Here’s another obscure but not-undistinguished album of electronic retro-pop. This one has the double distinction of not only being synthesizer driven, but also leaning heavily on songs from the Beatles’ “White Album. Named after its primary instrument, Wurlitzer’s popular synth/organ combo (your church probably had one), Orbit III is actually producers Jerry Styner and Larry Brown. The back cover says that much. Little else is available on either this album or its players. The label, Beverly Hills, is still in operation, but they are much more interested in shilling for their own current product than shedding light on the obscurities in the dark, best-forgotten corners of their back catalog.
We’re big fans of the Les Humphries Singers here at the Bostworld. Listening to the LHS is like mounting a helium-filled inner tube and sailing back in time, right over the the last 35 years of musical disappointment to a time when young singers would don funky futuristic costumes to sing in unison at their highest registers to up-tempo arrangements full of loud drums and frenetic full orchestras. If the original LHS canon ever comes out on CD, I’ll be queing up for my copies on day of release.
