Description
Offered for sale is a Japanese white label promotional pressing of Sufficiently Breathless by Captain Beyond, including the original obi.
About this copy:
The cover is VG, with no general wear, but with quite a bit of wear on the spine. There is a sticker on the cover that says “Sample” in both English and Japanese.
The obi is VG+ with slight fading, but no tears. The “hojyuhyo,” or reorder tag, is still attached.
The lyric insert is VG++ with slight fading.
The white label promotional disc is VG++ and close to M-, with a couple of faint sleeve scuffs. The disc appears to have been played only once or twice. Clean disc!
A nice copy of a very rare (and terrific) progressive rock LP.
Background: Deep Purple fired singer Rod Evans in 1969 because they thought he didn’t have the chops to sing hard rock, but the 1972 debut of Captain Beyond, a band that also included former members of Iron Butterfly, proved that he could sing with the best of them. While that album is revered among both fans of Deep Purple and fans of hard rock, the band’s second album, Sufficiently Breathless, caught fans by surprise with its somewhat more mellow sound.
Japanese copies of Sufficiently Breathless are considerably harder to find than Japanese pressings of their first album.
The first album sold well in Japan, and was released four different times, each with a different catalog number and obi. Sufficiently Breathless, on the other hand, was only released once, in 1973, sold poorly, and was quickly deleted.
Allmusic.com gave Sufficiently Breathless a 4 1/2 star review:
Captain Beyond’s second album must have confused the diehards. Where their self-titled debut had upheld the basic progressive heavy rock blueprint of lengthy instrumental explorations, constant tempo changes, and opaque, yet cinematic lyrics, Sufficiently Breathless downplays them for a subtler, song-oriented production. …The results were intelligent and self-assured, yet the band’s never-ending bad luck again intervened when vocalist Rod Evans quit in late 1973, leaving the album adrift. The band would proffer a markedly different style on their return four years later, but anyone dismissing progressive heavy rock as an oxymoron should definitely check out this album first.
While it sounds different, it’s still a terrific record. Here’s the title track from the album:
