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Complex prog rock inspired by Genesis primarily but you will hear a lot of different things that might remind you of any of a dozen other bands. These guys were just playing music they loved and did not mind if it crossed genre too much. They began in Houston in 1970, the CD contains liner notes so you get more of their history. Very cool stuff!
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Begun in Houston in 1969, brothers Duane and Bill Massey created an eclectic hard rocking progressive rock band that survived numerous line-up changes over the years and still exists to this day. An album, "Ruff Mix", was released in 1975 and features excellent arrangements augmented with blazing electric guitar by Richard Heath who went on to join Lic. This CD captures them in the early 80's where more emphasis was placed on hard guitar sounds, not necessarily metal but good Texas hard rock.
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Austin rural rock that had built up a good following and had incredible promise but for some reason their first recorded album never got picked up by anyone and remained shelved. As far as I know, this CD is the only way to hear this lost album, it's so obscure not even the track names are known. The band did change their name eventually and recorded another album which I know very little about.
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Heavy, rural psyche that features pretty acid influenced guitar (putting it mildly) stoned, psychedelic lyrics with an Eastern mysticism pervading. Effects include conch shell through echoplex (yup), flutes, walls of feedback, sort of what you might get if you mixed Ya-Ho-Wa 13 with Tangerine Dream, Loch Ness, Hendrix, and Amon Duul. Out There!
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Shotgun were a 1970s rock band from Dallas. The band consisted of Guy Houston on drums, Hugh Coleman on bass, John Michael Soria on lead guitar, Russ Skarsten on keyboards, and Billy Metcalf on lead vocals. The band's 1976 album, recorded but never released, Dallasian Rock was remastered and reissued by ShroomAngel Records, in 2014. Reviewing the album for seaoftranquility.org, Pete Pardo awarded the album five stars and said: "This is incredible material that should have been huge back in the day, and the amazing thing is it still sounds fresh and exciting here in 2014. The ShroomAngel team have done a wonderful job on the remastering, so be prepared for a killer listening experience."
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Released on vinyl, this features excellent multi-layered guitar, ripping bass and drum work, and Ian Gillan inspired vocals with dark, haunting, somewhat blues-tinged hard rock songs. Recorded in Rosenberg, TX. only a single 45 rpm was released, but the tracks on the 7" were from a previous demo recording done in 1974. This and much more is featured on the CD version, where you can hear for yourself why the world should have heard of the name Ottis Coleman, but hopefully now they will get the chance. For fans of Trapeze, Deep Purple.
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This is the first release on the Shroom Productions record label begun in 1995. It consisted of tracks mostly from Hands 1977 January Sound recording sessions in Dallas, TX. The CD was put together from that plus an assortment of other tracks because, at the time, it was not known if there would be another Hands CD, we just did not know what the demand would be. Well, some 3000 copies later, and there is STILL demand for this great music. Numerous reviews and consistently high ratings give praise to this band and this CD in particular. Discover them if you have not heard any of their music, I mean, if you love bands like Gentle Giant, King Crimson, Kansas, Yes, Camel, Happy The Man, Gryphon, Greenslade, UK, or PFM.
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Formed in 1972, Hands were originally called Ibis, and then a series of name changes which eventually led to Prism, which they were widely known as, until things got serious. With the production of high quality studio demos, they were forced to change names again, this time for good - with the name HANDS. These early recordings capture them at a time before the studio quality demos, when they were still working small clubs and colleges and playing a lot of covers (albeit very interesting ones).
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We got this tape years ago when it was submitted by a customer of ours who thought we would be interested in it. He was from Ohio, and told me he was friendly with the guys in this band. He managed to get their demo recording and sent it on behalf of the band. That was around 1986, and the recordings dated around 1983. That was the last I heard about it. Decades later, I rediscovered the tape and decided it was time. Heavy and complex, the first track of their demo tape was 45 minutes long! As you can imagine, there were no labels that took them on...except me of course!
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The twins Mark and Clark Seymour (and a third brother on Moog and assorted keys) have a very long history in music. They may be little known to the general public, but once upon a time they were "the next big thing"...until loads of cocaine, unscrupulous industry execs, and bad decisions got the better of them. The story is a long one so no way to repeat it here, suffice it to say this was a band that could have given Queen a run for their money. Carnegie were at their prime during the years 1977 and 1978, with demo recordings, record contracts, shows, and even occasional TV appearances -- this 2CD set gives you a rare glimpse into what could have, what should have been.
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From the ashes of the Moving Sidewalks, former members Tom Moore and Dan Mitchell decided to carry on playing the blues once Billy Gibbons formed ZZ Top and was doing straight up Texas style blues rock. Featuring Hammond B3 organ, the band had a different approach to blues rock but executed with the same kind of unique Texas panache. A single 7" was released but the band recorded quite a bit of material which never saw the light of day. This CD gathers most of those recordings along with a disc full of rare live tracks, of which include Ottis Coleman (Honest John, 1900 Storm, Texas Blend) replacing Tom Moore and Dusty Wakeman (bass) who also happened to be in The Barons and engineered the Honest John album in 1975.