Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1811 (starts 3/14/18)

    Between lots of stuff from 1965, 1966, and 1967 (including an all-British set), three artists' sets and an Advanced Psych segment, we've got a pretty full slate this time around, with a total of 34 tracks spread out over two hours.

Artist:    Paul Revere and the Raiders
Title:    Steppin' Out
Source:    Mono LP: All-Time Greatest Hits
Writer(s):    Revere/Lindsay
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1965
    1965 was the year that Paul Revere and the Raiders hit the big time. The Portland, Oregon band had already been performing together for several years, and had been the first rock band to record Louie Louie in the spring of 1963, getting airplay on the West Coast and Hawaii but losing out nationally to another Portland band, the Kingsmen, whose version was recorded the same month as the Raiders'. While playing in Hawaii the band came to the attention of Dick Clark, who was looking for a band to appear on his new afternoon TV program, Where The Action Is. Clark introduced the band to Terry Melcher, a successful producer at Columbia Records, which led to the Raiders being the first true rock band signed by the label. Appearing on Action turned out to be a major turning point for the band, who soon became the show's defacto hosts as well as house band. The Raiders' first national hit in their new role was Steppin' Out, a song written by Revere and vocalist Mark Lindsay about a guy returning from military service (as Revere himself had done in the early 60s, reforming the band upon his return) and finding out his girl had been unfaithful. Working with Melcher, the Raiders enjoyed a run of hits from 1965-67 unequalled by any other Amercian rock band of the time.

Artist:    Donovan
Title:    Season Of The Witch
Source:    Mono LP: Sunshine Superman
Writer(s):    Donovan Leitch
Label:    Epic/Sundazed
Year:    1966
    At nearly five minutes in length, Season Of The Witch is the longest track on Donovan's Sunshine Superman album, which at least in part explains why it was never released as a single. Nonetheless, the tune is among Donovan's best-known songs, and has been covered by an impressive array of artists, including Al Kooper and Stephen Stills (on the Super Session album) and Vanilla Fudge. Due to a contract dispute with Pye Records, the Sunshine Superman album was not released in the UK until 1967, and then only as an LP combining tracks from both the Sunshine Superman and Mellow Yellow albums.

Artist:    Moby Grape
Title:    Lazy Me
Source:    LP: Moby Grape
Writer(s):    Bob Mosley
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    Such is the quality of the first Moby Grape LP that there are many outstanding tracks that have gotten virtually no airplay in the years since the album was released. Lazy Me, written by bassist Bob Mosley, is one of those tracks. Enjoy.

Artist:    Canned Heat
Title:    Boogie Music
Source:    CD: Living The Blues
Writer(s):    L T Tatman III
Label:    BGO (original label: Liberty)
Year:    1968
    Canned Heat was formed in 1966 by a group of Bay Area blues purists. Although a favorite on the rock scene, the band continued to remain true to the blues throughout its existence. The band's most popular single was Going Up the Country from the album Living the Blues. The B side of Going Up The Country was a tune called Boogie Music. The song is credited to L T Tatman III, which may be a pseudonym for the entire band, much as Nanker Phelge was for the Rolling Stones. Unusually, the single version of the song is actually longer than the album version heard here, thanks to a short coda made to sound like an archive recording from the 1920s.

Artist:    Fire Birds
Title:    No Tomorrows
Source:    CD: An Overdose Of Heavy Psych (originally released on LP: Light My Fire)
Writer(s):    Firebirds
Label:    Arf! Arf! (original label: Crown)
Year:    1969
    Throughout the 50s and 60s there were literally hundreds of budget labels that made their fortunes fooling record buyers into thinking they were getting hit records at a discounted price, when in reality they were getting cheap cover versions by uncredited and underpaid studio musicians. One of the most successful of these budget labels was Crown, a label created in 1953 by the Bahari Brothers which specialized in low-priced LPs spotlighting either a specific genre (polka, blues, gospel, etc.) or a particular artist via a tribute album that did not include any recordings by the actual artist. In 1969 Crown released a pair of hard psychedelic LPs: Hair, by 31 Flavors, and Light My Fire, by the Firebirds. In reality, they were both by the same band, rumored to be a local Los Angeles group that was not actually called either the Firebirds or 31 Flavors. Unlike most Crown releases, however, these two albums featured original material such as No Tomorrow that would not have been out of place beside albums by Blue Cheer or early Grand Funk Railroad.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Our Love Was, Is
Source:    CD: Magic Bus (originally released on LP: The Who Sell Out)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:    1967
    The Who's late-1967 album, The Who Sell Out, is best known for its faux commercials and actual jingles lifted from the British pirate station Radio London. Hidden among the commercial hype, however, are some of the band's best tunes, including Our Love Was, a song that was one of the few LP tracks to be included on the Who's Magic Bus compilation album.

Artist:    The Mickey Finn
Title:    Garden Of My Mind
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Waller/Marks
Label:    Rhino (original label: Direction)
Year:    1967
    Not every band in the world makes a living performing their own original material. In fact, the majority of working musicians are members of cover bands, playing a variety of venues all over the world. Most of these bands will never see the inside of a recording studio. There have been times and places, however, when even cover bands could get recording contracts, especially if they had a sizable local following. One such time and place was London in the mid-1960s, where bands like Mickey Finn And The Blue Men found steady work playing ska and R&B covers for the Mod crowd. They recorded a series of singles for several different local labels, one of which was Garden Of My Mind, a freakbeat tune written by guitarist Mickey Waller and vocalist Alan Marks and released on the Direction label. As the decade wore on and the Mod fad began to die out, the Mickey Finn (as they were then known) found itself playing more and more on the European continent, eventually calling it a day (or night) in 1971.

Artist:    Small Faces
Title:    Itchycoo Park
Source:    British import CD: Ogden's Nut Gone Flake (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Marriott/Lane
Label:    Charly (original label: Immediate)
Year:    1967
    Led by Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane, the Small Faces got their name from the fact that all the members of the band were somewhat vertically challenged. The group was quite popular with the London mod crowd, and was sometimes referred to as the East End's answer to the Who. Although quite successful in the UK, the group only managed to score one hit in the US, the iconic Itchycoo Park, which was released in late 1967. Following the departure of Marriott the group shortened their name to Faces, and recruited a new lead vocalist named Rod Stewart. Needless to say, the new version of the band did much better in the US than their previous incarnation.

Artist:     Cream
Title:     Pressed Rat And Warthog
Source:     LP: Wheels Of Fire
Writer:     Baker/Taylor
Label:     RSO (original label: Atco)
Year:    1968
    Pressed Rat And Warthog, from Cream's third LP, Wheels Of Fire, is one of those songs you either love or hate. I loved it the first time I heard it but had several friends that absolutely detested it. As near as I can tell, drummer Ginger Baker actually talks that way. Come to think of it, all the members of Cream had pretty heavy accents.

Artist:    Cream
Title:    SWLABR
Source:    LP: Disraeli Gears
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    RSO (original label: Atco)
Year:    1967
     I distinctly remember this song getting played on the local jukebox just as much as the single's A side, Sunshine Of Your Love (maybe even more). Like most of Cream's more psychedelic material, SWLABR (the title being an anagram for She Walks Like A Bearded Rainbow) was written by the songwriting team of Jack Bruce and Pete Brown. Brown had originally been brought in as a co-writer for Ginger Baker, but soon realized that he and Bruce had better songwriting chemistry.

Artist:     Cream
Title:     White Room
Source:     Wheels Of Fire
Writer(s):     Bruce/Brown
Label:     RSO (original label: Atco)
Year:     1968
     Musically almost a remake of Eric Clapton'sTales of Brave Ulysses (from Cream's Disraeli Gears album), the Jack Bruce/Pete Brown collaboration White Room (on the Wheel's Of Fire album) is arguably the most popular song ever to feature the use of a wah-wah pedal prominently.

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    The Sound Of Silence
Source:    CD: Collected Works (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Sounds Of Silence)
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1965
    The Sound Of Silence was originally an acoustic piece that was included on Simon and Garfunkel's 1964 debut album, Wednesday Morning 3AM. The album went nowhere and was soon deleted from the Columbia Records catalog. Simon and Garfunkel themselves went their separate ways, with Simon moving to London and recording a solo LP, the Paul Simon Songbook. While Simon was in the UK, producer John Simon, who had been working with Bob Dylan on Highway 61 Revisited, pulled out the master tape of The Sound Of Silence and got Dylan's band to add electric instruments to the existing recording. The song was released to local radio stations, where it garnered enough interest to get the modified recording released as a single. It turned out to be a huge hit, prompting Paul Simon to move back to the US and reunite with Art Garfunkel.

Artist:            Butterfield Blues Band
Title:       I Got a Mind To Give Up Living
Source:    CD: East-West
Writer(s):    Traditional
Label:     Elektra
Year:        1966
       The Butterfield Blues band in 1966 had a lot in common with British blues-rock group the Yardbirds.  Both bands were led by harmonica-playing vocalists (Butterfield and Keith Relf), and featured two top-quality lead guitarists (Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page for the Yardbirds, Mike Bloomfield and Elvin Bishop for the Butterfields). Whereas the Yardbirds only managed to record three songs with both Beck and Page, the Butterfield outfit with Bloomfield and Bishop recorded an entire album: the classic East-West. Several songs on the album were credited to "traditional", meaning that they were in the public domain. Among these is I Got A Mind To Give Up Living, a song also recorded by B.B. King, although a casual search associates the song mainly with Butterfield.

Artist:    Seeds
Title:    Just Let Go
Source:    LP: A Web Of Sound
Writer(s):    Saxon/Hooper/Savage
Label:    GNP Crescendo
Year:    1966
    After listening to Just Let Go, from the second Seeds album, A Web Of Sound, it's easy to see why there were some in Los Angeles that were convinced that the band was actually from another planet. An acid-rock classic.

Artist:    Oxford Circle
Title:    Foolish Woman
Source:    Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Yoder/Patton
Label:    Rhino (original label: World United)
Year:    1966
    The Oxford Circle was one of those bands that had a reputation for being the opening band that blew the headliners off the stage, yet never was able to make it big itself. Originally from Sacramento, California, the group appeared frequently in and around San Francisco in 1965 and 1966, but disbanded before the scene started getting national attention, with many of the members moving on to greater fame with other bands. Drummer Paul Whaley was the first to get national attention as a founding member of Blue Cheer. Oxford Circle leader Gary Lee Yoder would eventually join Blue Cheer as well, after a short stint with his own band, Kak. Also of note was bassist Jim Keylor, who was in an early incarnation of Roxy and went on to form BSU studios, where the Dead Kennedys recorded. For all that, the Oxford Circle made only one single, Foolish Woman, which was released on the independent World United label in 1966.

Artist:    Herbal Mixture
Title:    Please Leave My Mind
Source:    British mono CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Tony McPhee
Label:    Zonophone (original label: Columbia UK)
Year:    1966
    After a stint backing up John Lee Hooker, guitarist T.S. McPhee branched out on his own with a band called Herbal Mixture in 1966. The group only cut two singles for the British Columbia label, the second of which featured a song that McPhee wrote called Please Leave My Mind as its B side. Eventually Tony McPhee would gain greater fame as leader of the Groundhogs in the early 70s.

Artist:    Sam The Sham And The Pharaohs
Title:    Wooly Bully
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Domingo Samudio
Label:    Rhino (original label: XL)
Year:    1964
    Sam The Sham And The Pharaohs were pioneers of what has come to be called Tex-Mex, a style that can best described as straight ahead rock and roll seasoned with traditional Mexican forms such as salsa and ranchero. The Pharaohs were already a popular band in their native Texas when they recorded Wooly Bully for the regional XL label in 1964. The song proved so popular that it (and the band's contract) was bought outright by M-G-M Records, at the time one of the largest labels in the country. Wooly Bully was re-released nationally on M-G-M in 1965 and ended up among the top 10 records of the year.

Artist:    Smithereens
Title:    Behind The Wall Of Sleep
Source:    CD: Blown To Smithereens (originally released on LP: Especially For You)
Writer(s):    Pat DiNizio
Label:    Capitol (original label: Enigma)
Year:    1986           
                In 1986 I was the host of a show called Rock Nouveaux on KUNM in Albuquerque, NM. Once a month we would feature an entire album from up and coming bands such as R.E.M., Killing Joke, Skinny Puppy and other groups that would come to be labeled "alternative rock", but at that time were part of a new musical underground. Among the albums that most impressed me was an LP called Especially For You from a band from New Jersey calling themselves the Smithereens. The album, produced by Don Dixon, had a decidedly 60s retro feel to it, especially on side two, which started off with Behind The Wall Of Sleep. The song eventually was released as the album's third single, doing particularly well in the UK.

Artist:    Mumphries
Title:    Woman Drivin' Me Crazy
Source:    CD: Thank You, Bonzo
Writer(s):    Stephen R Webb
Label:    WayWard
Year:    1989
    Sometimes a song can be personal, but not directly so. Such is the case with Woman Drivin' Me Crazy by the Albuquerque, NM band the Mumphries. Written and sung by guitarist Stephen R Webb, the song actually describes, in the first person, a situation being experienced at the time by bassist Quincy Adams. The woman in question was Clara Gardello, the bass player from another Albuquerque band, A Murder Of Crows. Sadly, neither Clara or Quincy are with us anymore, so all we can do is hope they get it together the next time around.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Foxy Lady
Source:    Mono LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    The first track on the original UK release of Are You Experienced was Foxy Lady. The British custom of the time was to not include any songs on albums that had been previously released as singles. When Reprise Records got the rights to release the album in the US, it was decided to include three songs that had all been top 40 hits in the UK. One of those songs, Purple Haze, took over the opening spot on the album, and Foxy Lady was moved to the middle of side 2.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Can You See Me
Source:    LP: Smash Hits (originally released in UK on LP: Are You Experienced)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA
Year:    1967
    Before releasing the first Jimi Hendrix Experience album, Are You Experienced, in the US, Reprise Records decided to make some changes to the track lineup, adding three songs that had been released as non-album singles in the UK. To make room for these, three songs were cut from the original UK version of the LP. The most popular of these three tracks was Can You See Me, a song that was included in the band's set when they made their US debut at the Monterey International Pop Festival in June of 1967.  Despite the audience's positive response to the song, the band apparently dropped Can You See Me from their live set shortly after Monterey. The song was originally slated to be released as the B side of The Wind Cries Mary, but instead was used as an album track. Can You See Me finally got released in the US in 1969, on the Smash Hits LP.
 
Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Love Or Confusion
Source:    Mono LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer:    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    A little-known fact is that the original European version of Are You Experienced, in addition to having a different song lineup, consisted entirely of mono recordings. When Reprise got the rights to release the album in North America, its own engineers created new stereo mixes from the 4-track master tapes. As most of the instrumental tracks had already been mixed down to single tracks, the engineers found themselves doing things like putting the vocals all the way on one side of the mix, with reverb effects and guitar solos occupying the other side and all the instruments dead center. Such is the case with Love Or Confusion, with some really bizarre stereo panning thrown in at the end of the track. In recent years engineer Eddie Kramer has recreated the original mono mix (and track lineup) of the UK edition of Are You Experienced, using tube-based analog equipment to get the most authentic sound. 

Artist:    Chocolate Watchband
Title:    In The Midnight Hour
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Pickett/Cropper
Label:    Tower
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 2012
    Among the many Chocolate Watchband recordings that were subjected to major changes by producer Ed Cobb was a cover of Wilson Pickett's R&B classic In The Midnight Hour, a song that was also covered by the Young Rascals. The biggest change Cobb made to the recording was to replace Dave Aguilar's original lead vocals with those of studio vocalist Don Bennett. Once Sundazed got the rights to the Watchband's recordings they included both versions on their CD version of the No Way Out album and in 2012 issued the mono mix of the Aguilar version for the first time as a single.

Artist:    Chocolate Watchband
Title:    Medication
Source:    British import CD: Melts In Your Brain, Not On Your Wrist (originally released on LP: The Inner Mystique)
Writer(s):    Alton/Ditosti
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Tower)
Year:    Backing tracks recorded 1968, lead vocals recorded 2005
    By early 1968 the Chocolate Watchband had fallen on hard times. In fact, the original group had disbanded, only to reform at the behest of Tower Records and producer Ed Cobb, who wanted to put out a second Watchband LP. In short order a new group featuring mostly former members of the Watchband was formed. Cobb, however, did not have the time to wait for the new lineup to gel and got to work on the album without them. In fact, the entire first side of The Inner Mystique was performed by studio musicians. Additionally, Cobb pulled out unreleased tapes from the archive to help fill out the album, including the original band's cover of a Standells tune called Medication. Like their earlier track Let's Talk About Girls, Medication featured studio vocalist Don Bennett rather than the band's actual lead vocalist, Dave Aguilar. It's not known for sure why the substitution was made, unless perhaps Cobb was feeling pressure from the rock press, which had dismissed Aguilar as a Mick Jagger wannabe. Finally, in 2005, Aguilar recorded brand new vocals to go with the original 1968 track.

Artist:    Chocolate Watchband
Title:    Psychedelic Trip
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Loomis/Flores/Tolby/Aguilar/Andrijasevich
Label:    Sundazed
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 2012
    Psychedelic Trip is essentially an early instrumental version of what would eventually become the title track for the Chocolate Watchband's debut album, No Way Out. Although Psychedelic Trip was a creation of the entire band, producer/manager Ed Cobb (the Ed Wood of psychedelic music) took sole writing credit for the song No Way Out.

Artist:    Blues Project
Title:    Hoochie Coochie Man
Source:    CD: The Blues Project Anthology
Writer(s):    Willie Dixon
Label:    Polydor
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 1997
    Featuring the most recognizable riff in blues history, Hoochie Coochie man was first recorded in 1954 by Muddy Waters, becoming his biggest hit. It was also the turning point for songwriter Willie Dixon, who was able to leverage the song's success into a position with Chess Records as the label's chief songwriter. The song has been recorded by dozens of artists over the years, including several rock bands. One of the most unusual versions of Hoochie Coochie Man was recorded by the Blues Project for the 1966 debut LP, Live At The Cafe Au Go Go. The Project's version speeds up the tempo to a frantic pace, pretty much obscuring the song's signature riff in the process. It was one of several tracks that was intended for the LP, but cut when lead vocalist Tommy Flanders abruptly left the group before the album's release.

Artist:    Rising Sons
Title:    The Devil's Got My Woman
Source:    CD: The Rising Sons featuring Taj Mahal and Ry Cooder (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Skip James
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1966
    Despite being, at one point, the hottest band on the Sunset Strip, the Rising Sons only released one single in existence. The B side of that single shows just what the problem was. A cover of Skip James tune, The Devil's Got My Woman, the recording seems to not know whether to be a blues song or a pop song, and ends up being neither.

Artist:    Yardbirds
Title:    Over Under Sideways Down
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer:    Dreja/Relf/Samwell-Smith/McCarty/Beck
Label:    Epic
Year:    1966
     The only Yardbirds album to feature primarily original material was released under different titles in different parts of the world. The original UK version was called simply The Yardbirds, while the US album bore the Over Under Sideways Down title. In addition, the UK album was unofficially known as Roger the Engineer because of band member Chris Dreja's drawing of the band's recording engineer on the cover. The title cut was the last single to feature Jeff Beck as the band's sole lead guitarist (the follow-up single, Happenings Ten Years Time Ago, featured both Beck and Jimmy Page).

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Let's Spend The Night Together
Source:    LP: Through The Past, Darkly (originally released on LP: Between The Buttons and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1967
    When Let's Spend The Night Together was climbing the charts, the Rolling Stones made one of their many appearances on the Ed Sullivan show. The show's producers (or maybe Ed himself) asked Mick Jagger to change the words to "Let's Spend Some Time Together", and he actually complied! I can't imagine anyone doing that to the Stones now (nor can I imagine the band agreeing to it).

Artist:    West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title:    Queen Noimphet
Source:    LP: Volume II
Writer(s):    Markley/Harris
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1967
    To say the motives of the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band's Bob Markley were questionable was an understatement. The man, by all accounts, was lacking in any kind of musical talent. What he did have, however, was a huge trust fund that he would get a quarterly check from. He used the money to set himself up in a big house in the Hollywood hills, throwing parties for all the local hipsters to attend. It was at one of these parties in 1966 that he was introduced to the Harris brothers, sons of a classical composer who had recently formed their own band but were in need of decent equipment. Markley's friend Kim Fowley (singer of the original Alley Oop and all-around Hollywood hustler) had booked the Yardbirds to play at the party, and Markley was so impressed by the band's ability to attact young ladies that he decided then and there to be a rock star. Fowley introduced the 30-year-old Markley to the teenaged Harris brothers and the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band was formed. As time went on it became apparent that the older Markley got, the younger his taste in women was becoming. Markley's lyrics for the song Queen Noimphet, from the album Volume II, are an indication of where his obsession with attracting young girls was taking him. Indeed, he was reportedly arrested in the 70s on sex charges, but was able to use his considerable financial resources to buy his way out of trouble.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Antique Doll
Source:    Mono British import CD: My Mind Goes High (originally released on LP: Underground)
Writer(s):    Tucker/Mantz
Label:    Warner Strategic Marketing (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Sometimes there is no comprehending what goes on in the mind of record company people. Take the Electric Prunes, for example. Their second single, I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night), put them right at the front of the pack of the psychedelic rock movement in early 1967. Their follow up single, Get Me To The World On Time, was a solid hit as well, which should have guaranteed them a good run. But even with that second single, problems with management's decision making were becoming apparent. For one thing, the song chosen as the second single's B side, Are You Lovin' Me More (But Enjoying It Less), had the potential to be a hit in its own right, but being put on a B side killed that idea entirely. It only got worse from there. The next single chosen was a novelty number from the band's second LP, Underground, called Dr. Do-Good. The tune was written by the same team of Annette Tucker and Nanci Mantz that had come up with both Dream and Lovin' Me More, but was played for laughs by the band. The choice of such a weird track is a complete puzzle, as there were several more commercial tunes on the LP, including one written by Tucker and Mantz themselves called Antique Doll. Unfortunately, the song was not even picked to be a B side, and has remained virtually unknown ever since. Rather than own up to their own mistakes, however, the band's management blamed the musicians themselves for their lack of commercial success, and eventually replaced the entire lineup of the original group (who had signed away the rights to the name Electric Prunes early on). Of course, the new lineups were even less successful than the original crew, but really, what else would you expect?

Artist:    Astronauts
Title:    Razzamatazz
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Venet/Boyce/Allison
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1965
    Landlocked Boulder, Colorado would seem an unlikely place for a surf music band. Nonetheless, the Astonauts were just that, and a pretty successful one at that. That success, however, came from an equally unlikely place. After being together for about three years and having only one charted single in the US (Baja, which spent one week on the chart in 1963, peaking in the #94 spot), the band discovered that their records were doing quite well in Japan, where the mostly-instrumental Astronauts were actually outselling the Beach Boys. The group soon began touring extensively in the Far East and when all was said and done had released nine albums and a dozen singles over a period of less than 10 years. Razzamatazz is the instrumental B side to the Astronauts' 1965 recording of Tomorrow's Gonna Be Another Day, a tune that would appear the next year on the first Monkees album (and on their TV show). Razzamatazz itself is basically the instrumental track for Tomorrow's Gonna Be Another Day with some harmonica added.
   
Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Where Have All The Good Times Gone
Source:    Mono LP: The Kink Kontroversy
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1965
    The third Kinks album, The Kink Kontroversy, occupies a unique place in the band's history. The group was still enjoying the success of their early hits like You Really Got Me, yet was beginning to make the transition to the more mature themes heard on songs like A Well Respected Man. The Kink Kontroversy captures the band right in the middle of this transition, with songs like Till The End Of The Day co-existing with tracks like The World Keeps Going Round. In fact, the lead single from the album (actually released in advance of The Kink Kontroversy) encapsulates this transition all by itself, with the aformentioned Till The End Of The Day on the A side, and a song called Where Have All The Good Times Gone occupying the flip side. The band's tour manager once referred to the song as one that a 40-year-old would write. Davies later said that he had been taking inspiration by listening to older people around him voicing their various concerns about life in general. This ability to transcend one's own limited world view would continue over the next several years, ultimately contributing to the band's longevity.

Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Eve Of Destruction
Source:    Mono CD: All The Single (originally released on LP: It Ain't Me Babe and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    P.F. Sloan
Label:    White Whale
Year:    1965
    The Turtles originally recorded P.F. Sloan's Eve Of Destruction in 1965, and considered the song for a potential single. Lead vocalist Howard Kaylan, however, expressed concerns that the song might become a big hit, but ultimately lead to the Turtles themselves being one-hit wonders. Accordingly, the band did not issue Eve Of Destruction as a single, instead including it on their debut LP, It Ain't Me Babe. That same year, Barry McGuire released Eve Of Destruction as a single and ended up becoming a one-hit wonder. I guess Kaylan was on to something.