An update.
The book got better - once it had got past the "and Abraham begat Isaac and Isaac begat Joseph and Joseph begat Billybob" bits and into the parts where he really got into the music it was fine, though still not very well written (repeated phrases and descriptions, and how the hell does someone so steeped in Krautrock manage to spell Klaus Schulze's name wrong every time?). Oh, and he mentions Grand Funk Railroad several times in complementary terms which is more than a little worrying.
Minor gripes though on the whole.
As for the music, I'd already got Satori (Flower Travellin' Band) and it's just as he described. And as mentioned before much of his top 50 albums are unavailable so well I've reluctantly downloaded several Far East Family Band albums and he's spot on there too, and though you can see that they're about 3 or 4 years behind the prevailing styles of the time from this remove it really doesn't matter.
The early one - The Cave Down To Earth is rooted in a melodic Moodies/Floyd style and is very good if you like that sort of thing, but is vastly improved upon by the follow-up Nipponjin: Join Our Mental Phase Sound, where Klaus Schulze basically remixed/re-recorded stuff from earlier albums into something much much better. Still the odd Moody Blues moment and a dash of phase 2 Floyd stabbing organ chords.
Even better is Parallel World, where Schulze turns them into something akin to a Japanese Cosmic Jokers. I've managed to buy both of the latter through German Amazon, though be sure to go for the vesion of Parallel World on Lion Records (it has a red frame round the cover) - I suspect the other version there is a pirate.
The following album is more of a reversion to the earlier style, and I haven't heard it.
I'd get The Cave too if I could find a copy.
The other one I've tried is the "super-session" album attributed to Love Live Life +1's Love Will Make A Better You, which Cope raves about. On first listen I can't relate to it at all - there's a long free-form track with lots of shouting followed by several long aimless jams that go nowhere..
Next on the list to listen to is a Les Rallizes Denudes album that I've downloaded (Blind Baby Has Its Mother's Eyes. I'm not sure it's going to be my cup of tea but I'll let you know...
Finally, if anyone out there has any views on any JA Caesar stuff - this sounds as though it should be great but I can't find anything on the web - it'd be appreciated.
