Messrs Farner, Schacher, and Brewer have been at it once more in the summertime of 1970. On June 15, Grand Funk Railroad launched Nearer To Residence, their third LP, because the trio ready to hit the American album prime ten for the primary time.
Album releases got here thick and quick in these days. The Michigan rock trio had, for instance, solely issued their sophomore set, Grand Funk, on New Yr’s Day 1970. It had reached its No.11 peak solely in March. That in itself was a considerable enchancment on the No.27 better of their 1969 debut set On Time. However now it was time to take issues up one other notch, each in file gross sales and in the way in which the band have been marketed.
A Large Apple billboard
As Nearer To Residence was launched, GFR spent $100,000, an enormous determine for the instances, on a billboard which ran alongside a complete block of Occasions Sq. in New York. Nobody within the Large Apple, at the least, was going to be unaware that that they had a brand new album out.
Circus journal on the time took a humorous strategy. “I went downtown to take a look at the billboard they had erected for themselves on Times Square,” wrote the periodical. “First of all it was bigger by far than the one John and Yoko rented this winter and it didn’t say all that much about peace either, which was ok, since why confuse commercialism with peace anyway?”
In July, Grand Funk performed songs from the brand new launch on the New York Pop competition occasion at Downing Stadium, Randall’s Island in New York. Right here, they shared the invoice with Jimi Hendrix, Jethro Tull, John Sebastian, and Steppenwolf.
A Prime 40 debut
By August, the album peaked on the US chart at No.6, regardless of the band’s now-traditional poor critiques from a sniffy media. Its near-title observe “(I’m Your Captain) Closer To Home” entered the Sizzling 100 on August 15 and, in late October, gave GFR their first Prime 40 hit single.
Hearken to the perfect of Grand Funk Railroad on Apple Music and Spotify.
One of many exceptions when it comes to beneficial press got here in Billboard. The journal wrote in its evaluate of the album: “The ‘together’ group again proves highly innovative within contemporary rock boundaries. In driving, pulsing songs such as ‘Sin’s A Good Man’s Brother’ or ‘Get It Together’ and ‘I Don’t Have to Sing the Blues,’ the group has few peers. The music is expressive, exciting, often funky, always good. A bow to producer Terry Knight.”
Purchase or stream Nearer To Residence.
