Customer Reviews

Moby Grape '84

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

 

 

In the never ending saga of bad mistakes of Moby Grape comes this entry in their catalog; a Matthew Katz-produced-and-released album. Of course, by buying this you gleefully fork over your bucks so Matthew Katz can afford to sue the Moby Grape. And, in his oft-time go after It's A Beautiful Day. Please, do everyone a favor and don't buy this. It's great music, but you can afford to pass on it. Moby Grape can't.

A must for the Grape nut. For anyone else you can buy the first album, a must have. 69 is another good one.

Just because the printing on the cover reads "Moby Grape" doesn't mean that the performers or composers have any relation to Moby Grape. This is not the same band that created, e.g., Omaha, Come in the Morning, Fall on You, Sitting by the Window, and Mr.Blues. Omaha, Come in the Morning, Fall on You, Sitting by the Window, and Mr.Blues feature imaginative rhythm changes. Moreover, these songs entail shifting of the lead voice among different voices with each voice having a different quality, e.g., earthy sounding versus more commercial (trained) sounding. In addition, these songs show changes in emphasis, where the emphasis is first on guitar, then on a multi-voiced chorus, and then on a solo voice. In contrast, the album being reviewed contains none of these qualities. No imaginative rhythm changes. No switching from guitar solo, to chorus, to solo voice. No shifting from typical "trained" commercial voice quality to an earthy voice quality. Do not be deceived by the cover art. The sound in the album under review is not relevant to the "San Francisco Sound." If you have already purchased Moby Grape's powerful first album, then your next step in pursuing the San Francisco Sound might be to buy: Surrealistic Pillow, the first three Grateful Dead studio albums plus their live Dark Star album, and Quicksilver Messenger's album containing The Fool. Of course, it wouldn't hurt to round out your San Francisco sound collection with the first Santana album, the first It's A Beautiful Day album, the second Big Brother album, and Country Joe (Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine; Janis; Fixin to Die Rag). I might also explore the first Sons of Champlin album, which contains the awesome "Sing Me A Rainbow," a song perhaps on par to anything created by Jeff Airplane. Because the song features an organ, and because of the "lovely" vocals, Sing Me A Rainbow embodies the "San Francisco sound." To conclude, the album under review is not Moby Grape.