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(reviewed by Casey Brennan)
HIGH POINTS: You Showed Me, Elenore, Surfer Dan, Chief Kamanawanalea (And The Royal Macadamia Nuts). LOW POINTS: Earth Anthem.
The Turtles' collective ambitions came to a full realization on The Battle Of The Bands, an album that presents them in a series of twelve songs as twelve different 'rivaling' bands who are trying to blow each other off-stage. Just some of the names of the bands that they pretend to be are the Crossfires, Nature's Children, The Fabulous Dawgs, and the Atomic Enchilada. And each of these bands, as you may have guessed, represents a different musical style that runs the gamut from groovy pop and psychedlia to bluegrass and surf-Rock. The diversity is definitely influenced by The Beatles' Sgt. Peppers (the band was heavily influenced by the band in general), but the Turtles wacky approach to each song here is one big boiling pot of hilarity. Main vocalist Howard Kaylan and special effects/vocalist Howard Volman certainly had a lot to do with the humor and crazy silliness; you can see the birth of their partnership as Flo and Eddie emerging here. At this point, as can be seen by the sharply-dressed tuxedo-suited Turtles on the front cover, Mark's afro is already pretty large and Flo-ish looking.
Anyway, the band is in full artistic control here (kinda bringing them away from the bubble-gum label attached to them before), with Monkees producer Chip Douglass brought in to make it happen (so that they wouldn't sound all that different than before!). The end result is a great and amusing pop album with non-stop excitement and lots of almost deranged fun. In a sense the Turtles humor was not far off from the absurd hippiesh humor that was popular at the time, with Howie and Mark actually joining Frank Zappa's The Mothers of Invention later on, but still, most of the songs are pretty poppy with well-crafted, catchy, infectious, and often Beatle-esque melodies. And that couldn't really be a bad thing, could it?
Well, let's go track by track then. The album appropriately begins with the exciting brass sounds of the vigorously up-beat two-minute title track. It immediately brings to mind other psychedelic brassy openers from the 1967/68 epoch such as "Artificial Energy" from the Byrds, and well, The Beatles "Sgt. Pepper", so this is like the third in a trilogy (though there must be more). It's not quite as good as either of them, but it still has a solid melody with a fantastic and invigorating big-band horn break in the middle measure. The harp then introduces us to the Atomic Enchilada who perform the psychedlic number "The Last Thing I Remember", which is trippy in a very toned-down Magical Mystery Tour sort of way. It has the Turtles identity slapped on to it though with Mark's neat ultra-high falsetto harmony lurking miles behind the melody, and a catapulting sound affect that leaps into space after each chorus. As far as pscyhedelic numbers go, this one ranks really well I'd say.
Following that is the 'hit' single "Elenore", a track that was written by a disgustful Howie in response to the record companies urging of another hit like last year's "Happy Together". While maybe not living up to the heights of the predecessor (I mean, it's such a classic song), it's minor-key piano-pop melody is a winner, and the chorus, which has the ultimate corny lyrics, is so joyous, upbeat and proud that you can't help but sing along. After that burst of pure pop, we get the Quad City Ramblers doing a 'lil' inoffensive country western tune called "Too Much Heartsick Feeling". While I used to dislike it, I find it to be a rather harmless little ditty sung by deep-voiced bassist Jim Pons. Then there is the groovy little pop-rocker "Oh Daddy" (about his set-up pot bust at a party in 1966), which turns into a cute Dixieland Jazz number with Howie crazily yelling into the microphone with awesome vocal echo.
Closing the first half is the heavy organ-funk riff of "Buzzsaw" (which I agree is a bit half-baked), followed by the Cross Fires and their surf-Rock tune "Surfer Dan", a completely addictive and fun parody on early 60's surf-Rock with a very hooky chorus. Gotta love those high Mark V. vocals in there too. It's the short Hawaiian tribal chant "Chief Kamanawanlea (And The Royal Macadamia Nuts)" that is the ultimate in absurd fun though. Amusing as can be, this strictly percussive tune has a sharp little drum 'solo' (with a clumsy edit job at the end of it that's very noticeable), some indian mutterings and vocals, and great 'oh yeahs!' at the fade-out with afro-headed Mark's girly voice coming out on top every time.
Next is the rescued Byrds outtake "You Showed Me", an extremely mellow minor-key ballad with gentle strings and a keyboard sound. Definitely turned into a minor classic here with its' Beatlish-influenced sound and strong melody(though maybe a rather subconciously good melody as opposed to a truly ingenious one). A recipe for how to bake brownies, along with a listing of various foods sung by the Bigg Brothers (same as the Turtles you dummy!) is what you get on the bizzarely appealing "Food", a track that has neat vocal effects as well. Afterwards is the charming blue-grass daddler "Chicken Little Was Right" followed finally by "Earth Anthem", a serious blow to the end of the album. And why? It's a stupid and too serious-sounding ecological tune for an album such as this. Blah. Still, a great late-60's gem is what you get here; Ray Davies of the Kinks even became linked to the band when he decided to produce their Turtle Soup album the next year.
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