"Question Mark recorded this album in 1974 in Kenya, the land safari parks, of elephants & lions. 5 musicians, all English vocals, heavy fuzz guitar, 8 freakin tracks. If you think BLO and WITCH where great African albums, you will love this one. It beats most bands from Africa such as OFEGE, CHRISSY ZEBBY, RIKKI ILILONGA and MACK SIGIS PORTER, unless you are only into African rhythms and chanting. This album has mostly western style songs with great and heavy guitar sounds all over but with an strong African touch of course." (BUY IT!)Many thanks to Mr. Attic for this gem!
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19 comments:
This is awesome! Any chance you could re-upload that Witch lp? (http://crotchbat.blogspot.com/2007/01/witch-lazy-bones-zambia-1975.html)
Done and done. Enjoy.
Another complete winner, Jet Jaguler / Jet Jagar / Jet Jaguar.
After discovering Witch (through this site) and eventually scrounging up the change to get my own vinyl copy (damn limited edition reissues...), when this Question Mark album came out I knew I wasn't going to be able to wait until it hit the blogs before I bought it.
I have to say, this was a real disappointment and certainly not worth the $45. Sure, it's got a couple of cool psych moves (frontloaded- side 2 is bo-ring!), but BLO, Chrissy Zebby Tembo, Witch, Ofege, and Rikki Ililonga *totally* *blow* these guys out of the water.
Anyway, just my two cents. You can't like them all...
p.s. thanks for all the links!
fuzztunnel - wait until you hear the Amanaz lp. Trust me. If you like Witch, it will blow your mind. The hardest African LP I have heard PERIOD. Shadoks is releasing it next month
Cool- thanks for the heads-up!
Really mortal surprise friend. Wow!!! Kenya!!!!!
mike
I just wonder. Are they really from Kenya? They don't sound african at all to me.
Anyway thanks for posting them.
Thanks also for bringing those african bands under our attention.
I agree with anonymous. It's pleasant enough pop psych or garage but I can't believe these are Black Africans singing these songs. Thanks for posting it.
-LhasaCrawler
super rockin'
I agree with fuzztunnel and others...not at all that "freakin" and while interesting and all I reckon bands like WITCH, BLO etc are much better.
And yeah...I don't think I would ever thought of them as Africans...not blacks for sure!
I appreciate a lot you sharing this and thank you very much, all the way from Chilean Patagonia!
Looking forward to sampling this one--this description and the comments from other readers have my curiosity way up.
Just stumbled onto this. Great find. However, I was once a member of Question Mark, and would like to note that this album was actually recorded at the EMI studios in Lagos Nigeria.
PS: do you know if this is available on CD format. thanks
@ Gotti22
Hi Gotti22 - as far as I know, the Question Mark album has only been reissued on LP.
So you played in the Question Mark band? What did you play on the album? Can you tell us anything about the making of the record? Thanks for taking the time to write!
@Crochbat
Yes, I stood in for my sister, who was the original bassist of the group. Since Question Mark was composed entirely of students (high school and college students based in Enugu in Eastern Nigeria), personnel frequently changed based on availability and schedule.
This (first and only) album was actually recorded in 1977 and frankly all that I can readily recall is that we were not entirely happy with the songs ultimately chosen by the producers. Plans for a more commercial follow-up was scuppered by events well beyond our control. Good times though.
Can you re-up please?
@M.Becerra
Sorry - I won't be re-uploading most of the African stuff I once had on this blog. Now Again records has reissued most of these and you should really consider buying them. Quality reissues for sure.
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