Main menu
Fretplay home Submit tabs

The Zombies
The Zombies tabs The Zombies discography

Channels
Guitar channel Bass channel Guitar videos Reviews

Message Forum
Guitar forum Bass forum Bands and artists Promote your band Recent discussions All categories

Fretplay.com

The Zombies guitar tabs

CD reviews

The Singles Collection: A's & B's, 1964-1969

The Zombies - The Singles Collection: A's & B's, 1964-1969 Audio CD

A fair review of the The Zombies "The Singles Collection: A's & B's, 1964-1969" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all The Zombies reviews here, or go back to the The Zombies tabs.

Band: The Zombies
Title: The Singles Collection: A's & B's, 1964-1969
Rating:

Release Date: 2000-03-14
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: She's Not There 2: You Make Me Feel Good 3: Leave Me Be 4: Woman 5: Tell Her No 6: What More Can I Do 7: She's Coming Home 8: I Must Move 9: Whenever You're Ready 10: I Love You 11: Is This the Dream 12: Don't Go Away 13: Remember You 14: Just Out of Reach 15: Indication 16: How We Were Before 17: Gotta Get a Hold of Myself 18: Way I Feel Inside 19: Goin' Out of My Head 20: She Does Everything for Me 21: Friends of Mine 22: Beechwood Park 23: Care of Cell 44 24: Maybe After He's Gone 25: Time of the Season 26: I'll Call You Mine 27: Imagine the Swan 28: Conversation off Floral Street

Jazzy Cool Mid-60's Pop with an Indie Flair
This, along with the fact that they only had three memorable singles ("She's Not There," "Tell Her No," & "Time of the Season"), is the reason that they remain a fairly obscure band. Compared to the massively successful guitar-driven bands like the Beatles & the Stones whose sound changed radically from album to album, the Zombies softer jazz (think Stan Getz "cool jazz") instead of blues based sound seems fairly consistent; everything they recorded sounds like it could have been made for the same mid-sixties album.

Another reason that the Zombies remain relatively obscure is that they sing about love and lost love and love regained time and time again. Luckily, the Zombies are interesting enough musically to keep their rather limited topical scope from becoming a liability. The organ flourishes alone make this band worth listening to. This singles collection makes sense because the Zombies were primarily a singles band (their first two records were collections of singles and covers). Ironically, their first album of all original material, Odessey & Oracle, was also their last album. And due to financial woes the band disbanded in 1967 before it was released. Odessey & Oracle recorded in 1967 and released in 1968 spawned the single "Time of the Season" (which was a hit in 1969). Though a commerical failure when it was released, the album has since been recognized by rock critics as a classic and is listed as #80 on Rolling Stones Best Albums of All Time. This "classic" has been re-issued several times and many of the reissues have had as many as sixteen bonus tracks on them making Odessey & Oracle a very attractive alternative purchase to this singles collection.

Nowadays, with so much sensitive emotive ("emo") rock on the charts, the Zombies are relevant again. They appeal to a whole new generation because their music is not about revolution but about the difficulties of making connections with others, about the wistful musings of youth intensified by the feeling that time is fleeting, about the battle between detachment and engagement--all ageless indie attitudes/qualities/themes.

The late Elliot Smith covered one of their moodier numbers, "Care of Cell 44", and "The Way I Feel Inside" was featured in Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic.

And, by the way, the group, with original line-up (minus the late Paul Atkinson), have just (July, 2008) begun a North American Tour.

.

Why Release Under This Title And Leave Off One Hit?
In 1964/65 they had just four North American hit singles for the Parrot label: She's Not There (# 2 Billboard Pop Hot 100 in December b/w You Make Me Feel So Good); Tell Her No (# 6 in February 1965 b/w Leave Me Be); She's Coming Home (# 58 in May 1965 b/w I Must Move), and I Want You Back Again (# 95 in July 1965 b/w Remember When I Loved Her). To say that The Zombies were not among the most prominent of those identified with The British Invasion would be understating the fact.

When nothing else worked by 1967 they had decided to disband but, before doing so, spent some considerable time putting together the album Odyssey And Oracle for CBS (# 95 in April 1968) which included the track Time Of The Season. With "I'll Call You Mine" on the flipside it was released as a single at the same time without success. Someone must have had faith in the song, however, because it was re-released in February 1969 by the Date label, this time b/w Friends Of Mine, and it rose to # 3 in March.

Because of that unexpected success, and with original members Rod Argent [keyboardist and the author of all their hits), vocalist Colin Blunstone, guitarist Paul Atkinson, bassist Chris White, and drummer Hugh Grundy scattered to the four corners (Rod had already formed the group Argent), a number of bogus groups began calling themselves The Zombies leading to legal actions.

Strangely, they had even less success in their native U. K. where just 2 of their over 20 singles released by Decca made the charts - She's Not There (# 12) and Tell Her No (# 42). Even so their music was appreciated by the likes of Santana who would take She's Not There to # 22 in 1977, and Juice Newton who would have a # 27 with Tell Her No in 1983.

This compilation, despite being billed as "the Singles" collection, leaves off I Want You Back Again and its flipside and for that reason I had to deduct one star. Everything else of significance is here, though, and the sound quality is excellent. .

Worth the money?...
What makes The Zombies so interesting is that they produced three oddly syncopated, jazz-infused and wonderfully different singles: "She's Not There", "Tell Her No" and the beautifully atmospheric "Time of the Season". . so good that no 60s collection is complete without them. . . plus two further "you really should have them" singles in "Whenever You're Ready" & "Care of Cell 44". Problem is how do you find them on the same CD. Well here's one of a couple of compilations that include all five, surrounded by several other equally distinctive tracks and a large amount of intriguing, but probably "destined to be played only a couple of times" stuff. Worth the money?. . . well that depends on how many of their "classics" you already own.

The Cuts
Though they only made a few albums and a string of singles, they have a memorable collection with the tops of their era. The Zombies were a thoughtful group of musicians in the 60s, who upped the scale of great pop music.

If you want the collection of the best of the best, I recommend this Singles Collection. If you want everything, I recommend The Anthology. The Odyssey and the Oracle is their art piece though you can get those songs on both these collections.

"She's Not There" and "Time of the Season" were their big hits.
Also, "Tell Her No" did well. These showed their vocal and musical complexity. Other songs that have great musicality are "She's Coming Home", "I Love You", "Remember You" (featured in the Otto Preminger film "Bunny Lake is Missing"), "She Does Everything for Me", "Friends of Mine" and "I'll Call You Mine".
I also recommend "Summertime", but you will find it on Anthology.

Colin Blunstone's vocals and Rod Argent's keyboard playing are the signature factors that make their music stand out. Argent, along with guitarist Chris White wrote most of their own songs.

The Zombies, which was a poor selection of a name for them and their music, were pop at a very high level - good musicians with thinker lyrics. They weren't really Mersey Beat, but certainly British Invasion.

For further interest, several years after they broke up, Argent came out with a band with his name and they produced the Zombiesque song - "Hold Your Head Up".

A great break from the crap that's out now.
I am a musician and presently play bass, piano, gutair, and I'm working on my drumming skills. I'm a 15 year old canadian and I'm discusted with the music of my generation. The only thing I bother to play is this great music. The bass in all these songs is great and it contains great gutiar. Of coarse it isn't the most elaberate instramentals but when you add in the great vocals it's a winning C. D. It's a shame they didn't make it big but if your looking for a break from the modern pop crap that's out their this is the C. D. for you.

You can see a complete list of all The Zombies discography, or go back to the The Zombies tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.