The Now Generation - The Legendary Spar Recordings

Conceived by songwriter Bobby Russell (the man behind Bobby Golsboro’s chart-topping Honey), then signed to Spar productions to produce soundalike dime store 45s for their Hit Records label, The Now Generation survive as every inch a product of the cash-in end of the late 60s pop market. Behind the cheesy easy listening façade, they boasted some impressive talent, including Buzz Carson, producer and arranger Bergen White, Jimmy Buffet and an all-star checklist of the hottest Nashville studio musicians of the era. Following the failure of The Now Generation’s 1967 debut album (largely a collection of Bobby Russell originals), to make any kind of impression on the charts, the outfit’s subsequent five studio albums, released between 1968 and 1971, were completely given over to formulaic soundalike copies of recent chart hits. The majority of this 20-track compilation comes from the 1967 debut, with the balance of tracks, including soundalike treatments of Sam The Sham’s Wooly Bully, Bobbie Gentry’s Indian Giver and The Byrds’ You Showed Me, coming from later releases. For all the cheapo cash-in mentality behind the project, the quality of the arrangements still occasionally shines through.