Here’s my weekly reminder to listen to Sinking with Sylvia (and Sometimes Todd) on Little Radio on Thursday morning from 11:00AM to 1:00PM PST. Tomorrow their guest will be Jim Putnam from the Radar Bros. Jim will be talking about the Radar Bros. excellent new album, Auditorium, the last night of their residency at the Echo, and what the future holds for the band.
Each week I make one selection on the show, and then I write about it here. On November 15th, 2007 my pick was Billy Nicholls’ “London Social Degree.” As you might have guessed by now, I’m a sucker for those “lost masterpiece” albums. According to the All Music Guide, Nicholls was 16 when George Harrison helped him get some demos recorded and submitted to the Beatles publisher. The songs got the attention of Rolling Stones manager, Andrew Oldham who was starting a label. Nicholls signed to Oldham’s label, Immediate, as a staff songwriter. With Oldham at the console, Nicholls recorded a full album, Would You Believe. Press copies were sent out in 1968, but the album never hit store shelves.
A CD copy was finally released in 2000. A lot of these lost masterpiece albums never live up to the hype, but this one largely does. The album is heavily influenced by Brian Wilson and features Pet Sounds-influenced production. Many of the songs feature heavy stings, session men and layered vocal arrangements. While it’s certainly no Pet Sounds, it is a very solid record. “London Social Degree” is indicative of what you get with the rest of the record. It captures Nicholls life at the time – being a young Londoner in the late 1960s doing LSD and hanging out with the Small Faces, the Who and the Stones’ crowd. If you’re into late 1960s, British, orch-pop then you’re going to dig this album. Forever’s No Time at All, a two-disc retrospective of Nicholls entire career, was released a couple of years ago on CD. If you’re intrigued by Nicholls, I’d pick that one up, because of a lot of his later songs are well worth hearing too.
Billy Nicholls’ website (you can sample some MP3s in the music section)
The All Music Guide entry on Nicholls (a source for some of this information)
Each week I make one selection on the show, and then I write about it here. On November 15th, 2007 my pick was Billy Nicholls’ “London Social Degree.” As you might have guessed by now, I’m a sucker for those “lost masterpiece” albums. According to the All Music Guide, Nicholls was 16 when George Harrison helped him get some demos recorded and submitted to the Beatles publisher. The songs got the attention of Rolling Stones manager, Andrew Oldham who was starting a label. Nicholls signed to Oldham’s label, Immediate, as a staff songwriter. With Oldham at the console, Nicholls recorded a full album, Would You Believe. Press copies were sent out in 1968, but the album never hit store shelves.
A CD copy was finally released in 2000. A lot of these lost masterpiece albums never live up to the hype, but this one largely does. The album is heavily influenced by Brian Wilson and features Pet Sounds-influenced production. Many of the songs feature heavy stings, session men and layered vocal arrangements. While it’s certainly no Pet Sounds, it is a very solid record. “London Social Degree” is indicative of what you get with the rest of the record. It captures Nicholls life at the time – being a young Londoner in the late 1960s doing LSD and hanging out with the Small Faces, the Who and the Stones’ crowd. If you’re into late 1960s, British, orch-pop then you’re going to dig this album. Forever’s No Time at All, a two-disc retrospective of Nicholls entire career, was released a couple of years ago on CD. If you’re intrigued by Nicholls, I’d pick that one up, because of a lot of his later songs are well worth hearing too.
Billy Nicholls’ website (you can sample some MP3s in the music section)
The All Music Guide entry on Nicholls (a source for some of this information)
Fan run Myspace page (more songs to sample)
2 comments:
Got this album the other day. I love it! Would definitely recommend.
Would you believe is really a lost masterpiece.. ...it brings a smile on my face everytime I listen to it...
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