Description
| 1. | Can’t Seem to Make You Mine | 3:01 |
| 2. | No Escape | 2:12 |
| 3. | Lose Your Mind | 2:13 |
| 4. | Evil Hoodoo | 5:07 |
| 5. | Girl I Want You | 2:23 |
| 6. | Pushin’ Too Hard | 2:36 |
| 7. | Try to Understand | 2:47 |
| 8. | Nobody Spoil My Fun | 3:51 |
| 9. | It’s a Hard Life | 2:37 |
| 10. | You Can’t Be Trusted | 2:02 |
| 11. | Excuse, Excuse | 2:17 |
| 12. | Fallin’ in Love | 2:45 |
| 13. | She’s Wrong | 2:13 |
| 14. | Daisy Mae (take 1) | 2:20 |
| 15. | Dreaming of Your Love | 2:19 |
| 16. | Out of the Question (version 1 – take 1) | 3:02 |
| 17. | Out of the Question (version 1 – master) | 2:23 |
| 18. | Pushin’ Too Hard (take 1) | 3:15 |
| 19. | Girl I Want You (alternate overdub take 6A) | 2:22 |
| 20. | Evil Hoodoo (unedited take and intercut section) | 15:59 |
| 21. | It’s a Hard Life (take 3) | 2:37 |
| 22. | Nobody Spoil My Fun (alternate overdub take 3A) | 3:50 |
From the time of its recording in early 1965, ‘Can’t Seem To Make You Mine’ may have taken two years to become a hit, but its success was wholly predicated on the record’s unusual resonance. That is why the track remains a vital performance to this day. ‘Pushin’ Too Hard’, too, continues to pack the rudimentary punch that it did when it scaled the charts at the end of 1966, as The Seeds’ lone Top 40 hit. Both of these signal tunes, the groups calling cards if you will, were included on the classic debut album known simply as “The Seeds”. There was an eternal element to Seeds music right from the very start, but it took the post-punk generation to fully appreciate, in its blend of energy and emotion, the timeless quality of the band and its music.
Although The Seeds were very much a collaborative effort, the public face of the act has always been its singer and frontman, Sky Saxon. Unfortunately, Sky the professional has invariably been eclipsed by Sky the eccentric, bolstered by the colourful copy that years of bizarre behaviour have attracted. Even before the rampant drug use, rock star megalomania and bizarre illogic that he became infamous for, it was obvious that the singer marched to a different drum, and that he was driven by a calling that few understood. What others might have regarded as impediments – a thin, whining voice, less than movie star looks, and only a modicum of musical prowess – the man born as Richard Marsh brilliantly translated into an unforgettable persona: Sky Saxon. His passion and sincerity were admirable; his inspiration and resolve quite extraordinary.
One fact however is unavoidable. Sky Saxon would not and could not have achieved his eventual breakthrough without the express assistance of his fellow Seeds – who were never, ever Sky’s “sidemen,” no matter how the media (or on occasion, the bands management) viewed them. Daryl Hooper, Jan Savage and Rick Andridge were, like Saxon, all refugees from middle America, subsisting on cheap Hollywood gigs in the vague but resilient hope that success might come their way. But The Seeds never acquiesced to the commercial styles of the moment, such as jingle-jangle folk rock, or shark-skinned white R&B. Instead, the quartet span their own relentless web of sound, tinged with a haunting, aberrant patina that is uniquely Seeds.
-from the extensive, illustrated liner notes by Alec Palao
