Fruits de Mer Records (intro 5)
I've been following Anton Barbeau's career for decades and reviewing a lot of his releases. I was also lucky enough to get him to play on two of my Astral Magic albums, Magical Kingdom and Sacret Mysteries. This CD-r is the first compilation of Anton's pretty extensive back-catalogue, although only stuff he has relesed on Fruits de Mer Records. This of course means lots of cover versions too, but Keith even allows original tracks on his releases for his special artists like Anton, Bevis Frond, Nick Nicely etc.
An Introduction to Anton Barbeau is a massive, 76 minute album with 19 tracks. Three of the last ones are marked as bonus tracks. The album starts of with one of my Barbeau original favourites: "Psychedelic Mind of Moses". Then follows covers by Hitchcock and Cope, both big influences for Anton. The stream of Anton's own songs as well as more great cover versions (Bowie x 2, Orange Bicycle, Big Star, Traffic, Donavan etc.) is just perfect. The tracks have previously been released on 7" singles, LP's and CD's except two of the last bonus tracks. "Third Eye" is previously unreleased and "Trouble Was Born" has previously only been available on Fruits de Mer Records Live in Glastonbury DVD. The album also features two collaborations: "Dr. Crippen's Waiting Room" with another FdM sweethearts The Honey Pot and "Pleasant Valley Sunday" with The Fishheads featuring Astralasias Marc Swordfish. Nice! All in all, a great compilation to both long-time die-hard fans and new Barbeay listeners as well! Only limited numers available.