Musicology

Birmingham Sunday - A Message From Birmingham Sunday 1968

Birmingham Sunday was a band from Nevada that consisted of Ward Johns, Debbie Parks, John Kvam, Jean Heim, Joe LaChew and Phil Gustafson. Although not much is known about the band and its members, A Message from Birmingham Sunday was originally released as a test pressing in 1968 on the All American Record label. The band play a variety of styles but the music on this album is mainly a folk based psychedelic pop sound with strong vocal harmonies. The singers alternate between male and female vocal leads with a wall of sound background that contains guitars, wind instruments, swirling organ and synthesizer. The entire album only clocks in at just more than 27 minutes but it is an enjoyable piece of late 60's psychedelia. The CD itself is housed in an impressive digipack but the only drawback on packaging is the lack of detailed liner notes and information on the band. The overall sound quality is good but there seems to be some sound fading on a couple of songs perhaps due to the quality of the master tapes. Despite some minor drawbacks it is nice to see such a rare album finally receiving a legitimate release. AllMusic.

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