English vocals
International relevance: ***
One of the most legendary albums to
come out of the Swedish progg scene, and also one of the earliest.
It's almost mythical to collectors, being extremely hard to find and
fetching ridiculous prices any rare time it's offered for sale. It
was ninth album release on MNW, one of the most important labels of
the Swedish 70's, putting out many stellar albums of the era.
Scorpion was in fact MNW head honcho Bo
Anders Larsson's own one-off project. Larsson had previously been in
Tintacs who had two singles out in the late 60's. Tintacs soon became
Ron Faust who put out a fine 45, ”I Wanna Hold You” b/w ”I Keep
on Moving”, in 1969. Both incarnations of the band also featured
Lorne de Wolfe who later made a mark in history as a member of
Contact, Vargen, and much later and to a lot lesser artistic extent,
Hansson de Wolfe United. The entire Contact back Larsson on ”I Am
the Scorpion”, and being produced by Kim Fowley, it's like the evil
cousin to Contact's – much more subdued – debut album ”Nobody
Wants to Be Sixteen”.
Delivered in a stunning monochromatic sleeve, ”I Am the Scorpion” is a partly
wild affair, sometimes reminiscent of the Stooges or any other late
60's/early 70's Detroit band of your choice. Side A of the album is
hard-boiled psych rock with frantic fuzz guitars. The title track is
a classic, as is the garagey ”Hey Girl, I'm Ugly” (which also can
be found on the MNW sampler ”Ljud från Waxholm”) and the heavy
”Red Queen of the Underground”, plus the short but great ”Blues
for Jimi Hendrix”. If you want to know why this album is in such
high demand, these tracks ought to explain it!
With the first side of the album having
the guitars going on the red and the drums pounding on your eardrums,
side B might come as an unpleasant surprise. Much mellower, and in
parts downright terrible. It begins with one of the lousiest tracks
ever recorded in Sweden, ”Michoican” (backed with another
pointless album track, the parodic blues track ”Everybody Knows My
Name”). Why this jolly-jolly-ho-ho-ho-thumbs-up-yeehah crap was
chosen as a single – A side at that! – is a complete mystery.
Somebody must have had a severe brain loss picking that as some kind
of attempted hit.
The rest of the second side is much
better, but a far cry from the stunning first one. Much more in a
60's beat style, it does have its pleasant moments, such as the
freakbeat rumbler ”Hey La La La” if you're into that sort of
thing.
”I Am the Scorpion”, as a whole, is
a disappointment – especially if you fork out the money dealers ask
for it without knowing what the B side is like. Side A, however, is
as heavy and rough as music got in 1970, up there with the best and
rawest US garage rock of the era. Do keep in mind though, that nice copies are hard to find of the early MNW releases, including "I Am the Scorpion". The vinyl they used were hardly audiophile stuff...
As an afterthought, Scorpion released a
non album 45 in 1971, a cover of ”It's All Over Now”, made famous
by the Rolling Stones, coupled with a screaming five and a half
minutes of ”Wolves Mouth Song”. Almost as impossible to find as
the album, this certainly is in the vein of the album's prime side.
”It's All Over Now” gets a blasting devil-may-care treatment sure
to fry your brain. ”Wolves Mouth Song”, although being entirely
instrumental, is Scorpion at their (or his) uttermost finest. Both tracks were in fact outtakes by Swedish-Norweigan
hippie duo Charlie & Esdor.
Full album playlist
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