Country Joe & The Fish
Album: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Label: Vanguard
Tracks: 22
Website: http://www.acerecords.com

One of The albums of 1967, no question, and one which, to put no finer point on it, literally defined an era. The band were Berkeley-based, and on this their first "proper" LP release they presented to the unsuspecting world a genuinely pioneering work, a heady and distinctive musical cocktail that stirred bluesy psychedelia with politicised commentary and shifting experimentalism within a simple electrified backdrop that mingled intriguingly unusual guitar adventures (from two contrasted lead players) with intense Farfisa organ and yet - considering its time - the disc sported little in the way of studio effects or post-production work.

Looking back with the power of hindsight, guitarist Barry Melton sums up the album most perceptively in a quote placed at the head of the incredibly comprehensive 40-page booklet that accompanies this deluxe expanded reissue package. In his words, "in essence, psychedelic music is folk rock", in that "from a musicological point of view, what people call psychedelic music has to do with an intersection of the folk revival, and jazz, and a time of world music availability.

It was the logical place for folk rock to go, to where it became an improvisational art form, in part." And yeah, we can hear exactly what is meant listening afresh to the album's 11 tracks, which though ranging from surrealist tripping to nihilistic blues, time-suspending inner-space reflection to gawky rock with soul or country overtones, possessed a strangely definitive unity and for the most part literally did not sound like any other group. Source musics were moulded, shaped into something quite personal. Even the most accessible of the most unmistakable of the tracks, like Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine (if ever there were a Dylanesque title!) had a strongly individual vibe, but no first-time listener can remain unmoved by the cheeky circus-mode dual-waltzery of Porpoise Mouth, the dripping orientalism of Grace, the full-on blister of Death Sound and Bass Strings and the peculiar fragmentations of the cryptic multi-movement instrumental Section 43.

What's amazing now is that these tracks still possess the power to shock and stimulate the listener who's intimately acquainted with them from all those years ago - and at the same time surprisingly hard to gauge or estimate their original impact. Sure, the sessions had their clunkier moments, such as the overcooked sock-it-to-me mess of Love and the over-obvious comic-book politics of Superbird, but hell, I even find the Spoonful-like groove of the country-roller Sad And Lonely Times rather endearing (albeit totally out of place alongside some of its companions). But this reissue is essential for any number of reasons, not least in that it brings us the vintage 1967 mono and stereo mixes of the album on CD for the first time (an earlier reissue had been sourced from an early-80s mix then newly-created in response to known degradation of the original 2-track master tapes).

The internal clarity of the original Sam Charters stereo mixdown in particular is astonishing. And the presentation, which contains in its exemplary booklet a tremendous contextual essay by Alec Palao, loads of photos, and Sam's production notes on the individual songs with complete lyrics too - wow!

David Kidman