Customer Reviews

Fat Mattress One

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The Fat Mattress was the band Noel Redding, former bassist from the Jimi Hendrix Experience, formed following his departure from that legendary group. Of course since the Experience, for all intents and purposes *was* Hendrix, I'm sure that no one knew what to expect from Redding after leaving. What the listener got with Fat Mattress was a solid, sometimes folky/woodsy, sometimes mystical rock band - very English and very stripped down, without pyrotechnics or pretensions. Songs like "Mr. Moonshine," "She Came In the Morning" and "All Night Drinker" (with Chris Wood of Traffic fame lending his flute, giving the song a style similar to early Jethro Tull) could have been staples on FM radio had the album been properly promoted. If you're at all into this type of music and wish to hear some of the little post-Experience music available by the late Noel Redding, you owe it to yourself to dig for this one.

Just like Clear Light and Skip Bifferty, Fat Mattress was a short lived band that made a strong impression with their great songs. With the rhythm section of Englebert Humperdinck's band and Noel Redding on guitar they put together a solid band.
I liked "Mr. Moonshine", "Magic Forest" and "Little Girl In White" the most. There are a lot of influences at work here: Small Faces, Traffic, The Byrds, The Who. If you're gonna crib, crib from the best-it rubbed off on them because these songs are just great! Listen and you will be pleasantly surprised.