Pretty Things - Pretty Things (18 tracks) +Album Reviews

Raw as an open wound!

10/03/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you've heard the R&B stylings of the Rolling Stones during their early years and love that, you ain't never heard the Pretty Things! Rawer and dirtier than the Rolling Stones, the Pretty Things basically played punk blues. Their first album is a classic which is chock full of great tunes like "Roadrunner", "13 Chester Street", "Mama Keep Your Big Mouth Shut", and "Rosalyn". The music is heavily indebted to Bo Diddley in contrast to the Stones which was more Chuck Berryish. The Pretties even managed to write a few original tunes on the album but their covers hold up remarkably well. The CD reissue on the Snapper label compiles the original debut album plus some single sides and unreleased tracks as well as CD-ROM data. If you like raw and dirty R&B and the Stones are too pussy for you, try the Pretty Things."

The baddest of the bad!!!

XaurreauX | New York, New York, USA | 06/19/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I first saw The Pretty Things on one of the "Shindig" TV shows originating from Los Angeles in 1965. The other acts looked hip and mod; The Pretty Things looked like trouble. They went on to be virtually unnoticed in the U.S. and so they remained until the recent rebirth of interest in the band.I acquired this album on vinyl because a friend of mine was going away to school and he wanted some extra cash so he sold this along with several other albums (including the one and only album by the now classic-and-revered proto-garage band, The Syndicate of Sound) for 50 cents each! The album had a 1/2" crack in it, but in those days you could set the edges together and the disk would still play reasonably well.I have gotten many hours of enjoyment from this and later the follow-up second album. Their sound was as raw and raucus as their lives, The Pretty Things being everything the Stones pretended to be. I heard a rumor that they were banned from an entire continent--probably not true, but it reflects their well-earned reputation at the time. Small example: one of their songs contains the line "...if you're underage, I just don't care..." I rest my case.I would definitely recommend this album to anyone who wants blistering, smoking blues and R&B as it was done by one of the seminal British blues bands of 1964 and to see the groundwork that was laid for those to follow. Don't forget to turn up the volume."

Early punk at its best

sfsorrow | West Lafayette Indiana | 09/06/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Along with The Who's "My Generation" Lp from 1965 this must rank as one of the first punk albums ever. Listen to the snarling vocals of Phil May and the over amped guitars of Dick Taylor, and Brian Pendleton, the crashing drums of Viv Prince and the bass of John Stax. These guys truly made the Rolling Stones look like angels. The album is rife with hard edged takes on blues numbers as well as bonus tracks of the first couple of singles. Its raw and powerful. In my opinion the only thing that set the Pretty's apart from The Who ( who were also on the rise when this album was released) was The Who added violence to their act, something the Pretty's could have done with ease. This album should be played extremely, dangerously loud. In addition any band that dares calls themsleves punk or grunge should listen to this album, because many of them could use the lessons the Pretty's laid down."

Thanks to BOWIE for introducing me to THE PRETTY THINGS!

Marc Lahn | Southern New Jersey, USA | 03/25/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"As a rock n roll obsessed kid growing up in the 70's, I thank DAVID BOWIE and his rollicking PINUPS album, for introducing me to one of the great (and under appreciated) bands of the 60's; THE PRETTY THINGS!Although this recording is a lttle wirey and thin (like alot of 60's rock), it has all of the spunk, attitude and swagger you need between the grooves, or should I say the 0's and 1's(cd version.) Of course for me, the stand-outs are "ROSALYN" and "DON'T BRING ME DOWN." However, this album DOES work as a whole and should not be ignored.I also love what THE PRETTY THINGS became a few years later, with the "SF SORROW" album(1968) and "PARACHUTE" (1970)I summarize by saying, "OH, YOU PRETTY THINGS..DON'T CHA KNOW YOU'RE DRIVING YOUR MAMAS AND PAPAS INSANE!"p.s I think it was cool that Steven Tyler thanked this great band, when he and the rest of Aerosmith were inducted into the "HALL OF RECORD SALES"(hall of fame) the other night. In my opinion, THE PRETTY THINGS should be in there too."

THIS Was Maximum British R and B

BluesDuke | Las Vegas, Nevada | 06/11/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"In college years, I had finally figured out who the Rolling Stones' real competition had been for a pull-few-punches approach to the blues, and bought a two-record set Sire had issued of the Pretty Things' first two albums (this set and "Get The Picture"). And, in 1975, this music still made Mick and the boys resemble the dandy-goes-slumming wannabes they were at heart, even if the second album showed a flirtation with semi-psychedelic sound that threatened to explode into full-fledged self-conscious indulgence, which is precisely what they went on to do - with the overrated "S.F. Sorrow," a classic case of a nice idea which didn't wring out properly in the wash and about as good a way to flatten your rep as you could ask for when you haven't got a clue that you were already more than what you thought yourself to have been.I lost a lot of albums over the years, including that Sire set, and despaired for ever stumbling over those first two Things albums, until now. ("Get The Picture" is also out and about again.) But here's the proof that the Pretty Things (who were formed in the first place by a former Stone - Dick Taylor, who'd been the Stones' bassist, before yielding to Bill Wyman so he could finish art college, then switched to lead guitar and rounded up this bunch) had one hell of a case for having been about the most dangerous blues group England would yield up in the mid-1960s. They might have had a particular addiction to Bo Diddley - material and predominant rhythm style being Exhibits A and B - but they seemed smart enough to know when to give it a break in favour of some other choice meats, and they mostly played as though they couldn't have cared less for anything much beyond the core of the music and throwing it not just in your face but through it. Which is precisely why "The Pretty Things" holds up just as well as and gets more deadly than their more obvious contemporaries of R and B raunch (the earliest Stones, the Yardbirds, Them, the Animals and company, even the Who).It may have taken David Bowie having a whack at "Don't Bring Me Down" and "Rosalyn" (on "Pin Ups") and Led Zeppelin having been fans (signing the band to their Swan Song label around 1974) to get the Pretties a third (and not altogether lame, by the evidence of "Silk Torpedo") life in the 1970s, but you and I both know that they never put it as deep in the pocket as they did with their first two albums and bunch of singles, and if they'd just dropped entirely out of sight following "Get The Picture" they'd still have been remembered. Of all the British bands who caught that lightning out of Chicago's blues and R and B and built careers on trying to get to within even ten nautical miles of its essence while raiding the songbooks, the Pretty Things probably came closest to delivering the goods in a manner in which no one could accuse them reasonably of being poseurs. Which may explain why they rushed from their foundation to the murky waters of what would soon enough be called "prog rock": Maybe there ARE times when setting your course and making your destination so soon and so well is overwhelming enough to scare the living bejesus out of you when you arrive."

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