Drift way back now..join me in a blue cloud as we explore, albeit briefly, a great lost artyfact from that magnificently swirling year of 1968. Society was seething. riots & violence was sweeping city after city......so many pivotal, iconic moments splotch the year.

....In music.....too many had sniffed The Sgt's Sweet Perfume & were drifting off into ever more imaginative...(+ Silly, self-indulgent, narcissistic, ridiculous) realms. "Psychedelic" music was all the rage....Across the pond the British were happily splicing tapes & using studio trickery( Its All Too Much, et al.) to create sonic landscapes alive with surprises at every beat. In America psychedelic music took the form of lifetime long guitar/organ/drum solos (closely related to the "blues Explosion" goin on in Great Britain but much more eclectic in source material, working in elements of pop/classical/avant...etc). Of course there were many exceptions....

The United States Of America put out one album, in 1968. Its been rereleased several times since and most recently, i think, on SunDazed cds in 2007. One really cannot say they were ahead of their time as everyone was incorporating everything & the kitchen sink into their sound........But TUSOA did it exceptionally well. Why they remain so unknown is a sad mystery. But anyone with a taste for vintage sixties psychedelica.....Oughtta give a listen. To me they're like Country Joe McDonald without the towering ego