"Spectromorphic Iridescence: The Complete Ffolly" by RAINBOW FFOLLY - featuring their May 1968 UK Debut Album "Sallies Fforth" on Parlophone Records in Both Mono and Stereo, Period Rarities and Their 2016 "Ffollow Up" Album (February 2019 UK Grapefruit Records 3CD Clamshell Box Set – Simon Murphy Remasters) - A Review by Mark Barry...

This Review Along With Over 310 Others Is Available In My

SOUNDS GOOD E-Book on all Amazon sites
CADENCE /CASCADE 

PROG ROCK, PSYCH, AVANT GARDE...
And Others Genres Thereabouts
Exceptional CD Remasters

Covering 1967 to 1977 - It Also Focuses On

Fusion Rock, Acid Folk, Art Rock and Underground 

Just Click Below To Purchase

Thousands of E-Pages - All Details and In-Depth Reviews From Discs

(No Cut and Paste Crap)

"...Ffollow Up..."

You have to love the sheer hutzpah of England's Grapefruit Records – I had to do a spellcheck on Spectromorphic Iridescence, let alone rack my brains on whether or not I actually remember 'Rainbow Ffolly' in my advanced dotage (hard to remember anything at 62). Turns out, these reissue madmen want me to hear a whole lotta Rainbow, and in the best moments, I can now hear why...

Born out of the burgeoning Psych musical explosion consuming 1967 and beyond - Buckinghamshire's Force Four were in a studio recording song appetisers when they realised they needed a hipper identity and so became RAINBOW FFOLLY. Slinging their demo album at the behemoth that was all things Electrical and Musical Industries - EMI's label imprint Parlophone (home of The Beatles) figured why not - "Peppers" and "Magical Mystery Tour" had blown the world open the year prior – so had the Floyd with "Pipers" and people raved about the Pretties and their curate's egg "SF Sorrow" (even if it didn't shift copies by the crate-load like the Fabs did).

And so in May 1968 (and the whole LP apparently still in all but demo form), our heroes get their one Beach Boys-sounding platter of the period "Sallies Fforth" to appear in Blighty in Mono and Stereo – all sexy pants in its appropriately far out sleeve. But despite favourable press reviews about original material and great ideas ("Drive My Car" is their own and not a Beatles cover), the public felt they had other things to do on the King's Road.

Flash-forward to 2016 and remaining members of the 60ts band put together a 'belated' second LP cleverly called "Ffollow Up" on their own Footprints Vinyl label (500 copies only) that featured similar drawn artwork to their much prized and expensive 60ts original LP (at times in the last few years, "Sallies Fforth" has reached four figures on auction sites). Always ones to do something wildly un-commercial and naughtily over-the-top, Grapefruit Records of the UK (part of Cherry Red) decided in 2019 to damn the lysergic mushrooms and clump the whole shebang into one place along with a wad of rare and previously unreleased accompaniments. So my pimply iridescent lava-lamp types - let's board the p-p-p-purple bus and multi-coloured sailing ship to yesteryear...

UK released 1 February 2019 – "Spectromorphic Iridescence: The Complete Ffolly" by RAINBOW FFOLLY on Grapefruit Records WCRSEGBOX052 (Barcode 5013929185203) is a 3CD Clamshell Box Set of Remasters that plays out as follows:

CD1 "Sallies Fforth (Stereo)" – May 1968 UK Debut LP on Parlophone PCS 7050 in STEREO (52:18 minutes):

1. She's Alright [Side 1]

2. I'm So Happy

3. Montgolfier '67

4. Drive My Car

5. Goodbye

6. Hey You

7. Sun Sing

8. Sun And Sand

9. Labour Exchange

10. They'm

11. No

12. Sighing Game

13. Come On Go

BONUS TRACKS:

14. Drive My Car (Single Mix)

15. Go Girl

Tracks 14 and 15 are their debut UK 45 from May 1968 on Parlophone R 5701

16. Sun Sing (Early Demo)

17. Come On Go (Early Demo)

18. The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill (Studio Demo)

Tracks 16 and 17 are PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED Studio Demos recorded May 1967 as FORCE FOUR

Track 18 is a PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED Studio Demo recorded circa December 1968 as RAINBOW FFOLLY

CD2 "Sallies Fforth (Mono)" – May 1968 UK Debut LP on Parlophone PMC 7050 in MONO (75:23 minutes):

Tracks 1 to 13 as per the LP on CD1

BONUS TRACKS:

14. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 1

15. Sunshine Of Your Love 16. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 2

17. Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds 18. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 3

19. Gimme Little Sign 20. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 4

21. I Can't Let Maggie Go 22. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 5

23. Sabrosa 24. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 6

25. The Bells Of Rhymney 26. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 7

27. Bonita 28. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 8

29. I Can Hear The Grass Grow 30. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 9

31. Something Else 32. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 10

33. Hold Me Tight 34. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 11

35. I'm So Happy (Part) 36. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 12

37. She's Alright 38. Hospital Radio Jingle No. 13

Tracks 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25 and 27 are PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED Home Demos recorded 1968

Tracks 29, 31, 33, 35, and 37 are PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED BBC Radio Broadcasts recorded December 1968

Tracks 14, 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, 34, 36 and 38 are PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED Hospital Jingles recorded late 1967 and early 1968 

CD3: "Ffollow Up" - July 2016 UK LP on Footprints Vinyl Records FV 16002 (58:34 minutes):

1. Single Cell Amoeba

2. Postcard

3. My Love Has Gone

4. White Swan

5. Cars

6. Sky Angels

7. Noah

8. Slow Down Zone

9. Countdown

10. Shoes

11. Is It Over?

12. Wot Do They Know?

13. Crazy Woman

14. All We Have Left

15. Parcel of Pigs

16. Nonesuch Sweetness

17. Tour De Fforce

18. Bathers Of The Lost Ark

Tracks 1 to 11 and 17 and 18 are the 2016 LP

Tracks 3, 6 and 10 were Subsequently Remixed 

Tracks 12 to 16 are Extras and PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED

RAINBOW FFOLLY was:

JOHN DUNSTERVILLE - Lead Guitar and Vocals

RICHARD DUNSTERVILLE - Rhythm Guitar and Vocals

ROGER NEWELL - Bass and Vocals

STEWART OSBORN - Drums and Percussion

The 20-page booklet inside the clamshell box set features new liner notes from Grapefruit's DAVID WELLS, period photos, London Evening News cuttings from October 1968, seven-inch single demo and French picture sleeve for their "Drive My Car" 45, live photos, gig posters from 1968 where they shared stages with artists as diverse as The Skatalites, Keef Hartley and Edwin Starr and an uppercoming bunch of Glam Rockers called The Sweet. It is informative and affectionate and the mastering is care of long-time Audio Engineer associate SIMON MURPHY over at Another Planet. The audio is a mixed bag - the STEREO variant superb (I prefer it over the Mono) but those Dave Cash Show and seven Previously Unreleased home demos on Disc 2 betray a lo-fi recording process. Then I dare say, if you're buying a Box Set like this, you know to take the rough with the smooth when it comes to 60ts fidelity...

Excepting three songs - "Sun And Sand", "No" and "Sighing Game" which were co-writes - the majority of the tunes were solely provided by the Lead Guitarist part of the Dunsterville brothers - John. "She's Alright" opens the English whimsical proceedings with a French voice lead-in followed by Beach Boys harmonies that sound like an outtake from "Pet Sounds" - I think that she's fine. Immediately followed by the dooby-dooby-do of "I'm So Happy" where the Rainbows sound like The Beatles meets Buddy Holly meets an embryonic 10cc - such is the fiendishly clever melodies cascading out of your speakers. Two tunes in and already you're thinking 'forgotten and overlooked masterpiece'. Yellow, blue and green - the finest colours ever seen in "Montgolfier '67" is brilliant and you really wish they had been given the benefit of a decent production by EMI (it's good but could have been so much more). Other winners include the pretty acoustic ballad "Goodbye" (your eyes betray the setting sun) while the fuzzed-up geetar of "Hey You" is mad Psych that feels like Jeff Beck having a stop-start whig-out on his Fender. By the time you get to "Labour Exchange" where our boys bemoan the English dole system and the very Byrds/Association vibe to "Sighing Game" - you're beginning to be very impressed indeed by the musical breaks in each tune - not just copyist but original and harmonious. I have to say I love the STEREO version of this, which brings out those fab and groovy harmony vocals more.

Fans are going to go after the cover-versions fest that is most of Disc 2 - very crude (but acceptable) versions of Cream's "Sunshine Of My Love" and The Beatles "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" (from "Peppers") and the White Album's whimsical "The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill". Better is their 60ts R&B cover of Brenton Wood's wonderful "Gimme Little Sign" and The Move's "I Can Hear The Grass Grow". For sure most of the six and seven-second jingles will test your patience and its arguable they should have stayed in the can - but they can easily be forgotten when you hear their frantic Freakbeat cover of Eddie Cochran's "Something Else".

Amongst collectors with deep pockets and much love for the period and its genres - the core album of "Sallies "Fforth" commands big money for a reason (its so bloody good). So it’s cool to hear both variants of this unfairly forgotten LP (Mono and Stereo) be given a tasty brushing-up on this exemplary box set. For sure, the average listener will never need much of the rest, but I for one am a tad chuffed to see such a missed opportunity in 1968 be given its proper due all these decades later. 2019 followed up rather well really...