This weeks featured groups are Cold Sun and The Chambers Brothers

Cold Sun – Dark Shadows (Rockadelic Records 1989)
Cold Sun - Dark Shadows Front Cover
Personnel:
Bill Miller – Lead Vocals and Electric Autoharp
Tom McGarigle – Guitar and Backing Vocals
Mike Waugh – Bass and Backing Vocals
Hugh Pattern – Drums

Track Listing

Side 1
01 Ra Ma (Miller, Mcgarrigle, Nelson)
02 See What You Cause (Miller)
03 Here In The Year (Miller)

Side 2
01 Twisted Flower (Miller)
02 South Texas (Miller)
03 For Ever (Miller)
04 Fall (Miller, Taylor)

The LP is a limited (300 copies) pressing of the bands demos from 1968, the recordings where made by Sonobeat Records with a view to selling the finished recordings to a major label, in the same way Sonobeat had done with Johnny Winter, sadly no one seemed interested at the time. The band name was not the name they used for gigging which was Amethyst, they formed in 1968 and originally featured drummer John Kearney who had played with The Spades, Roky Erikson’s pre Elevators band. The sound of Cold Sun is quite heavily influenced by both the 13th Floor Elevators and The Velvet Underground the vocals and lyrics are very much reminiscent of Easter Everywhere period Elevators, the epic 11 minute opener from the Dark Shadows LP Ra Ma is almost Cold Sun’s “Slip inside This House” !!!! with mystical acid influenced lyrics and ringing electric autoharp, its quite a fabulous opening track, although it was originally to be the LP’s finale, a great tune as either a finale or opening cut. Surely this is one of the great missing artifacts of the Texas Psychedelic scene, and is very hard to come by, but rumors are circulating of a CD release with live cuts from 1968/9, I am looking forward to this event should it happen. Sorry to say the band split in the early 1970′s but ironically ended up (minus Tom McGarigle) as Roky Erikson’s band under the name Blieb Alien!! and Bill Miller was instrumental in the formation of Roky’s next group The Aliens and his electric autoharp being an important part of their sound, just check out the runes LP, Bill now goes under the name Billy Angel and performs around the USA as part of the group “The Blood Drained Cows” which also features ex-members of The Angry Samoans
For more info on the Cold Sun story check out this rather excellent web page http://members.tripod.com/lysergia_2/LamaWorkshop/lamaColdSun.htm

The Chambers Brothers – Time Has Come Columbia Records 1966
Time Has come Front cover
Personnel:
Lester Chambers – Vocals and Harmonica
Willie Chambers – Vocals and Guitar
Joe Chambers – Vocals and Guitar
George Chambers – Vocals and Bass
Brian Keenan – Drums

Track List
Side 1
01. All Strung Out over You (Clark) – 2:30
02. People Get Ready (Mayfield) – 3:52
03. I Can’t Stand It (Chambers) – 2:42
04. Romeo and Juliet (Chambers) – 4:32
05. In the Midnight Hour (Cropper/Pickett) – 5:32
06. So Tired (Chambers Brothers/Goodwin) – 4:05

Side 2
01. Uptown (Mabry) – 2:56
02. Please Don’t Leave Me (Chambers) – 3:00
03. What the World Needs Now Is Love (Bacharach/David) – 3:20
04. Time Has Come Today (Chambers/Chambers) – 11:06

Time Has Come is their first LP for Columbia Records and contains the groups first chart hit “Time Has come Today!” the LP mix weighing in a hefty 11:00 mins is a true psychedelic soul masterpiece but these guys are no “one trick dog” the LP is 100% quality all the way through from the stomping “All Strung Up Over You” and equally as stomping “I Can Stand It” to a really strong cover of “The Midnight Hour” the beautiful “So Tired” a good cover of the Bacharach/David song “What the World Needs Now Is Love” to the amazing “Time Has Come Today” this 1966 tune is like an amazing hybrid of Love’s “Little Red Book” and Paul Butterfield’s “East-West”.
These guys are still performing, go here for more info http://www.lesterchambers.com/
There’s interview here http://www.soul-patrol.com/funk/chambers.htm
A rather sad story about Lester Chamber’s record collection

http://www.boingboing.net/2003/07/29/music_legend_lester_.html