The El Pea Situation

Introduction

About a month ago, I started becoming obsessed with the vinyl album "El Pea", and I am not sure why. I had also aquired a copy of "Bumpers", which is a great album, and "Nice Enough To Eat" was one of the first albums that I bought, and it introduced me to a lot of artists who are absolute favourites of mine.

While I was aware of "Bumpers" and "El Pea" as a teenager, I never bought them and didn't really know what was on them, but it seemed to be treated as an iconic (I hate that word) release.

So I found a copy and ordered it, and it came today. Annoyingly, when I dropped into Action Records in Preston, they had a copy for sale, but mine was already on the way. I did pick up a copy of "Clogs", a folk sampler, and on Preston Market I picked up a copy of "Bombers", another that I remember from my teenage years.

These are the ones that I picked up over the last two days:

This lot cost me just over twenty notes, but I walked past the market stall tat shop of HMV that is selling three LPs for the bargain price of sixty-six quid. Here are a few more in my collection:

Anyway, I have played the first record of the "El Pea" set and it is very good with an unusual sleeve design which you can see on my record player here:

It's just a 24" x 12" card with a fold in the middle, and all the info prind on the green side and then stored in a plastic sleeve to keep everything together.

So I thought I would do a playlist of some of the songs from my vinyl samplers, and may even tempt you to have a listen.

Traffic - "Empty Pages"

Traffic's "Empty Pages" opens "El Pea" and it is the first of many great songs on the album. I know it from "John Barleycorn Must Die" which is a CD that I play very often.

Slade - "The Shape Of Things To Come"

Not the Yardbirds song, but this is pre-paydirt Slade with a slice of excellent hard rock.

Heavy Jelly - "I Keep Singing That Same Old Song"

"Nice Enough To Eat" is choc-full of amazing songs, and I may include more than one, because this relentless eight-minute piece just has to be heard. When I first played the album, the Fairport Convention and Nick Drake songs did not impress me, but now they are nailed-on favourites.

King Crimson - "Cadence And Cascade"

Although I didn't get this as a teenager, I picked it up from RPM in Newcastle, and every song on this is a nine out of ten for me. Like "El Pea", it opens with a brilliant Traffic song, but once it's on, you don't skip.

"Cadence and Cascade" is from "In The Wake of Poseidon", one of the early King Crimson albums I don't have in my collection, although it is on my copy of "A Young Person's Guide To King Crimson:

That is a thing with vinyl: you put the record on and you have twenty minutes of music to listen to. We could create tape compilations, and I can with my record player that I got from RPM, as it also has a tape deck (which took me two years to discover).

Aprodites Child - "The Four Horsemen"

The video I have chosen for this is one that I did myself, and YouTube have let it go. It features the apocalyptic art of the North East's greatest artist, John Martin.

Aphrodite's Child included Vangelis and Demis Roussos in the group, and the album "666" features some stunning music.

Conclusion

Thank you for listening, and I hope you found something you liked. I love almost all of the music on these albums.