The Plastic People of the Universe - Egon Bondy's Happy Hearts Club Banned (1978)

Rating: 7.9

The Plastic People of the Universe have one of the most endearing histories of any band. They formed in 1968 after the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia, taking their name from the Frank Zappa song “Plastic People” (Source: http://www.furious.com/PERFECT/pulnoc.html). Throughout their history, they had to overcome censorship and oppression, and still they managed to deliver some amazing avant-garde rock music. I have only heard Egon Bondy’s Happy Hearts Club Banned from their vast repertoire, but it is one of the most treasured albums in my collection, both for the story behind it and the music within it.

I was initially turned off from the band because I had read that they were important only because of their story, not their music. How wrong that statement was. The music on this album is stunning, full of emotion, played with more passion than most bands can muster. I’m sure this relates to their flirtation with censorship – that alone gave their music an inherent purpose that most bands have to search for – but it would be an egregious error to ignore that this is music that really lets you see into the hearts of the musicians. They poured their soul into this work, and it shows in the final result.

What we hear on the album is a mixture of post-psychedelic rock and free jazz. There are strong grooves that dominate the album, giving it a tremendous flow and an irresistible charm. Every song brings something unique to the album. We have songs like the slow, beautiful “Metro Goldwyn Mayer,” and we have songs like the upbeat closer, “Jo, To Se Ti To Spi,” not to mention all the songs that fall somewhere between those two extremes. Every song is a true gem, packed with emotion until it can’t take anymore. The technical value of the music (how difficult it is to play) doesn’t seem high, and the production is shoddy at best, but these minor faults (the first isn’t even a fault at all, really) fall by the wayside in the face of the fact that this album simply sounds good.

At this point, I really find myself running out of words for this band and album, and I don’t know why (it’s just not like me). So, to end, I will again pull from the source used earlier. “The amazing history of the Plastic People is so crucially intertwined with the history of Czechoslovakia that one can not fully understand the history of that country without knowing the history of the band, and vice versa. No other rock band has had to put up with the abuse and the obstacles that the Plastics did during their lifetime. Yet they did not plan to risk their lives for their music. As [bassist Milan] Hlavsa said, they were ‘dissidents against their will.’ Eventually, however, they came to the realization that what they were doing was historically important and their very existence through the hard times their country was experiencing was a powerful symbol of freedom to the younger generation of Czechs.”

Egon Bondy’s Happy Hearts Club Banned is a stunning cd that pleases me every time I hear it. This is an essential addition to any avant-garde prog collection, and it is accessible enough to fit in nicely into any prog collection. Highly recommended!