Record people get the best free sh*t!!
When I was a pre-teen, got $5 a week allowance. In the seventies, this still was not a lot of money, especially for a music/media obsessed child like me! I was fascinated with the kid rock of the day, as were my caucasion peers, especially KISS & ALICE COOPER ( I went to a heavily integrated- 90% black- elementary school in Prince Georges county - the black kids had a group too, PARLIAMENT- similar to KISS, same label, costumes, fantastic stage show & mildly forgetable music- they always had a big DC following. They also had cool local hendrix/santana/proto-go-go group EXPERIENCE UNLIMITED (or E.U.) ). Due to monetary restrictions, my record shopping was usually confined to the used record store in College Park or the WAXIE MAXIE'S cut-out bin. Oh, what treasures one could find for 99 cents to $2.99 in those bins, most of the cut-outs of that time are the collectors items of today. No exception was ANGEL , who you could actually get the entire discography of for about $6 back then, around '79. Unbeknownst to me they WERE LOCAL too, although I was more interested in them due to the fact that they shared management & label (CASABLANCA) as KISS. The music was okay from what I remember, it was more exciting that I was into a group that NO ONE ELSE MY AGE HAD NEVER HEARD OF, as they never placed a radio hit off of any of their six albums, in fact the biggest exposure they received was a short cameo appearance in the movie FOXES with Jodie Foster and former RUNAWAYS (another pre-teen favorite from the cut-out bin) singer/front skank CHERIE CURRIE. I remember wanting to see that movie but being held back by it's R rating ( my father took us to see SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER the year before much to my mother's pissed-offedness). Just as well, I had to be in my mid-20s to appreciate that disco coke-romp of a film. Anyhoo, ANGEL were MY group (who I only marginally liked, it was more about the exclusivity of it than the music.) I've heard it said that if they had held out a couple of years into the 80s they would have been huge, but I honestly don't believe that, they were to prog for bubblegum, not metal enough for hair metal & kinda fey. Anyhow, occasionally, as obsessives do we try to re-stir those old musical intersts & re-investigate those old passions, which led me to this great qudio press-kit thing , HILARIOUS! How could you EVER want to buy something after hearing this...this...I don't know what to call it, dramatic recitation?? That and the fact that there were names like FELIX and BARRY in the group??? I don't know what I was thinking at all of 11 years old, but I was cool in my own head for it. Listening back now, the first and second albums are actually pretty great, the third is pretty good & the last 2 are absolute rubbish, stabbing for hits by approprating similar styles of the day ie. Bad Co., The Eagles, whatever. But if I had heard this I probably would have reconsidered and spent my allowance on something better, like toothpaste or books. Dig if you dare!
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