The American Metaphysical Circus is a 1969 album by Joseph "Joe" Byrd. It was recorded after his departure from the band The United States of America, and featured some of the earliest recorded work in rock music extensively utilizing synthesizers and vocoder, along with an extended group of West Coast studio musicians Byrd named "The Field Hippies". The album is most noted for "The Sub-Sylvian Litanies", which opened Side A. This three-part suite has been described as "an entire acid trip in 11 minutes". Other album highlights include the equally psychedelic "The Elephant at the Door", and the politically charged "Invisible Man", written for and aimed squarely at President Lyndon B. Johnson. Two of the more unusual tracks on the record are "Mister Fourth of July" — a ragtime tune complete with scratchy 78RPM-style effects, and "Leisure World", featuring narration from long-time ABC voice-over and "Ghoulardi" originator Ernie Anderson in an ode to California's first retirement mega-community.[citation needed]
Among the musicians featured on the record are prominent West Coast studio musicians Tom Scott and the late Ted Greene, who is credited with the album's stellar guitar work in one of his few recorded appearances. Meyer Hirsch was a member of the Buddy Rich Big Band and is an experimental composer. Vocalist Victoria Bond has gone on to a prominent career as a classical composer, conductor and vocalist. Fred Selden, a student of Byrd's at UCLA, joined the Don Ellis Orchestra (led by Byrd's partner in the UCLA New Music Workshop), received a Grammy nomination, and later returned to UCLA to receive his Ph.D.
The extensive use of effects, delays, echoes, backwards vocals and other recording tricks and techniques are reminiscent of some of the experiments and work carried out by George Martin as well as Pink Floyd.
Re-upload please!
ResponderExcluirSorry! Got the link to work!! :-)
Excluir