Made in England

Bulldog Breed's mighty obscure album -- the only one they put out -- is face-in-the-crowd late-'60s British psychedelia, neither memorable nor annoying. It's a bit of a club sandwich of period U.K. psych approaches, from the assertive mod guitar chording of "Paper Man" and testosterone-driven bluesy rock to clomp-a-clomp singsong vignettes of everyday English life ("Eileen's Haberdashery Store") and bittersweet harpsichord balladry ("Dougal"). Several cuts have an almost definitively cliched late-'60s British wah-wah psych pop guitar, and the filtered-fishbowled texture of the vocal on "Austin Osmanspare" is likewise the kind of sound you rarely heard on record in any other years. "Friday Hill," the best song, is fairly nice sad meditative U.K. pop-psych, and "You" is an unexpected shift into an almost cocktail-jazzy breeze. In all, though, the album's appeal is limited to fervid collectors of '60s psychedelia. ~ Richie Unterberger