The Krystal Generation – Unsatisfied With the Merchandise
Listen/Download The Krystal Generation – Unsatisfied With the Merchandise
Greetings all
Welcome to the middle of another spectacular week.
The tune I bring you today came into my record box via a chance meeting at an unexpected record digging stop a few years back.
I was out with the fam, headed in the direction of some delicious Thai food and we found ourselves with a little time to kill in the vicinity of the old Highland Park Record Sale.
I managed to grab a couple of very cool things that day, and today’s selection was one of those.
Flipping through a box of 45s, I was compelled to stop when I spotted the smiling face of Gene Chandler on the Mr. Chand label, familiar to me via a couple of very tasty Simtec and Wylie* 45s already extant in my crates.
I had never heard of the Krystal Generation before, but since I’m always on the lookout for Chitown soul, and the price was right, I grabbed the record and took it home.
When I finally had a chance to give it a spin I discovered what sounded an awful lot like an attempt by Mr Chandler et al to capitalize on the success of the Honey Cone ( a group that had a number of hits, some of them substantial, for the Hot Wax label between 1969 and 1972.
The Krystal Generation – who actually grazed the R&B Top 50 with an even more blatant grab at the Honey Cone with 1971’s ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’- were a femme vocal ensemble featuring the talents of Joyce Smith, Darlene Arnold, Mary Shelley and Mary Lead.
‘Unsatisfied With the Merchandise’ a very groovy side on its own merits, displays all the marks of a serious attempt to replicate the Invictus/Hot Wax sound, both instrumentally and vocally.
The history of popular music is filled with examples – somemore successful than others – with acts trying to get ahead by “borrowing” the sound and style of another, and the Krystal Generation, though competent, were a pretty obvious example thereof.
‘Unsatisfied With the Merchandise’ falls a few catalog numbers after ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’, so I’d assume that it was either from late 1971 or early 1972.
I hope you dig the tune, and I’ll be back on Friday.
Keep the faith
Larry
* Simtec and Wylie were having their hits for the Mr Chand label at the same time as the Krystal Generation, and Simtec Simmons very own T-Box’s band provides the backing on this 45
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Themocracy
Of course I had to play this back-to-back with the Replacements’s “Unsatisfied.”