POST NO. 7: NOT THOSE OUTSIDERS, THESE OUTSIDERS

There's at least five known bands that have gone by the name The Outsiders, and my guess is there's probably another 10 or more if you want to snoop around for older regional groups that never released a proper full length. The two you might be familiar with are the British punk rock band led by Adrian Borland, who went on to form The Sound. Then there's The Outsiders from Cleveland who scored a hit in 1966 with the song "Time Won't Let Me." This isn't either of those Outsiders.

These longhairs -- and I do mean long -- were from Amsterdam, Holland. So in a sense, they were truly outsiders to the late-'60s garage rock scene. Their contribution to the second Nuggets box, "Touch", is a spastic single released in the Netherlands in 1966. The trademark of that song is the raw guitar sound of Ronny Splinter and the vocals of multi-instrumentalist Wally Tax, whose smooth voice and unorthodox approach stands in contrast to the throaty screamers often employed by garage rock groups of the day.

I ran across a copy of their 1968 full length CQ on CD through Karl Ikola's Anopheles mail order, and promptly snatched it up to sit on the shelf near fellow Dutch garage rockers Q 65. The record really blew me away, and I was even expecting it to be good. It's part intense, primitive rock 'n' roll, part bizarre psych-rock, and part trippy, mellow folk-rock that recalls early Can and the Velvet Underground.

I'm not going to blather on and on about this dandy of an album; you can click the links below if you want to read more about the band. But I will go above and beyond the call of duty and post three mp3s from CQ to show you just how enthusiastic I am about this album.

The Outsiders - "Happyville"

The Outsiders - "Misfit"

The Outsiders - "You're Everything On Earth"

For more on the band, pick up a copy of Richie Unterberger's book Unknown Legends of Rock 'n' Roll for an entire chapter on The Outsiders, or see this, this, or this. You should be able to order CQ from Forced Exposure.