July – a psychedelic obscurity
If asked to pick a favourite month of the year then I’d probably dump for December; it’s dark, cold and host to that festival of swag acquisition and drunken debasement, Christmas. July would never enter into the reckoning. It’s hot. Too hot.
However, if the question were to pick my favourite psychedelic band named after a month of the year, then without a doubt July would be victorious.
July were one of the many British Psych bands that came, saw, yet failed to conquer and fizzled out with less than a year notched up on their collective belts. In this short time they did manage to put out one album, its rarity ensuring original pressings have gone on to attain near-Grail status amongst psych collectors.
The self-titled July was released in 1968, and really is a must-hear for anybody with a passing interest in psychedelic obscurities.
Although heavily influenced by the Californian psych sound, July manage to retain the quirkiness associated more so with the British acid-rock scene, throughout. This is ably demonstrated on the infectiously jaunty ‘Jolly Mary’, which successfully straddles the light-hearted wing of both camps, coming across Beatles-esque, Toytown, and West Coast, all in one eclectic nautical package.
Openers ‘My Clown’ and ‘Dandelion Seeds’ are eerily trippy, while elsewhere ‘Move on Sweet Flower’ is distinctly reminiscent of Gandalf. ‘Friendly Man’ alludes to some decidedly dark subject matter, although that could just be me misreading it, ‘The Way’ covers the eastern-mysticism angle with its energetic sitar-infusion, and ‘Crying is for Writers’ benefits from a scorching psychedelic guitar blitzkrieg slap bang in the middle.
July’s time on the music scene may have been but a slight ripple on an otherwise vast ocean of sound – though the constituent members would go on to enjoy success in various areas of the music industry – but the psychedelic gem they left behind deserves the status it enjoys today as one of the most sought after rarities of the acid era.
July is reissued on Rev-Ola and available to download at Amazon.co.uk
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Cripes – no comments? This is (to use the groan-worthy word) essential, and the album of outtakes – The 2nd Of July – a useful companion piece. Top-drawer pop psych, and I’m sure you know (although you don’t mention it) Jon Field and Tony Duhig later morphed into Jade Warrior.
Jade Warrior indeed. I have a couple of reviews of Jade Warrior albums upcoming. That’s if I can stay awake long enough to get through them… haha, only joking.