Country Joe & The Fish: I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die (Deluxe Edition) on 2 CDs

Die kalifornische Band wurde im Jahr 1965 von Country Joe McDonald und dem Gitarristen Barry Melton, in Berkeley gegründet. Ihr Debütalbum ‘Electric Music For The Mind And Body’ im Jahr 1967 kam in die amerikanischen Top 40 und zählt bis heute zu den Wegbereitern des Psychedelic Rock.

Ebenfalls 1967 folgte das zweite Album ‘I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die’. Die Band tourte in den USA und war 1967 beim Monterey Pop Festival. Sie gehörte zu den regelmäßigen Künstlern im Fillmore West und East, und spielte mit Bands wie The Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Led Zeppelin und Iron Butterfly.

Das offiziell zweite und letzte Album erscheint nun als wertige 2CD-Deluxe- Edition im Digipak inkl. 32-Seiten-Booklet sowie zwei Bonustracks Die Aufnahmen erscheinen hier erstmalig in den Original Mono und Stereo-Mixen, die es so seit der ursprünglichen Veröffentlichung des Albums 1967 nicht mehr gegeben hat. Dazu umfangreiche, detailverliebte Linernotes von Alec Palao, basierend auf neuen Interviews mit Bandmitgliedern.

Product Information

The first three Country Joe & the Fish albums all have distinct qualities. “Electric Music For The Mind And Body” was the band’s pioneering metaphysical debut. Their third album, “Together”, featured a democratically inclined potpourri of styles. In-between came “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die”, a textbook example of how artist and producer can overcome a perceived shortage of material to create something of lasting value. Ironically, for a group with roots in the folk idiom, there were no acoustic guitars on “Electric Music”. Its sequel introduced these in a necessary fashion. While “Electric Music” represented the essence of the “plugged-in” Country Joe & the Fish, “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die” delved back to the roots of the group’s players, yet still managed to stretch their horizons.

In the spring of 1967, Country Joe & the Fish resided at the cutting edge of the San Francisco psychedelic rock renaissance, and anticipation was high for the sequel to their influential debut. This was an era where a new album was expected every six months. By introducing other aspects of the Country Joe & the Fish musical make-up, “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die” made up for any shortfall with its fresh perspective. Thanks to a rising profile, the group had confidence, so the new album, recorded during a residency in New York that summer, featured bold material that for the first time complemented their outspoken political stance, but in an appropriately humorous fashion. As one critic put it, Country Joe’s protest was delivered as “satiric comedies, not as invective … their power is precisely in the laughter and the release of tension they provoke.” None more so that the title tune, with its sarcastic anti-war message and the “Fish Cheer” intro which, thanks to a ruder in-person variant as well as a star turn in the movie Woodstock, guaranteed ‘The I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag’ would become the number most associated with the act.

True, the commentary could be dark and biting, but there are performances on the record that are empathetic, touching and human. For an album that, as the participants recall, was essentially cobbled together, it bears a remarkable cohesion – perhaps less from the conceptual aspect producer Sam Charters saw as the way to salvage what was workable from the group’s repertoire than an overall deftness of touch that went against the grain at the time. The delicacy the group conjured up on tracks such as ‘Magoo’ and ‘Colors For Susan’ was without precedent in rock, and there is a thread of wilful nonconformity that runs throughout.

This deluxe reissue features Charters’ original stereo and mono mixes of the album, the latter available for the first time since 1967. Bonus cuts include an unreleased alternate mix of the title track (minus sound effects), while the deluxe 40-page booklet is stuffed with rare photos and memorabilia, and comes complete with a replica of the Fish Game, as included in original copies. Most importantly, “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die” sounds better than ever. As Charters’ original sleeve note states, this is indeed “their own world, their own sound … their own music together.”

By Alec Palao

(acerecords. co. uk)

Rezensionen

,,Wie schon das Debüt veröffentlicht Vanguard nun auch I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die in einer 2-CD-Deluxe-Ausgabe. Auf Scheibe eins erklingt das Album im Stereomix, auf Silberling zwei in der Original-Mono-Abmischung, erweitert um eine Instrumentalversion von “Janis” (der B-Seite der 1967er Single “Janis”) und eine bislang unveröffentlichte, kaum abweichende Alternativeinspielung des “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die-Rag”." (Good Times, Dezember 2013 / Januar 2014)