OKen's Album of the Week 12/02

This feature is to hopefully steer you towards listening and or purchasing an lp that you might not have heard previously. With listening to albums, I like to employ the “3 times” rule. That is to say, you must listen to an album 3 times within a few days to really formulate a true opinion of it. The first listen is for first impressions…do you even like what you hear before you delve into the specifics of the songs.

The second listen is to identify what songs you may target or enjoy better than others. The third listen is to listen in the context of a full album. You ask yourself if it works for you as a full Lp, or just a few goods songs. Will this stay in your rotation, or will you pull it up for a few songs here and there.

My Album of the week is Frijid Pink…by Frijid Pink!
Here is the Wikipedia link for background on them…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frijid_Pink

I love this album. I was introduced to this while in a battle of the bands way back in high school (1982 or so) The song we played in our set was “Drivin’ Blues” . This wasn’t even the hit on the album! That honor went to their version of “House of the Rising Sun”…and a minor hit at that! So my bud, had the album on vinyl back in the day and I listened to it and really dug the Big Muff driven fuzz tones. God Bless the 70s!!!!!! They are basically a blues band, but they shine when they straight up rock the house!!!

On to the songs!
1. God Gave Me You-A lovely opening ballad, that picks up to knock you around a little bit. I am a sucker for the slow beginning and then the drums kick in and shove me a little. Mind you, not table flipping by any means, but enough to groove me.
2. Crying Shame- Fuzz…Fuzz…Fuzz…so fuzzy you can hear it fuzz and overdrive simultaneously…this is the perfect psychedelic jam…pure and simple!!!
3. I’m On My Way- This is typical of their blues influence here, but it is relatively short and they pull it off well. It is pleasant enough to get you to a more force blues jam….
4. Drivin’ Blues- Appropriately titled. A drivin’ beat with a nice 12 bar blues riff. Some points may be taken away for the use of harmonica, but it is rectified immediately with skillful soloing!
5. Tell Me Why- Turn on that Big Muff again. Tom Beaudry lets if fly but not too hard here with the vocals. Kind of a chaotic instrumental break here, but he puts in the wah-wah, and we all know what that does to a song….INSTANT JAMS!!!
6. End of the Line-More 12 bar, but disguised a little better here. What I love about this album is that it sounds good at ear shattering levels!!!! Good toke and drink lp as well!!!!
7. House of the Rising Sun- My favourite version of this tune…where is my lava lamp? Lose yourself in this jam…now…I COMMAND IT!!!
8. I Want To Be Your Lover-It’s like if a skiffle band smoked a lot of dope and got a little pissed off as well. This album does not stop!!!!!! On some of their later albums they have way too many 12 bar blues tunes, but they really mix it up here..and that is a good thing!
9. Boozin’ Blues- Speaking of blues…this is the classic smoky room slow blues/atmospheric blues tune…and a good one
10. Heartbreak Hotel- a well done version of Elvis’ classic…this basically is a bonus track because it was one of their first two singles before this album was released
11. Music for the People- the other single before the album was released…nice little tune…kind of reminds me of the Five Man Electrical Band, or the Youngbloods or something like that…good 60s type stuff

Go find this album, download it, whatever you need to do, and either sit down one night while getting ready to go out, or play this early at a party, and it will be pleasing….until next week…