Smokestack lightning, shinin' just like gold

Finishing up my trip back through the 1965 album charts.

03/01/65 : Five Faces Of Manfred Mann - Manfred Mann


Thank you Manfred for ending the year on a relative high - I say this without even listening to it but knowing it has to be better than the last two albums I've had to endure.

This is an interesting one because, for the most part, if you'd told me it was an early Rolling Stones album, I'd have totally believed you - it's got that US R&B cover vibe going on and Paul Jones even sounds quite a lot like Mick Jagger. Except for when they randomly decide to jazz things up, which is fine, but just somewhat jarring. All in all, I quite enjoyed it without feeling I needed it in my life. And don't they look like hep cats on the album cover?

We're at #12 in the charts this week on their 17th week of a successful 22 week run, with it having peaked at #3 in its third and fourth weeks. The top five this week were The Beatles (of course - halfway through a seven week run at the top),  The Bachelors, The Rolling Stones, The Kinks and Roy Orbison and there were two new entries for Cliff Richard (#14) and Elvis Presley (#15).

And, to no-one's surprise, Wikipedia tells us it's a debut album to end the year - but only in the UK, because it was their second album in the US. Which seems a bit peculiar for a UK band, but I suspect "the British invasion" thing pushed quite a few managers/labels to give things a go over there. Although, of course, Manfred has quite the weird US connection because he's given Bruce Springsteen his only US #1 with "Blinded By The Light", but that wasn't until '76. The rest of the entry is pretty content free, except for telling us that there's a surprising number of original tracks for a debut album and the critics are still pretty keen on it. 

And with that, 1965 is complete - a full write-up will, of course, follow soon but it's been a pretty decent year and this was a pretty decent way to end it.

10/01/65 - Absolutely dreadful
1965 - And another one down!

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