Grand Funk Railroad Album: “Classic Masters”

Grand Funk Railroad's ham-fisted approach to rock 'n' roll left music critics appalled, but they sold twenty million records and even broke the Beatles' record for selling out Shea Stadium. During the band's tenure at Capitol Records (1969-1976), they hit the Hot 100 singles chart more than a dozen times. Mark Farner--the band's underrated guitar player and usual lead singer--wrote much of the group's material. However their two No. 1 singles, "We're an American Band" and "The Loco-Motion," were written by drummer Don Brewer and Goffin & King respectively.

Despite the non-stop criticism from the rock press, nothing succeeds like success, and Grand Funk was undeniably one of the biggest bands of the era. I do, however, have a few issues with this remastered collection:

*It's nice to see that they added the 1976 hit "Take Me" (No. 53), not found on the 1991 Collectors Series compilation. But with a running time of only 71 minutes why did they also delete "Inside Looking Out" from 1970 which was the only UK hit of their career? [These are the only two track listing changes that differentiate between Collectors Series and Classic Masters.]

*Three other singles are missing: "Upsetter" (No. 73) from E PLURIBUS FUNK, "Sally" (No. 69) from BORN TO DIE, and "Can You Do It" (No. 45) from the Frank Zappa-produced album GOOD SINGIN' GOOD PLAYIN'.

*Also, the track sequencing on Classic Masters is not chronological, which hurts the continuity.

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The new Grand Funk Railroad album, Classic Masters is a collection of some of their best known songs from the bands heyday of the late 60's through the mid 1970's. The remastering work on these songs is excellant and gives you the feel of how they should have sounded origionally. Certain tracks such as We're an American Band, Walk like a man, Gimme Shelter, Footstompin' Music and Feelin' Alright sound better then they ever did before. The live version of Mean Mistreater is also a good example of how the remastered Grand Funk Live album will sound too. This album should be in every GFR fans collection!

I have had Grand Funk Railroad LPs from the original 60s releases and was looking forward to this new 24 BIT remastering. I have over 1000 CDs and this CD is by far the most DISTORTED--LOUD peace of aluminum and plastic I have ever heard or owned. Even the stings on I'm Your Captain are distorted. The 1980s CDs have much less distortion. I understand analog 60s technology was not the greatest recording invention known to man but this new 24 BIT digital CD is in one word--TERRIBLE!!! I guess I should have recognized the cheap price is representative of this.

However, if you like CDs remastered at zero dB digital maximum so as to be clipping as loud as possible this CD is for you!

At first glance you may think Classic Masters is just another Grand Funk Railroad Hits CD, and it is that. But it is also a 24 BIT fully remastered Hits CD and it sounds absolutely wonderful. If you have Capitol Collectors Sires, Great Grand Funk, More Of The Best, Super Best, etc., there all good, but this CDs sound simply blow's all those CDs away. This Classic Masters CD has a good representation of Grand Funk Railroad's career at Capitol (69-76) from Time Machine and Mean Misterater, to I'm Your Captian/Closer To Home (There Magus Opus), to We're An American Band (there biggest Hit) Walk Like A Man and Shinin On (Both Big its), to Take me and Bad Time (there two last Radio hits whit Bad Time being the most played song on the radio in 76). This is a MUST Have for any Grand Funk Railroad Fan; A Must have for anyone who gets hits CDs of the bands they like; and a must have for anyone who want's to try Grand Funk Railroad out.

For those unwilling to delve deeply into the Grand Funk catalog this is the cheapest, most convenient disc to purchase. It contains fifteen tracks including almost every hit they had; the few omissions are very minor. If you want to know what Grand Funk was really about then this disc isn't a very good representation of their career. Grand Funk did make an effort to produce charting singles but their most essential recordings weren't hits nor were they ever meant to be. This was put together for the casual fan of Funk that just basically wants to hear what was played on the radio. The biggest drawback of this disc's presentation is that the songs aren't in chronological order; if one cares at all about the growth & progress of a group then this song order is a mistake. Of course, to the casual fan this isn't anything important, the pacing of the songs becomes the most prominent feature.

Classic Masters opens with "We're an American Band" (73), arguably their most famous song; it peaked at #1 & was the first of two singles to accomplish this feat. Next is "Time Machine" (69), perhaps their weakest single peaking at #48. "Walk Like a Man" (74) made it to #19. "Some Kind of Wonderful" (75) was one of many songs that they did a cover version of that peaked at #3; it has a near gospel feel with some excellent harmony vocals. "Gimme Shelter" (71) is a cover of a Rolling Stones song that went to #61. "Shinin' On" (74), from the album of the same name, went to #11. "Heartbreaker" (70), it charted at #72. "Rock & Roll Soul" (72) went to #29 & was the first single to feature their newest member on keyboards, Craig Frost. "The Loco-Motion" (74) was their only other #1 hit & a cover of a Little Eva hit written by the husband & wife team of Gerry Coffin & Carole King. "Footstompin' Music" (72) peaked at #29 that featured Farner on keyboards. "Mean Mistreater" (70) is a live version of the song & charted at #47. "Feelin' Alright" (71) was a cover of a Dave Mason song that peaked at #54. "Take Me" (76), sadly, was their last charting single & peaked at #53. "Bad Time" (74) was a song Farner wrote about his marriage going south, it was Funk's last major hit peaking at #4. "I'm Your Captain/Closer to Home" (70), probably Funk's second most famous song, peaked at #22 & was their highest charting single until "We're an American Band".

When you look at the chart positions you can tell that Grand Funk wasn't truly a singles act. This changed somewhat with the single "We're an American Band"; Capitol Records, their record label, was pressuring them to increase their sales in 1973. Their previous album, Phoenix, had been a mild disappointment, but the real reason was money, Capitol Records felt like Grand Funk needed to produce more income by having successful singles. It was unfortunate that when the singles ran dry Grand Funk pretty much did too but they had a great run of about six years that was almost as much fun for me as it was for them.