Ambrosia Collection

Ambrosia is an American rock band formed in southern California in 1970. Ambrosia had five Top Forty hit singles between 1975 and 1980

The group was founded as a quartet with guitarist/vocalist David Pack, bassist/vocalist Joe Puerta, keyboardist Christopher North, and drummer Burleigh Drummond. They chose the name Ambrosia in 1970 to represent a vision of their music: all shades, textures, colors and styles.[citation needed] While Ambrosia had many radio hits in the 1970s, much of the material on their five albums is progressive in nature.

The founding constituents of Ambrosia were reared in Southern California in the area known as The South Bay, later adopting San Pedro as their hometown. Their initial musical influences, like many of their generation, came from The Beach Boys and The Beatles. Ambrosia fused symphonic art rock with a slick produced pop sound.

Early on, the band was infatuated with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and began to experiment with vocal harmonies. After the group attended a show at the Whisky a Go-Go in December 1969, to see an unknown but highly recommended new band called King Crimson, their perception of music was changed.

The musicians, inspired by the music and artists of the progressive rock era, acquired a significant regional admiration. In 1971 a friend who was doing sound for the Hollywood Bowl invited them to play there on stage to test a new sound system that had been installed. Gordon Parry, the head engineer in charge at the Bowl, was so impressed with the group that he invited them back to attend performances by the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He introduced them to conductor Zubin Mehta, who featured Ambrosia as part of a so-called All-American Dream Concert.

1970s
The group auditioned for Herb Alpert and A&M Records early on but the audition did not go well.[4] In spite of their poor performance, Alpert let the band do some demos. Eventually they signed with Rubicon Management, which eventually landed the group a deal with 20th Century Fox Records.

The first album, Ambrosia, produced by Freddie Piro, was released in 1975. It spawned the Top 20 chart single "Holdin' On To Yesterday" as well as the minor hit "Nice, Nice, Very Nice." The latter sets to music the lyrics to a poem in Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle. The album was nominated for a Grammy award for Best Engineered Recording (other than Classical). Alan Parsons was the engineer for Ambrosia's first album and the producer for their second.[3] All four members of Ambrosia played on the first Alan Parsons Project album, Tales of Mystery and Imagination, which was recorded soon after Ambrosia's first album. David Pack later appeared on the Alan Parsons album Try Anything Once (1993), co-writing, playing and providing vocals on three songs.

After lengthy touring, the band returned in 1976 with Somewhere I've Never Travelled. The album yielded the title song and the single "Can't Let A Woman", which both became FM favorites, both featuring lush orchestration and vocal arrangements. The record sleeve folded into a large pyramid. Somewhere I've Never Travelled received a Grammy nomination and set the stage for the band's signing to Warner Bros. Records.

In 1976, the group covered The Beatles song "Magical Mystery Tour" for the transitory musical documentary All This and World War II. The film's soundtrack consisted of different groups providing arrangements of Beatles songs. Their version of "Magical Mystery Tour" scored a Top 40 hit and has since been a staple of their live shows.

In 1978 Life Beyond L.A. was released. It marked a move away from their lush arrangements and introduced a more raw, aggressive progressive rock/jazz influence. Christopher North, who had family obligations and was not totally happy with the group's shift away from the sound of the first two albums, left the group in 1977 during the album's recording.

The year 1978 marked their biggest pop breakthrough with their first Gold single "How Much I Feel" from the album, which was a No. 3 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. Warner Bros advertised the title cut for radio and Life Beyond L.A. started to get significant airplay on radio stations a few months after the album's release. Extensive touring with Fleetwood Mac, Heart, and the Doobie Brothers, in addition to major headlining shows, cemented Ambrosia's reputation as a live act. For the '78 touring band, North returned and the group added a second keyboardist, David C. Lewis, as well as an additional singer Royce Jones.

The band launched a 30th anniversary tour in 2000. They've been active upto 2011.

Discography

1975: Ambrosia
1976: Somewhere I've Never Travelled
1978: Life Beyond L.A.
1980: One Eighty
1982: Road Island
1997: Anthology
2002: Ambrosia Live
2002: The Essential
2003: How Much I Feel and Other Hits