Chocolate Watchband - The Inner Mystique

 

Tower Records 1968

01 Voyage Of The Trieste

02 In The Past

03 Inner Mystique

04 I'm Not Like Everybody Else

05 Medication

06 Let's Go, Let's Go, Let's Go

07 It's All Over Now, Baby Blue

08 I Ain't No Miracle Worker

Bonus tracks:

09 She Weaves A Tender Trap [B-Side 'Misty Lane']

10 Misty Lane [Uptown Records 1967 Single]

11 Baby Blue [B-Side 'Sweet Young Thing']

12 Sweet Young Thing  [Uptown Records 1966 Single]

A second Chocolate Watchband album was issued in 1968 and this one contained even less tracks by the original band. They can be heard on 'I Ain't No Miracle Worker', 'I'm Not Like Everybody Else' and the original single version of 'Baby Blue' included here as a bonus track.

The remaining songs are a new formation of the band, but the first three tracks are again a production team ensemble of session players.

What may seem like barrel scraping on the surface again provides an excellent psych album.

This is the Sundazed reissue, with the A and B sides of  contemporary singles added as bonus tracks.

Chocolate Watchband - No Way Out

 

Tower 1967

01 Let's Talk About Girls

02 In The Midnight Hour

03 Come On

04 Dark Side Of The Mushroom

05 Hot Dusty Road

06 Are You Gonna Be There (At The Love Inn)

07 Gone And Passed By

08 No Way Out

09 Expo 2000

10 Gossamer Wings

Debut album from California's answer to The Rolling Stones. Unfortunately for the Chocolate Watchband, they fell foul of those awful 1960's deals. The contract gave full power to the producers who insisted on more covers than original material, removed Dave Aguilar's vocals and replaced them with a singer of their choosing on some songs and even having entire 'ghost bands' on some tracks.

Despite this, the album is still awesome and a psych must have. Material the band recorded went on to fill another two albums (along with more session player material), I'll be posting those in the future.