Kaleidoscope

No relation to bands of the same name from California or from England, this Kaleidoscope was Mexican, though like the other two bands, they also operated in the late 1960s. Their sole album (sung completely in English) was a pretty fair, if pretty typical piece of garage rock-psychedelia, heavy on thick vibrating organ, fuzz guitar, and surly vocals. The album sounds very much like a soundtrack to a circa-'67 psychsploitation flick, but with a better band than most such films enlisted, with some unpredictable wacky effects and lead vocals (only betraying faint foreign accents) affecting a nonchalant cockiness. It's been reported that just a couple hundred copies of the LP were pressed when it first came out, and though it was reissued on La Ciruela Electrica, that was a limited edition of only 600 copies. ~ Richie Unterberger, Rovi