365 Days #274 - Harold Flake - The Snowmobile Driver Tells His Story in Song (mp3s)
MP3:
1 The Snowmoile Driver Tells His Story In Song (4:43)
2 Tour Of The Athabasca Glaciar (6:49)
Here's another unusual souvenir record, this time from the Athabasca Glacier on the Columbia Icefield in the Canadian Rockies. How it found its way to cloudy England is anyone's guess. It was made in the early 1970s and features gleeful snowmobile driver Harold Flake. He not only drove the snowmobiles that took tourists around the glacier but he also wrote and performs the theme song, narrates the b-side and even appears to have drawn the illustration on the bag.
The song sees him as a glacial cowboy doing a Rawhide-style country anthem about his job as a snowmobile driver. 'I am the driver of a snowmobile, I am hellion behind the wheel'. He just stops short of calling out 'yee-hah' but he's almost there. Not sure if I'd want o be in a snowmobile with him at the wheel though.
But the flipside is even better. Witness Harold's breathless audio tour of the glacier over a superb backing including some Moogy Beatles covers and a lovely Frank Zappa-esque, sax-driven instrumental. These clips of music were presumably used without permission. Can anyone identify any of them?
- Contributed by: David Noades
Image: Record
Media: Single
Catalogue: T-57204
Year: 1970s
"The Snowmobile Driver..." sounds a lot like a Kingston Trio song, no? Maybe from a Mighty Wind....
Posted by: Dale Hazelton | October 01, 2007 at 08:06 AM
The Zappa-esque music on the b-side is actually Soft Machine from their album Third - the backwards sounding bits are from the same track - I think it's Out-Bloody-Rageous or it could be Moon in June - anyway definitely that album
Posted by: Tony | October 01, 2007 at 02:51 PM
The Beatle covers are from Marty Gold's 1969 Atco LP "Moog Plays the Beatles." The Rato Records blog has a post about it at http://ratorecordsblog.blogspot.com/2006/03/marty-gold-moog-plays-beatles.html. There'a a nice cover scan but the downloads link is long expired, alas.
Posted by: Jeff Gee | October 01, 2007 at 11:57 PM
Soft Machine and Marty Gold. Thanks for letting me know guys. I'll have to look out for these albums. I guess this dates the record at circa 1970. I wonder why he used those particular tracks. If you're out there Harold I'd love to know.
Posted by: David Noades | October 07, 2007 at 09:39 AM