Hot diggity, this is really good! HEAVY organ presence from the early British progressive school - a little Mike Ratledge (Soft Machine) freakout here, thick comping in the dense Hugh Banton way (Van Der Graff Generator), high energy levels and rollicking sections with a pulse like Samurai.
He can sing really well, sounds like what Jimi wanted to sound. Don't get me wrong, I love his voice, but he was always disparaging it himself. In some places there are dreamy background vocals. What Chubby does vacillates from heart-wrenching rampage-fueled frenzies to heartfelt intoxications, often in the same song. At the very least, in every song, his voice is the perfect foil for fronting a tight forward-psychedelic outfit.
Anyway, you want this bad, it's sometimes like a cross between Hendrix, good Allman Brothers circa 'In Memory of Elizabeth Reed,' and something else I can't place - maybe because it amounts to about a dozen psych bands and at least as many progressive bands outside of the ones mentioned.
Nice West Coast acid guitar leads (I'm still trying to cipher the fuzz content), thumpy, rumbling bass, supportive and often appropriately bombastic drum kit. There are a couple of slower tunes, one of which ('He Died' - see) is a touch on the side of hypnotizing in the way that Paternoster is.
The last few cuts are on the heavy bluespsych angling vibe. Very wasted bludgeoning, enough for a soundtrack to smashing your head on the pavement and not feeling a thing. So rough and tumble that you could be eating glass and not notice, all the while thinking that the crunching is guitar and the bleeding is all inside your head. Butterfield Blues Band, eat your amps out. This is where the fuzz comes in, shaggy like an uncombed afro.
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