Mirror At The End of The Road

Mel Lyman declared himself god. Him & his followers in the Lyman Family started up a commune in the flower power heydaze of the 60´s. They were a pretty hardcore bunch, very anti hippy, but very pro LSD, hard labor & American folk music.

The family held intense self-criticizing analytic acid sessions. They hijacked the counter cultures underground papers, hijacked recording sessions & movie sets & wrecked general havoc on the peacenik community. Some even claimed that Lyman was Charlie Manson’s boss man... Mel Lyman has since vanished, his devoted followers doing the best they can to obscure any trace of their Family’s semi-fascistic mindfuck affairs.

I’ve heard rumors, & I wanna believe there’s some truth to it, of a box set being put together of the American Avatar record & a hole bunch of Lyman/Kweskin stuff plus a book of some sort on this little known LSD cult. In the mean time here’s a clip of Mel blowing harp (his harp work on their cover of Merle Travis classic Dark as a dungeon is mind shattering but I couldn’t find a clip of it.) with his main disciple Jim Kweskin & band. The second song is of the hijacked & renamed Lisa Kindred album that became American Avatar after Mel’s Family liberated the session.