Moby Grape

Moby Grape | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 16, 1994)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: San Francisco Sound
• ASIN: B000000DP9
• Also Available in: Vinyl
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (84 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,677 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #5 in Music > Indie Music > Folk > Folk Rock
  • #5 in Music > Indie Music > Rock > Classic Rock
  • #46 in Music > Rock > Oldies & Retro > Garage Bands

Track Listings

1. Hey Grandma

2. Mr. Blues

3. Fall On You

4. 8:05

5. Come In The Morning

6. Omaha

7. Naked, If I Want To

8. Someday

9. Ain't No Use

10. Sitting By The Window

11. Changes

12. Lazy Me

13. Indifference

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

280 of 297 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Don't Buy This Trash!, December 5, 2003

By 

Gavin B. (St. Louis MO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Moby Grape (Audio CD)

Moby Grape deserves a remastering of this album which is one of the best sets of music to come out of the sixties. This is on a label owned by Matthew Katz, one time Moby Grape manager and owner of much Moby Grape's licensing rights. Katz even owns the name and has locked horns with former members of the use of the name without approval. The retail asking price is outrageous, considering it is a low qaulity CD transfer that sounds like it was transferred from a second or third generation tape. You can get better quality recording of Moby Grape on the internet for free! Katz will continue to exploit Moby Grape name as long as there are people willing to shell out 20 bucks for his garbage.

If bands like Ultimate Spinach and Peanut Butter Conspiracy are significant enough to be accorded remastering, then Moby Grape deserves a well done box set of all of their releases. Don't buy this garbage from Katz's San Franscico Sound label which has all but destroyed the integrity of the original vinyl issue. If Katz can't peddle this overpriced trash, maybe he will relinquish the rights to the Moby Grape albums to the surviving members of the band and they can work to release a proper digitally remastered re-issue of their catalogue. I don't care if they individually release their albums or issue a Moby Grape Box. We've all waiting too long for Mr. Katz to put this great band's music into the hands of someone who will do justice to the Moby Grape legacy.

46 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Mistreated classic, March 26, 2002

By 

hyperbolium (Earth, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Moby Grape (Audio CD)

The three star rating represents an average: 5 stars for the album itself, and 1 star for this overpriced, underproduced reissue from the San Francisco Sound label.

As other reviews testify, Moby Grape's 1967 debut represents both the band's high-point and an artistic peak of the mid-60s San Francisco scene. Contained in this album's scant 32-minutes are many of the brilliant threads that surfaced in then-contemporary bands (e.g., folk and rock sensibilities, country music sounds, group harmonies and songwriting, etc.), but boiled down to their essence by a keen commercial sensibility. The deftness with which Moby Grape packed their wares into 3-minute songs is impressive to this day, and David Rubinson's stereo production, especially the panning of the multipart harmonies, is breathtaking.

What's disappointing about this particular reissue is San Francisco Sound's combination of premium-price and budget-quality. Not only does this straight-up reproduction offer none of the extras befitting a landmark album such as this, it does so at an absurd list price. Compared to Columbia's 1993 2-CD "Vintage" set, lovingly produced by Sundazed Records' head-honcho Bob Irwin, this reissue appears anemic.

The pedestrian construction of this San Francisco Sound reissue is little surprise: the label is owned by one-time Moby Grape manager, Matthew Katz. The long, strained history between the band and Mr. Katz is well documented (including in the liner notes of "Vintage"), and includes Katz's attempts to keep the band from using the "Moby Grape" name (he apparently owns the copyright), as well as "fake" Moby Grapes that have been sent on tour. Extensive details of Katz's legal wrangling with It's a Beautiful Day, Jefferson Airplane, and others are widely published.

While Moby Grape diehards may pick nits with the "Vintage" compilation, it provides a superb overview of the band's career. It includes the entire debut album (augmented with an unreleased instrumental that wasn't finished in time for the original release), and is filled out with in-studio chatter, mono singles, live tracks, demos, selections from Moby Grape's later albums, a sessionography, photos, interviews and extensive liner notes. Used copies of "Vintage" can be found for the price of this single-disc reissue, and new copies appear to be available from amazon.co.uk. It's a mark of just how good this album is that even San Francisco Sound's lackadaisical reissue can't dim its brilliance.

34 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This record probably changed my life., November 1, 1999

By 

Jeffrey Parsons "infrequent reviewer" (Nashville TN) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Moby Grape (Audio CD)

As a young, inexperienced musician, I was fortunate enough to see a Moby Grape concert shortly after this record was released (at the Psychedelic Supermarket in Boston). I still remember that show as the best concert I've ever seen. Unfortunately, I saw them again a year later and, as many people know, things had taken a bad turn by then. I must confess I paid less and less attention to the band after that, but this first album has remained among my all-time favorites. I've recently changed careers after 30 years as a professional musician, a life I may not have had if this record hadn't ripped the top of my head off as a teenager. It makes me feel so great that general interest in this band is returning, even though one of the reasons for it is the death of Skip Spence. Nowadays I listen to jazz and classical, new rock and old rock, but Moby Grape will always be at the top of my list. Do yourself a favor and check it out.