Pins in It

Personnel: Maurice Greer (vocals, drums, percussion); Billy Te Kahika (guitar, electric guitar); Billy TK (guitar); Neil Edwards (electric bass).
Liner Note Author: Maurice Greer.
Recording information: Mascot Studios, Auckland (05/1971).
This is at least an improvement over the interminable Stoned Guitar, with a much more concerted attempt to write songs and go for a somewhat more wide-ranging scope of early-'70s progressive rock than the heavy blues-psychedelia that dominated their first albums. This may have been due to the absence of songs by non-member Jesse Harper, who wrote much of the material on the first two Human Instinct LPs. It's still not that good, however. It is routine hard-progressive-psychedelic early-'70s rock, perhaps good enough to give them headliner (and later cult) status in New Zealand but bottom-of-the-bill ranking in the U.K and U.S. The decision to cover Pink Floyd's "The Nile Song" is certainly unusual; this would have been considered kinda nuts in England and America, but perhaps not as odd in more remote New Zealand, where audiences would have been less likely to be familiar with the original version. It doesn't match the Pink Floyd rendition, though. ~ Richie Unterberger