Missionaria Protectiva

  TOWER OF POWER  Back To Oakland  (WB, 1974) - Funk, Soul       Arguably the best and certainly the most commercially successful album from one of the greatest horn section bands. ‘Back to Oakland’ featured blistering horn section writing and awesome soloing by a young Lenny Pickett who went on to lead the Saturday Night Live band for 20 years. TRACKLIST : Oakland Stroke...                        Don't Change Horses (In The Middle Of A Stream)                        Just When We Start Makin' It                        Can't You See (You Doin' Me Wrong)                        Squib Cakes                        Time Will Tell          ...

        Carla Thomas – daughter of Memphis disc jockey and singer  Rufus Thomas  – was only 10 years old when she started out with the Teen Town Singers (a chorus drawn from the black high schools around Memphis) and just 15 when the self-penned  Gee Whiz (Look At His Eyes)  sold a million copies in 1960 and became her signature song.       She was one of the first artists to record for  Stax , the label that came to define the Memphis sound.       With Stax-mate  Otis Redding  she worked up  Tramp  – in which the pair carried on a memorable mock quarrel – during an impromptu Christmastime session in 1966. In 1967 she toured the UK with  Redding ,  Sam & Dave ,  Eddie Floyd ,  Arthur Conley  and  Booker T  as part of the legendary ‘Hit The Road’  Stax  package tour.       Carla spent most of the 1970s in Los Angeles, pursui...

  JUICE NEWTON  Quiet Lies  (Capitol,1982) - Country rock        This album assured Newton three country hits (the first three tracks) as she found her way back to the country-rock sound she seems to do best. Her choice of covers works better this time as well. Her  Brenda Lee  ( Break It To Me Gently )  netted her a hit, and her  Gene Pitney  ( I'm Gonna Be Strong )  cover wasn't bad either. TRACKLIST : Heart Of The Night                        Love's Been A Little Bit Hard On Me                        Break It To Me Gently                        Love Sail Away                        I'm Dancing As Fast As I Can                     ...

  WILLIE NELSON  Red Headed Stranger  (Columbia, 1975) - Country       Willie Nelson’s career-defining masterpiece symbolizes the transition from the glossy Nashville Sound of the then-recent past to the more introspective songwriting of a new generation of country songwriters; it’s an indisputable classic that harkens back to the rich storytelling tradition of country and western music. TRACKLIST : Time Of The Preacher                         I Couldn't Believe It Was True                        Time Of The Preacher Theme                        Blue Rock Montana / Red Headed Stranger                        Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain                        Red ...

  RICHARD BETTS  Highway Call  (Capricorn,1974) - Country rock       ‘Highway Call’  built on the country styling of  ‘Blue Sky’  and  ‘Brothers and Sisters’  but more so. While this seemed new and innovative in 1974, in reality, Dickey Betts’ inspiration was based on his childhood exposures to country, bluegrass, western swing, and the music of Jimmie Rodgers. The fact it was released under the name Richard rather than Dickey Betts adds to the sense of personal history. The musicians that Betts gathered to record  ‘Highway Call’  were a mix of southern rock musicians like Chuck Leavell, Cowboy’s Tommy Talton, and producer Johnny Sandlin, and real country and bluegrass musicians like famed steel player John Hughey, and bluegrass fiddler Vassar Clements. There were also appearances by Frank, Leon, and Walter Poindexter who were related to the Rice Brothers, Tony, Larry, Wyatt, and Ron, and the American Southern gospel group...

  PETER FRAMPTON  Wind Of Change  (A&M,1972) - Hard rock       Beginning with his initial solo album,  Wind of Change , Peter Frampton laid the groundwork for the releases that would follow. While not his strongest overall work, all of the songs had that inestimable  something  that would define Frampton’s solo work -- a gentle, comforting style that kept each tune playing over and over in my head. Songs like “Fig Tree Bay,” “Wind of Change,” “It’s a Plain Shame,” and “All I Want to Be” can stand with anything he would write in the future. While all his best works touched on relationships, they were all different enough not to cloud the mind, and they remain fresh through repeated listens. TRACKLIST : Fig Tree Bay                    Wind Of Change                    Lady Lieright                 ...

  STEVIE NICKS  Rock A Little  (Modern,1985) - Pop/Rock       This album is not as gripping as her previous efforts, Bella Donna and The Wild Heart, but it has greater variety. Nicks hasn't abandoned commercial pop-rock as songs such as Talk to Me and The Nightmare attest. I Can't Wait and Sister Honey have her experimenting with hard-edged dance rhythms that use electronic percussion. In the slower songs her voice, with its strange shadings and quavering nasality, can be irksome. On I Sing for the Things, she sounds like a bizarre cross between Edith Piaf and Elmer Fudd. But Nicks is too smooth a pro to allow her vocal idiosyncrasies to mar the whole record. She employs talented sidemen such as guitarists Waddy Wachtel, Les Dudek and Michael Landau. Nicks herself rocks a little, and she explores some other tempos with equal polish. TRACKLIST : I Can't Wait                       Rock A Little (Go Ahead ...

  MIDNIGHT OIL  Midnight Oil  (Powderworks/Sprint,1978) - Rock       A promising beginning, but the Oils' sound hasn't fully gelled yet; they're not as tight as they could be, the production's tinny, and while the guitar work's accomplished, it meanders too much into conventionally show-off solos. This album is basically split between tough, catchy rockers ("Powderworks", "Run By Night", "Used and Abused") and unfocused art-rock excursions ("Dust", with a really interesting bassline that's the basis of the song, but not much else; "Surfing With The Spoon", that works up to an exciting climax; and "Nothing Lost, Nothing Gained", of which the less said the better). Even at this early stage, the rockers are all exciting, especially "Run By Night", about drinking whiskey and playing with the light. Yes, the Oils are a bit more hedonistic and less politically oriented at this point. They even have ...

        The industrial/groove mash-up of White Zombie’s most successful era owes a great deal to the talents of Sean Yseult, who commanded the low-end in the Rob Zombie-fronted group from their beginning in 1985 through their 1998 dissolution. With driving, danceable bass lines feeding into the more mechanized aspects of White Zombie’s hit albums  La Sexorcisto: Devil Music Volume One  (1992) and the supremely verbose  Astro Creep: 2000 - Songs of Love, Destruction and Other Synthetic Delusion of the Electric Head , the way Yseult meshed with drummer John Tempesta made for one of the best rhythm duos in heavy music in the ‘90s. WHITE ZOMBIE Astro Creep 2000 Geffen, 1995 https://www.sendspace.com/file/fu20ya

  GREENSLADE  Time And Tide  (WB,1975) - Progressive rock       "Time and Tide" is  a discontinuous work , where the inspiration of their initial works seems to have faded in favor of a much simpler and more immediate style. The compositions are all rather short and do not show the levels of complexity to which the band had accustomed us in the past. The  progressive  of the beginnings is here indeed contaminated by  pop  sounds, which make the album perhaps a bit too accessible, but do not deprive it of interesting elements and noteworthy tracks. One echo of the past that is immediately proposed again is the cover illustration, which returns to depict the symbolic four-armed character conceived by Roger Dean, this time, however, realized by Patrick Woodroffe. TRACKLIST : Animal Farm                        Newsworth                 ...

  GENTLE GIANT  Playing The Fool  (Chrysalis,1977) - Progressive rock       Recorded in 1976 on their European tour, this is prime Gentle Giant at the height of their powers. Highlights? Well, the entire album is just wonderful from start to finish. Kicking off with the sparklingly robust "Just the Same" from the  Free Hand  album, the band launches into one killer cut after another, like "Proclamation", the complex ditty "On Reflection", the mammoth medley "Excerpts From Octopus"(complete with uncanny Gary Green/Ray Shulman acoustic guitar solo), the classic and meditative opus "Funny Ways", to songs like "Experience", the rollicking "So Sincere", the hard rocking "Free Hand", to the heavy sounds of the medley "Peel the Paint/I Lost My Haed".  TRACKLIST : Just The Same / Proclamation                    On Reflection                    Excerpts...

  IQ  Living Proof  (Samurai,1986) - Neo-prog       The drums are really louder and more punchy, even having a pleasant permanent echo! The electric guitar is clean, highly pitched, and no doubt Mike Holmes plays and sounds better here, producing very subtle and ethereal, melodic & sustained solos more in the background. The keyboards are maybe slightly more in the background, creating with the drums and bass a very pleasant and addictive echoed live ambience. Peter Nicholls' confident voice is excellent, quite in the foreground, having a natural echoed live sound. The bass is VERY well played and elaborated, much better than on the studio album! For people who only know the later IQ ("Subterranea", "Ever", "Seventh House"), I recommend you this record, because it has more the atmospheric mood so present on the 3 records above. TRACKLIST : Awake And Nervous                        Outer Limits ...

  STARCASTLE  Citadel  (Epic,1977) - Progressive rock       The lead singer sings like Jon ANDERSON's. The bassist sounds like Chris SQUIRE's and has the same sophisticated style. The keyboards sound a bit like Rick WAKEMAN's, especially the moog. The guitar is quite more modest than Steve HOWE's.       It explains why this group is the most close to YES. Even the backing vocals sound like YES'. This record is not as best as the 2 first ones, mainly because of the less elaborated keyboards and composition complexity. The bass is still very solid, complex, tireless, full of bottom. The lead and backing vocals are still excellent. The guitar is a bit too shy. Drums too. This album is less progressive than the 2 previous ones, but better than "Real To Reel". TRACKLIST : Shine On Brightly                        Shadows Of Song                 ...

  PETER BARDENS  The Answer  (Transatlantic,1970) - Psychedelic/Prog rock       If you’re a connoisseur of psychedelic blues-rock,  The Answer  may be right up your alley. If you’re here chasing the steeples of sound associated with Camel’s classic albums, however, you’ve come to the wrong place. There’s a whiff of the stuff on the opening track,  The Answer , and Camel did revisit  Homage to the God of Light  in their early days. The rest of the record relies mostly on basic blues-rock riffs with Green’s guitar solos liberally sprinkled on top. The island pop of  I Don’t Want to Go Home  is a pleasant exception. TRACKLIST : The Answer                        Don't Goof With A Spook                        I Can't Remember                        I ...

  ASHRA  Blackouts  (Virgin,1978) - Rock/Electronic       Ashra’s  Blackouts  is an essential Berlin-school electronic album with Göttsching’s layered guitars and synthesizers building wonderfully hypnotic soundscapes that feel like floating in space. The German guitarist’s melodies are incredibly infectious as usual, and there’s a wonderful sense of motion with these tracks. Unlike his peers in the Berlin-school world, Göttsching uses a minimal amount of arpeggiator with his synthesizer lines allowing room for his guitar to fill the space.  TRACKLIST : 77 Slightly Delayed             Midnight On Mars             Don't Trust The Kids / Blackouts             Shuttle Cock             Lotus Parts I-IV https://www.sendspace.com/file/g53byh