Joy Unlimited for Krautrock

Originally a Mannheim pop band fronted by the powerful female vocalist Joy Fleming under the guise of Joy & The Hit Kids, they moved on to progressive and very different realms by the late-60's and adopted the name Joy Unlimited to record OVERGROUND featuring numerous cover-versions of well-known songs. Their second SCHMETTERLINGE was an odd album for the Pilz label, a complex and ambitious conceptual rock ballet suite performed by a larger much more multi-instrumental ensemble. It ran a wide gamut of styles, from spacious jazz, via psychedelic rock onto a wild tongue-in-cheek raunchy blues, where Joy invites the listener to indulge with her sexually in a most profane manner! A fascinating and unique album. After this, Joy went on to pursue a successful solo career, and the band continued without her. American singer Ken Traylor replaced Joy on REFLECTIONS, an album that developed themes from SCHMETTERLINGE, but with a varied rock fusion as explored by many British bands of the era, like Raw Material or Gravy Train. In sharp contrast, with German Joschi Dinier as vocalist, on MINNE the style changed to a very Teutonic, slightly Floh De Cologne like, progressive folk.

Joy Fleming (vocals), Hans Herkeene (drums), Albin Metz (bass, trumpet, trombone), Roland Heck (piano, organ, vocals), Dieter Kindl (bass, tenor sax, vocals), Klaus Nagel (guitars, flute, vocals)

OVERGROUND
LP Polydor 2371 050 (1970)

SCHMETTERLINGE
LP Pilz 20 21090-1 (1971)

REFLECTIONS
LP BASF 20 21686-1 (1973)

MINNE
LP BASF 17 22331-0 (1974)