Randy Holden - Population II (1970)
Randy Holden - Population II (1970)
This is Randy Holden’s remastered rarity Population II plus 10 bonus tracks. The 10 bonus tracks are his Guitar God album. The artwork for this CD had several mistakes that are now fixed. The cover showed there were only 8 bonus tracks. That has been corrected to show 10 bonus tracks. The rest of the mistakes were on the tray. It only listed 8 bonus tracks. The 2 skipped songs are now added & tracks 6 & 7 have been corrected. The band members names had to be lowered to make room for the 2 missing tracks. All times were redone to reflect the actual length of the songs.
Biography by Richie Unterberger
A '60s guitar hero who never seemed to be in the right place at the right time, Randy Holden has attracted a small but intense cult following for his work with various California groups in the '60s. After a couple of surf singles with the Fender IV that featured his inventive reverbed fretting, Holden joined the Sons of Adam, a Los Angeles band that cut three decent garage-psychedelic singles. Holden's characteristic Jeff Beck-like sustain can already be heard on these, the best known of which is "Feathered Fish," which was penned by Arthur Lee of Love (although Love never recorded it). When the Sons of Adam broke up, drummer Michael Stuart, in fact, joined Love, while Holden joined the underrated punky San Francisco psychedelic band the Other Half. His searing, suspended leads are the highlights of their sole album (they also recorded a few single-only songs).
Holden is actually best known for his short stint in San Francisco's Blue Cheer, which bridged psychedelia and heavy metal. Holden replaced Leigh Stephens, but left during the recording of the third Blue Cheer album, New! Improved! (he appears on side two only). Holden then recorded an extremely hard-to-find hard rock album as a solo artist, Population II, for the small Hobbit label in 1970 before drifting out of the music business. Most of his work, however, has been reissued sporadically by small labels in the '80s and '90s.
Tracklist:
1. Guitar Song 6:11
2. Fruit & Iceburgers 5:02
3. Between Time 1:49
4. Fruit & Iceburgers (Conclusion) 1:53
5. Blue My Mind 6:00
6. Keeper Of My Flame 10:04
7. Dark Eyes (Part I) 5:07
8. Wild Fire 5:38
9. Scarlet Rose 4:04
10. Pain In My Heart 4:39
11. Hell And High Water 5:39
12. No Trace 4:15
13. Got Love 4:02
14. Blue My Mind 4:10
15. Castle In The Sky 5:14
16. Dark Eyes (Part II) 5:06