Captain Beyond/Sufficiently Breathless

First, I had never heard of these guys until I saw an add for them playing a show in my city, which I wasn't interested in, because I never heard of them. But I looked them up. there is limited data of them on Youtube, but I heard enough to dig deeper. I saw their Albums for sale here on Amazon, and, at a small price, I figured, why not, it could always provide a case to use for another disc. What I got was amazing. Great, fresh sounding well played hook filled prog rock, similar to Spooky Tooth at times, Deep purple at others and Rush at others, but never derivative. They have a seventies sound that, due to the return of that sound to vogue, with newer bands, sounds fresh and vibrant. I love these Albums, and will probably delve deeper into their catalog.

Ok..I sent allot of emails to the Australian label RAVEN to suggest this release. I cannot be sure I played a role, but I certainly suggested it enough. What a treat! For those of you who do not know,.. RAVEN is an Australian lable who does incredible remastering. Every piece I have purchased from them is amazing. The sound is WAY, WAY better than the remasters from Capricorn. If you are a fan of these two albums and care about the sound BUY IT! The first Captian Beyond album is one of the classics of all time. No need for me to talk about the albums because any fan knows what they consist of...It's the sound here that people ned to know about! Check out the whole RAVEN catalog because if any of your fave albums have been released by them you need to buy it...LESLIE WEST, HARVEY MANDEL, SHUGGIE OTIS, ALBERT LEE and on and on...great remasters by RAVEN.re: the 19+ comments. UPDATE*** A few very knowledgable Captain Beyond fans pointed out a couple problems with this release. They were right. However, the production flaws was CORRECTED and this IS BY FAR the definitive version of this cd released to date! Anyone who claims that the sound quality on this release is not good just doesnt have the critical-listening skills to be evaluating. There is way more midrange than before! There is no comparison between this and the Capricorn version (or the Japanese versions) RAVEN is an amazing company and have a long histroy of attention to detail. It's a shame the initial batch had some flaws but they fixed this issue. Do NOT hestitate to purchase this CD!Please ignore the ridiculous one-star review by this guy "Brian"..what does he expect them to do have one long file with no index points?

This is one of the best music of the 70's and includes in the same CD the second album that is outstanding also. The remaster proves to be amazing compared to the original edition. Well done Raven... All the instruments (including Rod Evans voice) sounds definitively more dynamic. The bass lines now is present, better than ever and guitar and drumms shine all over the tracks. Do it yourself a favor a buy it, specially if you never heard before about Captain Beyond, you'll be surprised.

Although the first batch of CD's had terrible flaws the company (Raven) replaced mine after i emailed them. They sent me a corrected one & wanted defective one back. Now we got the GREAT CD the way it's supposed to sound. I have several Raven CD's & they don't make many but when they do it's done right. Sound is crystal clear. Too bad Rod Evans left the band. They were never the same since Rod left with his fantastic voice never to be heard from again. I think they would have stayed together longer if Rod had stayed. Anyways these 2 albums are legendary. Straight forward ROCK.

Fans of the band will love it.

I had Captain Beyond on Vinyl. Dancing Madly Backward is my favorite. Sufficiently Breathless, while not as good as the first, it is an enjoyable listen.

If you were in college in 1972/73, a record by a group named Captain Beyond seemed as silly as The Blue Magoos. That would be until you discovered that the composite of the group members were drawn from the ranks of Iron Butterfly, Deep Purple, and Johnny Winter's bands. Rod Evans' voice was unmistakable to early Purple fans and Rhino and Lee Dorman were at least acceptable if not gifted name drops, not to mention drummer Caldwell. We just didn't know what to expect from a "Captain Beyond" unless we were lucky enough to walk into the campus oriented record store when the album with the 3-D lenticular art card mounted on the cover was hammering out Dancing Madly Backwards or A Thousand Days Of Yesterdays. Then all of a sudden everyone was madly dancing backwards to the C bin looking for the LP!This was not a top-40 band, it was, as with many of the groups we were really interested in, progressive fused rock with extraordinary compositions and players. Even FM radio did not sign on immediately to the LP but legions of word of mouth fans were eager to pick up on Sufficiently Breathless as soon as it hit the racks a year later, and we were not disappointed by that one either, as it melded more acoustic and latin-fringe (think Santana) influences into the already progressive grooves. What you ended up with was two one-of-a-kind records by a short-lived group which you wished could have lasted a good bit longer. However, that being said, with 1978's Captain Beyond reunion effort Dawn Explosion to compare notes with, I personally feel the group gave us their sum total creative effort on these two albums which are easily listened to on repeat playback. Captain Beyond compares with no other group. They have a progressive rock edge with giant splashes of fusion jazz, 70's heavy metal, and the customary prog-rock time signature changes and recurring themes popping up in various places on the suites of songs. Throw them into a pond with Manfred Mann's Earth Band, ELP, Yes, Triumvirate, Kansas, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Moody Blues, The Who, and Genesis, and Captain Beyond would emerge from the water without any stains from the others because they were simply as concise and self-contained as any of those others. They can be slightly compared with any of those acts and probably countless others, but Captain Beyond was Beyond and on these two albums on one fantastic Raven remaster you will experience a real 1970's rock treat that stands by itself today. This music has not suffered from technological aging, it has a power that keeps it fresh and relevant.No disrespect to Iron Butterfly, Deep Purple, or Johnny Winter, but the sum of Captain Beyond's parts is vastly superior to individual personnel's previous groups. I have plenty of albums by all three groups, and these two albums outrank anything ever produced by any of them, seriously. Yes even Machine Head falls short of these two masterpieces!Now as with more than a few notional progressive rock acts of the period, Captain Beyond struggled with success and died a short career with more transitions in group members than albums committed to vinyl. The four players listed above who founded the original group lost Caldwell between the debut self-titled work and Sufficiently Breathless, but picked up a keyboardist and two more percussionists to add more latin-jazz flavoring to the mix. Core to the group however was Evans terrific voice and Rhino's solid and multi-textured guitar work. Rhino lays riffs and staccato bursts out like a Jimmy Page drenched machine gun, his jazz-laced solos and sometimes Gilmouresque blues bursts, all mixed in with a rock-steady pre-heavy metal drive (think Who's Next, Led Zepplin III, and Dark Side Of The Moon cooked together into a stew) makes each and every composition a wildly talented work of art. Evans and Caldwell on the first album garnered all the songwriting credits only because Rhino and Dorman were in contractual disputes with their former Iron Butterfly management. They did however all contribute to the tempestual array of songs. On Sufficiently Breathless, Dorman composed all of the songs and with the expanded percussive lineup, the result was a very Santana flavored album as noted before. The keys increased the element of progressiveness and on Starglow Energy, featuring Paul Hornsby on organ, a whole new Floydian sound surfaced. If these influences are in your wheelhouse, then by all means, this CD is going to end up one of your favorites.They may have not received the critical acclaim or the sales of other acts mentioned in this review, but the composite work of these two albums was (fortunately for a by word of mouth few) something to truly enjoy, in fact to bathe in! They dissolved after two releases inside of two years and then reunited for Dawn Explosion in 1978, with all the same original musicians save a replacement vocalist for Evans who didn't quite have the chops, and the resulting album was not nearly as impactful as these. Pick up this well priced and well remastered twofer for a fantastic trip into 70's progressive rock land. You won't be sorry.Now a word about Raven, especially given the fact that there were some reviews here alluding to a manufacturer's defect which has obviously been corrected almost immediately. Raven is an Australian company who specialize in reissuing terrific rock and jazz products from the USA, UK, and Aussyland. They do all of their own remastering, with permission, using Sony equipment in studios in Japan. The results have been awesome. A few years ago I picked up Deodato's first two albums released together like these two; the remastering was superb, almost better than the fantastic CTI jazz label originals. I have found other treasures on Raven and always been overwhelmingly pleased with the results. CAPTAIN BEYOND & SUFFICIENTLY BREATHLESS are far and away significant improvements on the reissued vinyl products which I had to purchase in the 80's to replace my worn out records, owing greatly to having access to original master tapes. If you haven't heard of Raven before, let this be your jump off point into a new land of discovery.Final Word: Without writing a dissertation on each and every track or suite of songs, the best way to enjoy CAPTAIN BEYOND & SUFFICIENTLY BREATHLESS, is to jump into the deep end of the pool. Put it into the machine, press play and off you go! This is a ride you are going to be happy you've taken if anything written above interests you (or any other descriptions from other reviews). Last point for the digital media crowd: Captain Beyond is NOT conducive to selective mp3 chopping. If you have a heart, if you like music segued into suites of psychic celestial space travel all interwoven into a rock fest, then listen to this music as it was meant to be listened to by the composers. Start at the beginning and end at the ending, take a trip and seclude yourself for an hour and a half; but mostly, have a heart and give Captain Beyond the respect they deserved.

Sono due album in un CD. Sono 2 capolavori! Per essere nei primi anni settanta hanno un suono pazzesco ! Ascoltateli sarete stupiti !

It say remastered 24 bit! I say it's not.Music is five star, but the sound is three star

Beide Albrn sind auf einer CD. Die Aufnahmen sind klar und kräftig.

Habe sie schon immer gemocht und nun mal auf CD ausnahmsweise.