Customer Reviews

Grand Funk

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Finally got me a copy of THE RED ALBUM by Grand Funk Railroad on CD!!! No more cracks and pops of my original vinyl edition.This album ROCKS!! It Rocked the first time I heard it at age 12 in 1970, and still rocks after all these years!!! Now my two sons are loving it too!! They both ask me to put this one on when we cruise in the custom van <without mom>, and turn it up full volume!! Mel Schacher's bass lines absolutely vibrate the mirrors on the doors!! YES!!! This is true American Rock at it's best!! My favorite song on this one is "Mr. Limousine Driver"!! Grand Funk is American Rock at it's best!!!

G.F.R. always "teetered" back and forth between a bluesy/folky sound and hardcore rock. Esp. in the early years. "The Red Album" as it's affectionately known as, exempliflies the latter! While "On Time", "Survival" and others are more known for the former. "The Red Album" had that "hard-hitting" high impact sound. In some respects the instrumentation on this album reminds me of the early Black Sabbath years; only not as dark. As always with G.F.R., the one glaring weakness is Mark Farner's lyrics. It seems he always throws words together just so they would rhyme rather than reason. And this album is no exception. However, give Mark Farner his praise for a wonderful singing voice. I'd put him up against any gospel or R&B singer anytime! And his unique approach and attack on his guitar can be thrilling if not at times exhilarating! Not to be outdone, Don Brewer also has a great voice and can really fly on his drums as this album indicates. Mel Schachter with his deep bass lines really keeps pace and adds great bottom to these tunes (similar to what Lee Dorman has done for Iron Butterfly). All around, a very good and listenable CD. I would highly recommend it to you, if you like music from that era. Only don't blast it too loudly, You just might blast Grandma right out of her girdle!

This is the one to start with. No doubt. Its raw. The musicianship is sloppy. The lyrics can be silly. The band is young.

But it rocks. Much better on CD than vinyl (most Grand Funk was pressed cheaply for the masses and most vinyl copies are worn and scratched - that says something about its long term playability).

One of the most straight up and unfiltered rock driven recordings ever made. The guitar, bass, drums, and vocals are so in-your-face, its remarkeable, even if they are not craftily or creatively played. Decades after listening, Ive gotten a little tired of the songs (just a tiny little) but the sound is still punchy.

Highly reccomended a sone of the best albums to play really really really loud. And best on CD.

I first heard The Red Album back in 1970 while I was in Korea, and it blew me away still does' It was a very good Rocker, especially High Falootin Woman and Mr. Limousine Driver 'Winter And My Soul Hot, Very Hot

Red Album is along with Live Album the Quintessential Grand Funk Railroad Album. I was turned on to this album in early 1970 and have never stopped listening. This is the best Studio album in Rock N Roll Histroy. Red Album Starts off with "Got This Thing on The Moves" and then it moves into classic's such as "Please Don't Worry," "High Falootin' Woman," and "Mr. Limousine Driver." The Next song "In Need" makes you question weather you are listening to a studio album or a Live album. And as a matter of factGFR did all there early records as you would play them live (with lead Guitar and Vocals included), just adding a little rhythm Guitar track after to fill the sound. The CD moves on to "Winter And my Soul" next a bit of a changed from the rest of the album in style, but none the less is a solid rocker with some great lyrics. Then we Move on to "Paranoid" the quintessential GFR Power Trio Rocker with Mel Schacher Playing lead Bass, Mark Farner Wailing on the Lead Guitar and Don Brewer Pounding those Drums. This is one of the best hard rock songs in the history of music and is a freash today as it was 29 years ago and so is the whole album. Finally we end are trip though RED Album with GFRs cover of the Animals, "Inside Looking Out" and let me tell you I usually like the original version of songs better but not thsi time "Inside Looking Out" GFR style just kicks as* and far surpasses the Animals version. RED ALBUM, is a Must have, not only for every GFR fan but every Hard Rock fan the world over.

Rick Cappetto

THIS IS THE BEST CD THAT GRAND FUNK EVER PUT OUT.I CAN`T BELIEVE THAT THE RECORD COMPANY`S HAVE NOT PUT THIS OUT IN THE STATES YET,MAKING ALL FANS HAVING TO BUY THIS AS A IMPORT.THIS CD WAS MADE RIGHT IN GRAND FUNKS PRIME.HAS THERE EVER BEEN A BETTER SONG MADE BY FUNK THAN INSIDE LOOKIN OUT.I DON`T THINK SO.BUT THE WHOLE CD ROCK`S LIKE NO OTHER FUNK RELEASE.THIS WAS BEFORE MARK CUT HIS HAIR AND WENT INTO HIS JESUS THING,AND STARTED MAKING BAD CD`S LIKE ALL THE GIRLS IN THE WORLD AND SHINE ON.COME ON,THAT`S NOT THE GRAND FUNK I WANT TO REMEMBER.THE EARLY DAYS WERE THE BEST.THIS CD EARNS A 5 STAR.ALSO CHECK OUT CLOSER TO HOME.

This was an excellent follow-up album to GFR's first album "On Time". Considering all the great music on this CD, I'm surprised it hasn't yet been released in the US. It includes a couple of their signature songs in "Paranoid" and "Inside Looking Out", but they all rock!

The opening cut on this wonderful recording is called "Got This Thing On The Move." This would be a great title for this album, because that's exactly what every song on it makes you want to do. A combination of psychedelic rythmn n' blues and hard, driving rock, this is Grand Funk Railroad's best and most consistent effort. I agree with other reviewers that this is one of the greatest rock albums of all time. This is what truly exciting rock and roll is all about. What makes it so great? The recording flows from one song to the next (and within songs) with memorable melody and rythmn patterns which shift and change gears so as to never get boring. Everytime you listen, you listen to the whole recording because every song is fantastic; there is nothing approaching a weak song. And the production is incredible: the sound quality is crystal clear; you can hear each instrument distinctly and how each fits in to the total sound. The hard driving up-front bass, the blistering guitar, and the pounding drums all jump out of the speakers at you - it sounds as if the group is playing "live" in your room. I love the way the bass is used as a creative lead instrument, rather than a simple background thump-thump as in most so called "rock" music. I have nothing more to add, except: WHY IS THIS GREAT ALBUM ONLY AVAILABLE AS AN IMPORT? It is a crime that one of the most popular American groups (albeit of years past) has such a popular CD (judging by the comments of Amazon.com customers) that can only be bought in Europe and Japan but not its country of origin!!! ...And if you like this album, please check out the following from my list of greatest rock albums of all time (not in any particular order): Deep Purple-Machine Head; Led Zeppelin-II; Black Sabbath-Black Sabbath; Camel-Mirage; Uriah Heep-Look at Yourself; The Tea Party-Splendor Solis; Long John Baldry-It Ain't Easy; Alice Cooper-Killer; Queen-Queen; Wild Turkey-Turkey; Cactus-One Way or Another...

I really want to write an intelligent review of my favorite hard rock album of all time, but I just got to say, I defy anyone to find another album from this era that rocks like this one from start to finish, and rocks well. No matter how much I try to get into other 70's hard rock bands like Deep Purple, April Wine, Santana, Mountain, etc., I always come right back to Grand Funk, and this album in particular. It has such a memorable sound like no other.
I genuinely think that Grand Funk wanted to make a statement with every track on this album, the same way Deep Purple tried to make a statement with "In Rock", or Jimi Hendrix with "Are You Experienced?" It's just on that sort of level. Their first album, "On Time", sort of came and went with little fanfare, containing mostly semi-original music (mainly, borrowed riffs from the bands they were previously in, re-worked for headbanging consumption, much the same way Jimmy Page borrowed Yardbird-riffs for "Led Zeppelin 1", but creative use of those riffs making for great music, nontheless.) The major problem with the first album was the sound quality wasn't up to scratch, lead singer/guitarist Mark Farner being quoted as complaining that his guitar wasn't loud enough--actually, his guitar and Mel Schacher's Bass could barely be heard over the drums. None of which was a problem on this album. Producer Terry Knight did a 180 with the sound quality here, putting the guitar and bass WAY up front, and putting the drums in their rightful place in the back of the mix. They definitely wanted to be closer to the way they sounded live, and next to "E Pluribus Funk" and the "Live Album" itself, this one definitely captures that "live" feeling of all their albums. But right down to the sound, and even the cover art itself--with a photo of the three of them jamming, and the title of the album simply "Grand Funk", not "Grand Funk 2", as if to somehow erase the memory of the first album and start fresh, they certainly wanted to make a statement.
True, it didn't take them a whole lot of time to write the songs, rehearse, and make this album, but they didn't really need to. They did a lot of things on this album in one take because they were just that good--something you'll never hear other critics admit to. This having been one of the most poorly reviewed albums of all time, and listening to it a lot myself, I don't know what those critics thought they heard. I don't think they even really listened to it. They might have heard a few hard guitar riffs, and immediately wrote it off as "noise", much as they did with Black Sabbath. If they had bothered to listen to it all the way through, they would have heard three excellent musicians, all of them with over 5 years of playing professionally under their belts (albeit, high school bands), equally adept at playing melodies, tempo changes, and working through tricky arrangements, as they are at playing heavy. True, guitarist Mark Farner stole a few chops from his hero, Jimi Hendrix, but who, in 1969, didn't? In my opinion, Farner was one of the most creative guitarists of all time in his use of distortion, feedback, and overdubbing--the highlight on this album being "Paranoid", perhaps the heaviest song to come out in 1969, several months before Black Sabbath unleashed on the world their own (by the way, I think its no coincidence that Sabbath's album, "Paranoid", came complete with war sirens to open the album on their song "War Pigs", the same way war sirens open Grand Funk's "Paranoid", AND EVEN SOUND SAMPLED!!--gee, I wonder where the "biggest rip-off group" in history got the idea to do that??) Bassist Mel Schacher, the youngest member of the group, then only 18, was said to be the most underrated bass player of all time, with a improvising style and a distorted bass sound all his own--maybe Geddy Lee of Rush comes close in sound and style, but no one else could touch him. Even critics that hammered Grand Funk stopped short of speaking ill of Mel's talents. They often felt sorry for him, saying thing like he deserved a better group, but that's about it. His playing on this album probably represents his best, loud and clear, whereas on the previous album, you could barely hear it at all. And lest we forget Don Brewer, a drummer of the Jazz/Motown school, adding a nice touch to the group's blend of Motown, Blues, and Hard Rock. And as far as Motown, Blues, and Hard Rock, I don't think there was ever a better group in America at blending those three styles. And of all their albums, this one was probably the best at defining that "Grand Funk sound" from start to finish, one which provided much of the music for their live shows for years to come--because it's just good concert jamming material! An album of that Motown, Blues, and Hard Rock mixture so intoxicating, so contagious, I can't stay away from it long no matter how hard I try. It's Addictive!!

I love everything by Grand Funk (except that Loco-motion stuff!) but the red album, in my opinion, is the best. The music is powerful and hard-hitting. In lots of music today, the bass lines are simple and get lost. I'm a guitar player, but I'm fascinated with Mel's bass riffs and how it just rips thru me. Mark's tone is also incredible and he cranks out chords I've never heard of. But don't forget Don's great timing and quickness. Excellent mic placement on drums. Listen to this with headphones on and you'll hear what I mean. I originally had this recording on 8 track, then I bought the cassette and soon wore that out. I was lucky enough to find the CD on the rack in a small music store. I hate to make this comparison, but they should be the idols to grunge musicians today. Grand Funk was ahead of their time on this one. If you feel the same way I do about Grand Funk, or even if you disagree, drop me a line. joe_laq@yahoo.com