Artist: Bloodrock Album: First 4 Albums Country: US Genre: Hard Rock, Heavy Prog Release: 1970-71 Format: Vinyl, LP, Album Quality: FLAC (tracks+scans) Albums: Bloodrock - 1970 - Bloodrock (Capitol Records ST-435) Bloodrock - 1970 - 2 (Capital Records ST-491 Winchester Pressing) Bloodrock - 1971 - 3 (Capitol Records ST-765) Bloodrock - 1971 - U.S.A (Capitol Records ST 645) Personnel: Jim Rutledge - Lead Vocals Lee Pickens - Lead Guitar Steve Hill - Keyboards, Vocals Ed Grundy - Bass, Vocals Rick Cobb - Drums, Vocals Nick Taylor - Guitar, Vocals The history of this band dates back to 1963, when the quartet "The Naturals" was formed in the Texas city of Fort Worth. Composed of Jim Rutledge (b. January 24, 1947; drums, vocals), Nick Taylor (guitar, vocals), Ed Grundy (b. March 10, 1948; bass, vocals), Dean Parks (guitar), the group existed for a couple of years and, leaving behind the single "Hey Girl", was renamed "Crowd + 1". After releasing several more EPs, Parks was replaced by Lee Pickins, and along with him, keyboardist Stevie Hill appeared in the ensemble. Nothing else interesting happened in the team until 1969. It was then that two key events in the band's career took place: the name was changed to "Bloodrock", and the musicians were taken under the wing of the manager of "Grand Funk Railroad" Terry Knight. On the wave of interest in heavy music, generated by the great trinity ("Purple", "Sabbath", "Zeppelin"), many bands appeared that tried to master this genre. These were the Americans "Grand funk railroad" and their fellow tribesmen "Bloodrock". Accordingly, this fact could not but affect the work of "Bloodrock", who took the style of "grand funk" as a basis. The musicians did not refuse blues a-la "Led Zeppelin". A contract was signed with the American label "Capitol", and at the end of 1969, the self-titled debut album "Bloodrock" was released on this label. The record turned out to be a solid hard rock work, which immediately gave the band a cult status. The best tracks on the disc were "Fantastic Piece of Architecture" with a "funeral" organ in the spirit of "Doors" and "Melvin Laid an Egg" with interesting keyboard transitions between guitar riffs. By the time of recording the second disc, Rutledge had completely focused on the microphone stand, leaving the drum kit at the disposal of Rick Cobb. The biggest hit from "Bloodrock 2" was the epic eight-minute composition "D.O. A." It was thanks to it that the disc received "gold" status based on sales. On the next album, they began flirting with progressive, but the "grand funk" intonations never disappeared. The tendency towards "progressiveness" continued on "Bloodrock U.S.A.", but this did not add any popularity to the group. Incidentally, Pickins had disappeared somewhere by that time, and Warren Ham appeared in the team. He was the one who replaced the frontman Rutledge, who later fled. With him, the band released a couple more albums, "Passage" and "Whirlwind Tongues". These releases were not particularly successful. The replacement of the drummer (Randy Reeder took this place in 1974) did not help either. Having finally lost its orientation and been knocked off course by strong competition, the band was disbanded in 1975. They remembered about it only at the turn of the millennium, when the compilation "Triptych" was released, which included songs from "Passage" and "Whirlwind Tongues", as well as unreleased material from the previously unreleased album "Unspoken Words"