Near The Beginning
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Album Summary
Near The Beginning was Vanilla Fudge's third studio album, dropped in 1969 on the mighty Atlantic Records label, right in the thick of that beautiful, swirling psychedelic rock era that had the whole world turned upside down. The band came in with their signature sound fully locked and loaded — heavy, distorted, and gloriously extended, the kind of music that didn't just ask for your attention, it demanded it. With only four tracks spread across two sides of vinyl, this was a statement album, a record that said Vanilla Fudge wasn't interested in playing it safe or short. They were stretching out, reaching deep, and letting the music breathe in ways that most of their contemporaries hadn't even dreamed of yet.
Reception
- The album reached #31 on the Billboard 200 chart, keeping Vanilla Fudge firmly in the conversation as one of rock's most formidable acts of the era.
- Rock critics of the time recognized the album's ambitious scope and instrumental firepower, offering positive notices for a band clearly operating on its own terms.
Significance
- Near The Beginning stands as a landmark document of the late 1960s psychedelic and proto-heavy metal movement, planting a flag at the crossroads where garage rock, progressive ambition, and heavy sound all converged into something wholly new.
- The album's Side B, consumed entirely by the sprawling 'Break Song,' demonstrated that Vanilla Fudge had the vision and the chops to hold an audience through extended improvisation — a blueprint that heavy rock and progressive bands would spend the entire next decade chasing.
- Through tracks like 'Shotgun' and 'Some Velvet Morning,' the album showcased the band's gift for transformation, taking raw musical material and rebuilding it into dense, fuzz-drenched sonic architecture that helped define the vocabulary of hard rock.
Tracklist
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A1 Shotgun 105
6:10
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A2 Some Velvet Morning —
7:34
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A3 Where Is Happiness —
6:59
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B Break Song 109
23:27
Artist Details
Vanilla Fudge was a heavy, psychedelic rock outfit that rose up out of Long Island, New York in 1967, blending blues, classical influences, and sheer sonic power into slow-burn, cathedral-sized arrangements that turned pop hits into something almost sacred — their landmark debut album, featuring that epic, aching reinvention of The Supremes' "You Keep Me Hangin' On," laid the groundwork for what would become heavy metal and progressive rock. These cats — Mark Stein, Vince Martell, Tim Bogert, and Carmine Appice — were way ahead of their time, giving a generation of listeners permission to take rock music seriously as an art form, and their influence can be heard echoing through the work of Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, and beyond.
