The Edgar Winter Group - "Frankenstein"

The year: 1972. The place: my friend Pam's teen-age brother's bedroom. The reason: we had no idea. He had always ignored us completely. Until one day when he asked us both to come in, have a seat on the bed, and look at THIS!:

We examined the album cover politely. It was the era of individuality, high self-esteem, and glam-rock acceptance so we didn't want to say anything uncool. Then he put the needle on the record and, as if initiating us into a secret rite, said, "Now listen to THIS:"


Even as an eight-year-old, listening to this song for the first time, I assumed The Edgar Winter Group must have consisted of seven or eight guys, which impressed me no end. I tried picturing them all in my head, each more crazy-looking than the other. But this video is even more impressive, showing the basic rock quartet with Edgar playing timbalis and sax all the while wearing a very heavy-looking tricked-out synthesizer keyboard. I've played (and carried) 70s-era keyboards before. They are some of the densest objects in the universe. But happily I find that the more I watch the video, the crazier it seems, living up to my childhood imaginings and then some.

Edgar tells the story of Frankenstein in this interview. He seems like a total sweetheart. And he's a Scientologist--ca-razy! (genius).

Appropo to this post, this might be the greatest album cover of all time.