The Nomads — “Thoughts of a Madman”: Brace for the Obscure (60s rock)! — July 11, 2024

THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,268) The Nomads — “Thoughts of a Madman”

Wandering down from Mount Airy, North Carolina, the Nomads offer us “wickedly cool” (On the Flip-Side, http://ontheflip-side.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-south-spotlight-nomads-thoughts-of.html?m=1) and “totally raw, frenetic garage psych played by pumping organ, searing acid guitar including a rip-roaring break . . . heavy bass line and . . . thunderous drums, topped off by . . . [a] screaming, wild punk vocal”. (Bayard, https://rateyourmusic.com/release/single/the-nomads/thoughts-of-a-madman-from-zero-down/) On the Flip-Side adds:

[Madman”] opens with an echo-chambered guitar that is reminiscent of the work on the 13th Floor Elevators’ second album . . . [then] Bruce Evans pushes the microphone into the red as he sings of suicide, death with peace of mind, insanity and ‘1000 graves dancing in my head’. Not your typical A-Side material for rural North Carolina in 1967!

http://ontheflip-side.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-south-spotlight-nomads-thoughts-of.html?m=1

Talking of rural North Carolina:

[The] rural town [of Mount Airy] is perhaps best known for being the home to one Mr. Andy Griffith. The town even claims that Mount Airy was the inspiration for Griffith’s fictional town, Mayberry. That may be, but Aunt Bee and Floyd The Barber never rocked like th[is] primal band . . . .

http://ontheflip-side.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-south-spotlight-nomads-thoughts-of.html?m=1

As to the Nomads, “[b]y 1968 the band had changed name to Blu-Erebus and, in keeping with the times, put out a more psychedelic single ‘Willowgreen / Plastic Year’”. (Cosmic Mind at Play, https://cosmicmindatplay.wordpress.com/2013/05/02/classic-singles-15-the-nomads-thoughts-of-a-madman-from-zero-down-1966/) “[T]he boys scattered to the usual spots — college and Vietnam.” (On the Flip-Side, https://ontheflip-side.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-south-spotlight-nomads-thoughts-of.html?m=1)

Here is the Scottish garage revival band The Green Telescope:

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