Mountain - Avalanche

A band who can write a monster like "Mississippi Queen" must have deeper cuts just waiting to be discovered ... right?

Let's find out.

I found this in the dollar bin, and while it cleaned up okay, I didn't realize there was a pretty good wobble in the vinyl. I have a weight stabilizer and it helped a bit, although the first cut on each side is a little off until it moves in a bit - but it isn't too noticable. This really doesn't have anything to do with the album but it was part of my experience with the album so I'll allow it.

The first thing that stood out was how tacky and well, bad the album design was. Sure, it was the early 70s an era of pretty much anything was allowed - or tried, but come on, this was also the era of really great Roger Dean covers, so having a cover with a blurry "action shot" of Leslie West and Felix Pappalardi surrounded by weird cartoon bird creatures that looked like angry McDonald's Fry Guys or worse technicolor copies of Woodstock (if you don't know who that is, there really is a generation gap) - the cover hardly screams "Buy me, I'm cool." 

The second thing that stood out was how bland the songs on the album were. I mean, it just felt lifeless. Admittedly there were some flashes of energy here and there, but mostly this was "meh" and pretty disappointing. It's not like I came to this with any expectations, and dagnabbit I try to look for silver linings - I'm pretty forgiving. Really, I almost liked an album by Jack Wagner so it's not like I can't try and find a few nice things to say.

Let's do the nice things: I liked the instrumental "Alisan" with Leslie West on guitar, it wasn't too flashy - it was tasteful but a tad too long. The band had chops - make no mistake, those boys could play. Heck, as I'm closing out the first side the band is tearing it up, in a good way, with their cover of The Rolling Stones "Satisfaction" this is the best song on the first side. When I first read the back cover and saw two covers: "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On" and "Satisfaction" I was actually kind of intrigued. The first cover was lifeless and totally forgettable - I've played the album several times through now, and I can't remember how it went. "Satisfaction" though is pretty cool but again ultimately forgettable.

The second side charges out of the gate with the thick fuzz driven riff infused "Thumbsucker" it's a decent song, and is one of the better cuts on the album. However, being the best song on a pretty mediocre 70s psychedelic infused rock album is being damned with faint praise. I'm sort of running out of nice things to say.

I really wanted to like this ... I went into this wanting to like it. I suppose there will be people who really like this, and I suspect it will be a time and place thing. Me trying to digest this based on my tastes today can be unfair, but it is what it is. I suppose if eleven year old me had grown up with this one, I may think differently - but I suspect, and I am not alone in my assessment of how disappointing this was overall. I'll look for a greatest hits, and probably still only really like "Mississippi Queen" - but I'll find out one day.

There's no doubt Mountain are deserving of respect, like I said at the start they wrote a monster hit that's part of the rock pantheon of all time great rock songs in "Mississippi Queen" and by 1974 they'd been riding their own coattails for a few albums, and as fate would have it after Avalanche the band would essentially break up and wouldn't be heard again for the rest of the 70s.