# Obscure Albums that You Would Recommend **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 24, 2007, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414 "2007-04-24T03:39:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/21 "2007-04-24T15:00:27Z")
[QUOTE=DfrntBreign] **Screaming Cheetah Wheelies** - _Magnolia_ yet another defunct jamband **Strangefolk** - _Weightless In Water_ another defunct jamband (I’m seeing a theme) [/QUOTE] I saw **Screaming Cheetah Wheelies** at my first rock concert ever . . . opening for **Meatloaf** on his Bat out of Hell II tour. And yay for **Strangefolk**! Local guys (for me); they played my high school ‘project graduation.’ Someone graduating was friends with the band. This was before (I think) they were anything other than a local group. ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/22 "2007-04-24T15:10:40Z")
[Morris On.](http://www.amazon.com/Morris/dp/B00000063T) Traditional British folk songs with a raw Steeleye span kind of vibe. Ashley Hutchings, Richard Thompson, John Kirkpatrick, Shirley Collins – what’s not to love? ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/23 "2007-04-24T15:23:37Z")
[QUOTE=ZipperJJ] **Oh! The Grandeur!** - by Andrew Bird’s Bowl of Fire. Ok more jazz. Some people on the SDMB have heard of Bird. This is the band’s second album, and the first one is awesome too but this one is even better. Fiddle-based jazz with a crooning frontman. Difference here is that Bird writes great lyrics that you don’t usually find in jazz. [/QUOTE] This crystalises the difficulty of answering the OP. I have all 6 CDs of Andrew Bird’s stuff including _Armchair Apocrypha_ and he was on Letterman a couple of weeks ago so I assume he is not obscure. But by the same token anyone I play him for has never heard of him. So I will offer a few other things that no-one ever seems to have heard when I play it for them, but they seem mainstream to me: **Beirut** - _Orkestar_: A 19 year old makes an album where he plays virtually all the instruments - accordion, keyboards, saxophone, clarinet, mandolin, ukulele, horns, glockenspiel, and percussion; that is a weird melange of mariachi bands and klezmer and gypsy music but instantly puts a smile on your face. **Soul Coughing** - _Ruby Vroom_: A weird combination of beat poetry and improvisational jazz and whatever else was in the neighbourhood has been a favourite for many years. **CocoRosie** - _Noah’s Ark_: The most minimalist album I have enjoyed. Very bare percussion and instrumentation and lots of found sounds but somehow it all works. ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/24 "2007-04-24T15:28:33Z")
> [@koeeoaddi](#): > > Morris On Well, then, don’t leave out [The Compleat Dancing Master](http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_m/103-3188890-1464639?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=compleat+dancing+master). Mostly the same lineup as “Morris On,” it offers a wider range of music (including Renaissance and Medieval), with short readings by superb actors interspersed. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/25 "2007-04-24T15:46:27Z")
If I gave you links to mp3s would you actually go listen? Thought not. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/26 "2007-04-24T15:55:14Z")
Ooops, I missed the edit window because the phone rang. I didn’t mean that to sound so snippy. I was amused because OPs like this aren’t meant to get responses, they’re meant to tout whatever the OP is on about (in this case, Rick Danko). There’s nothing wrong with that. I’ve done it. Many of us have done it. It was just amusing to me, that’s all. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/27 "2007-04-24T16:05:06Z")
[QUOTE=DfrntBreign] \*\*Jazz Is Dead \*\* - (three albums, all good) rotating line-up of Very Good Musicians playing jazz(ish) arrangements of Grateful Dead songs [/QUOTE] Great Sky River is very good. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/28 "2007-04-24T16:12:03Z")
**Mike Oldfield** - _Amarok_. 60 minutes, one track. Starts with an amazing bit of guitar work, goes on to Spanish style playing, and it’s hilarious also. Include tooth brushing, an alarm clock, Morse Code encoded by a chain saw, and about four endings, one narrated by a Margaret Thatcher impersonator. It was the second to last album he had to do to fulfill his ripoff contract with Virgin, and he felt free. Not a bit seller, but high on the list of favorites of Mike fans. ---
**Author:** ![bat312](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c77e96/32.png) [@bat312](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bat312)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/29 "2007-04-24T16:17:46Z")
Wazmo Nariz - Tell Me How To Live -Things Aren’t right Frank Zappa meets Talking Heads ---
**Author:** ![Sapo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@Sapo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sapo)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/30 "2007-04-24T16:47:47Z")
\*Amarok \* is excellent! Anything from _Vicky Richards_ \*Eden \* by _Eden_ Anything from _Les Nouvelles Polyphonies Corses_ not so obscure: _It’ll end in tears_ from This Mortal Coil _en Attendant Cousteau_ by _Jean Michel Jarre_ ---
**Author:** ![madisonmax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a587f6/32.png) [@madisonmax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madisonmax)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/31 "2007-04-24T18:19:09Z")
[QUOTE=ColonelDax] Dale Hawkins, [L.A., Memphis and Tyler, Texas](http://www.cherryred.co.uk/revola/artists/dalehawkins.htm). I bought this a couple of months ago and have since been playing it quite a bit, I think it’s very good swamp rock/blues. [/QUOTE] If you like that, check out Swamp Dogg from the early 70s. [Excellent Sides of Swamp Dogg Vol 1](http://www.amazon.com/Excellent-Sides-Swamp-Dogg-Vol/dp/B000000N3R/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-6523563-1392047?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1177438372&sr=8-1) If I Die Tomorrow and Synthetic World are great tunes. Very bluesy but funky too. It’s worth a good listen. ---
**Author:** ![stucco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@stucco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stucco)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/32 "2007-04-24T18:48:18Z")
[QUOTE=don’t ask] **Beirut** - _Orkestar_: A 19 year old makes an album where he plays virtually all the instruments - accordion, keyboards, saxophone, clarinet, mandolin, ukulele, horns, glockenspiel, and percussion; that is a weird melange of mariachi bands and klezmer and gypsy music but instantly puts a smile on your face. [/QUOTE] I came in to recommend Beirut too. They’re great aren’t they? I remember the first song I heard off of it was Postcards from Italy. I thought it was very strange the first time I listened to it, but by the second listen, I was hooked. I had no idea that he was 19 though, pretty cool. My suggestion is The Lemon of Pink by **The Books**. I don’t really know how they make their music, but it is all beautiful and really exciting to listen to. I think they’re pretty obscure, although I’ve heard one of their songs in a hummer ad back in the states. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/33 "2007-04-24T19:11:47Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] **Child is Father to the Man** by Blood Sweat and Tears. No, not the David Clayton-Thomas group. This was their original incarnation, headed by Al Kooper. Excellent blues based rock, with jazz horns nicely integrated. [/QUOTE] What **ZipperJJ** said. I bought this album as a 16 year old in 1970, thinking I was getting more David Clayton-Thomas, but this was far, far better. I loved this album right away, and still do. Let me add: _Convertible Music_ by Josie Cotton. I was browsing the books one day in Books, Strings, & Things in Blacksburg back in 1983, when they played this over the sound system, starting (of course) with “Johnny, Are You Queer?” When the next song turned out to be almost as good, I bought the record. _Let It Bee_ and _Honey Lingers_ by Voice of the Beehive. _Third World Child_ and _Shadowman_ by Johnny Clegg & Savuka. If you liked Paul Simon’s _Graceland_ but weren’t sure where to go next, here’s your answer. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/34 "2007-04-24T19:19:13Z")
[QUOTE=DfrntBreign] **Trapeze** - _Medusa_ Is this really obscure? [/QUOTE] Hopefully, not after The Final Swing. [QUOTE=DfrntBreign] **Tommy Bolin** - \ [/QUOTE] Dude, you’re alright! Loves me some Bolin, especially Private Eyes, exactly the one I came in to mention. Post Toastee and Savannah Woman are just such awesome works. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/35 "2007-04-24T20:07:10Z")
[QUOTE=kelly5078] : Second that. “Live” is, IMO, one of the greatest pop songs ever recorded. I don’t know how this guy avoided being big. [/QUOTE] Briefly, his record company screwed him. They didn’t seem to promote his songs as singles, and then insisted he tour (since he played all the instruments himself, that was a problem). Then, they insisted he come out with a followup album ASAP (again, since he played all the instruments, that was difficult). The followup, **Mirror** was rushed and did poorly and Rhodes was dropped. ---
**Author:** ![Wee\_Bairn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/90db22/32.png) [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2007, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/36 "2007-04-24T23:18:27Z")
Unjustly obscure in the US, Love’s \*\*Forever Changes \*\* is rightfully on most critics best of all time lists. ---
**Author:** ![Ichbin\_Dubist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ichbin\_Dubist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ichbin_Dubist)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/37 "2007-04-25T02:39:35Z")
Phil Ochs, **Pleasures of the Harbour.** Unjustly obscure because the only people who like Phil Ochs are hardcore leftie folkies, and this record isn’t particularly folky and is short on politics, being mostly deeply sad and poetic songs with lush orchestration, with one brief ragtime/comical cynicism interlude, and culminating in a 12-minute electronic-music epic about the Kennedy assassination. This record is huge in several parallel universes. Raincoats, **Odyshape**. In between their first record (amateurish but charming girlpunk) and their third (almost-professional off-kilter worldbeat), the all-female Raincoats released a record where they hadn’t quite learned how write songs or play their instruments in a normal matter, but this record has the power to scare the shit out of me for some reason. The ticking alarm clock gamelan of “Only Loved at Night” especially. Mahmoud Ahmed, **Ere Mela Mela**. A friend of mine described this record as jazz held up to a mirror. Slinky R&B band rocking the Sultan’s harem with a muezzin sitting in on lead vocals. Bülent Ortaçgil, **Benimle Oynar Misin.** He’s the Turkish Nick Drake. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/38 "2007-04-25T04:24:39Z")
Older than dirt, and probably not re-released these 30 years, but: **Chapin Music**. First album by Harry Chapin, with his brothers Tom and Steve (who has an amazing falsetto). Recorded while all three were in college/grad. school. Sounds nothing and everything like what made Harry and Tom separately famous. ---
**Author:** ![madisonmax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a587f6/32.png) [@madisonmax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madisonmax)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/39 "2007-04-25T15:39:51Z")
Any album by [Nanci Griffith](http://www.google.com/musica?aid=2i_BY58GAoC&sa=X&oi=music&ct=result). She has a beautiful voice, a little high-pitched but very listenable. She’s been putting out albums since the early 80s but has never reached mainstream status. I saw her live several years ago, still can’t get her out of my head. ---
**Author:** ![NailBunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecae2f/32.png) [@NailBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NailBunny)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2007, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414/40 "2007-04-25T16:04:57Z")
Having just received it from Amazon yesterday, and having never heard of it before the song on the _Planet Terror_ soundtrack, I will recommend **Nouvelle Vague**. Soothing bossanova covers of songs by such artists as the Dead Kennedys (the song on _Planet Terror_ was “Too Drunk to Fuck”), the Specials, the Cure, Sister of Mercy and P.I.L. Very nice. Good work music. 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obscure-albums-that-you-would-recommend/401414.md?page=3)