Bonniwell Music Machine

Personnel: Sean Bonniwell (vocals, guitar); Doug Rhodes (vocals, keyboards); Keith Olsen (vocals); Ron Eager (guitar, drums); Mark Landon (guitar).
The Music Machine were renamed the Bonniwell Music Machine when they went to Warner Bros., as the original lineup disbanded at some point, leaving only chief singer and songwriter Sean Bonniwell. Much of the material on Warner, however, was recorded by the original group, and this album was pasted together from some singles (some of which had appeared on Original Sound in 1967) and other tracks, both by the original incarnation and a second outfit that was pretty much a Sean Bonniwell solo vehicle. Accordingly, the tone of the album is pretty uneven, but much of the material is excellent. In fact, some of the songs rate among their best; a few are also found on the Rhino anthology, but other first-rate tunes ("Bottom of the Soul," "Talk Me Down," "The Trap") are not. Some of the cuts (presumably those recorded after the first lineup broke up) find Bonniwell branching out from psych-punk into a poppier and more eclectic direction, sometimes with very good results, sometimes not. ~ Richie Unterberger