Album Review:

Nineteen-sixty-seven will be rembered as the Summer of Love, the year the Beatles' released Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Club Band, and social rallies would dominate the headlines in newspapers across America. It also happened to be the year the Astronauts released their final album. It had been five years since the Astronauts burst onto the scene with Surfin with the Astronauts and much had changed since they sang about the simple joys of cars, surfing, and girls. In fact, the Vietnam War draft would make guitarist Dennis Lindsey and drummer Jim Gallagher absent from recording on this particular project.

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Surrounded by a bevy of forgotten rock covers are three gems harkening back to the simpler surfing sounds of the previous day; three tracks warrant attention from surf enthusiasts. Despite no mention of surfboards, cars, or the beach, Gary Lewis' Beach-Boys'-tinged 'She's Just My Style' was written and arranged in a style so indicative of  Brian Wilson's output circa 1964-1965, I've included it here as the first of these surf-related numbers.* Secondly, the original 'In My Car' is a sweet ode to the bond between owner and vehicle.  It's a heartfelt number much in the same vein as the Beach Boys' 'Ballad of Ole Betsy.' Lastly, the Marketts' 'Out Of Limits' gets a late cover - was this a leftover from an earlier recording session? We may never know, but it's a welcome inclusion nevertheless...

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The Astronauts' final album had the band traveling back to their roots in many ways. There are truly some pleasant moments here. Overall, Travelin' Men is one of the Astronauts' better albums. There's a polish here that's missing from the band's earlier output. This is a good start if you can reconcile purchasing an entire album for three outskirts surf tracks.

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*SIDE NOTES:

1. Another Playboys number, 'Main Street,' also takes its cues from the five-member California Hawthorne band, but it would be too much of a stretch to include it in a surf list.

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2. The Astronauts would find continued success in Japan, where the population was still infatuated with surf music until 1968, when the group disbanded.