The best Captain Beyond post, ever

Oh, my did this album freak out my delicate ten year old brain back in 1972......"Stoner Rock", pure and simple, 35 years before anyone ever dreamed of the terminology. The self-titled debut is an absolute masterpiece of heavy psychedelic blues/rock, the stoner bands of the 2000's are still trying to catch up to it, it is, in my opinion, the blueprint for MOST music that we currently place under the "stoner" tent, right down to the very awesome 3-D album cover. Captain Beyond, for this disc, were vocalist Rod Evans, guitarist Rhino, bassist Lee Dorman,  drummer Bobby Caldwell, and keyboardist Lewie Gold......it is hard to explain how wonderful this album was then, and today remains a brilliant and influential period piece, a definitive one. The tracks run together to perfection (check that transition from "Dancing Madly Backwards" into "Armworth"), lyrically as stupidly pretentious as only to be fantastic ("What was my Armworth when they took it away?")......it is full of multi-part songs, reprises, returns.....ALL tracks are great, hard to talk about  the album  without mentioning "I Can't Feel Nothin'", "Frozen Over", "As the Moon Speaks to the Sea".....and that's about a thrd of it.....the amazing guitar work on "Myopic Void"....the vocals on most ALL of the album (some of the greatest singing of the style you'll ever hear (even though, as said before the "style" per se didn't even exist at the time.........

And then it was over. Just like that. They released two more studio LP's (with various personnel switches), "Sufficiently Breathless" and "Dawn Explosion", and they are AWFUL. I actually have a vinyl copy of one of them (I think it's "Dawn Explosion"), and they are BOTH available in a Pirate Bay torrent. To me, they are so bad I am not about to waste my time putting them up.

So what else is there? Well "Frozen Over" is a 1973 Dallas show that touches on most of the first album's highlights, and throws in "Stone Free" (!) as an encore.....also we have a double CD set, "The Completer", which features live stuff from various venues mostly in 1971-72, but (warning) a bunch of stuff from 1977 as well........these recordings are not great,in fact for the most part they are fairly poor (still better than "Sufficiently Breathless" of "Dawn Explosion", though) but they are what we have to document one of the great one-shot wonders of musical history. Not to be missed.

CAPTAIN BEYOND-01 Dancing Madly Backwards (On a Sea of Air)/02Armworth/03 Myopic Void/04 Mesmerization Eclipse/05 Raging River of Fear/06 Thousand Days of Yesterdays (intro)/07 Frozen Over/08 Thousand Days of Yesterdays (Time Since Come and Gone)/09 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part 1)/10 As the Moon Speaks (To the Waves of the Sea)/11 Astral Lady/12 As the Moon Speaks (Return)/13 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part 2)

FROZEN OVER-DALLAS 1973-01 Intro/02 Distant Sun/03 Dancing Madly Backwards (On a Sea of Air)/04 Armworth/05 Myopic Void/06 Drifitng In Space/07 Pandora's Box/08 Thousand Days of Yesterdays/09 Frozen Over/10 Butterfly Bleu/11 Mesmerization Eclipse/12 Drum Solo/13 Mesmerization Eclipse (Reprise)/14 Stone Free

THE COMPLETER DISC 1-01 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part 1)/02 As the Moon Speaks (To the Waves of the Sea)/03 Astral Lady/04 As the Moon Speaks (return)/05 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part 2)/06 Dancing Madly Backwards (on a Sea of Air)/07 Armworth/08 Myopic Void/09 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part )/10 As the Moon Speaks (To the Waves of the Sea)/11 Astral Lady/12 As the Moon Speaks (return)/13 I Can't Feel Nothin' (Part 2)/14 Dancing Madly Backwards (On  a Sea of Air)/15 Armworth/16 Myopic Void/17 Thousand Days of Yesterdays/18 Frozen Over

TRACKS 1-8 Montreaux 9/18/71, TRACKS 9-18 Miami 5/19/72

THE COMPLETER DISC 2-01 Dancing Madly Backwards (On a Sea of Air)/02 Armworth/03 Myopic Void-Thousand Days of Yesterdays/04 Frozen Over-Dawn Explosion-Mesmerization Eclipse/05 Drum Solo/06 Mesmerization Eclipse/07 Taped Intro/08 Distant Sun/09 Dancing Madly Backwards (On a Sea of Air)/10 Armworth/11 Myopic Void/Breath of Fire/12 Sweet Dreams/13 Fantasy/14 Thousand Days of Yesterdays/15 Frozen Over/16 Oblivion/17 Instrumental Jam/Meserization Eclipse/18 Drum Solo/19 Mesmerizatio Eclipse/Dawn Explosion

So, 1 stone-cold, must have must hear CLASSIC album, and a bunch of filler basically.......if you have an interest, check out the live stuff, but by NO MEANS are you to miss "Captain Beyond", a record that literally changed the life of THIS ten year old!


Links will be up when I get them up, you know I work like a DOG to bring you the finets in rock n rolllllllll!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Leave comments. This is one classic album that deserves discussion!