Fusion

Personnel: Hello People (vocals); Goodfellow (vocals, electric guitar, background vocals); Smoothie (vocals, clarinet, tenor saxophone, organ, electric bass, finger cymbals, background vocals); Wry One (flute, alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, tambourine, background vocals); Thump Thump (harmonica, percussion); Much More (piano, electric piano, harpsichord, organ, background vocals).
Liner Note Author: Gene Sculatti.
Recording information: Battery Studios, New York, NY; Regent Sound; Ter-Mar Studios; The HIT Factory.
Arranger: Hello People.
While the late '60s were one of America's most celebrated and colorful eras for the development of rock music, for every band that broke through and managed to make waves in the constantly shifting shape of rock's lineage, there were thousands of unknowns. The Hello People are one of the more interesting also-rans of their day, never really scoring a hit record but turning heads for a moment with their gimmicky mime motif, dressing in full face paint and performing wordless skits between songs while performing. A convoluted back story and one best ignored when examining Fusion, the second of eight LPs produced in the group's lifetime, and arguably their brightest moment. More or less the creation of New York producer Lew Futterman, the band reached out in several directions at once to cash in on various musical trends at the inception of their Summer of Love. Watching mimes tune in, turn on, and drop out may have been a little harder to swallow at the time, but with decades of hindsight, the various attempts at counterculture significance on Fusion are pleasantly comical, surprisingly inspired, and often weirdly deep. Beginning with the moody, Baroque pop of "White Winged Doves," the album switches gears with almost every song. The Free Design-esque flutes and social commentary of "Anthem" are bizarrely mismatched, and abruptly fade into the proto-prog horns of the instrumental "Jelly Jam," and then into the electric Dylan rip-off of "How Does It Feel to Be Free?" Beatles-via-the-Monkees pop, psychedelic folk, and rootsy road ballads round out the album's diverse ten songs, bringing together a vaguely conceptual album about fusing ideas and styles from a vaguely conceptual band. Buffered by nostalgia, the ten completely processed stabs at appropriating styles of the day hold some weight and feel enjoyably odd as tuneful reminders of strange days past. ~ Fred Thomas