SNOB Organization - Are Women Snobs?

• SNOB Organization - Are Women Snobs? - LP
• Heroes of North America, 198?, WLP 1024
• Produced by Helen Le Roy, Philip and Jimmy Walter

• A1 Look Again (♫)
• A2 Message From the Stars (♫)
• A3 Le Robot (♫)
• B1 Women (♫)
• B2 Le Love
• B3 Carnaval

I figured I should pick something nice for the first post, so why not make it one of my all-time favorite disco albums? Are Women Snobs? is quite the eye-brow raising title, but consider that the band itself is called SNOB Organization and things get blurry really fast. Though the whole album is a little bit hit-and-miss (as is almost always the case with Thrift Sounds), there is still alot going for this under-documented slab of Montréal Disco.

Side A is the winner, hands-down. Look Again (♫) starts it off with a with a hot up-tempo funk work-out that manages to combine a pushy female chorus, an incredibly confident male protagonist with slightly less-than-perfect mastery of English (hey, Montréal would be nowhere without Frenchies), occasional string swells, a hot percussion break and a New Orleans Jazz bit. Message From the Stars (♫) follows with a slightly reggae cosmic slow-jam. Not the best cut on the record, but still unusual enough to be mentioned.

Le Robot (♫) is the jaw-dropping crown-jewel. A punky new-wave bass lick, crisp snare & hand-clap hits, alien synth washes, Babe Ruth-like twin-lead solo, Jethro Tull-ish growling flute, and that apocalyptic warbly voice (presumably the title's Robot) talking about lying, stealing and killing for, and OD-ing on, Disco. This should have been their big single, but they inexplicably left it an album cut.

Side B is more miss than hit though Women (♫), the first track, is still quite a good one. Leaning towards the happy-sound side of things, the insanely impenetrable lyrics still make it quite enjoyable. Something about a galaxy devoid of both women and "universal charity." Thankfully, action is spotted on Planet 23, where the main attraction is "satisfaction guarenteed." There are two Proggy breaks (while Quebec remained a Disco strong-hold long after it had all but vanished everywhere else, it also fervently nursed Prog Rock, possibly keeping Pink Floyd's career alive through their lean years) that are quite jarring, but add a lot to the mix. All this leading to the predatorial chorus "Women! Women! We're gonna get you!" which turns into a kind of psychotic minor-key mantra for the last part of the song. This one was released as a single on PBI (W12035) with Look Again on the flip. Le Love is a pretty generic funky disco track with shades of Bee-Gees vocalising, a Cerrone-like effected tom break and completely unimaginative Franglish lyrics. Carnaval, the last track is abso-fucking-lutely unbearable, and quite long to boot. A terrible way to end a record containing so many outstanding moments, unfortunately.

Are Women Snobs? was recorded at Studio SNB (for SNOB perhaps?), which is still active to this day. Action in Ville St-Laurent! Executive producers Phillippe Renaux, Patrick Barbero and George Antiglio have chops too. Renaux was boss of French dance-label Clever (sub-label of Carrere) and is still at the music production game. Barbero also has quite a few production credits to his name, including a Rap version of Suzanne Vega's Tom's Diner. Antiglio has a more modest CV. He seems to have been mostly active in the early 80's, with some occasional appearances in the 90's. Though his Disco version of Devine's The Name Game sounds like it could be a good time!

Heroes of North America is an amazing name for a label, though I've found very little else about it but this SNOB release. I remember coming accross another H.o.N.A. release during the very bin-raid that unearthed this beauty. It was a 3-man sports-themed character band (football, baseball and...hockey maybe? or tennis?) that sounded like the Bee-Gees. I dropped it like a wet tissue.

PS: Spotted this LP for sale on a European web-store while researching this post. It was selling for €60, in used but mint condition, naturally. My crapped-out copy is probably still worth the ¢99 I originally paid for it though.