The Red Krayola, Coconut Hotel (side A)

Coconut Hotel is of course a bit legendary—in 1967, it was too weird for International Artists, who were putting out plenty of weird records.  When it got reissued in 1995, the sources of the Red Krayola's inspiration were not exactly clear.  Coconut Hotel consists solely of abstract sounds, some in pointillistic arrangements and others more sustained.  Some sounds have a clear source of origin (including ones with titles like "Piano" and "Guitar") where others are harder to discern.  While the music has little to do with the group's rock background, it seems most logical to try to understand Coconut Hotel in this context.  As the Red Krayola collaborated with John Fahey at this time, they must have been aware of his tape-music experiments on Requia.  Founder Mayo Thompson seems unfavorably disposed to hippies, so its creation in the same year as Jefferson Airplane's sometimes-chaotic After Bathing at Baxter's might be coincidence.  An obvious reference point, with only tangential rock connections, AMM's first album came out a year earlier, but there's no way to know if it reached Texas.  Searching for references or influences proves difficult, and Coconut Hotel really can't be judged in any context but its own, which is how Thompson clearly intended it.  The blurry cover photo is funny.  To the extent that sound quality can be discerned on such an abstract release, the reissue seems to have been transferred respectfully.