Search - Herbal Mixture, Groundhogs :: Please Leave My Mind

Young Tony McPhee

JOHN SPOKUS | BALTIMORE, MARYLAND United States | 10/30/2000

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Recently a fellow Groundhogs/Tony McPhee fanatic lent me the original vinyl pressing of Herbal Mixture (minus the early Groundhogs recordings that make up a portion of this CD version).Herbal Mixture is a period piece;an attempt by Tony McPhee to cash in on the psychedelic pop of this era at a time when he was forced to work a day job to make ends meet, prior to the successful period of The Groundhogs. It's pretty typical of such music of the time and not really exceptional, but not totally horrible either. The better stuff, like "Machines", reminds me of The Who around the time of The Who Sell Out record or maybe the early music of The Move. Herbal Mixture apparently got to release a couple of singles; the rest is made up of demos and alternate takes of the same tunes, one which is done with a different vocalist who is simply terrible. Not great, but interesting stuff for hard core Hogs fans and those who enjoy really obscure psych/garage/pop, you'll probably want this as an archive in your collection. A good look into what McPhee and bassist Pete Cruickshank were up to before the successful reformation of The Groundhogs in '68."