Cheap Magic Lantern (Music) (Haymarket Square) Price

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Customer Reviews of Magic Lantern

Sweet and groovy psychedelic druidic hymns
This is an interesting little item by a unique late 60's group. The opening number has a dirge-like feel, and several of the songs have a kind of pagan hymn quality to them. The lead singer, Gloria Lambert (who was quite a lovely flower child judging from the cover photo) has a beautiful, soaring voice, as good as any 60's female singer I can think of except perhaps Mama Cass. The band had a kind of untrained seeming knack for quirky rhythms and arrangements. One can almost imagine future members of DEVO having listened to this a lot at one point. The highlight of the album is "Amapola" with great wah wah guitar work throughout and a memorable chorus. There are only six songs, however, and one is a stiff, jerky and forgettable cover of "The Train kept a-rollin" and another is a throwaway drum solo. The drummer is energetic but kind of haphazard in his attack, and musicianship tends to be a weak point with this band. Also, the whole thing ultimately sounds like a demo, rather than a finished, produced album. These caveats aside, I'd recommend this to serious fans of late 60's psych.

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How can I not think it's awesome...
... it's my father's band!! :-) Even though I'm not a big fan of "oldies" music and even though my father is in this band, I truly do like this album. You will definitely sense the similarity of lead singer Gloria Lambert's vocals to that of Grace Slick of Jefferson Airplane/Starship. I don't know that I necessarily agree with some of the lyrics (especially the first track, titled "Elevator" (you do the math)), but you have to realize this album was released in 1968. I think everybody was on something back then! :-)

Even though it's 2001, I think the college crowd of today could really go for this... psychadelic rock at its' finest!! BUY IT!! You won't regret it!