Unwitting rivals with the Silver Apples,and the United States Of America for the Electronic Rock pioneer throne was the rather trad Psych sounding Fifty Foot Hose. They still had guitars involved, and had a Grace Slick-a-like as singer; but, crucially a bloke on oscillator, and the guitarist doubled up on Ring Modulator,so we're getting into pre-synthesizer early Electronic territory here.
Inevitably getting lost in the bowel movement of Psych bands from San Francisco in 1967/8 their album became an influential cult classic. Pere Ubu being an obvious beneficiary.
Well, I'd sooner listen to this stuff than The Grateful fucking Dead, in fact i'd sooner listen to Mylie Cyrus than the Grateful Fucking Dead,even though Cyrus is a sexual propaganda-bot for the old world order, in fact I'd prefer anything to another adult orientated psychedelic guitar solo from Jerry Garcia!
Fifty Foot Hose had all the ingredients to have made it to number 154 in the billboard charts, but those weird noises put off the rock crowd and they bombed.Which probably saved them from eventually making their own version of "They Built This City On Rock'n'Roll", like what happened to Jefferson Airplane......stay off the drugs kids.
For artistic integrity to remain intact,the best thing that can happen to you is Failure, or Death.But if you're gonna fail, better make it a glorious failure, like this album,and the Silver Apples' albums;or a glorious death like Jimi Hendrix, who died just as he was starting to suck real baaaad.Like all music,timing is the most important aspect of one's art;but, if you want suck-cess,all you gotta do is turn up consistantly.They'll like anything if you're reliable,repeat yourself constantly, and most important,make sure you're there.No matter what your music is like,don't break up and you'll make it.If Fifty Foot Hose had continued they'd have been as big as The Residents are today,as in 'not very'.And if you broke up,and wanna reform 20 years later with no original members left, that's a surefire way of earning some quick cash....just,please, don't make a new record!? As in football, you have to maintain momentum.The magic is lost the moment a group decides they have musical differences,or the drummer wants to make a solo album.There are NO exceptions!(discuss).
Tracklist:
1 – And After 2:06
2 – If Not This Time 3:39
3 – Opus 777 0:22
4 – The Things That Concern You 3:30
5 – Opus 11 0:26
6 – Red The Sign Post 2:58
7 – For Paula 0:30
8 – Rose 5:07
9 – Fantasy 10:14
10 – God Bless The Child 2:36
11 – Cauldron 4:55
12 – If Not This Time (Demo) 3:39
13 – Red The Sign Post (Demo) 2:17
14 – Fly Free (Demo) 2:41
15 – Desire (Demo) 11:39
16 – Bad Trip (33 rpm) 3:21
17 – Skins 2:24
18 – Bad Trip (45 rpm) 2:03
