Happy Dragon Band

I bought it by chance a couple of years ago and I'm obsessing over it since.
I know nothing about the Tom Court guy who made it back in 1978: I own also his previous lp, released under the moniker of The Phantom, (a rather goofy Doors rip-off), but the Happy Dragon lone album seems to push some of my secret buttons.

It may be just an acquired taste, but there's some real grief and turmoil here: the sleeve sports a dedication to the memory of "my friend Ritchie and my child Ritchie Joe" and every song (tanks to a super muddy production) is soaked in this dense, suffocating instrumental fog.
Its the mixture of classic rock moves and avant-garde pretentions that really make it: "soulful", anguished vocals against a backdrop of electronic keyboards and distorted guitars. Think Pere Ubu fronted by a hippie playing the weird bits of Todd Rundgren's A Wizard, A True Star - just weirder.
Opener "3D" is heavily reverbed acoustic strumming & electronic bleeps over a limping semi-reggae rhythm, with lyrics about someone dreaming a happy, happy future: it shouldn't work but it works.
And the rest of the album follows the same crazy route: "Positive people" starts with a ominous John Carpenter-like synth line, while "In Flight" is a spooky electronic rock dirge, filled with real despair. "Bowling pin" is an instrumental as creepy and mysterious as those early Cabaret Voltaire sides. "Inside the Pyramid" (great title, btw) is another instrumental track, half Devo half ELO. "Astro Phunk" couples pretty acoustic fingerpicking with piercing, Helios Creed-y electric guitar phrases while another version of "3D" (aptly subtitled "electronic") wraps up the proceedings, this time with cheap sci-fi effects, bizarre moaning and female chanting that just add to the overall weird cult atmosphere.

There's a definite (totally American?) alien aura here, not too distant from other out-there guys like Todd Tamenend Clark or Bobb Trimble, but it seems to me that Tom Court after all still fancied himself as an average "rock guy" - well rooted in the Sixties dream but accidentally stumbling on these wonderfully twisted songs.

All this endless talk, just to ask if someone knows more about the man and his whereabouts...

I was thinking when I read the description 'there's something Trimble sounding about this...'

i'll just say this is a good record. if i had more time or wasn't tired or was a good poster or something, i'd say more.

"I was thinking when I read the description 'there's something Trimble sounding about this...'"

Definitely: this guy is less childish and scarily "innocent" than Trimble, but they're absolutely on the same wavelenght.
Sorry again for the long post - its just this album makes me sick in the best way possible.