Badge –Sing Don’t Speak

Badge –Sing Don’t Speak/California Saga –Pagoda 256 (1973 Argentina)

Argentina? Yes, I have picked up a few interesting ones from this country as there were a clutch of Glam-tinted releases at the time. One particularity is that several of them were covers of the hits-of-the day –check out Albatross’s English AND Spanish cover of Abrazame Y Complaceme (c’mon...easy to work out...). Another particularity is that the Argentine 45 in fact often played at 33.3rpm! Although Argentina had a healthy underground scene, Glitter did not gain a strong foothold in Las Pampas, some like Norah had to move to Spain in order to fully accomplish their stomping mission (more on her soon). John Bright’s I’ve Tried It is suitably raucous, but its country of origin is uncertain as is Sunday's who released the splendid Hard Way To Go. Still, there is bound to be more to be discovered from Argentina and South America in general.
Anyhow Badge’s cover of Blackfoot Sue’s 2nd hit is pretty credible, it has a nice bouncing groove and the fuzz is fuzzy in a matchbox-kind-of- manner, and is on a par with the Italian Multiple Sound’s Ultra fuzzed up version (I need that one!!!). Badge released at least two singles as they also covered Blackfoot Sue’s Standing In The Road. It is still unclear if they ever covered Glitter Obituary...

Hear a full version of Sing Don’t Speak