Howling At The Moon - The Punk Panther's Album Reviews

1967’s debut from  Big Brother & The Holding Company , featuring  Janis Joplin  on lead vocals is nowhere near as bluesy as their subsequent albums. Released in the summer of 1967, it is a collection of all sub-three minute tracks and it a mixture of semi-bluesy pop/rock, mixed with a bit of country, hippy and psychedelic rock thrown in.   Bye Bye Baby  is rather poppy and only gets heavier and a bit bluesy near the end, while the rocking  Easy Rider  has real shades of of  The Rolling Stones  1966 work about it.  Intruder  is more blatantly rocky, with some blistering drums and Janis’s voice at its growliest.  Light Is Faster Than Sound   begins with Janis almost sounding like   The Mamas and The Papas . It is one of those “spacey” songs such as  2000 Light Years From Home  - getting in on the whole space vibe, man. There are a few good bits in it, particularly a grinding guitar, but it is very much of its time. Just when you expect a bit of extended guitar play, it ends.  Call On

This was  Janis Joplin 's second album backed by her band,  Big Brother & The Holding Company . It is, bizarrely, overdubbed with crowd noises between tracks to make it sound like a live album, a deliberate move and one that convinced many at the time.  It is, in fact, a studio album. To be fair, though, it has a loose, "live" feel to it throughout. It is acid-rock psychedelia in all its glory, but there is also that bluesy soulfulness that Joplin always had. A year before this had come Sgt. Pepper but this took rock music to another level altogether in some ways. Had anyone heard vocals so damn passionate, from a female artist too? Janis was no Sandie Shaw or Mary Hopkin. She blew them all away.  Beginning with some of that afore-mentioned crowd noise,   Combination Of The Two  bursts from a heavy rock intro to an upbeat, pulsating piece of rock-soul with Joplin trading vocals with others in the band over a frenetic drum backing. It ends with some typical late sixtie