Side 1:

Listen: Shake Your Hips / Slim Harpo
Sahke

Listen: I’m A Lover Not A Fighter / Lazy Lester
LarryLesterLoverNotFighter.mp3

Side 2:

Listen: Wild Cherry / Leroy Washington
Wild

Listen: Hello Mary Lee / Lightnin’ Slim
Hello

EP’s came along from the labels for many reasons. Besides being generally rare due to their overall lack of substantial sales, as only the very biggest shifted sizable quantities, many were issued as promotional only. As a rule, they went to radio and the press, but on some occasions, to retail for in-store play, the latter being prevalent in the US during the early 1970′s.

EXCELLO ROCKERS wasn’t really any of the above though. It was about this time that England’s Ace Records issued a series of Excello artist compilations as indicated on the EP’s back cover. So what better reason was needed to create a classy promo only treat for the most informed industry friends and clients of the label? None. Clearly much care was taken in it’s preparation, right down to the cobalt blue and tangerine tri-centered pressing.

Three of the four acts here were amongst Excello’s best known and seemingly biggest sellers, given the number of singles each released during the label’s most active ten years, from 1962.

Then there’s Leroy Washington. His backwoods moonshine style was a template for so much of the mid and late 60′s output by the white British blues bands that I’m surprised he’s never name checked. Or maybe they didn’t even know he was their guy. Sounds to me like he, let’s say, rubbed off on many of his contemporaries. Perhaps without knowing, it could have been Leroy Washington who influenced Freddie King who influenced Peter Green or Kim Simmonds who influenced….the dominoes tip from there.

‘Wild Cherry’ was Leroy Washington’s first on Excello in 1958 with only two more to follow for the label during ’59 and ’60. The track is really blues on it’s way to becoming rockabilly, and wouldn’t have been out of place on the The Cramps BLUES FIX EP.

Listen: The Green Manalishi (With The Two Prong Crown) / Fleetwood Mac
The

To my recollection, this 1970 non-LP A side was Peter Green’s final, officially planned single with Fleetwood Mac. Almost feels like they were veering toward the sound de jour: those beginnings of heavy guitar arena rock, as Deep Purple and The Jeff Beck Group seemed to happily forge.

In fact, around the same time ‘The Green Manalishi (With The Two Prong Crown)’ was released, so too was Deep Purple’s ‘Black Night’. And given Peter Green’s imminent departure, that musical default could very well have been Fleetwood Mac’s path of least resistance.

Luckily, guitarist Jeremy Spencer’s love of late 50′s/early 60′s doo wop/ RnR influenced the direction for their next album, KILN HOUSE, and disaster was averted.

Technically, KILN HOUSE was an extension of ‘Somebody’s Gonna Get Their Head Kicked In Tonight’, the B side of a previous single, ‘Man Of The World’, their only ’69 release on Immediate Records, issued a year or less, between their periods on Blue Horizon Records and Warner Brothers/Reprise. The band even adopted the comical moniker Earl Vince & The Valiants for that side of the single’s label copy.

If ever you were lucky enough to see the Peter Green lineup pictured above on that beauty of a rarer than rare 7″ sleeve, you know how powerful these five were on a stage. Simply unforgettable.

Peter Green’s closing guitar solo twists and turns once again provided musical fear as only he could.

Listen: Station Man / Fleetwood Mac FleetwoodStationMan.mp3

Much critical praise is deservedly lavished on the first incarnation of Fleetwood Mac: the Peter Green years. Many a great single came from that span (’67 – ’70). Then there’s the Buckingham/Nicks lineup from ’76 onwards and their astronomical success. Yet it seems little to no attention is ever paid to the middle bit. It’s here where some of my favorite albums by them reside.

Ok, I loved THEN PLAY ON, after which Peter bailed – certainly leaving on a high. The Peter-less followup (literally the same lineup minus one), KILN HOUSE was pretty great too. First of all, the album cover was a beauty, and the abrupt shift away from blues toward the Jeremy Spencer preferred 50′s RnR was a nice change. ‘Station Man’, the B side to ‘Jewel Eyed Judy’, had such a swaggering groove, it really feels like a one take jam – in a good way.

Listen: Hypnotized / Fleetwood Mac FleetwoodHypnotized.mp3

By ’73, Bob Welch was established as a member and important songwriter – his haunting vocals and lyrics matched each other, and this band, pretty perfectly. By ’73, he and Christine McVie were the consistent strong song components on MYSTERY TO ME. Very ying and yang but it worked. Like Bob Welch’s ‘Bermuda Traingle’, ‘Hypnotized’ was nicely eerie and luckily for the 7″ junkie, made it to a B side. I love having it on a single.

Listen: Heroes Are Hard To Find (Single Version) / Fleetwood Mac FleetwoodHeroes.mp3

The lead track from ’74′s HEROES ARE HARD TO FIND is hard to top. I still listen to it pretty faithfully some 30 years later. I’ve posted the hard to find, mono single version up top.

Listen: I Could Feel The Whole World Turn Around / The Shotgun Express ShotgunExpress.mp3

’65 – ’66 was a busy time for so many major stars as they did a non stop jig of musical chairs, seeming all a bit desperate in hindsight.

In this internet age, where everything is at your fingertips instantly, and anyone can record some songs with only their laptop, it’s wildly ironic that in the 60′s, bands, records and record deals moved much faster than today. Within months you could jump ship to another company, with two, four or more singles under your arm ready to release. Yet nowadays, despite all our resources, it seems to take like sometimes two years for a band to issue a followup.

Again, none of that was the case back then. And talk about musical chairs, Jimmy Page is rumored to have been on dozens, maybe hundreds of hits and flops as an in demand session player and John Paul Jones too. Rod Stewart went from solo deal to a very short stint as vocalist with The Kinks (thank God and heaven above that didn’t work out) to Long John Baldry & The Hoochie Coochie Band, on to Steampacket – a sort of super star ensemble that featured Baldry, Stewart, Brian Auger, Julie Driscoll, Micky Waller and others, back to a solo contract (this time recording ‘Shake’ with The Brian Auger Trinity on backup), then onto The Shotgun Express. Often viewed as a poor man’s Steampacket supergroup, with members Peter Green, Mick Fleetwood, Peter Bardens (later of Camel) and female vocal sparring partner, the unknown Beryl Marsden, they lasted only a few months, but it didn’t hinder a singles deal with Columbia UK and this lone, flop 7′ release, by official NME chart position that is. Over at pirate station Radio Caroline, it had a decent first week at # 25, unfortunately also it’s peak, by two weeks later, it was gone from their Top 50.

Always collectable mostly due to it’s various members instead of the music, on first spin, it’s a big let down – more often a “what the hell did I spend all that money on this dog of a record for?” Even I thought that too, yet on second listen, I quite liked the obvious frustration of it’s members sounding ‘forced’ into recording a track against their instincts, back in the day when you obeyed your label, their chosen producer and accompanying material. I kinda think it’s pretty great now, and not only because of that tension, I like the song too. Plus it’s a co-write by a favorite: Heads, Hands & Feet vocalist/Taste producer Tony Colton.

Listen: Big Towne, 2061 (Mono) / Paris Paris2061.mp3

While going through the library for my previous Mica Paris post, I couldn’t resist also listening to her alphabetical predecessor, Paris, the band.

Baffling how this post Fleetwood Mac, pre solo success Bob Welch era hardly gets a mention. Almost as though his band, Paris, never existed.

Firstly, nowhere near enough credit is afforded to the Fleetwood Mac/Bob Welch chunk of albums. Being just prior to their Stevie Nicks/Lindsey Buckingham skyrocket, it’s sadly dwarfed. As with the Peter Green era just before it, both include must have singles.

I was a serious Glenn Cornick fan, for ages considering him the best bassist out there. From seeing Jethro Tull’s first US show at The Fillmore East, I was in. THIS WAS and STAND UP, have remained big favorites. That band just plummeted downhill once he was replaced by a very stiff someone or other. All of the band’s soul was robbed.

Therefore, with much interest did I approach Paris. BIG TOWNE, 2061, their second album, oddly didn’t register with FM radio, a strange twist given the Fleetwood Mac and Jethro Tull history. Not to mention it’s quality. Seemed Capitol didn’t care, never do I recall much press or visibility. Add bad timing to the equation as this preceded punk by less than a year, so in no time, the sound was passe.

Still, a good single. I forced it on everyone around for ages, which clearly didn’t help the big picture at all.

Listen: Heavy Heart / Peter Green PeterGreenHeavyHeart.mp3

Despite having a massive instrumental hit with Fleetwood Mac (‘Albatross’), repeating the process for Reprise as a solo artist wasn’t so automatic. In fact, this was a total non-starter. Released a year after his disappointing post Mac album, THE END OF THE GAME, it seems all his fans lost interest, all of the press and media lost interest and quite frankly, so too did his label.

Now the subtle grower is a damn hard single to find. Having patiently riden out his has-been phase, Peter Green graduated nicely to legend – making this record sound just a little more vital.