Balaklava

Performer: Pearls Before Swine
Distributor: MSI Music Distribution

Notes: Pearls Before Swine's 1968 album BALAKLAVA is a psych cult classic. "Trumpeter Landfrey," "I Saw the World," and "Lepers and Roses" are included here, among other songs. The East Village folk-rock group Pearls Before Swine was basically songwriter Tom Rapp and a shifting cast of friends. Their first album, ONE NATION UNDERGROUND (with its famous Hieronymus Bosch cover), is an erratic affair, but 1968's poetic antiwar BALAKLAVA is quite possibly one of the greatest New York folk-rock albums ever recorded. It perfectly captures the surreal acid-drenched atmosphere of the city's then-hippie milieu: speed freak paranoia leavened with a kinder, gentler Jesus freak spirituality. Their version of Leonard Cohen's "Suzanne" is perhaps the most visionary realization of that classic song ever recorded, and that includes Cohen's own performance, not to mention Judy Collins's. Jazz musician Joe Farrell provides lyrical flute and oboe accompaniment throughout.

Magnet (p.114) - "Veering from the reverbed 12-string strum and whispered contrapuntal vocal of 'Translucent Carriages' to the pastoral, flute-driven 'Images Of April,' BALAKLAVA never reverts to protest music's angry clich�s."

Primarily the vehicle for singer/guitarist Tom Rapp, 1960s psyche-folk ensemble Pearls Before Swine were one the few non-jazz acts to record for the venerable New York City label ESP-Disk. Rapp's blend of revolutionary politics, surreal lyrical imagery, and an often numinous take on various folk forms relegated the artist to the outer reaches of the pop map. He made the jump to a major label in 1969 and recorded under the PBS moniker and his own name, but stopped playing music in the mid '70s to concentrate on civil rights law. Rapp was coaxed back to the stage in the early 2000s by a legion of new underground musicians deeply indebted to his music.

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