Graham Bond ‎– "Love Is The Law" (Pulsar Records ‎– AR 10604) 1968

Following the dissolution of The Graham Bond Organisation, our Graham went to the USA to try and 'make it.'
After a struggle,and few gigs, Pulsar records offered to release an album.The result of which was this Crowley-esqely titled record, "Love is the Law",on which they somehow managed to spell his name wrong!?
Crowley also said, "Every man every woman is a star", except Graham, it seems, as the record bombed. There was not much call for chubby pop stars in the valleys of LA, which would explain why he became a permanent fixture at Mama Cass's house.
"Where's my Graham!", she could be heard screaming when he wasn't there to suck up to her.
Bizarrely they both met an early death in London within a couple of weeks of each other in 1974!In her case, no, she didn't choke on a ham sandwich as pub legend prescribes;but, strangely, she did die in the same room that Keith moon also expired in a few years later.
Had they been dabbling with the Dark Arts? ...we'll never know. I'll dig out my Waddingtons Ouija Board to ask Graham directly.......He said "Not the dark arts, it was the dark arse"......sense of humour intact then Mr Bond? Even in the after-life,hell or whatever?
This album is his most commercial attempt at extoling the virtues of Magick,backed up with the finest Californian session musicians.
A very soulful psychedelic blues outing that, if made by someone more photogenic would have hit the billboard chart at a healthy  number 666.
After one more ,Magick-less album,his visa expired and was required to return to the UK (i.e. Kicked out), where he went onto much stranger and darker things.Eventually ending up as Ginger Bakers's side-kick in Ginger Bakers Airforce.The ultimate humiliation.

Tracklist:

Love Is The Law 3:26
Moving Towards The Light 4:29
Our Love Will Come Shining Through 3:03
I Couldn't Stand It Anymore 4:10
Sun Dance 2:24
Crossroads Of Time 2:33
Bad News Blues 2:50
Strange Times, Sad Times 3:57
The Naz 3:30
The World Will Soon Be Free 3:55

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Graham Bond ‎– "We Put Our Magick On You" (Vertigo ‎– 6360 042) 1971

As appaling Paul Daniels used to say....."Now, That's Magic", noticably without the 'K', and this album certainly is Magical.
The Mighty Shadow himself, Graham Bond, wants to put his Magick, with a 'K', on us. Very nice of him, but he could have tried putting his magick on himself, then he would have been the pop star he so openly craved to be,and not the roadkill he became under the wheels of a subway train three years later!
The cover shows us that his wife(Diane) was determined for a second time to place the various musicians around the studion in accordance with their astrological positions in relation to the pentagram, or, he-he clever this.....Penta-graham. 
Again the rhythm section of Pugwash(?) and Terry were on opposite sides of the room,but this time they seem to be tight and funky.On the previous "Holy Magick" album Rick Grech was most likely off his tits on copious amounts of Vertigo supplied drugs, or pissed.
I had a friend called Pugwash at primary school,just around the corner from where Rick Grech lived his last days.He was so-called because he had a constant crust of dried snot around his nostrils,'Pug' being the local word for said nasel bi-product. My now self-murdered 'friend', an 'orrible little oik called 'Tomo', who forced me to be his friend or face pugilistic retribution.Did a shit in his trousers one afternoon in art class,and eased the fresh turd down his trouser leg by waggling the appropriate limb until the offending stool dropped onto the floor next to Pugwash's desk. Like  the shitkicker he was, Tomo kicked the odourous item under Pugwash's chair.
His hand shot up in the air consumed with delight as he gained the attention of the pedagogue in charge and steered her attention to an obviously oblivious 'Pugwash'.
"Please Miss, Pugwash has done a shit in class", he informed with barely concealed glee.
Pugwash was forcefully removed and sent to the principles office after the obligatory visit to the bogs to wipe his innocent,and presumably 'shitless' arse.
Oh how we laughed for weeks on that one.
I next met Pugwash some twenty years later, when I produced my driving Licence at the local Police station after a speeding offence.The officer handling my case was none other than PC Pugwash himself,and I noticed he had a large tattoo on his forearm,with the word 'Tracey' proudly displayed in the centre of the swirling doodle of an art nouveau heart shape.He pretended not to recognise me, but I did take note that there were no longer any 'pugs' caked around his nose holes,and took care not to mention the 'Turd' incident.
This, kids, is how to handle yourself when in a Cop-Shop.
Ironically 'Tomo' chose to end his life in the very same manner as Graham Bond did,by throwing himself at the mercy of an approaching train.It was just that Tomo did it at Leicester railway station,and Bond ,Graham Bond, did it at Finsbury Park Tube station.
It could have all been so very different couldn't it? But then again there wouldn't be anything to write about if it all ended in roses like some crappy Hollywood movie, would there?

Tracklist:
1 Forbidden Fruit / Part One
2 Moving Towards The Light
3 Ajama
4 Druid
5 I Put My Magick On You
6 Time To Die
7 Hail Ra Harakhite
8 Forbidden Fruit / Part Two

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Graham Bond ‎– "Holy Magick" (Vertigo ‎– 6360 021) 1970

Graham Bond, rivaled the Yardbirds for producing musicians that would go on to greater and grater(sic)things, while he languished in poverty and had an unerring talent for failure. Ginger Baker, Dick Heckstall Smith, John McLaughlin,Jack Bruce,John Hiseman,all went on to have sucessful careers, while our Graham struggled with his weight, and became obsessed with Aleister Crowley (he believed he was Crowley's son!?).
Whereas fellow Crowley obsessive and,as yet,unarrested satutory rapist, Jimmy Page, made that dull over saturated hard rock crap with Led Zepplin, Bond was truly inspired to make a couple of albums of pure madness on prog label Vertigo.Incredibly,the money was there to indulge Grahams fantasies,and included a lavishly packaged gatefold sleeve.....mmmm nice!
Like a Spinal Tap sequence,during the recording, all the musicians had to stand in certain postions in a pentagram shape, that Bonds wife (Diane Stewart) had worked out based on their horoscopes. This led to the rhythm section standing in opposite ends of the room.(the bassist of which was Rick Grech,who lived his last years of his life in a wheel chair a few doors down from me on the council Estate in Leicester where i spent my formative years)
This inevitably caused a slight wandering in syncopation that some would find amateurish,but not your faithful scribe;it makes this album as great as much as it was a massive failure commercially.
Graham treats us to a bit of 'Atlantean' as his husky growl squeezes out the lyrics, "Lashtal.......Attah, Malkuth, Vega-Burah, Vega Dulah, Leolame, Amen."
Messing about with the Occult in the medium of Progressive Jazz Rock is not recommended.Especially as our hero was mysteriously hurled in front of an approaching train in the london Underground at Finsbury Park Station........it could have been Suicide I suppose? In fact, yes it was Suicide.Mess about with the Occult if you want, nothings gonna happen either way.

Tracklist:

A1 Meditation - Holy Magick Suite
B2 Return Of Arthur
B3 The Magician
B4 The Judgement
B5 My Archangel Mikael

Bonus Tracks:

1 Water Water (7" Version 1969)

2 12 Gates To The City (7" Version)

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Aleister Crowley ‎– "Aleister Crowley" (Not On Label ‎– OZ 77) 1986

Leamington Spa produced some recording greats, like Swell Maps,The Shapes, and....erm Aleister Crowley, aka The Great Beast.
Yes, Satan came from an upper middle class town in Warwickshire,and if you've ever visted there,you'll see why.
So this slightly posh bloke spent most of his free time,of which there seemed to be a lot, mucking about with the Occult,flirting with Nazism,mountaineering,and shagging.......lots of shagging.....of all gender types.
Basically a decadent Occultist, he became the object of fascination for many an impressionable musician in the 70's and 80's. But he seemed to be a bit of a Twat as far as I can see. Narcissistic and self-indulgent,Crowley considered himself to be one of the outstanding figures of his time.....don't we all?
Here we have the complete recorded works of Crowley's poems and innvocations from about 1914 to 1920 ,plus a rousing operatic version of 'vive La France', for some strange reason.
The Devil he were not, a silly old knob, he certainly was.

Tracklist:

A1 The Call Of The First Aethyr (Enochian)
A2 The Call Of The First Aethyr (English)
A3 The Call Of The Second Aethyr (Enochian)
A4 The Call Of The Second Aethyr (English)
B1 La Gitana
B2 The Pentagram
B3 One Sovereign For Woman
B4 The Poet
B5 At Sea
B6 Fingernails
B7 The Titanic
B8 Collects From The Gnostic Mass
B9 Vive La France

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