Obscure Bands – Space Opera

Space Opera was a band from Texas that released a self titled album in 1973 on Epic Records. They had at least one single, titled “County Max”. The four-man group hailed from Fort Worth, Texas. Their album was recorded at Manta Sound in Toronto, Ontario, and mixed and Mastered at Crystal Sound, Hollywood, CA.

Scott Fraser started out in a teen ban called The Mods in 1965. In 1968, David Bullock and Philip White entered the picture, and the three talked about forming a new group. First, they all took part in a studio project—with a young T-Bone Burnett behind the board—that became the album, The Unwritten Works of Geoffrey, Etc..

Pseudonymously credited to Whistler, Chaucer, Detroit, and Greenhill, the 1968 LP was barely promoted by the label, UNI Records, before sinking without a trace. In the spring of ’69, they were introduced to Brett Wilson, a jazz drummer, who was also from Fort Worth. This is when they started performing as Space Opera.

They played frequently in a local bar and started opening for bands such as Jefferson Airplane and the Byrds. A Canadian agent saw them and signed them to a Columbia record deal. They moved to Toronto in 1972 and recorded the LP. They played live in the studio, but then overdubbed heavily, saturating the tape with sound.

Striving towards perfection, they spent a lot of time on it, which made Columbia nervous. Moving back to Texas, and waiting, the album finally came out on March 21, 1973 on Epic Records in the US. After just a few shows to promote the record they called it quits.

DangerousMinds.net says: Blending country, folk, psych, prog, and pop to great effect, Space Opera is a fantastic rock record that, in a perfect world, would have been a huge hit. The songs are solidly sung and played, with gorgeous harmonies and guitar solos that are positively euphoric. There is another band called Space Opera that released techo/trance records in 1990.