Stoneground - Family Album (1971 us brilliant psychedelic/west coast rock - Flac)


É muito interessante o grande número de bandas que no final dos anos sessenta e início dos 70s, emergiram de comunidades hippies americanas, e mais interessante ainda deve ser vivenciar um estilo de vida totalmente fora do que é tradicionalmente considerada como sociedade, e além disso ainda poder criar e lançar excelente música!

Stoneground é um bom exemplo do que eu falei acima, vocês podem conferir isso através desse brilhante álbum duplo lançado em 1971. Desfrutem!


Stoneground was formed in 1968 in the San Francisco suburb of Concord, California. The original lineup consisted of Tim Barnes (guitars, vocals), Craig Randall (Bass, vocals), and Mike Mau (drums). Band manager and former Autumn Records executive Tom Donahue introduced the band to ex-Beau Brummels singer Sal Valentino and John Blakely (guitars, bass), both of whom joined Stoneground. 

Four female vocalists—Annie Sampson, Lynne Hughes, Lydia Phillips, and Deirdre LaPorte—were also added to the group. While touring America and Europe, the band added another new member, bassist/keyboardist Pete Sears, later of Jefferson Starship and Hot Tuna. 

Stoneground's self-titled debut album, released in early 1971, featured seven different lead singers on the album's ten tracks. Music journalist Robert Christgau said the album was "certainly the aptest use of Sal Valentino since the Beau Brummels were on Autumn". A Billboard review remarked that "Stoneground has a lot of advance publicity to live up to, and in light of their first LP the predictions may have been somewhat inflationary, though there's no denying the potential for excitement here".

During this touring period, Stoneground was a "traveling house band" for Medicine Ball Caravan, an attempt by Warner Bros. to promote the band and capitalize on the success of the concert film genre following Woodstock. 

The Medicine Ball Caravan film, which documented the 8,000 mile cross-country trip by 154 people in a "hippie caravan" of buses, trucks and musical groups, was directed by François Reichenbach—with Martin Scorsese as associate producer—and released in 1971. Three Stoneground songs appear on the original soundtrack, which also contains songs by Alice Cooper, B.B. King, Delaney & Bonnie, Doug Kershaw, and The Youngbloods. 

Allmusic writer Joe Viglione criticized the soundtrack for devoting "a third of the music [to] the bar band sounds of [Stoneground]".

Pete Sears left the band and returned to England to record on Rod Stewart's classic "Every Picture Tells a Story" album, later returning to the USA with Long John Baldry. Cory Lerios (keyboards, vocals) and Steve Price (drums) joined the band prior to the recording of Stoneground's second album, the double-LP Family Album, released in 1971. 

Billboard described the music as "infectiously exciting and ... colored by a wonderfully lighthearted feeling", and praised Lynne Hughes' vocals on "Passion Flower", the closest Stoneground ever came to having to a hit single. The song was also included on Fillmore: The Last Days, a 1972 triple live album chronicling the final run of concerts organized by rock concert promoter Bill Graham at San Francisco's Fillmore West, which closed on July 4, 1971. 

In 1972, the band released their third album, Stoneground 3. They also appeared in that year's Hammer Studios film Dracula A.D. 1972 starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing.

By 1973, the band was dropped by Warner Bros. due to disappointing record sales, and tensions within the group had risen after three years of constant touring. Stoneground's original formation played their final concert on January 6 at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium. The performance was released as an album, The Last Dance: Live January 6, 1973, by Dig Music in 2001. 

Within weeks of the concert, Sal Valentino left the group and moved on to a short-lived Beau Brummels reunion. Three other members—Lerios, Price, and David Jenkins—left to form the pop group Pablo Cruise. Barnes led various rosters of Stoneground for another ten years, along with original member Annie Sampson and singer Jo Baker, who joined in 1974. Other members included Terry Davis (guitars, vocals), Fred Webb (keyboards, vocals) and Sammy Piazza (drums). 

The band released three more albums during this period: Flat Out (1976), Hearts of Stone (1978), and Play it Loud (1980). In 1982, Stoneground released "Bad Machines and Limousines", an E.P. with early band member Pete Sears appearing as a guest on keyboards. In 2004, a reformed Stoneground—featuring Barnes and Price—released the album Back with a Vengeance.






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    1. EAC > Flac+.cue+log+scans

      http://www.mediafire.com/file/ljyo0ejigrc7n09/Stoneground_-_Family_Album.rar

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  2. Sigh.. for some reason i have always liked to discover obscure bands - this one is quite good.

    California's Stoneground the proto-jam band whipped up a melange of hard rock, country and blues (and, often some gospel-ish overtones in the vocals), a mixture that's often entertaining but at times also unwieldy as their 10- (or more) piece line up must have been to truck around the country.

    Stoneground "Family Album" originally released by Warner Bros. 2ZS 1956. in 1971 on original white label promo 2LP - Sides 1-3 recorded live in San Francisco 8/8/71. Side 4 recorded at the Record Plant, L.A. The music is West Coast hippie rock, not psychedelic and not boogie, but a kind of rhythm and blues infused with soul and elements of gospel!

    Stoneground built some early buzz before their debut album due to live performances, particularly by touring as the house band on the "Medicine Ball Caravan" -- a sort of traveling cross-genre Woodstock-ish festival organized by Warner and San Francisco DJ/occasional record label magnate (and Beau Brummels/Stoneground manager) Tom Donahue.

    Considering their rep was made as a live act with the ability to take on various types of music, it's not entirely surprising that the self-titled debut LP feels a bit unfocused. Despite the fact that half the 10 tracks were written by Valentino, the group goes for a democratic approach and seven different lead singers are featured, which leaves Stoneground sounding more like a compilation album than one band.

    When their debut didn't set the world on fire, Stoneground returned with a mostly live album for their second effort, the double-disc Family Album. Sides 1 through 3 were sourced from KSAN broadcasts, and the chance to hear the band in a live context brings into focus the sound they were going for much more clearly than the previous studio album. The group's easy-rolling groove sounds relaxed but still maintains an intensity missing on their earlier studio material. While Family Album does include more covers than band originals, Stoneground's interpretations are usually so much their own that the covers might as well be new songs. The live set starts with a rollicking version of Johnny Cash's Get Rhythm and the passion and excitement doesn't let up for over 60 minutes. The duet with Sal Valentino on guitar and Annie Sampson on vocals, "Precious Lord". Of special interest to Beau Brummels fans will be some uptempo new rockers by Valentino, and takes on a pair of obscure songs by Brummels songwriter Ron Elliott (who is also listed as co-producer with Valentino and Donahue).

    Stoneground 3 features 12 original songs, including six by Valentino, and adds horns to their sonic mix. This album is quite a bit more straightforwardly '70s pop/rock-oriented, with only a couple songs clocking in over four minutes. Along with including perhaps Valentino's best song for the group, "From a Sad Man into a Deep Blue Sea," it's certainly their most coherent-sounding album due to the more unified sound. I haven't listened to it enough yet to decide whether that coherency is an improvement over their earlier more free-wheeling efforts, though.

    @Nel:As always, thanks for sharing.

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  3. Thanks very much. Sal Valentino's voice is very distinctive and beautiful.

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  4. Links are dead. Please repost when you have time.

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    1. LINK:

      EAC > Flac+.cue+log+scans

      http://www.mediafire.com/file/ljyo0ejigrc7n09/Stoneground_-_Family_Album.rar

      Excluir

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