TOP 1972 Orig MOTT THE HOOPLE = BRAIN CAPERS DEATH MAY BE SANTA CLAUS Hard Psych

$

78

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           IN ORIGINAL FACTORY SHRINK WRAPPER

                             ~TOP COPY~

                1972 WRATH & ROLL HEAVIEST:

                  MOTT THE HOOPLE

           BRAIN CAPERS                

                       USA - ATLANTIC RECORDS SD 8304 (1841 Broadway label)

TOP COPY!

ORIGINAL 1972 first pressing with the old 1841 Broadway labels ... BRAIN CAPERS found a turned-on Mott The Hoople at their heaviest .... 

          still in factory shrink wrapper and MINT all over!

“Brain Capers” capped off Mott’s dynasty of their first four, Guy Stevens-produced albums and it was the most defiantly rock of the bunch. Recorded live in the studio over a span of four days, it was rendered as if cognizant of teetering the verge of being dumped by their record company -- which, as time would show, they were. Perhaps it was this sense of back (and balls) to the wall desperation that made Guy Stevens go so far as to donning black mask and cape while wielding pistols (AND forcing engineer Andy Johns to sport likewise) in an attempt to “encourage” the five Hoople men to stand or deliver. And deliver they did:
“Death May Be Your Santa Claus” is a song taken in title only from an obscure album by The Second Hand, kicking off “Brain Capers” with a “Brown Sugar” stenciled hoopla that qualifies as fantastically ‘leapy music,’ the very epithet bestowed upon Mott by Hawkwind DJ Andy Dunkley when he presented their autumn 1971 Radio One session. “Death May Be Your Santa Claus” is all shook up, nowhere to go and if you didn’t move during this one, put down your knitting and go crazy or die. The drums are big ass, Verden Allen’s organ is even bigger with supersonic swirls and the whole group is rockin’ out like crazy over the reoccurring “I don’t care what the people might say/ I don’t give a...anyway” with a blustery boot to the ass again and again. Then all settles with the acoustic opening of “Your Own Backyard”, Dion’s then-recent cautionary reflection on his previous struggles with life’s confusions and drugs. “Darkness Darkness” is a late autumn night solitude hideaway sung ably by Mick Ralphs as Buffin’s ever-present, backdrop tom toms shroud all in fog and mystery as incoming errant solo guitar bursts from Ralphs rip across the sonic shag carpeting of Verden Allen’s low, sustained foghorn tones. “The Journey” ends the first side in an extended Ziggy Dylan track that casts a melancholy gaze upon the losses that come with the passage of time as Hunter’s piano and free-forming, tortured mental apocalypse builds in a tidal wave of images and emotions against Allen’s organ swells until Mott communally gathers again and again to bang out a roughhewn riff over and over, as if to nail passages from Hunter’s text that bleed through into all his back pages. It sustains through an entire stanza and a half of Hunter’s personal grief, and resurfaces after Ralphs’ needling in with a fluidly bending guitar solo that swoops and bucks over the backing.
Side two begins with “Sweet Angeline” which shoulda been titled “Absolutely Sweet Angeline” as it’s “Blonde On Blonde” as hell: ‘specially with the freewheeling Kooper-esque organ tones and the overbearing Hunter piano keys banged louder than even Buffin’s drums (and that’s no mean feat, seeing as they’re recorded about as loud as they were played.) There’s a part where the whole band lurches on a missed riff, right after Hunter’s first intonation about a “New York City queen,” causing him to reflexively make amends by speeding up on his extra strength ivory hunting. Overend Watts anchors the whole thing stupendously, and it’s only this and Mick Ralph’s razor sharp guitar solo that keep it from veering entirely into ‘66 Dylan territory altogether. The brief “Second Love” by Verden Allen opens sounding a helluva lot like the kissin’ cousin of the hung over, morning after hotel room goodbyes of “Shine A Light” by The Stones.
Then it’s straight back into the earlier wrath’n’roll/opened vein of “Death May Be Your Santa Claus” with the blistering “The Moon Upstairs.” Whoa -- it’s Mott’s very own “Won’t Get Fooled Again” minus the VCS3 and far more brazen in manner and musical attitude (badder), giving it a kick in the pants up the attic stairs as full moon fever begins to make all your questions turn into answers as Hunter hands to you a piece of the place where you know who you are, where you’re going, what you must do and everything else in one blinding flash that describes and defines without words, with emotion and the pounding qualities of the music that shakes its head and fists at those who despite the mental amputations of the rock’n’roll stage can still only get it up just enough to shrug, piss and moan at it all. And all the while, Allen’s overdriven organ sonorously calls out zig-zagging warning tones of imminent approaching reefs which Mott slam into again and again and again. Overend’s bass is not only over-the-end-but-the-fu*king-top, too as Hunter calls out a variety of missives from the heart of rock’n’roll like: “Screw the man!” “Alright!” and “Hahahahahaha...” Mick Ralphs has now switched to play his guitar on the chorus with a sheet of the coarsest grade sandpiper instead of a pick just to keep up with Allen’s most utterly overdriven organ that dwarfs even Jon Lord’s “Louie Louie” distorto-vamp for tempestuousness alone. And Buffin carries on with his simple and effective bashing out of the same simple pattern of snare/cymbal/hi-hat that subtly makes the entire piece even heavier as a result, until his final drum vignette with jettisoned sticks signal a (seemingly) final cease and desist. Until the slight return of “The Wheel of The Quivering Meat Conception”: an ending pound-out of “The Journey” a full album side later with everyone going mental all over signature riff. Hunter announces in the fade in that it’s “The Mott The Hoople Light Orchestra” as they proceed to tear it all up, down and all around that strident riff until all is swamped with gales of feedback, yelps and overall chaos.

SIDE ONE

1. DEATH MAY BE YOUR SANTA CLAUS

2. YOUR OWN BACKYARD

3. DARKNESS DARKNESS

4. THE JOURNEY

SIDE TWO

1. SWEET ANGELINE

2. SECOND LOVE

3. THE MOON UPSTAIRS

4. THE WHEEL OF THE QUIVERING MEAT CONCEPTION

CONDITION: The cover: is solid all over = in original shrink wrapper and MINT with 4 sharp coners, no bends, no writing and no seam splits ... a TOP copy

The vinyl: is about as clean as one could hope for, all glossy shiny smooth M- looking and playing immaculate ... clean 1841 Broadway labels make this copy a must own...

keeper!

A GREAT ADDITION TO ANYONE'S COLLECTION !

SEE: SELLERS OTher items for similar cool sounds for "head" people...

EFFICIENT/CAREFUL GRADING

All imperfections are noted both cover & record