Unreleased late 60's/early 70's recordings by US psychedelic band. This is for me my best discovery since years. The influences are Public Nuisance, The Doors, Music Machine, Jungle, Steppenwolf, Iron Butterfly, Hunger, Pugsley Munion and mainly Bloodrock (in their first album)...

I've had this band's two singles for longer than I can remember. They were always among my favorites, though they remained completely overlooked by compilers. Indeed, they were relatively unknown even by colllectors, so information on the band was extremely limited. To say I was shocked to learn of a two disc CD compilation of their material would be an understatement. This collection contains virtually all of their known recordings, 1966~71, including the stupidly rare single by their earlier incarnation as The Mal-T's. There was even some room for three demos by a band hanger-on named William Chalker, whom the band tapped for song lyrics on a number of their tracks. Chalker was not actually a member of the band, but he was certainly a very inspiring character during their recording sessions. The liner notes do not exactly explain where the tracks credited only to 'Chalker' were from but the demo tracks by him would provide the lyrics for their corresponding titles by Wildwood, who would then add their own music. By themselves, these tracks are completely out of place here, and do little more than provide some comic releaf. Overall, this is psych influenced, soul tinged hard rock. Much of the soul element comes from the singer's style and voice, which isn't objectionable for a couple of songs but can become a little tedious over the course of two CD's. The band is very tight and their material is original sounding, though a couple of these tracks do resemble each other. Their keyboard player switched from a Vox unit to a Hammond B3 midway through the time period this encompasses, and personally, I'm partial to the earlier material with the Vox. Rounded out with a lengthy booklet telling their entire story, this is quite an impressive release. Genre fans would do themselves well to investigate.FromtymeshifterAthttps://rateyourmusic.com/release/comp/wildwood/plastic_people/

Hey, thanks for the review, I'm the keyboard player. Like you, I have a fondness for the Vox sound, definitely more psych, but Hammond was where things were going at the time -the Vox sound was pretty much over by 1971. I love the Hammond too, and we rerecorded 'Free Ride with it, but I still prefer the Vox version- it suits that song. Also, we weren't crazy about including Chalker's solo material on the CD, but the record company insisted. Anyway, it's great that people are enjoying our stuff almost 50 years later. Watch out for a Wildwood vinyl release coming this September on Guerssen Records, including selected tracks from the CD. Thanks again...Mark Ross