Well, except for a little unlikely boost from our next liner-note luminary, the Renaissance rock musician and producer Al Kooper. At this time the renowned keyboardist for Bob Dylan and the leader of such groups as the Blues Project was a CBS producer himself, and even though he was deeply-steeped in blues and R&B, Kooper took a musical and promotional interest in the Zombies, who with their nuanced pop sensibility, were a decided exception to the R&B-based school of British Invasion bands.
“While in London recently,” Kooper adds to the liner note hodge-podge, “I acquired forty British LPs. Upon listening to them, the tuneful and trippy Odessey “stuck out like a rose in a garden of weeds.” Moreover, in giving a brief rundown of some of the wide-ranging cuts' subject matters — from the girlfriend coming home from prison to a World War I battlefield story -- he finds the Mellotron-infused music “so original in thought” with “melodies incorporating well-timed diminished chords leaping through warm melodic tapestries.”
“With this album, the Zombies establish themselves alongside the royalty of rock,” Kooper sums up. Indeed, they are “very much alive.”
That might’ve been a little wishful thinking on Kooper’s part. The of-late hit-less but always prolific Zombies, contracted with CBS only for this one final release before disbanding, went their separate ways. Rod Argent took his distinctive, jazz-flavored keyboard skills to his new group Argent, and vocalist Colin Blunstone continued a solo career with some success in Britain.
Not even the surprise monster hit from Odessey and Oracle, the classic oldies staple "Time Of The Season" could get them to get back together.
"The Isle is full of noises," Shakespeare two-cents it. Yes, but with a little less in the way of sound and sweet airs that give delight.
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