Let's gp trippin' (The Astronauts) (LP 4144 - 4145)

The Astronauts  Surfin' With The Astronauts (Vinyl, RCA Records, 1963) ****  

The Astronauts  Travelin' Men (Vinyl, RCA Records, 1967) *** 

Genre: Surf pop

Places I remember: The Little Red Bookshop, Slow Boat Records

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Pipeline (Surfin' with The Astronauts)

Gear costume: Kuk, Baja (Surfin' with The Astronauts)

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Part 6

Active compensatory factors: Miles from the sea in Colorado, the Astronauts were riding the surfin' craze in 1963. 

Band members were Rich Fifield, Jon "Storm" Patterson, Bob Demmon, Dennis Lindsey, and Jim Gallagher. They had a local hit with their first single - Baja and then their debut album Surfin' With The Astronauts. Their last album (they did nine in total) was Travelin' Men in 1967.  Gallagher and Lindsey had been drafted for the Vietnam War before Travelin' Men was recorded so they were replaced by two others.

They present a fascinating flip side to Jan & Dean and The Beach Boys who obviously ruled in this genre. Their version of Let's Go Get Stoned is hilarious! The instrumentals are terrific - gifted amateur style. The harmonies are done well too. Clearly not at Beach Boy standard but what is?

I love those album covers too - my copies are genuine artifacts from a different world.

Where do they all belong? Would snap up any of the other seven albums they put out.