Linda Perhacs – Parallelograms (1970)

Better late than never!!

1. Chimacum Rain (3:33)
2. Paper Mountain Man (3:13)
3. Dolphin (2:56)
4. Call Of The River (3:51)
5. Sandy Toes (3:00)
6. Parallelograms (4:36)
7. Hey, Who Really Cares? (2:44)
8. Moons And Cattails (4:09)
9. Morning Colors (4:48)
10. Porcelain Baked-Over Cast-Iron Wedding (4:01)
11. Delicious (4:08)
12. If You Were My Man (2:59)
13. I Would Rather Love (3:06)

So yeah, I'm kicking my 70's thread back off with a dizzyingly good one-shot from that ever musically fertile land of California. Linda Perhacs is often said to be the "Joni Mitchell who never was", and that's about as true a statement as one I've ever run across.

To elaborate: Parallelograms, this obscure woman's one and only record that hit shelves in 1970 and was subsequently ignored, is a psychedelic folk masterpiece that is heads and shoulders above even some of the best records in the genre. Why, you may ask? Well, for starters, Linda's voice is one of those short-lived epitomes of esoteric beauty, an arcane instrument that seems hardwired to carry forlorn abstractions into the minds of those who let it in.

Most importantly however, although a gripping stripped down experience in fragility for the most part where an acoustic guitar, some light percussion and Linda's voice reign supreme, there is an occasionally noticeable streak of impenetrable experimental ebony that leers in the hollows of a number of these arrangements, such as the Brainticket-esque title track and its followup, a harbinger of endless isolation locked in two and a half minutes called 'Hey, Who Really Cares?'.




For me, these two tracks are the heart and soul of Linda's languid songwriting, and that's saying quite a bit considering how strong all thirteen songs are across the board. In particular, compositions such as 'Morning Colors' and 'Chimacum Rain' are toe-to-toe with the best of Mitchell's infamous Blue, and that's about as high a praise as I could give anything from 1970. Because if you weren't Joni Mitchell or Karen Carpenter in 1970, you were going to have a helluva hard time making it as a successful songstress in an industry that was ultimately male-dominated.

Unlike a lot of people across the Interwebz, I don't throw around the term "masterpiece" too often when it comes to psychedelic music...party because so much of the stuff that came out throughout the late 60's sounded very derivative of one another and partly because I have an ear for something that nails that hard-to-scratch sweet spot in terms of atmosphere.

Parallelograms, at least to these ears, is everything a real psychedelic fanatic should be looking for: spacey arrangements, led by Linda's monstrously beautiful set of pipes, and held together at the end of the day by an honest, sparse...yet rich production to make the whole shebang shine like something Van Gogh might have painted.

Woo!

That must be the only album you've brought up and that I already owned (and loved for that matter).
It seems that everyone I recommend that album to, ends up telling me that it starts up good and becomes redundant or boring later on.

Glad I'm not the only one that loves Linda Perhacs' Parallelograms... and you've reviewed it beautifully btw.

I too like Linda Perhacs, although I'm not a fan of every song on the record.

Something I like about her aside from the music is the story of the album. She was a dental technician that somehow got to realease that one album and then became famous for it way later in the 90s when she got played on radio. I know she's since recorded vocals for Devendra Banhart who I think is a bit of a fan of this record.

I have to say this is one of my favorite threads. After reading each of your reviews, I have found so much great music. I especially like Odgipig (being both a folk and prog rock geek this was gold to me) and that Rainbow proto-metal album.

Perhacs is more 60s to me, I mean 1970 is 60s style music all through. So I tend to start the 70s from 71 myself.

Origional vinyls of Perhacs were all jacked.
If you have one that plays well then you really got something,son.

Try finding a Quicksilver Messanger Service first lp without ringwear.
Or a Nucleus-same lp thats clean & wasnt partied to death.

Interesting. A friend was asking about this band a couple of weeks ago and I couldn't find anything by Googling them. There doesn't seem to be much info on the band to begin with and hawk is a pretty common word to search on without the name of an album.

My mistake. I asked my friend and it was actually Sun Hawk he was asking about. Doh!

Previews sound pretty nice. Will have to add some Smokey to my list. :)