Stark Reality - Now
Tripped out funky psych-rock interpretations of jazzy children's songs. Stark Reality features Monty Stark on vibes, leading a quartet featuring drums, bass and guitar. Recorded in 1968-1970, these tracks have a lot of psychedelic flavor, but there is also quite a bit of funkiness. Also, there are moments that are quite loose, and moments that are extremely tight musically. Recommended for lovers of psych, fusion jazz, funk, or just generally interesting music -some of you are really going to love this one.
Tracks 1-8) Selections from The Stark Reality discovers Hoagy Charmichael's Music Shop. This album is one of the Holy Grails of crate digging culture, original copies regularly change hands for $500 on eBay. Originally produced for a special on Boston's public television station WGBH about the music of Hoagy Charmichael, these are way tripped out versions (there's plenty more background in the liner notes).
1) **Dark, slow. Starts with open drums, clanking percussion, plenty of fuzz
2) *Mellow jazzy interplay of vibes and wa-wa guitar, vocals with odd harmonies
3) Discordant, percussive
4) *Metallic fuzzed out vibes, marching vocals
5) Mellow at first builds up to a nice freak-out at the end, good one to frighten the kids with
6) *Up-tempo fuzz, floating echo-y vocals, with a really satisfying distorted guitar finale
7) Rocking, essentially a long guitar solo and instrumental intro with some
8) **Down tempo fun intro to music theory, with some real nice open drumbreaks
Tracks 9-12) Bonus tracks, these are Monty Stark orginals, not from the Music Shop LP, but very much in the same vein. These songs also feature a larger band including horns.
9) *Funky off kilter song about roller coasters
10) Strange off-key singing
11) **Very funky baritone sax
12) **Groovy little tune originally released on a 45, chugging, with more slightly discordant vocals
Tom Purcell, October 2003