Japanese Anzen Band, Album A, 1975 [nonFLAC] and 1976 [FLAC]

 

Brilliant cover art in both instances, I think we can agree.

Back to the Japanese rock/prog for the next three posts.  This is a mine that never gets exhausted in its yield of pure gemology.  Here's one I could have sworn I posted before but obviously didn't, similar to my old favorite School Band, with hard rock, ssw, and fusion elements mixed together in a pretty accessible form, or perhaps like Tranzam.

Information on the band here.  Unfortunately, only 2 albums from the mid 1970s.

Track 4 from the first album gives you an idea of the delightful mix of sax plus rock this band is capable of:

Intro to the second album which appeared the next year, showcases the smooth sax sound again:

Later they get into the funky sounds, rock stuff, providing quite a lot of variety.  I absolutely adore the track 3 song, with its warmth and drive:

Stay tuned to the wonderful bridge passage with harmonics and the full-on electric guitar riff, followed by dreamy synth strings.

Another wonderful 'lost' Japanese rock album... How many more are there still undiscovered?

Mezzoforte from Iceland (1979 ST and 1980 Octopus aka I Hakanum)

 

Light and pleasant fusion sounds from this band that was quite prolific from the late 1970s onwards, as you can see here.

Mezzoforte is an Icelandic, instrumental jazz-funk/fusion band, formed in 1977. They signed a record deal with Icelandic label Steinar. Their biggest hit single was Garden Party (1983), taken from their fourth album (second international release), Surprise Surprise. It peaked at number 17 in the UK Singles Chart. The solo that takes place two minutes into 'Garden Party', was created and played on the flugelhorn by English trumpeter, Stephen Dawson. 'Garden Party' was later covered by Herb Alpert at a slower speed than the original, apparently as he'd learned the track from the single played at the wrong speed. Another single, Rockall, spent one week at number 75 in the same listing in June that year, and was used as a signature tune by several European radio chart shows.

And, obviously:

The band was named after the traditional musical term mezzo forte, an instruction to play, literally, "moderately loud".

The opener of the first from 1979, Kinahverfio:

Northern Winds from the 2nd:

Personally, I was not so impressed with their 'big hit,' Garden Party, but I'm sure others were.

Tilsley - Haseley - Flick in Byways, from 1976

 

Information here, mostly composed by Reginald Tilsley.  You can see from his discography he led an orchestra and / or composed orchestral music, then made some libraries in the 1970s.

The description is quite appropriate: 

light group sounds featuring keyboards

I was struck by how lovely his composition called Clarissa is, with the different keyboards recalling our beloved Hawkshaw:

Porcelain, also by Tilsley:

Simon Haseley and Paul Kass in Prototype from 1972

 

Information here. 

Simon Haseley was another highly prolific library composer.  Paul Kass was less so, discographed here.

A note about the cute graphic for the cover.  This is from Nick Bantock, who made some absolutely gorgeous cover graphics (for various LPs mostly library ones) back in the day, then in the early1990s became hugely successful with the 'mixed-media' picture book called Griffin and Sabine.  If you take a look at those album covers, there are some really mind-blowing ones among the pages and pages to look through.  Rubber Riff, with members of Soft Machine, is one of the more famous ones.  I posted Simon Park's Stretch not long ago.  He was also responsible for the cover of Chatton's Vapour Trails. His prolific output continues all the way until 1991 when, presumably, his success with the aforementioned publication overtook this accessory endeavour.

Back to the music though.  Overall, it's light and gentle and infinitely agreeable, all instrumental of course. Sample tracks, Propshaft:

And Sunlight:

Powerhouse 5 + 4; 1975 [FLAC limited time only]

Needless to indicate there are many artists called Powerhouse, but this particular formation's info can be found here.  Description therein:

Collection of tracks originally composed by Al Newman and performed by Powerhouse in 1975. Peer International Library was part of the Standard Music Library organization and was responsible for 45 releases between 1969 and 1980...

Apart from this, I don't see a lot of credits for the composer Al Newman.  That's unfortunate because this particular library release has quite a few gems on it.  Overall the music is nice and funky uptempo rocking energetic instrumentals, similar in sound to the Rock Machine by Hawkshaw once posted.

Late Summer has such a great groove, and the arrangement is so perfectly done too:

Almost as groovy is Injury Time: