Iron Claw "it's like Black Sabbath with Syd Barret on vocals..."

Classic Rock's "Lost Pioneer's of Heavy Metal" feature unearth's Iron Claw, and brings the band back to life after 30 years.
Initially active between the years of 1969-1974, Iron Claw brought about a havoc like no other to Dumfries, Scotland, save for the likes of Black Sabbath. Formed by Alex Wilson in 1969, who then recruited Jimmy Ronnie (guitar) and Ian McDugall (drums), they were joined by singer Mike Waller in early 1970. Wilson, the groups founder and bassist, decided to go about forming a band after witnessing a Led Zeppelin gig in 1969. The band lifted their name from the opening lyric to King Crimson's classic "21st Century Schizoid Man." (Cat's foot/iron Claw/Neuro-surgeon's scream for more). Wilson and McDugals attendance at Black Sabbath's performance at Dumfries (which Wilson recorded, representing Sabbath's earliest live recording) convincing them to not only cover their entire first album and single live, But to conciously constuct their sound around them.

In 1971, Willson had to replace Mike Waller (when he left to take up the guitar), and so two new members (Wullie Davidson/vocals/harmonica/flute, and Donald MacLachlan/guitar) were recruited by Wilson and this changed the sound of the band to a more structured twin harmony guitar direction. However in 1971, when new recording sessions were looming, Donald MacLachlan was asked to leave the band as Jimmy Ronnie was unhappy with his presence. After the recording sessions, drummer Ian McDougal left in May 1972 and was replaced by Neil Cockayne. The group broke up in 1974.

In 1993, Iron Claw played a one-off show for charity. And in the late 90's, a German bootleg CD of some of the early recordings resurfaced. And in 2009, 16 recorded songs from the 70's were remastered and released on CD on Rockadrome Records from Texas. In response to the critical success the band reformed in 2010 and began working on an album of new and unreleased material. New vocalist Gordon Brown was recruited by the three remaining members of the band to finish the album. Alex Wilson (bass), Jimmie Ronnie (guitar), and Ian McDougal (drums).

The resulting highly acclaimed CD "A Different Game" was released internationally by Ripple Music in 2011. In November Gordon parted company with the band and following his departure Gary Hair was chosen from Brown to take over as vocalist. March 2013 saw the final disbanding of Iron Claw.

In anticipation of Lee Van Kleef: "Holy Smoke" Vinyl release date:11/25/2016

Thank the maker for youtube. I believe all of us have sang that praise many times over, with it came the capability of finding hundreds of bands we wouldn't have ever had the slightest chance of being exposed to. Bands so obscure and localized that their name wouldn't have normally carried further than a hundred miles of their hometown now have the capability of reaching the furthest corners of the globe, thus the potential for greater audiences. Or so you'd think.
Along with the unlimited distribution capabilities also came an infinite supply of every flavor of music, along with any and all sub-divisions of sub-genres and any and all combinations there of, you would need to be a very special kind of boring not to have more than a hundred times your own lifetime's worth of new material to sift through.
If one could do that. Humans need time to eat, sleep, shit, you get the picture.
What follows is just another one of those examples.
Don't know how I got there, wouldn't even be able to speculate, but I recently stumbled upon a stoner-rock/70's kinda wah-pedal guitar jam type outfit (I think that's a valid summation) going by the name of Lee Van Kleef. Normaly by the time shit finds it's way to my desk, it's been around for a bit (at least a year or so), but this time, I happened upon it before it's release! (vinyl is due Nov. 25th, 2016. Download is already available from Bandcamp:
https://leevancleefjams.bandcamp.com/album/holy-smoke
The vinyl will be released by White Dwarf records in an extremely limited edition of 165 copies on purpel vinyl, another 350 on black.

From the White Dwarf website: "The project Lee Van Kleef was born as a joke at the end of 2015 and is the result of long jam sessions between Marco Adamo, guitarist (La Povere de Bodele), Guido Minervini, drums (Efesto, Lamark) and Petro La Tegola, bass (Whiskeycold Winter). Influenced by bands like Earthless, Black Bombaim, Harsh Toke (to name a few) the first work: "Holy Smoke" was recorded, mixed, and mastered in Godfather Studio of Naples. The artwork was done by Robert Gnista."

"When I read the press release with its mention of Earthless, Black Bombain etc I'll admit to bit a bit skeptical - those are big names to throw around. However, on listening it soon became evident that these guys know how to rock! The musicianship is superb and the sound they create is huge. They have taken the general structure of heavy psych and jammed around the theme to create a monster of a record. I think that Lee Van Cleef can be added to the roster of the best acid bands around."
Dayz Of Purple And Orange