SEALED 1968 GRAHAM BOND LOVE IS Psych BLUES JAZZ A+

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                                                  ***  ATTENTION! **

         RARE 1968 "PULSAR" ORIGINAL ~

 HAMMOND ORGAN & MELLOTRON PSYCHEDELIC BLUES JAZZ     

         GRAHAM BOND

        LOVE IS THE LAW 

                            USA - PULSAR - AR 10 604    

AMAZING TOP COPY ~ STILL SEALED ~ 1968 FIRST PRESSING ..."RARE" ORIGINAL  Love Is the Law is the first of the two LPs Graham Bond recorded for the Pulsar label, (the other is "The Mighty Graham Bond") in the late '60s after his move to the United States, and is the better of the pair by a wide margin.

The Mighty Graham Bond express pulled into town in a variety of guises throughout the late 1960s. As a member of Alexis Korner’s Blues Inc. and titular host of the Graham Bond Organisation – a group that also included such luminaries as Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce and Dick Heckstall-Smith – his imposing frame sat at the forefront of the Brit-Blues explosion, playing a major part in revolutionising that sound with his incorporation of blues & jazz influences.

Psychedelia beckoned and being both an early adopter of the Hammond organ and the first man in Britain to introduce audiences to the wonders of the Mellotron, the underground rock scene was ripe for a dose of Graham Bond exuberance.

A diet of heroin, the occult, depression and his eventual suicide in 1974, meant the creative flame that burned early in his career never really reignited and certainly didn’t rekindle the audience interest previously enjoyed. Love is the Law and Mighty Grahame Bond were recorded and released ONLY in America during 1968 and 1969 respectively, at a time when personal demons were taking a hold, the money was running out and the offer from a US label seemed hard to turn down. He never received a penny in royalties for either album.

Despite what was going on behind the scenes, neither Love is the Law nor Mighty Grahame Bond sound as bad as Graham Bonds turbulent circumstances might portend.

The cover of Love is the Law depicts a dishevelled and troubled looking Bond stood against the backdrop of a sun-worshipping flower child. This image pretty much sums up the music, with the Hammond and Mellotron-rich sound typical of the West Coast hippy psychedelic vibe, juxtaposed against the raw blues vocal that Bond belts out between gargles of broken glass.

The fact the Americans seemed not only incapable of paying him for his services, but also of spelling his name correctly – with an erroneous ‘E’ finding its way onto the crediting of both albums – didn’t prevent them from managing to coax a full-blooded performance from the anguished artiste. For Love is the Law, Bond played all the instruments aside from drums, setting down a fertile foundation of blues tropes upon which to layer his psychedelic keyboards. There’s undoubtedly a raw energy bubbling away, which gives Love… an almost homemade feel and despite the inclusion of some female backing throughout, it remains very much a Lo-Fi affair.

With a perspective that changes like the weather, from the loved-up flower power of the title-track and the unbridled hope of ‘The World Will Soon be Free’, through to the sour darkness of ‘Bad News Blues’ and pessimism of ‘Strange Times, Sad Times’, Love is the Law is very much a mixed bag of emotions, possibly denotive of Bond’s then frame of mind.

                keeper copy!

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EFFICIENT/CAREFUL GRADING

All imperfections are noted both cover & record