Laura Nyro-Eli and the 13th Confession (1968)


 

Artist: Laura Nyro

Title: Eli and the 13th Confession

Label: Columbia

Format: LP

Catalog Number: CS 9626

Year of Release: 1968

Country and Year of Edition: US 1968 Pitman Pressing

Sell Price: $7.34

Sell Date: 8/17/26

Condition: VG/VG with original foldover lyric sheet

Discogs Last Sold: 8/24/26 G/G+ $2.40

Low: $1.57 G+/G+

Median: $10.22

Average: $12.11

High: $38.00 VG+/VG+ 7/18/25

Current low price: $2.50 G+/G+

Curren Number on Sale at Discogs: 23

Have/Want: 475/244

Where Sold: Greensboro, NC

Time It Took To Sell: 3 years

Where and When Bought: Facebook marketplace lot

Gwiz-gau Letter Grade: B+

Sad To See It Go: No

Although I saw Nyro open for Dylan in the early 90's at Tanglewood in Lenox, MA, I never really listened to her stuff until the early 2000's.  Outsider filmmaker Nick Zedd had mentioned that he really liked this album so I picked up a CD copy sometime in the early aughts.  This particular vinyl copy that sold came in a lot from a few years back, and had the foldover lyric sheet still inside it that was issued as an overlap on the cover.

This record I initially found to be shrill Broadway music bordering on unlistenable.  True, that is oversimplification and you can't really deny "Eli's Coming" or "Stoned Soul Picnic" their charms.  This is more a blend of musical theatre, Jazz pop vocal and Carole King before Carole King was "Carole King" and part of Goffin-King Brill Building songwriting infrastructure that gave girl groups a voice.  As far as art, this is probably an A record, but it takes some getting used to.  Then you can discover the quirks that sound good like the "whoa whoa whoas" of "Lonely Woman" or the "whoa" of "Woman's Blues."

In terms of pop success, she had bigger albums thought the first half of the 70's, but this was her Columbia debut after an album on Verve/Folkways and the first one to chart the lower regions of the Billboard 200 before her run of top 75 albums with several month chart runs.  However The 5th Dimension had big hits with "Stoned Soul Picnic" and "Sweet Blindness" while Three Dog Night went top 10 with "Eli's Coming."  This was the territory of late 60's AM radio.

Dylan could relate.

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