13th Floor Elevators - Easter Everywhere - 1967
The 13th Floor Elevators second album Easter Everywhere pretty much carries on where the debut album left off. A few of the rough edges of the debut have been smoothed out production wise , and the manic rawness of the debut seems to be replaced with a kind of laid back confidence.
The album begins with the 8 minute epic Slip Inside This House , as covered by Primal Scream on their Screamadelica album. Whereas Primal Scream's version was dubbed up to the max with the throbbing bass dominating the track this version is all about the rhythm complimented by a simple guitar riff layered over the top. Totally different but both versions are good in their own ways.
Slide Machine is another highlight of the album , a glorious laid back white boy R&B number that floats along effortlessly.
The next couple of songs She Lives (In A Time Of Her Own) and Nobody To Love are pure British invasion style pop.
Next up is a cover of Bob Dylan's It's All Over Now, Baby Blue , It's not all that bad actually. From what I can recall it seems pretty faithful to the original , albeit as faithfully as possible for essentially what is a garage band's cover of it. You can even hear Erikson attempt a couple of Dylan's vocal mannerisms too.
Sadly the second half of the album is where things begin to fall apart a little.
Earthquake is a bit of a throwback to the first album and hearing it makes you appreciate how far the bands songwriting has improved since then. It sticks out a bit from the rest of the material on this album up till this point as it has a much more primitive feel to it but then as you carry on listening to the rest of the album you wonder if they ran out of ideas and just went back to what they know I've Got Levitation which comes a bit later on the album suffers from the same problem.
Dust is the bands first attempt at an acoustic ballad. I'm not sure it totally works but it doesn't really seem out of place on this record , it just doesn't really work. I Had To Tell You is pretty much the same thing , A folky ballad that's part Dylan part Simon & Garfunkel. It's better than Dust , but only just. The final song on the album is Pictures (Leave Your Body Behind) which finishes the album on a low key note , it's an improvement on the rest of the second half of the album but it can't save it.
This is an album of two halves , the first half is brilliant , the second half just sort of slips away into averageness as you listen to it. It's probably fair to say this is the point the band began to run out of steam
Rating 6/10
Favourite Songs - Slip Inside This House , Slide Machine , She Lives (In A Time Of Her Own) , It's All Over Now Baby Blue