MIGHTY BABY

After releasing a very good psychedelic/ folk album the year before MIGHTY BABY are back in 1971 with "A Jug Of Love". There was a slight country vibe on a few of the songs on the debut but here it's like they've gone full blown country but not quite. It's mostly heard from the guitarist and his style and tone and not the vocalist thankfully although it really doesn't matter as this is a rare 2 star album for me.

The songs for the most part are slow moving with that country sound, the exception is "The Happiest Man In The Carnival" as far as that country sound goes and the only tune with energy is the regretfully named "Keep On Juggin'" with country guitar upfront. Yikes! And speaking of that he's singing of old country roads on "Tasting The Life" a slow piece at that. Sounds like fiddle on the closer. I hope it is.

This was painful for me but if you like country you might want to check this out.

MIGHTY BABY were a five piece band out of London, England and this is their debut from 1969. This band arose out of the ashes of THE ACTION and the debut here I would describe as psychedelic with some folky flavours. The keyboardist by the way adds sax and flute.

"Egyptian Tomb" the opener and "House Without Windows" are the two outstanding tracks for me, liking both from the first spin. The opener especially with those sax leads and uplifting sound just sounds amazing. Gotta love the acid guitar leads on this album as well, I'm not as into the piano but check out the organ on the closer that is quite upfront and just floats on and on. Cool song and a top five.

"Same Way From The Sun" is another top five and the most psychedelic and uplifting track on here. "A Friend You Know But Never See" rounds out my top five. The three I'm not that into yet even with each of these songs there's sections I'm impressed with making this a four star record for sure. But "I've Been Down So Long", "Trials Of A City" and "I'm From The Country" are those three with a country/folk vibe on each yet as I said so much more than that. I understand they went more into the direction of these three songs on their next and last album "Jug Of Love".

Despite the odd band name I'm very happy to include this in my Psychedelic section. I will check out their other record down the road hopefully. This one is a keeper.

MIGHTY BABY were a two-album Psychedelic Rock band from London, England, who were previously known as The Action. Their first album "Mighty Baby" (1969) was firmly rooted in American Psychedelic Rock. They had a change of direction with their second album "A Jug of Love" (1971), which had more of a laid-back spiritual feel to it, due to several members of the band taking up the Sufi faith in the interim period between the two albums. Let's take a mighty leap now into the psychedelic world of Mighty Baby's eponymously-titled first album.

We're in Raiders of the Lost Ark territory for the glorious opening number, "Egyptian Tomb". It's a trippy acid-drenched song that perfectly captures the American West Coast sound of the late 1960's, emulating such bands of the time as Quicksilver Messenger Service and Jefferson Airplane, only with a saxophone providing some additional flawless flourishes. The music brings to mind exotic images of pharaohs, sphinxes and pyramids, and camel rides across the desert beneath a burning red sun. Just watch out for those nasty scorpions and huge camel spiders though. There's more sunny psychedelia on the way with "A Friend You Know But Never See", another full-blooded blast of Psychedelic Rock with a powerful driving rhythm and some magnificent fuzzy guitar soloing. This is a perfect sunburst of rainbow-coloured psychedelia for listening to in a free-and- easy hippy commune on a sunshiny day in Southern California, or failing that, listening to at night with the lights off where you're free to do some California Dreamin' of sun, sand, sea and surfing, regardless of whether all the leaves are brown and the sky is grey, on a winter's day. There's a pleasant change of pace for "I've Been Down So Long", which begins as a nicely laid-back groove to put you in a mellow mood, but this is only a prelude as the dazzling guitarist has his amp turned up to eleven and he's more than ready to deliver another scorching hot guitar solo in a magnificent crescendo of sound. We're continuing the wild ride with more psychedelic red-hot vibes in "Same Way From the Sun", a footloose and fancy-free fuzz- toned guitar freak-out from beginning to end.

Opening Side Two is a "House Without Windows" which must be a very dark house indeed. The music is as bright as a sparkling crystal though, featuring six uninterrupted minutes of musical magic in another groovy psychedelic jam session. There's no let-up in the incredible pace with "Trials of a City", a bluesy psychedelic jam which barrels along at full-speed ahead. These London guys have really nailed it when it comes to playing American Psychedelic Rock. They sound like they were born and raised within sight of the Golden Gate Bridge, instead of the sprawling suburbs of London. We're slowing things down a bit now with "I'm From the Country", a pleasantly countrified, mellow diversion amongst the heavy Psychedelic Rock numbers. This is the kind of laid-back West Coast sound we're accustomed to hearing from any number of U.S. Country Rock bands, although it's rare to hear it played so authentically by a London-based band, where there's not a lot of sea and surfers to be seen. The final song "At a Point Between Fate and Destiny" has a somewhat solemn and spiritual air to it, which opens to the sound of a beautiful church organ. The music sounds mystical and hauntingly atmospheric and represents the real highlight of the album. It's a charming and blissful melody floating amidst a sea full of psychedelic rockers surfing on Californian waves of sun-drenched late-1960's music.

"Mighty Baby" is a mighty fine album for all of the psychedelic rockers out there who lived through the "Summer of Love" year of 1967 and want to rekindle those bygone, flower-power free-love days. You can re-live those halcyon days at any time of the year and travel back in time whenever you listen to this evergreen album of sparklingly effervescent psychedelia.

Mighty Baby was a Savoy Brown-related band, in that guitarist Martin Stone was a member and played of Savoy Brown's debut Shake Down from 1967 (that album was unknown to many American fans of the band due to it never being released here). Mighty Baby managed two albums, this being their debut, appeared on Head Records in the UK and US (in the US it was oddly distributed by Chess Records, a label I associate with R&B, blues, and early rock and roll, like Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, etc.). Also we get a Roger Powell on drums, not THAT Roger Powell from Utopia, a British musician with the same name. I noticed Ginger Baker was a big influence on his drumming as he did a lot of those same type of cyclical fills that Baker did (Baker would likely be less than impressed if he heard it, given his unnecessary contempt for other drummers). It's the kind of album I felt should have been on Decca (due to the Savoy Brown association), but being on Head meant the album received limited distribution at the time making it a bonified rarity. While Savoy Brown pretty much stuck to a blues format (competing with contemporaries like Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac, Ten Years After and John Mayall's Bluesbreakers), Mighty Baby obviously stretched out and took a more diverse format, in a psychedelic format. The opening cut "Egyptian Tomb" is a great piece of psych with early prog leanings. "A Friend You Know But Never See" is more in the straight up heavy psych vein, with some of those Ginger Baker type drum fills I mentioned. "I've Been Down So Long" is more in the country vein bearing more than a passing resemblance to the Grateful Dead. Even some of the vocals sound like Jerry Garcia minus his trademark guitar playing (I could even imagine the Dead playing this song live and it could easily pass as one of their own). "House Without Windows" and "A Point Between Fate and Destiny" are clearly in the prog/psych vein, while "I'm from the Country", unsurprisingly has more of that country/Grateful Dead feel to it.

While an original LP, regardless if its a UK or US pressing, will cost you a pretty penny, go seek out a reissue. This is really worth your time!

Mighty Krauty Trippy psychedelic live from UK. This incredibly delightful, fantastic gig in 1971 can be called as sorta their legacy. Although their acceptable catchiness heard e.g. in "Trials Of A City" sounds like 60s bluesy psychedelic rock like Iron Butterfly, addictive, aggressive improvised energy of leapfrog all over the entire live (album), first of all, reminds me of long trip gigs by Grateful Dead, and at the same time notifies me of authentic Krautrock texture like Eiliff (this is the reason why I thought they should be approved as a Krautrock combo).

Even in the first pickup and their signature song "Egyptian Tomb" are plenty of improvisational, spiritual mashup phrases. Monotonous loose lazy blues rock between freakout improvisations is comfortable indeed, but their real "might" should be upon another turf. The longest track (over 20 minutes!) "India", that might be the highlight upon this stage methinks, has various musical, rhythmic appearances. Mainly impromptu, improvised rock / blues sensation was played, without any deformation nor distortion. The audience might be quite happy drenched in such a tripping atmosphere, and enjoy in front of "the mighty babies" without any breath.

It's a pity they are appreciated simply as an old-fashioned progressive rock unit. Let me say they are non-German Krautrock prototype from UK. Why cannot we get amazed at their gorgeous live album?

A solid four stars for this wonderful second Mighty baby album. Quite different in style compared to the first psychedelic (and also excellent) first album. The instrumentation is very pure, mainly guitar/piano. "Jug of love", the eponym opening track is a good example: a mellow and upbeat tune, sweet waves of guitar/piano with a fluid and spacey quality similar to QUINTESSENCE, without the religious, mystic fervor. "The Happiest Man in the Carnival" is another highlight, lot of guitar/piano/flute extatic moments and there's no doubt about the proginess! Cherry on the cake, singing is very pleasant and soft, with a tone which evokes Rick Wright at times. The general mood is hippy, meditative, and sligthly upbeat. A fantastic aerial feeling somewhere between QUINTESSENCE and POPOL VUH. "Keep On Juggin'" is another substantial piece with a more groovy bluesy feeling, trippy psychedelic guitar parts betray another major influence from the GRATEFUL DEAD. "Virgin Spring" is a charming evanescent, melancholic tune featuring superb piano/acoustic guitar parts and still that spacey, sound, "planant", as we say in french. Perfect! "Tasting the Life" shows a bluesier, down-to-earth facet of their sound and still featuring great guitar, while "Slipstreams"gently ends the record. The 2006 Sunbeam CD edition i own is good sounding (natural) and features good bonus, alternate and unreleased tracks "(Ancien traveller" is from the first era).

An overlooked late-sixties psych-rock gem, Mighty Baby's self-titled 1969 debut somehow got lost amongst all the 'Atom Heart Mothers' and 'In The Court Of The Crimson Kings' upon it's initial release. Although a fairly straight-forward of R'n'B, folk, rock and psychedelic influences, which, technically-speaking at least, is closer in spirit to the likes of The Beatles, The Doors and Jefferson Airplane than it is to any of the genre's popular progressive rock acts, 'Mighty Baby' showcased an inventive and surprisingly-experimental outfit whose West coast-leanings contrasted nicely with their UK beat-group origins. Songs, such as the impressive, country- flecked rocker 'A Friend You Know But Never See' start as seemingly-simplistic late-sixties psych-tinged rock, before breaking headlong into complex, overlapping rhythms that spin off into Jerry Garcia-inspired oblivion and back again via semi-progressive instrumental passages that feature Cajun violins, bluesy-guitars and folk-pressed vocals. Fans of The Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Wizards From Kansas, as well as early rainy-day UK psych purveyors The Move, Tomorrow and The Magic Mixture should find much to admire on this enjoyable album, and whilst there may not be the complex keyboard passages, rampant experimentation and surreal conceits that ordain the best 1970's prog, Mighty Baby's brand of all-encompassing Beatles-ish psych-folk-rock remains refreshingly unique. STEFAN TURNER, LONDON, 2010