USC's 1970-71 Album (MP3's)

Here's an album capturing the sounds and events one might have encoutered if one attended USC during the 1970-71 school year.

I've heard plenty of high school and college year-in-review albums, but few have sounded like this one.

The A-side is a montage of sounds from around the campus during the school year. Even if I'd attended, I suspect I'd have found this production frustrating, because of the way it jumps from event to event, never explaining anything and never containing a complete recording of any one event, either. There are things captured here that I'd love to know about. If I'd been at the school that year, and hadn't been at an event captured here, I'd really want to know what I'd missed.

On the other hand, this is fairly well done, as a montage, and it reminds me of some of the montage work done by Nurse With Wound, among others, and with its recurring use of the song "Moments To Remember", I'm reminded of a particularly enjoyable Negativland "Over the Edge" CD. I do have to question whether the song "Moments to Remember" would have possibly connected on any level with college students in 1971, though.

If anything, the second side, while also an interesting listen, is even more frustrating. it captures the sounds of a music festival held at the school - presumably a yearly event. And it appears to have been a lengthy and wide ranging event, based on this sampling. But again, that's what we have here - a sampling. We few exceptions, these are excerpts from individual performances, with no information as to performers, and no ability to hear from beginning to end any but a couple of these songs.

I really wonder what the performers thought - if they found out they would be on the album, and then listened to it, and discovered that their four song set had been boiled down to 90 seconds out of one four minute song. As with the first side, there's some interesting stuff here (as well as some... not so interesting stuff), and I'd have liked to have heard it all the way through.

The album came in a mostly plain white sleeve, with two fascinating little bits of text on the front cover (at the top and bottom) which are scanned, below. The labels are also fairly plain, but I have scanned them, as well.

1.) USC album - Montage (Side One) (MP3)

2.) USC album - Songfest '71 (Side Two) (MP3)

Cover Scan One - Cover Scan Two - Label Side One - Label Side Two

Comments

[crotchbat]

Holy crap - side 1 is incredible.

[coupler]

may the data be with you

[Joe]

What is that opening song? Bloody amazing!

[kevin]

i have this record! so weird!

opening song is joan baez - welsh song.

[joe]

Thank you

[charles terrat]

This is very funny to listen to. I attended USC that year, and I used to have a copy of this record, which was given with the yearbook. Towards the end of the school year there was a traditional music festival (Songfest), in which campus organizations were encouraged to enter. There was a common theme, which that particular year was something like "Time gone by." You were given a strict 6-minute limit, and you had to audition to get in. The finals were held at the Greek Theater, and had always been dominated by the fraternities and sororities, who would group together. I played bass in a dormitory band we put together for the contest, doing a Sha-na-na type early rock medely. We were called Buster Hyman and the Penetrators. Five guys singing, with two electric guitars and bass. We dressed the part, and had appropriate choreography. When the curtain went up on us the crowd, which included most of our fellow dorm-mates, went nuts. The judges included show-biz elite, like Lalo Schifrin and Nelson Riddle. They seemed to like what we were doing, and gave us first place. The first time a non-Greek organization had ever won, as I recall. We were campus heroes for a week. I don't know where you foaund this record, but thanks for putting it up.