Track Listing

1. Inspiration Information
2. Island Letter
3. Sparkle City
4. Aht Uh Mi Hed
5. Happy House
6. Rainy Day
7. XL-30
8. Pling!
9. Not Available
10. Strawberry Letter 23
11. Sweet Thang
12. Ice Cold Daydream
13. Freedom Flight

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #93941 in Music
• Released on: 2004-06-28
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
Son of band-leader, Johnny Otis, multi-instrumentalist, Shuggie Otis worked with Al Kooper when he was 16, refused the offer to join the Rolling Stones after Brian Jones' death and recorded this highly influential album in 1974. So why so few of us have heard of him is a mystery. Exiled to cult status, "Inspiration Information" (reissued in 2001 by David Byrne's Luaka Bop) was his finest hour on record-loose, spellbinding, a wonderful combination of vulnerability and consoling mellowness. Too weird to be embraced by the mainstream, it's actually an extraordinary jazz-soul listen that strives for a kind of gravity-defying weightlessness. Produced and reportedly multi-tracked all by him, (only the strings and horns were played by session musicians) this album of stark, breath-taking beauty recalls Stevie Wonder, Sly Stone, The Meters and Love in feel and quality. The previously un-included "Strawberry Letter 23" (later covered by disco band, The Brothers Johnson) begins as a deceptively languid sing-along, backed by a celeste, then Otis begins weaving dense webs out of guitar riffs, wacked-out up tape flanges and lots of far-out effects. However ornate the effects may become, the song/track is always allowed to predominate. "Island Letter" and "Aht Uh Mi Hed" are both intoxicating and menacing, contrasting hard, angular arrangements with crooned vocals and lush, electronic textures. Tracks, like the sweetly valedictory "Not Available" and "Rainy Day" achieve a kind of unsettling and hypnotic sensibility in their dreaminess. Nearly 30 years on, Otis should feel vindicated for sticking to his guns. Remarkable and visionary, "Californian Soul: Inspiration Information" is definitely deserving of that misused term, "lost classic." --Maxine Kabuubi

Customer Reviews

Masterpiece
I am so lucky that I found this record. About six years ago this record was remastered and re-released. At that time I read a couple of favourable magazine reviews, came across the CD quite by chance in my local independant record store, (remember those?) and on a whim purchased it. I don't usually buy things without having a listen but I am so glad that on this occasion I did.

Shuggie was a true genius, a visionary who locked himself in the studio for months, reluctant to meet with record company executives who would visit from time to time to see how their money was being spent, sending out for horn and string sections to play his lush arrangements when required, and gradually piecing together almost single-handedly this beautiful record.

I won't go into individual discriptions of tracks because that's boring, and let's be honest; how can you have great music described to you? You have to hear it for yourself. Buy this album. You NEED it, you just don't know it yet.

A masterpiece
This is an amazing album - a funky mellow jazzy masterpiece, with some rock influences thrown in. Listening to it well over 30 years since it was produced you can hear just how influential he has been, and how far ahead of his time he was.

Included here are 4 tracks from his earlier album, Freedom Flight (1971) and this makes the package an essential (if it wasn't anyway). If you like Sly, Isaac, Curtis, Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis, the Isleys, mid 70's Marvin Gaye, etc etc you will not be disappointed by this - so buy this - NOW

Genius!!!
Ahhh just buy it trust me!! It has the original and much superior version of Strawbery Letter 23 it has some great rhodes work in it and pioneering use of the drum machine. Funky chilled out summer goodness all written and mostly performed by the teenage Shuggie who at 14 or 15 was hired by the great Zappa to play bass on 'Peaches En Regalia' so he has to be good. BUY IT NOW YOU FOOL!