Extended Versions - 2006 |
| |
|
|
1. I'm Your Captain
2. Foot Stompin' Music
|
| |
For The People - 2006 |
As strong as is stated in the cover picture, Mark Farner isn't afraid to serve his fellow man. And here he's servin' us Passion and Patriotism! Guitar grindin' Rock n' Roll to cause a Revolution and a Revelation! It really doesn't get any better than this! |
| |
|
|
1. For The People
2. Cry Baby
3. Nadean
|
| |
Live!! N'rG - 2003 |
Mark Farner does something extraordinary on his 2003 in-concert album, Live! N'rG, named after his NRG band. Recorded on March 8, 2003, at Chicago's DuPage University and March 9, 2003, at the Pabst Theater, Milwaukee, songs from the two shows are combined onto one disc, starting with "Footstompin' Music" from 1971's E Pluribus Funk album and lasting through to the closer, "Closer to Home," from the 1970 album of the same name. And what a powerful set of recordings this is. |
| |
|
|
1. Footstompin Music
2. Aimless Lady
|
| |
The Pack Anthology - 2002 |
In 1972, ABKCO Records released Funk Off: Mark, Don & Terry 1966-67, which had the same packaging as Grand Funk's greatest hits collection, Mark, Don & Mel. Twenty-one selections were on that Terry Knight & the Pack double LP, which got pulled from the shelves and is now a collectors item. Exactly 30 years later, Mark Farner's own Lismark Communications has issued 22 titles from the Pack on an album entitled The Pack Anthology: The Singles 1965-1968, and it is the definitive collection from the Pack featuring a dozen of the tracks found on the 1972 ABKCO release, along with other nuggets from the Michigan rock scene. The story is here in the music and accompanying booklet, a true artifact which has surfaced again, this time in its proper setting. Lismark did a nice job re-creating the Lucky Eleven logo and including a wonderful array of photos. |
| |
|
|
1. One Monkey Won't Stop The Show
2. Harlem Shuffle
|
| |
Heirlooms - 2000 |
Heirlooms: The Complete Atlantic Sessions, 1977-1978 is single CD with all the music from Mark Farner's first two albums without Grand Funk Railroad, both originally released on Atlantic. Credited to the Mark Farner Band on the inside spine and Mark Farner on the outside, there are five photographs of the musician with his wife, Lesia Farner, on the tray card and a six-page booklet that accompanies the package with liner notes by the artist explaining how it all came to be. |
| |
|
|
1. Easy Breezes
2. Just One Look
|
| |
What's Funk? - 1983 |
After making a comeback in 1981, the revamped 1980s version of Grand Funk Railroad took one last stab at the '80s rock market with What's Funk? This time, the band enlisted Gary Lyons (producer for Foreigner and the Outlaws) to create an updated version of the kind of slickly produced album that made the group into a pop hitmaker during the mid-'70s. |
| |
|
|
1. Rock & Roll American Style
2. Borderline
|
| |
Grand Funk Lives - 1981 |
Rising like a Phoenix, which was the title of one of their previous albums, perhaps Mark Farner is sending a subliminal message with opening track "Good Times" that his "Bad Time" is over? "Queen Bee" has riffs taken from Black Sabbath and Uriah Heep, specifically the ending of the song; "Black Sabbath meets Heep's "Easy Livin'," with Farner's pop influences glossing it up. In a world mutated by Guns N' Roses, Nirvana, and Aerosmith gone pop, Grand Funk Railroad kept the flame of hard rock lit with this solid disc. It's too bad it didn't reach a larger audience. ~ Joe Viglione, All Music Guide |
| |
|
|
1. Good Times
2. Queen Bee
|
| |
Wake Up - 1989 |
| |
|
|
1. Wake Up
2. Into The Light
|
| |
Born To Die - 1976 |
The title says it all: Although not steeped in heavy metal riffs or gothic sound effects, this 1976 effort from Grand Funk Railroad creates a mood gloomy enough to rival the darkest moments of Black Sabbath. Even though the production is solid and the group's instrumental performance is tight, neither of these elements make it easy to listen to an album of oppressively dreary songs. However, a few bright spots shine through: "Sally" is a country-tinged mid-tempo rocker that highlights Mark Farner's harmonica playing. Ultimately, Born to Die is such a grim affair that it may turn off some of the group's fans but it remains an interesting curio for the Grand Funk Railroad completist. |
| |
|
|
1. Sally
2. Politician
|
| |
Shinin' On - 1974 |
Shinin' On's best songs are the ones that became its single releases: the title track infuses its hard-driving, spacy rock groove with some surprisingly ethereal vocal harmonies and the cover of "The Loco Motion" turns this dance classic on its ear with a stomping beat and a screeching guitar lead from Mark Farner. In the end, Shinin' On is too unfocused and uneven to win over non-fans but Grand Funk Railroad fans will find plenty to enjoy on this album. |
| |
|
|
1. Shinin' On
2. The Loco-Motion
|
| |
Grand Funk - All The Girls In The World Beware - 1974 |
Grand Funk Railroad continued to move further into the pop/rock mainstream with this hit album. The album's combination of high-gloss production and the band's energy resulted in some impressive hits: "Some Kind of Wonderful" is an exuberant, organ-drenched soul song that highlight's the group's strong harmonies while "Bad Time" mixes a delicate, string-laden melody with a pulsing beat from the rhythm section to create a one-of-a-kind power ballad. |
| |
|
|
1. Some Kind Of Wonderful
2. Bad Time
|
| |
Closer To Home - 1970 |
This is the trio's fourth album and the record that really broke them through to a more commercially successful level of metal masters such as Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. Rather than rushing headlong back into their typical hard, heavy, and overamplified approach, Grand Funk Railroad began expanding their production values. Most evident is the inclusion of strings on the album's title track, the acoustic opening on the disc's leadoff cut, "Sins a Good Man's Brother," as well as the comparatively mellow "Mean Mistreater." |
| |
|
|
1. Mean Mistreater
2. I'm Your Captain
|
| |
Grand Funk LIVE - 1970 |
Either you love or you hate it. Live Album by Grand Funk Railroad was a smash when released and those who loved it played it to death. A hard rock phenomenon of the waning days of the Sixties, Grand Funk proved over and over that they were the live performing act of the time, and this album is a testament to their in-concert power. |
| |
|
|
1. Are You Ready
2. Paranoid
|
| |
