ATTILA - Feat. a pre-famous Billy Joel

Anybody here remember/ever heard of ATTILA, featuring a pre-fame Billy Joel? It was a two-man band featuring Billy on Hammond organ and a guy named Jon Small doing pretty much everything else. Their songs included the above "Wonder Woman," "California Flash" and "Brain Invasion." Dig that album cover! Soooo Spinal Tap before there even was a Spinal Tap. Legend has it that when they played live they were so loud that people were unable to stay in the same room.

Attila released one mostly forgotten album in 1970. It was a commercial disaster and the band promptly split up. Billy himself has dismissed their album as "psychedelic bullsh*t." I've seen the record a couple of times over the years and have almost picked it up as a curiosity item, but have never quite pulled the trigger on it. I didn't actually hear the band for the first time till tonite when one of my wise ass Facebook friends sent me the above video as a goof, saying "I bet I finally found a heavy metal band you've never heard of!" -- he was surprised, and I think a little disappointed, that I was already aware of their existence.


Seriously tho, it sounds kinda cool to me, in a totally goofy Deep Purple/Iron Butterfly worshipping way... I mean, this is not what you'd expect to hear from the Piano Man at all. Sounds like he was seriously beatin' the hell out of those keys!!!

Below is the aforementioned "California Flash," which is a hoot - listen to the lyrics. It's about a rock star (with a "20 foot mustache!") who gets busted by the police after stripping nude onstage during a concert.

I'd heard of this...and I'd heard that it was terrible. That first song is pretty good though. Maybe this wasn't the total waste of space I thought it was.

I can't stand joel, but there's some pretty entertaining moments on the record.

DeathCult wrote:

I can't stand joel, but there's some pretty entertaining moments on the record.

I just listened to what must be the entire album on YouTube. Laughed my ass off. If I ever stumble across that record again (it's been years since I've seen it) I am sooooo picking it up.

Info on the band/album from Wikipedia:

Attila was the name of a band featuring a young Billy Joel. Billy was a member of a band called The Hassles; he and the drummer, Jon Small, broke away from the Hassles and formed Attila in 1969. The instrumentation was mostly organ and drums, with Billy Joel also handling the bass lines with a keyboard, like the Doors' Ray Manzarek. Their creative partnership ended in 1970 when Joel allegedly ran off with Small's wife, Elizabeth, although this did not end their collaborations, as Small produced Joel's концерт video as well as the "live at Shea stadium" performance
They released only one album, Attila, in 1970, later reissued by CBS Inc in 1985. Attila is often selected by critics and other music journalists as one of the worst rock albums of all time, but also receives a significant amount of praise from people who normally would not listen to Billy Joel. Joel himself has gone on record as describing the album as "psychedelic bullsh*t."

End of the sixties, I was in a two-man group. We were heavy metal, we were going to destroy the world with amplification, we had titles like 'Godzilla', 'March of the Huns', 'Brain Invasion'. A lot of people think [I] just came out of the piano bar... I did a lot of heavy metal for a while. We had about a dozen gigs and nobody could stay in the room when we were playing. It was too loud. We drove people literally out of clubs. 'It was great, but we can't stay in the club'
—Billy Joel, Interview with Billy Joel by Dan Neer in 1985

One track from the album, "Amplifier Fire, Part 1 (Godzilla)," appears on Joel's 2005 boxed set "My Lives."

Allmusic says it's as if "a drill has punctured the center of your skull — it's that piercing, painful, and monotonous.", and gave it one star out of five.

I have this album and it reminds me of a crappy version of Deep Purple