Believe it or not, I haven't been going too bonkers picking up weird bargain bin LPs lately. It's partly because I still have a pile of past purchases that weren't keepers and need to find new homes, and partly because the pickings have been somewhat slim in recent months. There's a lot more competition for cheap vinyl lately, apparently!
Here's a trio of records I got to before anyone else did.
Racey, Smash and Grab: There's a certain category of mysterious records one encounters in the used bins that look interesting, but are often priced just a bit too high to take a chance on. However, because few others know what they are either, eventually most of them leave the regular price zone and get bumped to the dollar bin. Smash and Grab by Racey is a perfect example.
The few copies I've seen over the years have all been European imports on producer Mickie Most's RAK Records label, so I'm guessing it probably never was released in the U.S. Most himself is credited with producing Smash and Grab; even more promising, there's some songwriting involvement by Mike Chapman and Nicky Chinn, pioneers of a very specific glam-gum sound in the '70s employed to great success by Sweet, Suzi Quatro and others. Racey's Chinnichap numbers come across like Sweet crossed with Bay City Rollers, which could be a good thing or bad thing depending on the listener. It turns out a couple of them were big hits in the UK, hitting the top ten.
Elsewhere on the album, Racey mostly follows a somewhat similar (if less clappy-stompy) formula. They do go sideways into new wave occasionally, as on "There's a Party Going On," a dead ringer for the weird keyboard sound of early Squeeze hits such as "Goodbye Girl." Even more interesting is "Kitty," which Chapman and Chinn re-wrote a couple years later for Toni Basil, resulting in the massive hit record "Mickey." Somewhat oddly, it appears there were dueling bands touring as Racey in the 2000s -- see here and here -- both including some original members. (RAK/EMI Electrola 1C 074-63 261, Germany)
Jeffrey Cain, Whispering Thunder: For a brief time, the Youngbloods had the Raccoon record label in collaboration with their then-home, Warner Brothers. Apart from the band’s own albums, this label provided a home for other productions by the band's members. Most of those side-project LPs don't turn up all that often. Those I've heard have been country-folk influenced rock similar to the Youngbloods' own sound ... and a pair of classic albums by the indescribably iconoclastic Michael Hurley.
Jeffrey Cain also had a pair of albums for the label, the second of which was Whispering Thunder. It's not the transcendent experience that finding another Michael Hurley on the label's roster would be, but it's occasionally more aggressive than many singer-songwriter efforts of the time. Cain alternates between folk-rock songs aiming for a Youngbloods sound, hippie blues, and rockers that let lead guitar player Eddy Ottenstein show his stuff. The rockers, particularly "When I'm Thirsty," stand out on first listen; the rest will take a few more spins to make an impression. (Raccoon 12/Warner Brothers BS 2613, 1972)
Dan Sorkin, Folk Singing One: It's no secret to regular Vinyl Cave readers that I have a soft spot for '60s folk records. I'm also intrigued by vintage comedy albums, which can provide a unique historical insight into the last several decades. Folk Singing One by Dan Sorkin somewhat improbably combines both those interests into an entertaining package.
Framed as a course in folk music, WCFL Chicago radio jock Sorkin leads a live audience at the Gate of Horn through a discussion of folk instrumentation and song styles, aided by an occasionally unhelpful ensemble called the Plucker Family. The writers -- all material here is credited to Ernie Sheldon and Dick Powell, rather than Sorkin or any of the performers -- clearly knew the genre well enough to poke fun at it, and the album solidly skewers the folk scare tropes encountered on hundreds (thousands?) of albums from the early '60s. Though it's snarky, the album remains good-natured enough that it's pretty damn funny if you're a folk fan.
It turns out the writing team had at least one inside man in the folk scene, as Sheldon released a straight folk album as part of a duo on Mercury around the same time; the identity of Dick Powell remains a mystery. Apparently Chad Mitchell had something to do with bringing this project to Mercury, as he's credited as "Recording Director" on the jacket. (Mercury MG 20861/SR 60861, 1963)
