This compilation is where the Green Crystal Ties series was beginning to scrape bottom -- and maybe reached its full glory. On what other series from a major label could one possibly hope to find two Merseybeat-flavored demos by the Outcasts -- cut when they were still known as the Radiations -- and the Stingrays? These boys may have been from the U.S.A., but they had the nuances down just right, in the playing as well as the singing and songwriting, and, well, hell, I'd have payed money to any dance they were playing. The ...
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This compilation is where the Green Crystal Ties series was beginning to scrape bottom -- and maybe reached its full glory. On what other series from a major label could one possibly hope to find two Merseybeat-flavored demos by the Outcasts -- cut when they were still known as the Radiations -- and the Stingrays? These boys may have been from the U.S.A., but they had the nuances down just right, in the playing as well as the singing and songwriting, and, well, hell, I'd have payed money to any dance they were playing. The Mad Hatters are a bit more conventional garage rock, shouters with a Yardbirds fixation but no set of pipes anywhere near the equal of Keith Relf (or even Chris Dreja, to judge by the evidence), but one will be no worse for having heard "Go Fight Alone" -- they do much better on the Dylanesque "A Pebble in the Sand." The Intruders, off of the Lone Star State's See Ell label, unintentionally crossed swords with the Velvet Underground on the appropriately titled "Temporary Insanity," while "The Lone Stranger" is too fragmentary to appreciate. And the Comets, out of North Carolina, are surprisingly strong stand-ins for the Rolling Stones on "The Last Time" -- considering that not one member was over 14, they do any amazingly good job of sounding like a pretty inspired college frat-band of the period, the lead singer even perfecting the U.K.-inflected stammer on the word "know." A lot of the cuts on this 18-track disc represent the cream of Collectables' foray into the vaults of Justice Records in North Carolina, and the tracks by the Englishmen, the Trees, the Marsadees, and others, will be familiar to those who have purchased those earlier releases devoted to those bands. The sound is more than decent and the annotation, such as it is, does tell what little is known about these groups, few of which ever got their work heard much beyond their hometowns and cities. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi
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