Jan 19, 2009

ROCK SHOP - MR LEE'S "SWING 'N AFFAIR" PRESENTS... (LEE-MO 1968)




Hailing from W.Covina, California, Rock Shop became one of the most popular bands in the area, playing regularly at Mr Lee's Swingin' Affair nightclub in West Covina to packed houses. The band's one and only album, released on the Lee-Mo label, took it's name from the nightclub, and featured 12 self-penned tracks of fuzz-led blues and psych, as well as boasting a spoof cover depicting the band as the next Beatles and hairdresser-cum-rock promoter Mr Lee as God! Despite enjoying a minor level of success including supporting both the Shirelles and Big Joe Turner, the band decided to call it a day in 1969, leaving this lone recording as their epitaph...[net]
The LP could be viewed as a "1-killer-track" type deal, this being the opening fuzz-psycher "Soap suds & creme" which is a quite successful take on the Butterfly/Steppenwolf bag, with a long killer guitar break. The rest of the LP (all originals) is more teenbeat-sounding and what you might expect from a 3rd tier Sunset Strip band. Although light fare I must admit a couple of them have good, memorable hooks, and excellent fuzz leads keep recurring.
The band played mainly at Mr Lee's Covina nightclub, where the bulk of the LP pressing was sold. There were also some lounge gigs in Santa Cruz. The band existed roughly a year. Ex Rock-Shop member Alan Clark has a website with more info and images...
Here

4 comments:

mscmichael said...

Very good work as usual. Thanks...

The Bomber said...

welly well !
very rare lp!
great choice George
keep it up

Georgie Hirezola said...

its an "R3" album...
I dont usually post albums by..."R"s but this one is really great!!!
The sound has an early 1966-67 feeling...a bit like "Kenny & the kasuals","New Colony Six"...or something like that...dont know...
I love it!!!

stinky diver said...

Can you please re-enable the upload? I really want this! Thanks