Wilderness Road - Sold For The Prevention Of Disease Only (1973/2013)

Back in 1973, naming an album after a slogan found on condom dispenser wasn’t exactly a smart commercial move—but what do you expect from a band whose members met at the Second City club in Chicago? Wilderness Road’s Warren Leming and Nate Herman were satirists and fixtures on the local bluegrass scene when they started the group to raise funds for the Chicago Consipiracy Trial in the aftermath of the 1968 DNC convention; after making self-titled concept album for Columbia, they signed to Warner-Reprise and made this cult classic record in 1973. Though the front cover displayed them as futuristic glam-rockers, Wilderness Road actually played a mutant hybrid of mountain music, psychedelia, rock, country and avant political satire, sort of Chicago’s answer to Country Joe & the Fish and the Fugs…except they might have been funnier. For example, Sold… includes “The Gospel,” a suite of songs, fake commercial and spoken word interludes pointedly parodying religious radio, while “The Authentic British Blues” is a devastating takedown of the white boy blues genre. Never before on CD, this one-of-a-kind album appears here complete with the original gatefold album art and new liner notes by Richie Unterberger. Another Real Gone find!