THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,221) Brainbox — “Down Man”
The band’s first A-side was a blistering number that “swagger[s] like [a] stevedore[]”. (Marco Rossi, https://recordcollectormag.com/reviews/album/brainbox) It is “a prime example of their sound, which can be described as ‘progressive blues with folk influences’”. (elgreco, https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/brainbox-remaster-focus-or-brainbox.184910/) And it hit #13 in the Netherlands.
Ian Gledhill (Vibrationbaby) calls the song “[c]lassic sixties psychedelic blues from the Netherlands (vibrationbaby, https://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=3372) and goes on to say:
Right in your face complainin`blues. This [single] features two of the meanest blues tracks from the late ‘60s that you’ve never heard. Those who are curious as to what guitar maestro Jan Akkerman was up to before making guitar freaks drool in the early seventies with his fret melting licks with Focus should check this out. . . . [They] demonstrate how accomplished a player he was in the sixties and combined with singer Kaz Lux’s soul ripping vocals this could easily be mistaken for something from the British blues explosion in the latter half of the sixties. . . . These tracks, recorded in 1968, were also the first two recordings made by the band before they acquired a bass player (Akkerman plays bass on both cuts).
As to BB, Ian Gledhill tells us:
[W]ith their harder edged blend of psychedelic rock and Chicago blues, Dutch band Brainbox paid hommage to both American and British Contemporaries while at the same time developing their own more progressive brand of pop music. [F]ormed in 1968 shortly after guitarist Jan Akkerman and drummer Pierre van der Linden joined 19 year-old singing prodigy Kazmierz ” Kaz ” Lux to lay down a couple of demos after the latter had won a talent contest sponsored by the Dutch Record label Bovema. . . . Lux had previously sang with several Dutch pop bands but his heartfelt vocal deliveries were closer to the soul of Howlin’ Wolf and Leadbelly . . . . Akkerman ha[d] become one of the most famous young musicians in his homeland with a hit single, “The Russian Spy And I” in 1966 while playing with a band called “The Hunters”. . . . [H[e had developed a distinctive rock guitar sound which drew more from jazz and classical sources . . . . Van der Linden had also played with Akkerman in one of his earlier groups “Johnny And His Cellar Rockers” . . . . While Lux’s emotive voicings sounded similar to contemporary blues rocker counterparts . . . such as Rory Gallager . . . and Joe Cocker, when fused with Akkerman’s immaginative guitar the result was a blistering meltdown of emotive blues and heavy rock with jazz attitudes. . . . Akkerman’s adventurous guitar work gave the band a progressive aspect wth his extensive soloing and intricate rhythms . . . . Akkerman’s appetite for more explorative and complex instrumental music saw him jamming with another young Dutch musician, Thijs van Leer, who possessed similar aspirations which resulted in Akkerman’s dismissal from the band by the end of ‘69. He subsequently formed “Focus” along with Van Leer . . . . He was followed by Van der Linden into “Focus” a few months later with the remanants of Brainbox forging on with new musicians.
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