Cries From The Midnight Circus (The Ladbroke Grove Scene 1967-1978)

Unless you're deep into arcane British rock scenes of the '60s, chances are you've never heard of Ladbroke Grove, or even if you did, you might not quite know what it was. Castle's two-disc set Cries from the Midnight Circus: Ladbroke Grove 1967-1978 writes the record, explaining that it was an offshoot of London, filled with hippies that were a little heavier and scarier than the rest, yet not quite acid-fried. Well, at least that was true at the start: as the set rolls on, the acid-burn sets in pretty deeply, as evidenced by Hawkwind's addled biker rock and the Pink Fairies primitive stomp, both bands playing a good dream turned wrong. Not everything in Ladbroke Grove was quite so mean: there were enough hippies who dabbled in mysticism, either folk or dope induced, and there were some who embraced weirdness for its own sake, like the fantastic Edgar Broughton Band. But for the most part this is grandly odd hard rock, the kind that embraced the damaged nerves of psychedelia and the oldies boogie, which is why it could spit out both pub and prog rock among a group of eccentrics that include Mick Farren, Camel's Peter Bardens and Motorhead. They may be the best-known names here, but they're not the weirdest and the appeal of Cries from the Midnight Circus is hearing how weird this forgotten corner of England could get. Not always good, but always weird. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine|