The Guess Who Album: “This Time Long Ago: The Lost Sessions 65-69”

Rescued from oblivion by Randy Bachman's Ranbach label, this collection proves how accomplished The Guess Who were before their US breakthrough hit, "These Eyes", with material drawn from the previous couple years. "This Time Long Ago", "Flying On The Ground" (a Neil Young composition), are "Miss Felicity Grey" are a few of the songs which demonstrate that this band was every bit as good as what your typical top ten group of '67 or '68. A portion of the material was restored from some recently recovered tapes from their tenure as house band on the Canadian dance TV show, LET'S GO, so we also get to hear their interpretations of such hits as "Summertime Blues" (Blue Cheer style), "Love Is All Around", "White Room", and "Light My Fire". "Light My Fire" is particularly impressive, done twice, first, in Jose Feliciano style, then busting into Doors style. This barely 20 yr old Burton Cummings has no trouble being bluesly and pained a la Jose, nor delivering edgy, break on through vocals, Morrison style, although there's a certain young "cuteness" to the latter, warmer than the Lizard King's rendition. Also included in the 2 disc set are a couple of songs that were later released on their RCA debut LP, WHEATFIELD SOUL, "These Eyes", "A Wednesday In Your Garden" (a lovely hidden GW gem of a song) & "Friends of Mine". Here, "Friends of Mine" is much more raw (a touch of adolescent-sounding sadism, but forgiveable, taking age into account), and perhaps embarrassing to modern-day Cummings, but very interesting, with a very cool closing abstract jass saxophone solo. The symphony, also heard on "Wednesday", also adds a fresh flavor for those accustomed to the WHEATFIELD SOUL version. One gem in particular on THIS TIME LONG AGO, is the jazz standard, "I'm In The Mood For Love". We now realize that Burton Cummings had these jazzy bluesy vocal stylize-abilities long before he started wearing the mustache and touring with that white grand piano. The Cummings-Bachman interplay is impressive for a couple young guys, Randy, doing his Lenny Breau, Burton & his Chet Baker. There's a couple little hiccups on this record, like the extremely goofy version of "Pretty Blue Eyes", and "Sitar Saga" (now we realize how far & quickly Burton progressed on flute from here to "Undun" or "Follow Your Daughter Home"), but I've only scratched the surface regarding this CD's points of interesting. Very informative liner notes from Canadian Rock Historian, John Einarson are included.

I bought this album a week before the opening night of their American Woman Tour to get myself in the mood for the show. I'm a big fan of the band, but until this album, was disappointed we didn't have a rarities album like other bands from that era. And now it's here..

I gave the disc 4 stars, but that's really because the second disc in the set redeems the first. An interesting lok at the band in its renaissance after Chad Allen left, but aside from the odd Pretty Blue Eyes and the amazingly adept Sitar Saga, there isn't all that much spectacular stuff. Until disc 2. Starting with two versions of the Doors' Light My Fire, and rolling through a number of alternate versions of future album tracks, from These Eyes to 6am or Nearer, and a remarkable White Room, It really shows how the band grew into what we have today. This disc makes the set well worth it.

A real Guess Who Fan needs this. If you aren't a huge fan, don't worry too much about getting it.

This is a really great collection, although I enjoy the first disk more than the second. Randy Bachman's There's no getting away from you is fabulous. It ranks up there with some of their moody lesser known gems, compositions such as The Answer- it's one of their best. You have a great variety of pop songs on this collection as well as covers and earlier versions of songs that were re-recorded on American Woman & Canned Wheat. These earlier versions are for the most part at least as good if not better than the later versions. The warped Pretty Blue Eyes is as funny as anything you ever heard - sung through a megaphone along with a Walter Brennan type of narration, topped off by a drunken sounding trombone solo ala Dylan's Rainy Day Woman or Kristofferson's I may drink too much. You have to hear it to believe it. There are only three misses - The Feliciano-version Light My Fire and White Room don't have the right feel or sound. The earlier version of Friends of Mine is brutal - RCA must have wisely forced Cummings to tone down/delete the lyrics about infanticide and incest. Still I'll give him credit - he outdid Jim Morrison with his outrageous lyrics. This collection is absolute fun, and is a prime example of why this highly underrated band was the best thing that ever came out of Canada. Just buy it damn it!