While there are some bands who owe their reputation to just one album, there are others who owe it to just one song, and not necessarily a Top 40 hit, either. The tune’s commercial or mainstream cultural impact is not as important to collectors as how it resonates with them and their like-minded peers. Among aficionados of psychedelia and other obscure rock from the 1960s and 1970s, there are some who believe the acquisition of even extremely scarce LPs to be a pursuit bordering on the mundane. These seekers of the rarest of audio artifacts don’t want to waste their time with anything that has even the faintest whiff of financial or popular consideration. To their way of thinking, anyone possessing the wherewithal to record an album was more likely to be corrupted by the hit-making tendencies of the music industry.
Therefore, if someone wants to experience a record from this era that qualifies as a genuine artistic expression, he or she should focus on the thousands of 45s that were released by independent labels or privately pressed by the musicians themselves. Sifting through all these pebbles, such collectors argue, is the only way to find the genuine underground music of the 1960s and 1970s.
As a high school student more than twenty-five years ago, I and countless other American teenagers got caught up in the Classic Rock movement in which radio stations adopted playlists consisting entirely of hits by US and UK musicians from those aforementioned decades. By the time I was in college, I started to branch out into more esoteric bands from the same period whose uncommercial nature precluded them from receiving similar exposure. These were my heavy psych years when I just couldn’t get enough vintage mind-expanding music. One of the most significant records I acquired during those days was the now-legendary Endless Journey Phase One compilation on the bootleg Psycho label. Among the tracks that opened up entirely new worlds for me was a song titled “Diamond Studded Cadillacs” (sic) by the enticingly-named Unsettled Society. This listening experience was extremely mind-blowing as I had never previously heard psychedelic rock with such a dark and menacing vibe. Who the fuck were these guys?
At the time, the Internet as we know it was still in its infancy, and there weren’t really any record collector-themed websites to provide information about bands of this ilk. Vernon Joynson’s book The Flashback was just about the only resource available then, and even it wasn’t much help.
A few years later, I remember receiving a catalogue in the mail from a rare records dealer with whom I conducted regular business in the mid and late 1990s. In addition to the descriptive listings, said vinyl merchant’s inventories often featured photocopied images of album sleeves, book covers, old advertisements, and assorted music industry ephemera. Lo and behold, this particular catalogue included a promotional photograph of the Unsettled Society in which the band members were all looking as gloriously demented as I had imagined them to be. A few days later while placing an order over the phone, I made some inquiries with the dealer. No, he didn’t have any copies of the “Cadillacs” 45 for sale, but he had sold one for a few hundred dollars in the past. Yes, they were an East Coast group (New York, specifically), as I had suspected. And that was all I would know about the Unsettled Society. Until now.
Maintaining their reputation as one of the top reissue labels in the business, Guerssen Records has compiled the Society’s complete works from 1969-1974 on this release, with its title taken from their best-known song. I was hoping they would have been able to present “17 Diamond Studded Cadillacs” with sound quality superior to that on Endless Journey. However, if I understand the album’s informative if somewhat inelegant insert notes correctly, the song was produced by utilizing a demo that was later enhanced in a more professional recording studio. Consequently, not much could be done to alter its murky tone, to which I’ve come to the conclusion is actually more of an asset than a liability. The most disappointing aspect of this anthology results from the fact that the band’s complete discography consists of a mere six songs that originally appeared over the course of three 45s released by Charm Records, a tiny independent label from upstate New York. While none of the other five titles (more hard rock than mind-expanding) qualify as atrocious, they also do not come close to duplicating the sublime otherworldly nature of “Cadillacs.” That seems to be a recurring theme with bands such as this; they are touched with undeniable genius during the recording of one particular song, while their other tracks pale massively in comparison. Nevertheless, “Passion Seeds” (the B-side to “Cadillacs”) and “Rainbows” deserve mention as other notable performances.
The pressing and packaging of this release are up to Guerssen’s usual high standards. The insert booklet includes an incredible number of photos of the band, which helps illustrate their status as major oddballs in the semi-rural area outside of Syracuse from which they hailed. As fantastic as most of the pictures are, it still would have been nice if someone had bothered to identify the musicians in at least one of them.
Another gripe concerns the brevity of this release. While it makes sense to have put out this album in an LP format, some people will balk at paying an LP price for less than twenty minutes of music, especially if there is only one song that is genuinely exceptional. Be that as it may, the album’s title track ranks among the greatest psychedelic rock performances of all time. If you’re the type who has to have it on vinyl, your alternatives to purchasing this album are limited to hunting down an original 45 (good luck with that) or a copy of Endless Journey Phase One, with both being more expensive options.
Tracklist:
A1. Unsettled Society - 17 Diamond Studded CadillacsA2. Unsettled Society - Passion Seeds
A3. Unsettled Society - Gunfighter
B1. Unsettled Society - Rainbows
B2. Thunder Head - Don't Run
B3. Thunder Head - And I Need You