Label: Fantasy Records (US), FCD-24711-2
Style: Folk Rock, Country Rock, Psychedelic Folk
Country: New York, NY, U.S.
Time: 67:40
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 365 Mb
Take me back to Random Canyon,
Where the gryphon's always riffin',
And the unicorn is horny in the spring.
Where the crystal coyote calls
Over sleepy garden walls
And the wireless wombat wanders on the wings.
And the wireless wombat wanders on the wings.
- The Holy Modal Rounders, "Random Canyon"
In the early 1960s, the Greenwich Village folk scene took a left turn away from the clean-cut sounds of, say, The Kingston Trio. Bob Dylan was singing "Masters of War"; Phil Ochs had "Power and the Glory." That didn't sit well with Peter Stampfel. "I really hated the seriousness of the people on the folk music scene," Stampfel says. "I thought it was stupid. I mean, it was beautiful stuff, but it was goofy, too. At least some of it was, and I thought the goofiness was one of the great things about it." Stampfel admits that his own band, the Holy Modal Rounders, was silly. But it wasn't doing parodies of old folk songs. Its members knew the music inside and out. "I got the idea in 1963: What if Charlie Poole, and Charley Patton, and Uncle Dave Macon and all those guys were magically transported from the late 1920s to 1963?" Stampfel says. "And then they were exposed to contemporary rock 'n' roll. What did they do? And that sounded way, way, way more interesting than trying to be Mr. Note Perfect 1929."
The Holy Modal Rounders filled out an odd profile in the thick of the 1960s folk movement: It was challenging tradition by taking it into weird and psychedelic realms. The Rounders had a small but intensely devoted following, and one of the group's songs was even included in a major motion picture.
The duo's influence has grown steadily over the intervening decades, inspiring a younger generation of innovative folk musicians - and filmmakers. The Rounders are now the subject of the new documentary Bound to Lose.
(full version: www.npr.org/2009/02/24/101105671/holy-modal-rounders-oddly-influential-folk)
01. Blues in the Bottle (03:27)
02. Give the Fiddler a Dram (02:35)
03. The Cuckoo (03:08)
04. Euphoria (01:34)
05. Long John (02:20)
06. Sugar in the Gourd (01:54)
07. Hesitation Blues (02:22)
08. Hey, Hey Baby (01:22)
09. Reuben's Train (02:33)
10. Mr. Spaceman (01:56)
11. Moving Day (02:34)
12. Better Things for You (03:14)
13. Same Old Man (01:45)
14. Hop High Ladies (02:04)
15. Bound to Lose (04:18)
16. Bully of the Town (03:04)
17. Sail Away, Ladies (02:41)
18. Statesboro Blues (01:40)
19. Clinch Mountain Backstep (02:05)
20. Down the Old Plank Road (02:06)
21. Black Eyed Suzie (01:40)
22. Hot Corn, Cold Corn (02:13)
23. Crowley Waltz (01:36)
24. Fishing Blues (01:44)
25. Junko Partner (01:10)
26. Soldier's Joy (03:11)
27. Mole in the Ground (02:50)
28. Chevrolet Six (02:03)
29. Flop Eared Mule (02:18)
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