D Windorf-P Stanley progenitor on vox; G Funk fellow travele
Bill Your 'Free Form FM Handi Cyber | 10/13/1999
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Music from the very brief period (late 1969-early 1970) where psych rock was turning into hard rock, and albums had elements of both. "Dead Man" is a heavily Grand Funk-influenced (I mean the "good" Funk here, not the post-1971 "good time" Funk junk) epic that is an immediate hard rock classic. I gave this four stars only because several songs appear in two versions on the CD, and for the most part (except maybe the two versions of "Dead Man") the differences between versions are too small to justify the duplication. But that's a minor quibble. There ain't a bad song here."
I am sick of titles and will just write about the freekin' c
Bill Your 'Free Form FM Handi Cyber | Mahwah, NJ USA | 02/22/2009
(4 out of 5 stars)
"In 1969, countless power trios were trying to fill the void Cream just left. Few if any could, but it did lead to some pretty good hard rock.
Josephus was among these power trios, but are a cut above many. Their playing is clean and percise, and their writting turns lots of corners, with unique takes on standard blues changes, and unexpected breaks and codas. This band understand riffs.
The production here is very basic--nothing like the buffered glow of Cream's studio work--but these guys are such good players that the lack of gloss actually adds to the punch of the music. Josephus also sticks to this riff based rock, making a quality record from start to finish by avoiding the 60s experiments that marred many rock albums of the era.
An aside: pay particualr attention to proposition. There is a wonderful suprise there you don't want to miss.
There is a lot of mediocrity in 4th or 5th tier 60s rock, but Josephus represents anything but.
You can't go wrong with this."
