22072014 - Jim Sullivan "U.F.O."

This album was released in 1969, six years before Jim Sullivan himself got abducted by aliens. Or so the story goes. What we do know is that Sullivan disappeared without a trace in New Mexico, his car abandoned, his guitar, clothes and wallet still in his motel room and his music mostly ignored by a bigger audience. The fact that he was a friend of luminaries like Harry Dean Stanton, had performed on the José Feliciano Show and had a cameo role in Easy Rider adds to the enigma, but the fact that Phil Spector's legendary Wrecking Crew are his musicians on this record should tell you that we're talking quality stuff! And yes indeed, comparisons with Fred Neil and Joe South serve him justice, and both singer and songs here are at least as captivating as the story of the man that never discovered success, but himself ended up as a part of a near mythological tale that also includes a local mafia connected family, a retired sheriff moving to Hawaii and talks with his own manager about walking into the desert never to return. If the story is incredible, thankfully so is the music. And the biggest mystery remains why he never made the big time!