Supersnazz

Performer: The Flamin' Groovies
Engineer: Sy Mitchell
Distributor: E1 Distribution (USA)

Notes: The Flamin' Groovies: Tim Lynch (vocals, guitar, harmonica); Roy Loney, Cyril Jordan (vocals, guitar); George Alexander (vocals, harmonica, bass); Danny Mihm (drums, percussion). Additional personnel includes: Tom Scott (clarinet); Curtis Amy (saxophone); Mike Lang (keyboards). Producer: Stephen R. Goldman. Reissue producers: Tim Livingston, Efram Turchick. Recorded at CBS Studio A, Los Angeles, California in 1968. Originally released on Epic (BN 26487). Includes liner notes by Jud Cost. Digitally remastered by Bob Irwin (Sundazed Studios, Coxsackie, New York). While fellow San Francisco bands like the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane were dropping out and turning on, the Flamin' Groovies were revivalists hell-bent on mining '50s rock for inspiration. Despite playing the wrong kind of music at the wrong time, their cult-like success sparked by the 1967 mini-album SNEAKERS earned the Groovies a contract with Epic to record a full-length record. Led by vocalist Roy Loney and guitarist Cyril Jordan, this Frisco quintet put together a debut overflowing with garage-rock brio on songs like the fuzz-guitar driven "Love Have Mercy" and the rollicking "The First One's For Free." Not surprisingly, the Flamin' Groovies pulled out all the stops in paying tribute to their idols. Highlights include a chugging version of Little Richard's "The Girl Can't Help It" along with a smoking medley of Eddie Cochran's "Somethin' Else" and the swing standard "Pistol Packin' Mama" (complete with Loney's hiccuping phrasing). Also notable is a laid-back reading of Huey P. Smith's "Rockin' Pneumonia and The Boogie Woogie Flu" that could have could have been the inspiration for John Lennon's ROCK 'N' ROLL album. Unfortunately, poor sales and anachronisms don't mix and Epic released the band after only one record.

Rolling Stone (12/13/69, p.52) - "...The fine thing about [SUPERSNAZZ]...is the fidelity with which it sets the Looney Tune 'spirit' (exuberantly childlike satire) in perfectly realized soundscapes thumpingly reminiscent of the good old days..."

Something of an American underground institution, San Francisco's the Flamin' Groovies started out in the mid 1960s as a Stones-tinged throwback to the early days of rock & roll. Although the band had its fans, they were too out of step with the Summer of Love to break through to the mainstream. Though this era would produce one of their two signature songs, "Teenage Head." By the '70s, the band switched up their sound and recast themselves as power-pop songsters. It was during this period that the Flamin Groovies would release their other beloved classic, "Shake Some Action," one of the all-time great power-pop tunes.

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