The Smoke - High In A Room (The Smoke Anthology) (2002)

A band from Yorkshire, formed in 1965 under the name The Shots, was also called Chords Five. Since 1967 - The Smoke (which means London in local slang). It's Smoke Time is their only LP from 1967 + singles. The very first forty-five My Friend Jack immortalized The Smoke in the annals of psychedelia - not so much because of its musical merits, but thanks to the line "My friend Jack eats sugar lamps", which caused indignation of the BBC censorship, which banned the song and unwittingly enveloped The Smoke in an atmosphere of heroism. As a result, The Smoke boycotted by radio stations were able to achieve greater popularity on the continent, especially in Germany - where the album It's Smoke Time was released, which has not yet been released in England. The band's subsequent UK releases did not generate the same hype as My Friend Jack. An interesting song is Utterly Simple, written by Dave Mason and featured on the Traffic album "Dear Mr. Fantasy". Although it was never released as a single, it can be heard on various psychedelic compilations. The preserved material paints The Smoke as a musically diverse, rather tough (sometimes garage) band capable of composing a good melody, conveying concert drive to the listener and knowing the measure when using studio effects. After the breakup of the band, none of its members left any noticeable traces in music anymore, with the exception of drummer Jeff Gill, who became the sound engineer of the famous disco band Boney M.