixty Six & Then, The United States of America, Wishbone Ash, The Wizards from Kansas, Yesterday’s Children, Zerfas.

Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and iTunes.

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