Crystal Pure: Classic Collection [Import]

Well, let's put it this way. You've probably never heard of The Lemon Drops, but after listening to this CD a few times, you'll wonder why you didn't! They have many good, psychedelic-like songs that are catchy and sound great, even today. Good song-writing, effective use of sound effects, fun lyrics, lots of imagination...they have it all....GET IT!

The Lemon Drops were a band from the northwest Chicago suburbs in McHenry County. Formed in the mid-1960s by the Weiss brothers and some other like-minded high school students, they were the recipients of a rather unique gift in that the older brother of two of the band members was a partner in the local label. This allowed the group to 1) record material in a far more professional environment and 2) manufacture records for sale.

But, even with this advantage, success eluded the band. By the end of the decade, the band - after bouncing between the East and West Coasts with records companies like RCA - foundered. The end of the story - as described in the liner notes - finds most of the surviving core members - back in Illinois where they record an album's worth of material sans drums.

The Collectables Records being reviewed here contains 24 songs that were to have been two albums by the band. The first twelve constitute sessions done in New York City for RCA that were never produced and released; the second twelve are the so-called basement tapes.

Most of the music is decidedly psychedelic in nature, replete with "nudge, nudge, wink, wink, then smirk" titles and lyrics about drugs. This includes a song where " Hi! How are you?" transforms into "How high are you?" Looking back on it, one has to wonder just how idiotically naïve and simplistic we were at the time.

The earlier material is very directly linked to the 1967 timeframe with a spoken intro lifted (in)famous 78 rpm cut on Moby Grape's "Wow." The songs themselves are pretty harmless, lightweight fare; some of the material sounds a bit like The Association trying to be overly hip. The standout cut on the `first' album is "I Live for the Springtime," written by the band by the older brother/label owner at a time when band-written original material did not exist. Not psychedelic in the least, the above excellent harmonies evoke a Beach Boys feel more than anything else. Of the rest little can be said beyond it's being more-or-less emblematic of the output one would expect from a group of teenagers at the time.

The material of the `second' album sounds like demos, workups and, frankly, fragments that are performed in a manner that suggests fractured morale and ego. The Hi/High song appears again, as does a cymbal on a couple of tracks. Why someone had a cymbal but not a drum kit is an issue lost to history.

This was another one of the garage bands of the 60's that just didn't jive with me. There was a song I first heard in 1986 by a group called Buzzsaw which was written by Eddie Weiss of the American "Bend Me Shape Me" Breed. The song I heard was called "I Live In The Springtime", but it was also done by these guys The Lemon Drops. This version by the Lemon Drops was more wimpy than Buzzsaw, but watch it be an alternative of the song, and they called themselves Buzzsaw. Anyway back to the Lemon Drops the rest of this album I used to have, and it was terrible. "Sometime Ago" is gaurunteed to make me an emotional cripple where I'll just want to curl up in a fetal stage crying. This is a fairy-tale song that sounds like a princess locked up in a castle tower, and pretty much put up there by her father. This song reminds me too much of how dysfunctional families can be; I know I had a hard time listening to the song after a fight with my parents. It made feel that it should be better, but it isn't, and life should be more pleasant, but it isn't, and this brings me down into a depression. I guess it's because of the fact that I feel like it's up to me to bridge a gap, and repress all my feelings that I have to deny all my feelings, and my passions, and my desires, and favorite things to have a normal discussion with my parents. This isn't right to me, but I don't see any other way. The rest of this is not all good either. "It Happens Everyday", and "Hi How Are You Today?" are the only 2 halfway decent songs on here. The rest just doesn't work with me.

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