Lee Michaels Nice Day For Something

A loftier percentage of the remembrances relating to Lee Michaels surely pertain to his 1970 Acme Ten hit single "Do You Know What I Mean?" However, the guy released a string of nine LPs from 1968-'75, with a few of them, and one in item, having sold some copies, and so it'due south a fleck perplexing that he doesn't concord a larger contemporary profile. He'south not forgotten though, equally Manifesto reissued all of his A&M material on compact disc separately and in a 7-disc box fix dorsum in 2015, and just this last November the label followed up with CDs of his two records for Columbia, Nice Day for Something from '73 and Tailface from the next year. They provide a precipitous contrast equally finale to an interesting career.

Similar many, I first heard Lee Michaels through his biggest hit, but the more substantial introduction came through his self-titled endeavor from '69, a record that put him on the radar and a slab that some praise equally one of the great "get down and boogie rock" platters of the archetype rock age. Merely to my ears, that one's always been something of a mixed bag.

Reportedly cutting live in the studio in seven hours by Michaels on keyboards and bass pedals and Barry "Frosty" Smith on drums, the atmosphere of cutting loose is prevalent on Lee Michaels, but the whole is marred past drum soloing, organ noodling, a medley (never a good sign), and moments of general overzealousness in the merger of stone and soulfulness.

It did stop with the likeable good-vibes drug song "Haighty Hi," which was a FM hit and the title to Manifesto'south 2015 comp of Michaels' A&Thou years. The eponymous set was his tertiary for A&M, and its stature as a breakout has in part led to imitation summaries of the guy equally but half of a ii-man band. The reality is that his commencement two LPs, the considerably more psych-tinged (in a pop sorta mode) Carnival of Life and Recital (both '68), are full-ring diplomacy, and Barrell, the follow-up to Lee Michaels (from '70) featured a trio with Drake Levin (of Paul Revere & the Raiders) on guitar (he'd played on Recital).

His album fifth(from '71, which is where "Practice You Know What I Mean?" is plant) did go back to the duo affair, but with some occasional saxophone and backing vocals from Merry Clayton; his next truly two-man try was the '73 2LP Alive, his final release for A&Yard. Of all these records, I'll confess to liking Carnival of Life best (fifty-fifty if its cover is kinda awful), which might pb to suspicions that the likelihood of my appreciating these ii Columbia discs is pretty dang low.

But look. I've non mentioned Infinite and First Takes from '72, the studio album that followed 5th'southward Top 20 status. It holds ii brusque songs and two longer jams delivered past a quartet featuring Levin back in the fold, a decidedly non-commercial gesture that finer spelled the terminate of Michaels' association with A&M (like many performance sets, Alive was the contract fulfiller).

I dig Infinite and Starting time Takes, in no small office due to Levin'due south guitar rawness only too because the grooves don't connect like they have something to prove. It's not an amazing record, only information technology is a consistently enjoyable one, and it fabricated me wonder what the story was with Nice Day for Something and Tailface, as I'll confess to unfamiliarity prior to Manifesto'due south reissuing them last fall. To begin, the pair are quite different as neither held what I was expecting.

If Michaels' A&M years are partially a tale of frustrations between artist and label, Overnice Day for Something stands as a fresh chapter begun in good faith. It's essentially a popular album, though opener "Your Breath is Bleeding" retains Michaels' occasional gestures toward social commentary as he chooses ivory tickling over organ grinding. It's another duo LP (only with some clear overdubbing in achieving the pop objective), here with hereafter Doobie Blood brother Keith Knudsen (who was on Space and Offset Takes and Live) behind the kit, and as the songs unwind, he hits hard plenty to offset a certain tendency.

That inclination would be a similarity to soft rock, which really comes to the fore in "Same Old Vocal." The narrative on Michaels' Columbia menstruum relates that the label's firing of A&R man Clive Davis left Lee without an advocate amid company disinterest, only at to the lowest degree "Aforementioned One-time Song" was released as a single, and had it come out a few years later with some promotion I take a creeping suspicion it could've resulted in some chart action, if perhaps minor.

"So Hard" extends this approach but adjusts it into a resemblance, through the continued utilise of piano and the audio of Michaels' vocalization, to early Elton John, though Knudsen'southward drumming continues to hit hard plenty to (hypothetically) continue the rockers from abandoning ship. "High Wind" broadens into a funky groove with some New Orleans-manner piano; remember Elton in a Dr. John frame of mind. "Olson Arrives at Two 50-Five" is the finale to the LP'south first side, and in stretching out to most seven minutes and shifting gears along the fashion, it reminds me more than a fleck of a non-rural ii-man version of The Band.

That'south cool, but "The Other Solar day (The Other Way)" places him back into soft rock fashion; again, had the song come out in '77 with a fiddling promotion, it's not hard to imagine information technology making some sales waves. This framework extends into "Rock & Gyre Community," which was the flip to "Same Former Song." Every bit on that one, Michaels brings dorsum the harpsichord from his early psych-pop days, though there'due south ultimately aught trippy about Nice Day for Something.

With "Bell," Michaels' switches to guitar for an appealing slower groove that's clearly designed for stretching out (equally it soars in the soloing), though the song wraps at a picayune over 4 minutes. "Went Saw Mama" quickly snaps dorsum to the keys-focused pop-zone (it could've been a second single if things had transpired differently), simply then "Nothing Matters (Merely It Doesn't Thing) finds Michaels switching back to guitar for a mesomorphic mid-tempo rocker that's at odds with the remainder of the record as it forecasts what was to come up with Tailface.

Which undercuts the temptation to speculate that the second Columbia LP's turn to a guitar-fueled quartet lineup (though the cover offers a snapshot of a trio) for a short and tangibly non-pop set was a reaction to Nice Twenty-four hour period'southward lack of sales; the first record did chart, but it stalled at 172, his weakest showing since Lee Michaels put him on the map back in '69.

By extension, I've read of Tailface as a punk statement as career ender (there was a self-released early '80s album that's effectively lost), but that seems off-target to me; instead, the crunchy licks of opener "Met a Toucan" and "Slow Dancin' Rotunda" made me think of James Gang, though the soulful grooves are nonetheless recognizably Michaels.

The keyboards (piano and organ) haven't been ditched, as "Politician" (not a Cream cover), "Drink the Water," and "Lovely Lisa" do put his chief instrument and some lingering remnants of a pop approach upwards front, but overall this is Michaels in stone mode with drummer Frosty (total name Bartholomew Eugene Smith-Frost) making his return. And I'll admit to enjoying the blues-rock aura of "Roochie Toochie Loochie" hither more than anything on Lee Michaels. Yes, even "Haighty How-do-you-do."

That before set's vii-hour condition proposes a tossed-off sensibility, simply information technology to my ear it revealed them trying really hard (read: too hard) to impress. Much of Tailface simply rocks, though the wearisome-build crescendo of "Drink the H2o" is indicative of a non-slapdash date with the material, at least structurally. Lyrics are another affair; closer "Garbage Gourmet" offers Michaels having a conversation with his anus, which isn't exactly tossed-off, but you lot get the thought (hopefully).

The verdict on these two CDs? Both are surprisingly listenable, and from various but not incongruent angles. The rocker in me leans toward Tailface, just I'll acknowledge that the pop appetite of Dainty Day for Something is a bit of a grower. Along with Funfair of Life and Space and Kickoff Takes, these sit virtually the top of my personal Lee Michaels hierarchy as they combine into a solid career capper.

Nice Twenty-four hours for Something
B+

Tailface
B+

Source: https://www.thevinyldistrict.com/storefront/2019/01/graded-on-a-curve-lee-michaels-nice-day-for-something-tailface/

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