Italian born female vocalist who early moved to South Africa where she had a blossoming carreer in the sixties, including big selling records, stage acts and TV performances. A couple of singles also did well in Europe and US with a cover of Paul Simon's "You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies" as one of the most popular. Her first US LP, the 1972 "Not The Flower But The Root" (Brunswick BL-754180), didn't sell much and a couple of years later she teamed up with ex-Mountain Leslie West and Corky Laing providing vocals on West's solo album "The Great Fatsby". This was recorded at the same time with the same crew and can be seen as a sibling album to TGF. It is one of those that sometimes show up in the cheapest used bins and hardly picked even then. I think it's time for music lovers to discover and revaluate, cause to my ears it's a small gem worth both love and understanding. "To Be Alive" and "Music And My Man", both co-written by Valery and West, having a rather heavy Mountain feeling with signature guitars and West pitching in on vocals for the latter. You also get a dark semi-psych version of "Play With Fire" and an odd Mountain style "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" again with West doing some vocals. The remaining more or less powerful ballads, some gospelish with big background quires. She has a very nice personal voice, connecting far from any professional distance. All together making it very good listening, mostly soothing but with a fair share of rousing twists and turns. So if you're a Mountain fan, gospel afficionado, sucker for female vocal or just like good music in general and happen to find it in one of those bins - do pick. Also released on vinyl in South Africa (RCA BPL 1-1124), but never reissued on CD. Premiere US had label as shown here and glossy cover. (YZÄ*) (FÄV*) (MÖU*)
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