Ah, the Single Artist mix. Mr Conroy's forte? Well, all I can say is, when you get round to doing your Carly Simon anthology, be sure to include 'Nobody Does It Better'.....
Great mix here btw... Although I quite like 'Yellow Brick road' :(

What, no Tarot Plane??? Incidentally, it's not Yellow Brick Road that I hate, and hate is too strong of a word for any Beefheart song. If you don't know me by now... Anyway, everyone should have one of these.

i dunno, rob, i guess i never really "got" captain beefheart - which isn't to say i don't totally respect him for his unique vision, i just never caught hold, i guess. that said, i would really really like to give him an honest to goodness shot one of these days, i'm just not quite sure where to start, & i know he's got quite alot of what you'd call "essential," so, who knows? maybe i need a copy of this? it is the holiday season, you know... ;)

Best Batch Yet!

I pick and choose with the good Captain.

I'm with a few people here, that is, I have Trout Mask Replica, though it is not at the top of the rotation. I would really like to add Safe As Milk to my collection some time, but that is more as a Ry Cooder completist, than necessarily for the Beefheart.I'm also with Anthony (and Queen) on the whole Xmas spirit perspective too, Rob.

Yellow Brick Road will surely feature on your Elton John mix :) But seriously I am very fond of the Captain when he does avant pop, that is Safe As Milk and Clear Spot. I appreciate Trout Mask but can't really love it. Notwithstanding my preferences this is a quality mix.

Well, its been pretty well established here that I am Beefheart-impaired. After 9 years of trying I can make it through Safe as Milk but not Trout Mask Replica. I can't make up my mind if I want to challenge myself with this one or not, but I am certain it is the real deal.

Aaah, the good Captain... I first heard him on one of those last 60s sample albums I was always on the lookout for but it was his vocal appearance on Zappa's Hot Rats album that sent me to the record store. Came home with the earlier Safe As Milk but also the newly released Trout Mask Replica which really pissed off my parents, brothers & sisters, and most of my friends. You can imagine the racket that record made at a party in the summer of 1969. Anyway, that was the start of a Beefheart fascination and I grabbed every album through the 70s and 80s. The Dust Blows Forward Anthology CD continues to get heavy play.
So is Lick My Decals Off better than Trout? Depends on how you heard them. Trout was so different from everything else you heard at the time. When Decals came along a year later your ears had time to adjust to the strangeness. But I wonder what it would have been like to hear Decals first. Clear Spot, Doc, etc were pop albums in comparison.
Well Rob, great collection. I love everything here.

I must admit that I'm not really all that familiar with the work of Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band. But what I am familiar with I definitely find intriguing, to say the least! I have the first single, "Diddy Wah Diddy," on the first "Nuggets" box set, as well as "Trout Mask Replica" on CD. That's one disc that definitely takes quite a few spins to really get into and absorb. The first time you hear it, it strikes one as sounding just incredibly cacophonous and chaotic, but there's just something engagingly eccentric about the music which makes you want to stick with it. And sure enough, little by little and with each listening, it starts to make more and more sense. I can't really argue with your picks from "Trout Mask Replica," but perhaps you should have included "Ant Man Bee"! That's proably my second favorite song from that record...after "Moonlight On Vermont." (One of these days I'm going to put "Ant Man Bee" on one of my own compilations, but it's kind of hard knowing where to put any song by the good Captain in the scheme of things, considering that everything else in my collection is so relatively conventional by comparison! ;-))

One band which I still haven't come to like no matter how hard I try to digest. I'll dust off my "Trout Mask Replica" LP and try to get into it. Judging by your enthusiasm I know I'm missing out here!

Awesome! love it all, again you have done one superb mix!

I have a friend whose last name is Van Vliet and he thinks he may be related to Beefheart. Judging from his own compositions, I think it may be likely. Having said that, I can't say I'm a fan of Beefheart at all, though I've tried.