Customer Reviews

Best Of: That Was Only Yesterday

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Boy was I glad to discover this one. I've reviewed the Tooth's "Spooky Two" already and I stand by my original criticism therein. While "Spooky Two" will stand as their finest hour, this collection is more than welcome as an addition to my late 60's-early 70's Brit- Rock lovin' ears. Spooky Tooth were one of a rare breed of English groups who could take a seemingly un-rocking track like Janis Ian's teen-angst weeper "Society's Child", and, completely oblivious to the context of the lyrics, turn it into a tough rocking masterpiece.In the good ol' USA bands like The Vanilla Fudge tried the same trick and,to my ears, came up sounding like sludge. "Society's Child" is off their first album, along with a killer version of "Tobacco Road", it makes me wish I'd first picked up the vinyl LP when I hovered over it in the TG&Y bin back in '70. The heart and soul of this CD is culled from "Spooky Two", and the band never hit such heights again, but, here's your chance to hear their magnificent last puff on "I Am The Walrus", and a version of Elton John's "Son Of Your Father" that gave hope to us fans of this underappreciated group when it became apparent their time was up. Trivia fans alert ;Greg Ridley became a Humble Pieman, Luther Grosvenor became the Ariel Bender of Mott The Hoople fame, and Gary Wright weaved dreams into the hearts of secretaries in cubicles everywhere.The MVP on this satisfying collection,however, is vocalist Mike Harrison. Like fellow Brit soul singer superb Terry Reid, this guy was miles and miles ahead of more celebrated singers such as Robert Plant and Joe Cocker. Mike Harrison, if you still care, get with Terry Reid, form a band and write some great songs and tear the roof off the sucker again for us baby boomer- Brit-rock -'eavy organ - lovin' Yanks. Oh sorry...guess I got carried away there. Buy this one and you'll be carried away too. Gotta call my mom and see if she threw out my lava lamp.

The good news is that Spooky Tooth finally gets the full remastering treatment on a domestic greatest hits release (although it would have been preferable to have the individual albums remastered). However, all but one of the tunes from the classic Spooky Two album are thankfully included here, plus four great tunes from The Last Puff. The bad news is that the remastering ain't great. There's a harshness on the high end that makes listening through headphones a painful experience at times. And more than just one measly tune from You Broke My Heart So I Busted Your Jaw would have been nice. Oh well, guess it's the best we can expect from A&M. Five stars for including most of Spooky Two, three stars for sloppy remastering...

I would have made this a two-disc set and included a LOT more material from You Broke My Heart, Witness and The Mirror, the band's last three albums with Gary Wright (who WAS Spooky Tooth} and Mick Jones (who founded Foreigner after Spooky Tooth split). Leaving off the early, pre-Spooky Two stuff like Society's Child would have left more room for the later material, which is far superior. If you can afford it, I would recommend getting Spooky Two along with the import releases of You Broke My Heart and Witness. If that's too much of a financial strain, then by all means, buy this CD, since it includes almost all of Spooky Two and will introduce you to one of the greatest hard rock bands ever. One listen and you will know right away where Foreigner and Journey came from.

Look, it's like this: This collection is fine as far as it goes, and I really enjoy my copy. But why in the world only one cut from "You Broke My Heart So I Busted Your Jaw"? And why, oh why, "Cotton Growin' Man"? Sheesh ... a bunch of Europeans with a weak anti-racism message song. What about "Moriah"? The vocal on that track is one of the guttural classics of all time. Mike Harrison pulls the name up from his chest like aliens busting a rib cage and more distinctive than 90% of vocal performances before or since. What mangey dog of a marketer decided on the criminal underrepresentation of YBMHSIBYJ on this collection? By God, you owe us! You can make us whole by pulling the Ceremony track from The Best Of and re-releasing It's All About/Spooky Two and The Last Puff/You Broke My Heart So I Busted Your Jaw as twofers and Ceremony as a stand alone, the way God intended it. Nothing less will do (actually, I'd suck it up and twist the knife of my credit for a release of YBMHSIBYJ). This is a needful thing - don't let us down.

I bought this album because it's a recent release and I took it for granted that it would be remastered. When I took it home and listened to it the frequencies and dynamics of the music are just as dull as what A&M did with Spooky Two. There is nothing stated on the cd indicating any remastering and it's more of just a transfering. There's a recent version of the album on import which boast of being remastered with Cotton Growing Man being replaced by the Weight. You might want to check that out.

This CD and SPOOKY TWO are the first two CDs to buy by English rockers Spooky Tooth. Combining the influences of Traffic, The Band, Procol Harum, Cream, Hendrix, and the Jeff Beck Group, and boasting two great singers- Mike Harrison and Gary Wright- who took the Memphis-Chicago-Texas-St. Louis-Muscle Shoals-Detroit-New Orleans-Kansas City blues/R&B/soul vocal sound, blended in a bit of the Band's Richard Manuel, and topped it off with the influences of other English rock singers like Jack Bruce, Steve Winwood, Gary Brooker, and Rod Stewart, Spooky Tooth created an original, progressive sound that displayed their affinity for black music while pointing towards something totally new, influencing such AOR bands as Foreigner. These guys could have stayed together for ages, but individual egos drove them apart quickly, and although they reunited for a couple of albums in 1973-74, they were never better than in their original incarnation.

For those unfamiliar with Spooky Tooth (and there are a lot of you out there), think of a cross between the psychedelic-soul of Traffic and "Beggar's Banquet"-era Rolling Stones. Spooky Tooth was one of the most underrated bands on the British blues-rock scene.

Fortunately, "That Was Only Yesterday" is the perfect sampler of Spooky Tooth's sound. Unlike most "Best of" collections, this CD takes more material from better albums (including all but one track from their masterpiece "Spooky Two") and less material from weaker ones. The result is truly the BEST of a great unknown band.

A fond memory, blast from the past. Remembering the two "hits" (at least in my mind) :"Waitin' for the Wind" and "Evil Woman" I was struck with how two voices can cooperate and augment a band's vocal sound. Overall, some of the material is weak, but their ideas and presentation deserve credit. Luther Grosvernor on guitar has some moments as do vocalists Gary Wright(later "Dreamweaver") and Mike Harrison.

My only problem with Spooky Tooth is that there isn't consistancy in the music. Some songs are done extremely well and others seem a bit like fillers. None the less this is a good complilation of their best and well worth getting for any fan from way back...

Though not as complete as a "Best Of" should be (it has nothing from "Witness" or "The Mirror"), still it contains most of "Spooky Two" (excluding only "I've Got Enough Heartaches") and all the highlights from "It's All About", and "The Last Puff". It also includes (an edited) "Prayer" which is a snippet from "Ceremony" (and probably all you need) and last but not least: "Cotton Growing Man" from "You Broke My Heart, So I Busted Your Jaw".