The Temptations - Psychedelic Shack (1970)

♫ hey girl! i wanna mess around with you and feel so good and put my jumper on 'cause it's cold right now ♫

'cause psych = wanting to protest+weed
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feel so good

Terry Callier - What Color Is Love (1972)

Intricate/sophisticated arrangements would be the source of much inspiration to lesser artists a decade or so later also concerned with the human condition by way of their own 'profound' experience or observation- I'm thinking of you, sophistipoppers! Lyrically repetitive/sentimental like you'd expect from a soul record. Grand, organic, stoned, atmospheric, and melancholic like you mightn't. And that might be where the folk kicks in. Or was that jazz? Who can tell. Starting things with your best song and then repeating that but not as good with a few Withers-y ones to mask or dress up the repetition would be a terrible idea if it weren't for his fantastic voice carrying it. He might repeat himself, but he sounds good doing so. Not a terrible idea, but not a good one either. The ear longs for anything half as good as Dancing Girl and after 30 mins still has blue balls. This record will probably blue ball you. But it also has a song so good that it almost makes it worth returning to that blue ball state. And that's the most critical I can be of What Color Is Love/Terry Callier: you put your best song first. The others are pretty good too, but you put your best song first

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here
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Baby Huey - The Baby Huey Story: The Living Legend (1971)

Baby Huey's only album, released after his untimely death, is titled The Living Legend with good reason. He was legendary in his appearance, a 400-pound man with a penchant for flamboyant clothing and crowned by a woolly Afro, a look that is best illustrated by one of several rare photos included in the Water Records edition that shows our man in a wide-lapeled polka-dot shirt with a lime-green jacket. Beyond his unusual appearance, though, he was graced with a stunning, fierce voice on par with Otis Redding and Howard Tate, wailing and howling one moment and oddly tender and sentimental the next. Nowhere on Living Legend is his range more apparent than the opening track, "Listen to Me," where listeners are introduced to both the enigma of Baby Huey and his diamond-tough psychedelic funk backing band, the Baby Sitters. The high-energy instrumental workout "Mama Get Yourself Together" is worthy of the J.B.'s and a hazy, spiraling ten-minute rendition of Sam Cooke's chestnut "A Change Is Going to Come" confirms that the Baby Sitters could hold their own with Blood, Sweat & Tears. Further lore that catapults The Living Legend from good to great: the production was helmed by Curtis Mayfield, reason enough to make it near essential, and is highlighted by three of his compositions, "Mighty Mighty," which Mayfield and the Impressions recorded a few years earlier; "Running," a classic Mayfield cut that can only be heard here ripped to glorious bits by a band that is trying to let every member solo; and "Hard Times," which Mayfield himself would revisit on his 1975 album There's No Place Like America Today, although Baby Huey's razor-edged reading remains the definitive version -- no small caveat considering Mayfield not only wrote the tune, but could rightfully be considered one of the architects of soul to boot. 

-AMG

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spotify

Gonjasufi - MU.ZZ.LE (2012)

1. White Picket Fence

2. Feedin' Birds

3. Nikels and Dimes

4. Rubberband

5. Venom

6. Timeout

7. Skin

8. The Blame

9. Blaksuit

10. Sniffin'

Fuck the haters. If someone said to me hey MU.ZZ.LE is the best album of 2012 I'd think they were pretty cool even though I'd also be thinking this year hasn't been that good and also you should check out this blog I post on to hear Big K.R.I.T.'s new one and also Keepers of the Light 'cause they're straight up better

Weird nocturnal sounds, really good

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