A diverse mix of hard rock, blues, punk, and psych, all with a semi-garage flavor, and fairly non-commercial orientation. Grades - 1 A, 2 B's, 3 B-'s, and a C. This issue is anumbered micro-press of 350 copies.
From RYM (tymeshifter)
Surely his strongest release. Though his albums are generally considered commercial, this one generates strong cross-over appeal to the underground crowd. Just a hint of commercialism flavors this basically hard rock record, which features some strong psych overtones. Some of these tracks are actually pop/psych. Overall, it's a superb album, a real sleeper! Grades - 3 A-'s, 1 B+, 4 B's, and a C+.
From RYM (tymeshifter)
As the awesome fuuzy, bluesy pump of "Gotta See My Gypsy Woman" gets grooving, you'll feel like you're in old school heavy heaven. And this Japanese band certainly had their hearts in the right place when it comes to this kind of old school heavy ambling about. "Woman Called Yellow" and "Five More Pennies" are great, with plenty of power and energy, the latter bringing a slightly less cranked out MC5 to mind, and the same goes for "Leave Me Woman," which is superchanged R&B that just makes you shake whether you want to or not. But as much as I hate to pigeonhole bands on the basis of national origin, Strawberry Path did do the typical Japanese deal, and included a couple of ludicrously sappy numbers as well. But just as quickly the get back to business. There's even a "Moby Dick" style drum solo workout called "Spherical Illusion." Damn good record. And if you're motivated enough to find it, I'd also grab Blues Creation's second album, and Ranmadou's 1971 album to get a nice picture of early Japanese heavy stuff. From RYM (cirithungol)
"Color Humano 3" seemed to re-find the creative songwriting of the first album, perhaps featuring a better production for their 70s' heavy prog rock, and quite interesting instrumental passages, for instance in the long "Las historias que tengo".
The tongue-in-cheek "Mañana por la noche", "Hace casi 2000 años" & "Cosas rústicas" (aka "Coto de caza") must be the highlights of this final Color Humano's album...not a big fan of the Edelmiro Molinari's vocals, nevertheless I like the album, it's quite ace during some passages, a bit so-so at times though.
Color Humano never reached the excellence of other Argentine bands of its time, like Invisible, Almendra, Vox Dei or Manal, but will be reminded as part of the idealized 70s, and for albums like this one.
From RYM (death metal doll)
Disk 1 tracklist: A1 Ouverture / Take Warning A2 The Moment Life Appeared, A3 25 Øre
B1 Oppe I Træet, B2 To You, B3 Down Along the Cove, B4 April '68 (Instrumental) Disk 2: A1 You Upset My Baby
A2 And Who But I Should Be A3 Calypso
A4 Won't You Take My Place in the Queue B1 Slow Down Driver B2 The Daybreak B3 Kragerne Vender (Instrumental)
Wow, this is an example of good Cream emulation. This is also a huge improvement over the first album. The only weak track is the opener, "You Upset Me Baby". It's relatively bland blues rock. Don't be fooled into thinking that this represents the rest of the album. The second track, "And Who But I Should Be", has a very experimental sound, with changing tempos, alternating moods, lots of phasing, a whole bunch of sound effects. It's very interesting to say the least, and, overall, it's pulled off quite well. The third track was originally an upbeat folk track called "Calypso" (from what I've read), but the reissues replaced it with the heavy-blues "Party Beat", which has a very strong Cream vibe.
The next two tracks, "Won't You Take My Place in the Queue" and "Slow Down Driver", are quite simply some of the finest examples of heavy blues you'll ever hear, with an extra emphasis on "heavy". Very heavy for 1969. With extra loud fuzz.
Incredible as these two tracks may be, the track immediately after, "The Daybreak", continues the heavy tone of the previous tracks. It also happens to be the best track of the album. It's hard to describe how good it is. The slow blues rhythm (which is catchy as hell) grabs your attention immediately, and the amazing solo compliments it perfectly. Pure sonic bliss for 6 minutes straight.
And finally, the album ends with the 10 minute "Kragerne Vender". I used to hate this song, but it really grew on me. Unlike the rest of the album, this track is jazzy (after the bluesy first half), and not just because of the saxophone. The bass-line is easily recognisable as a jazz-rhythm, and the guitar even sounds exactly like the solo from the opening track of the Catapilla debut from 1970 (perhaps they heard this album?).
Anyway, this is highly recommended to anybody that enjoys heavy rock and doesn't mind the blues. From RYM (Andrupchik)
An orgy of fuzz and pretty much every other form of excess (musical and otherwise) ya wanna reel off, Shinki Chen’s 1971 solo LP is a cherished artifact among brain-damaged low life everywhere.
Backed up by his short-lived blues outfit, Power House, “Friends” is little more than a monument to Chen’s beyond wasted guitar pyrotechnics– and whatever adjective exceeds “beyond”– wasted psyche. Beginning with cymbals and who-knows-what-the-fuck-else (most likely 50 reasons why you should be stoned before you proceed any further) on a backwards loop augmented by some ivory-tinklin’, you are then treated to 40 minutes of heavily-phased vocals (so much so that you’ll feel like you’ve been underwater for nearly three-quarters of an hour), charmingly inept drumming and the sweet tonality of Chen’s beatifically sustained, singing licks. The undoubted masterpiece is “Farewell to Hypocrites,” 13 minutes of unhinged riffing that somehow manages to soar despite some monotone– in fact, kinda robotic– backing, courtesy of “His Friends,” who occasionally drag things down to a Procol Plod. Luckily, Thee Shink’s inventive string-bendin’ is always there to save the day.
From RYM (theepope)