Five favorite "obscure" bands (or CDs)?

[rschleicher]

OK, since the 5 favorite bands question tends to produce a lot of common answers (how could I not include the Beatles, for example), how about a variation? What are your five favorite "obscure" bands? (Or individual CDs/LPs?). You know, the ones you think are the greatest thing you've heard in a long while, but no one else has heard of.

Of course, there are degrees of "obscureness", so you can still answer with bands or CDs that some people have heard of - as long as they were never popular!

My list (at least what occurs to me today) is:

1. The old Rockpile boys (Dave Edmunds and Nick Lowe) - maybe they're not really that obscure, but they were definitely never that popular.
2. Rancid (esp. the "Out Come the Wolves" CD)
3. Fountains of Wayne ("Welcome Interstate Managers")
4. David Johansen (pre-Buster Poindexter days, especially his first solo album with "Funky But Chic" on it - also get to count the New York Dolls album)
5. The English Beat (their greatest hits CD is a good collection, with "Save It For Later", "Door to My Heart", and a nice double-time ska cover of "Tears of a Clown")

 

[Shadow_Ferret]

Well, my favorite bands are probably on my favorite obscure bands list, too. They were fairly obscure (not pop) at the time (70s) but I think with time passing they've become even moreso.

Captain Beyond
Gentle Giant
Hawkwind
Stray Dog
Armageddon

 

[MDS]

Based on all of these favorite band/artist/album threads I'd say alot of you like 70s and 80s rock and metal like myself, so I'll offer my all time favorite obscure 80s rock (or 'pop' metal, 'hair' metal, if you will) band: King Kobra.

They are relatively unknown although the members of the band are recognizable: Carmine Appice, Mark Free (later founding member of Slaughter, and even later became Marcie Free ), Mick Sweda (Bulletboys), Johnny Rod (Wasp, I think) and a few others over the years.

 

[Rob Babcock]

Ready To Strike is definately an 80's metal masterwork. Don't look for profound lyrics or stunning musical innovation, cause you ain't gonna find it in KK. But, they will rock your *** off! Free was a helluva singer, and although I haven't heard him/her since the weenie snipping, I guess he's still singing and still sounds great. You have to wonder what the hormones have done to his voice, but obviously the mechanism must still basically be there.

 

[jeffsg4mac]

SAGA, the Worlds Apart album from the 80's. Some amazing guitar work and fresh lyrics on that album.

 

[Leprkon]

"Gamma" showed that Ronny Montrose still had some licks left in him.
"Axe" had a couple of decent songs (Rock N Roll Party in the Streets and You May Not Remember My Name) and some really wicked album covers
"Giuffria" the Silk and Steel album was excellent
"Elefante" (John Elefante's pre-Kansas group) contributed a really great song to the St Elmo's Fire soundtrack
"Vandenburg" (prior to his days of working with WhiteSnake)

 

[Rob Babcock]

Hmmm...votes for Guiffria & Vandenberg. There must be more old-school metalheads here than I thought. I finally managed to get Silk & Steel on CD a few years back (hard to find now) and I have several Vandenberg CDs, too.

 

[Shadow_Ferret]

I remember when I was in HS seeing albums by a band called Budgie in the record store. I never picked them up thinking, "what the hell kind of name is 'Budgie'?" I just downloaded some songs by them and now I must rush out and buy ALL their albums. Man, I passed on some really kickass early metal there! They would easily top my favorite rock group list.

 

[20to20K]

1) Was (Not Was) - Alternative rock
2) B Sharps - a jazz quintet
3) YaYa3 - jazz trio
4) Lighthouse Family - British Pop
5) Richard Bona - African Pop/Jazz

 

[MDS]

SAGA, the Worlds Apart album from the 80's. Some amazing guitar work and fresh lyrics on that album.

Yep, another good but obscure band. I have Worlds Apart, but really only like Wind Him Up, On The Loose, and Amnesia. The other songs are so-so, IMO.

 

[MDS]

Hmmm...votes for Guiffria & Vandenberg. There must be more old-school metalheads here than I thought. I finally managed to get Silk & Steel on CD a few years back (hard to find now) and I have several Vandenberg CDs, too.

I finally got the Giuffria song 'Call To The Heart' on a 'Hits of the 80s' kind of CD, but still haven't found an original Giuffria CD. It will show up on Ebay someday and I'll try to get it. Just like King Kobra - I finally got an original KK III CD for $29 in absolutely mint condition.

 

[Francious70]

1) Anberlin - Never Take Friendship Personal
2) Bella Fleck & The Flectones - Ten from Little Worlds
3) Spoken - Echoes of the Spirit Still Dwell
4) Forth Right - Forth Right
5) Joe Satriani - Strange Beautiful Music

Paul

 

[bpape]

Was Not Was (already mentioned but worth it again)
The Tubes (not terribly obscure but certainly not mainstream)
Lucifer's Friend
Riuichi Sakimoto (Sounds exactly like David Bowie)
The Smiths

 

[FLZapped]

Spike Jones.....

 

[rschleicher]

Probably most people have never heard of Spike Jones, except maybe having heard the name mentioned in the line from "Up On Crippled Creek" (the Band) where Levon Helm sings, "we had Spike Jones on the box". I guess Jones would best be described as a parody or satirical song writer (along with his band, the City Slickers), but I don't know if he really wrote the songs, or just modified existing songs. I suppose the closest modern analogy might be Wierd Al Yankovic.

 

[Shadow_Ferret]

To be honest, I'm not even sure Spike Jones should be considered obscure, except to anyone younger than 40 maybe. The comparison was made above, like Weird Al was to rock, Spike Jones was to Big Band. But he had a very large following at the time. My point is, to say Spike Jones is obscure is like saying Weird Al is obscure. Even those who have never heard a Weird Al song know his name. The same holds true of Spike Jones in his day.

Spikes Jones and the City Slickers had many Top 10 hits and he was most famous for his use of weird and funny sound effects in his songs.

 

[BMXTRIX]

SSQ - Playback
Men Without Hats - Pop Goes The World album
Dramarama - A Via Musicom
Senses Fail - anything
Love/Hate - Blackout In The Red Room

I probably have a thousand obscure songs I like, but very few complete albums from a band that really didn't go far.

 

[Hawkeye]

I have some early Kraftwerk, not really an obscure band but I do have a couple of their pre-Autobahn albums which are getting increasingly difficult to find I would imagine.

Symphonic Slam - vinyl - mid 70s synthesizer based progressive rock

The Northern Pikes - Big Blue Sky in vinyl. They're a Canadian band mostly unknown in the US I think.

 

[Randos]

I'm more the numetal/poprockish type I guess and a few off the top of my head include:
Seven Wiser / Pillar / Seven Channels / 30 Seconds to Mars / No Motiv / Breaking Benjamin (finally getting some airplay) / Crossfade (also finally getting some airplay) / Cauterize
I am attempting to broaden my horizons however and will definately give as many of those mentioned as possible a listen.

 

[Engine Joe]

Depends on what obscure is (for example, the listed Was (Not Was) doesn't strike me as obscure, but if that's the criteria, I'll work with it):

Sparks - "Kimono My House"
Mr Bungle - "California"
The Pretty Things - "S.F. Sorrow"
Air - "Talkie Walkie"
Barry Black - "Tragic Animal Stories"
Jim O'Rourke - "Eureka"
Brian Eno - "Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)"
The Dickies - "Dawn of the Dickies"
King Crimson - "Red"
Jellyfish - "Spilt Milk"

OK, so only some of that is obscure. Hmmm... looking at that list, there's a pretty wide diversity of material there.