Heavy Jelly-Heavy Jelly (1970)

Jackie Lomax was a British singer, songwriter, and guitarist who rose to fame in the late 1960s as one of the first artists to sign with The Beatles' label, Apple Corps Ltd., which had been founded in 1968 as a parallel record label to EMI Records. However, Lomax's career had begun much earlier with various projects as a member of some of the leading bands on the British pop-rock scene of the 1960s, such as Dee and The Dynamites. He later moved to the United States and joined The Undertakers, but without achieving the desired fame or fortune. Once back in the UK, thanks to The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein, he signed with CBS, with whom he recorded several singles and an album that had little impact. His friendship with Epstein opened many doors and great opportunities for him, including collaborations with artists of the caliber of George Harrison and Eric Clapton, among many others. After leaving The Beatles' label, Lomax joined forces with former members of the band Aynsley Dunbar, John Morshead, and Alex Dmochowski, along with former Animals drummer Barry Jenkins, to form Heavy Jelly. In 1970, the band recorded their first and only album, which also featured Tom Evans and Pete Ham, both members of Badfinger, another Apple Records band, and the Rolling Stones' horn section, Bobby Keys and Jim Price. This debut album is essentially composed of an interesting repertoire of powerful rock tracks with psychedelic sounds, as demonstrated in "Take Me Down to the Water," while the group's melodic side is showcased in "You Better Let Me Know" and "Too Complicated". The Beatles-esque sound can be found in "Born For Something", along with darker hard blues-rock sounds in "Just Don't Feel So Good" and "F-F-F-Females", classic blues-rock tracks like "Bio-Blues", and another song with a Beatlesque flavor, "If You'd Like To". However, because the album featured artists signed to Apple Records, the label boycotted its release, preventing its official publication beyond a few promotional copies. Some of these copies served as master tapes for bootleg releases, which became highly sought after by collectors for decades. More than forty years later, after Jackie Lomax's death, his family was able to resolve the contractual issues with Apple, and the album was officially released in 2013, thus recovering one of the most famous lost albums in rock music history.