Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1935 (starts 8/25/19)

    Good news for Vanilla Fudge fans. The second hour of this week's show features nearly 30 minutes' worth of classic Fudge material from their first two albums, including two Beatles covers. Speaking of the Beatles, we also have a portion of the classic Abbey Road medley in the show's first segment. Also of note: a 1968 set that ended up filling an entire half-hour long segment and over half a dozen tracks making their Stuck in the Psychedelic Era debut. Read on...

Artist:    Monkees
Title:    Love Is Only Sleeping
Source:    LP: Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn And Jones, LTD.
Writer(s):    Mann/Weil
Label:    Colgems
Year:    1967
    Among the various professional songwriters hired by Don Kirschner in 1966 to write songs for the Monkees were the husband and wife team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, who had hit it big with a pair of songs for Paul Revere And The Raiders (Kicks and Hungry) earlier that year. But when the Monkees rebelled against Kirschner's control over their recorded output in early 1967 it looked as though the band was done with Mann/Weil compositions altogether. Later that year, however, the Monkees themselves, now firmly in control of their own musical direction, chose to record a new Mann/Weil tune, Love Is Only Sleeping, as their fourth single. At the same time, the group was working on their fourth LP, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn And Jones, LTD. A last-minute change of plans resulted in a different song, Daydream Believer, being released as a single instead, with a tune from the album, Goin' Down, as the B side. Goin' Down was then deleted from the album lineup and Love Is Only Sleeping included in its place. It was the closest that Michael Nesmith would ever come to being the lead vocalist on a Monkees hit single. 

Artist:    Doors
Title:    The Crystal Ship
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer:    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    One of the most popular B sides ever released, The Crystal Ship is a slow moody piece with vivid lyrical images. The mono mix of the song sounds a bit different from the more commonly-heard stereo version. Not only is the mix itself a bit hotter, it is also a touch faster. This is due to an error in the mastering of the stereo version of the first Doors LP that resulted in the entire album running at a 3.5% slower speed than it was originally recorded. This discrepancy went unnoticed for over 40 years, until a college professor pointed out that every recorded live performance of Light My Fire was in a key that was about half a step higher than the stereo studio version.

Artist:            Moby Grape
Title:        Naked If I Want To
Source:    LP: Great Grape
Writer:    Jerry Miller
Label:    Columbia
Year:        1967
        Although guitarist Jerry Miller's name appears in the credits for nearly half the material on the first Moby Grape album, more than any other band member, there was only one song credited to Miller as the sole songwriter. Ironically, Naked If I Want To was also the shortest track on the album, with a running time of less than a minute. A longer version of the song appeared on Moby Grape's second LP, Wow.

Artist:    Eric Burdon And The Animals
Title:    Good Times
Source:    British import CD: Winds Of Change
Writer(s):    Burdon/Briggs/Weider/Jenkins/McCulloch
Label:    BGO (original label: M-G-M)
Year:    1967
    By the end of the original Animals' run they were having greater chart success with their singles in the US than in their native UK. That trend continued with the formation of the "new" Animals in 1967 and their first single, When I Was Young. Shortly after the first LP by the band now known as Eric Burdon And The Animals came out, M-G-M decided to release the song San Franciscan Nights as a single to take advantage of the massive youth migration to the city that summer. Meanwhile the band's British label decided to instead issue Good Times, (an autobiographical song which was released in the US as the B side to San Franciscan Nights) as a single, and the band ended up with one of their biggest UK hits ever. Riding the wave of success of Good Times, San Franciscan Nights eventually did get released in the UK and was a hit there as well.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Big Black Smoke
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1967
    The Kinks had some of the best B sides of the 60s. Case in point: Big Black Smoke, which appeared as the flip of Dead End Street in early 1967. The song deals with a familiar phenomenon of the 20th century: the small town girl that gets a rude awakening after moving to the big city. In this case the city was London, known colloquially as "the Smoke".

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Out Of Time
Source:    LP: Aftermath (British version)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original UK label: Decca)
Year:    1966
    The history of the Rolling Stones' Out Of Time is actually somewhat convoluted. Originally released only in the UK as a five and a half minute track on the Aftermath LP (the US version of the album having a different song lineup), the tune was soon covered by British singer Chris Farlowe, whose Mick Jagger-produced single went to the top of the UK charts in July of 1966. A shorter alternative mix of the Stones version was then released on the Flowers album, a US-only compilation of singles, B sides and unreleased tracks compiled by London Records. Finally, in 1975 a third version of the song, using the backing tracks from the Farlowe version and Mick Jagger's vocals, appeared on an album called Metamorphosis, which was a compilation of unreleased tracks that were owned by record mogul Allen Klein.

Artist:    Fleur De Lys
Title:    Circles
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):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Rhino (original label: Immediate)
Year:    1966
    Circles was a song by the Who that was originally slated to be released in the UK on the Brunswick label as a follow-up to the highly successful My Generation. A dispute between the band and the label and their producer, Shel Talmy, led to the Who switching labels and releasing another song, Substitute, in its place, with Circles (retitled Instant Party) on the B side of the record. When Talmy slapped the band with a legal injunction, the single was withdrawn, and another band, the Fleur De Lys, took advantage of the situation, recording their own version of Circles and releasing it on the Immediate label. Just to make things more confusing Brunswick issued the Who's version of Circles as the B side of A Legal Matter later the same month.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Abbey Road Medley #2
Source:    Abbey Road
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Apple/Parlophone
Year:    1969
    The Beatles had been experimenting with songs leading into other songs since the Sgt. Pepper's album. With Abbey Road they took it a step further, with side two of the album containing two such medleys (although some rock historians treat it as one long medley). The second one consists of three songs credited to John Lennon and Paul McCartney: Golden Slumbers is vintage McCartney, while Carry That Weight has more of a Lennon feel to it. The final section,The End, probably should have been credited to the entire band, as it contains the only Ringo Starr drum solo on (a Beatle) record as well as three sets of alternating lead guitar solos (eight beats each) from Paul McCartney, George Harrison and John Lennon (in that order).

Artist:    Paul Jones
Title:    The Dog Presides
Source:    British import CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Paul Jones
Label:    Zonophone (original UK label: Columbia)
Year:    1968
    Like many frontmen in the mid-60s Manfred Mann's Paul Jones decided to leave the group for a solo career right at the height of the band's success in 1966. Also like many former frontmen, Jones's solo career was less than stellar. Most of Jones's records were done in an almost lounge lizard style. One notable exception is The Dog Presides, a bit of psychedelic insanity that was credited to Jones himself, but in all likelihood was co-created by some friends of Jones's who participated in the after-hours recording, which appeared as the B side of the (deservedly) obscure single And The Sun Will Shine in 1968. In addition to Jones on vocals and harmonica, The Dog Presides features guitarist Jeff Beck and bassist Paul-Samwell Smith, both formerly of the Yardbirds and some guy named Paul McCartney on drums.

Artist:    Them
Title:    We've All Agreed To Help
Source:    LP: Time Out! Time In! For Them
Writer(s):    Them
Label:    Tower
Year:    1968
    Following the departure of Van Morrison, the remaining members of Them returned temporarily to Northern Ireland to recruit a new lead vocalist, Kenny McDowell, before "permanently" relocating to Los Angeles, California. Once in the Golden State, Them recorded a pair of psychedelically oriented LPs for the Tower label, both released in 1968. The second of these, Time Out! Time In! For Them, primarilly featured songs written by Sharon Pulley and Tom Lane, but there were a few exceptions, such as We've All Agreed To Help, which were credited to the entire band. To be honest,I think the Pulley/Lane tracks are stronger than the band's own material, but I thought you might want to take a listen for yourself.

Artist:    Oracle
Title:    Don't Say No
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single).
Writer(s):    Ruthann Friedmann
Label:    Rhino (original label: Verve Forecast)
Year:    1968
    Before the days of arena rock, with two or three bands touring together and putting on virtually the same show night after night, headliner bands often looked to local talent for their opening act, making each stop on the tour a unique event. Sometimes the local opening band made enough of an impression to create a path to stardom for themselves as well, or at least to get a record contract. Take the case of a Lake Charles, Lousiana band known locally as the Great Society. Although they had not made any records, they had developed enough of a reputation to be able to score gigs across the state line in East Texas. One of those gigs was opening for the Music Machine in mid 1967. The Music Machine, at this point, was experiencing the frustration of being unable to score a successful follow up to their 1966 hit Talk Talk and was on the verge of dissolving, with the various individual members starting to explore other options. Among those members was bassist Keith Olsen, who liked Great Society enough to convince them to come out to Los Angeles and let Olsen produce them. Things did not go exactly as planned, however, as a bad acid trip left the band in no shape to cut a record. Olsen, however, working with co-producer Curt Boettcher, did get the group to provide vocals for a studio project the two of them were working on, a Ruthann Friedmann song called Don't Say No. As there had already been a band in California called Great! Society as recently as 1966, it was decided to rename the group the Oracle for the release of Don't Say No on the Verve Forecast label in 1968. Although the record was not a hit, it did help open doors for Olsen, who would go on to discover and produce the duo known as Buckingham Nicks, along with their breakthrough album as members of Fleetwood Mac. Since then Olsen has become one of the top producers in the history of rock music, working with such well known artists as the Grateful Dead, Bob Weir, Eddie Money, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Rick Springfield, REO Speedwagon, Pat Benatar, Heart, Joe Walsh, Starship, Santana, Kim Carnes, Jethro Tull, The Babys, Ozzy Osbourne, the Scorpions, .38 Special, Bad Company, Sammy Hagar, Russ Ballard, Whitesnake, Foreigner, Sheena Easton, Journey, Loverboy, and Lou Gramm. Not bad for a bass player from a one-hit wonder band.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Kyrie Eleison
Source:    CD: Mass In F Minor
Writer:    David Axelrod
Label:    Collector's Choice/Rhino (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    After the commercial disappointment of the Electric Prunes second LP, Underground, producer David Hassinger decided to use the band in an experiment. David Axelrod had written a rock-mass and was looking for a band to record it. It soon became apparent, however, that Axelrod's arrangements were beyond the technical skills of the Prunes, and studio musicians were brought in to complete the project. The result was Mass In F Minor, which with its royal purple cover stood out on the record racks but did not sell any better than the previous Prunes LP. Before fading off into obscurity the album was immortalized by having its opening track, Kyrie Eleison (one of three tracks to feature all five members of the band itself), included in the film Easy Rider and its best-selling soundtrack album.

Artist:    Bob Seger System
Title:    2+2=?
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Bob Seger
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1968
    Bob Seger had a series of regional hits in his native Detroit in the mid-1960s, leading to a deal with Capitol Records in 1968. The first single for Capitol was 2+2=?, a powerful anti-Vietnam War tune that was later included on his first LP for the label. The mono single version of the song heard here has a guitar chord near the end of the track that was not on the original recording (on which the song simply stops cold for a few seconds). It was inserted because, according to Seger, radio stations were "afraid of dead air".

Artist:    Mouse And The Traps
Title:    I Satisfy
Source:    Mono British import CD: The Fraternity Years (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Weiss/Stanley
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Fraternity)
Year:    1968
    Mouse And The Traps recorded singles in a variety of styles, ranging from grungy garage rock to sweet pop songs over a period of about three years. One of their last efforts, I Satisfy, was also their most psychedelic tune. The song, released in October of 1968, showed the influence of bands like Vanilla Fudge and the group itself went full mod, with Nehru shirts and granny glasses, to promote it. Sadly, I Satisfy didn't catch on and, until it was included on a Mouse And The Traps anthology from the British Big Beat label, was nearly impossible to find a copy of. Personally, I think it's one of the best things they ever released, but then I have a biased view of such things.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Long Hot Summer Night
Source:    CD: The Ultimate Experience (originally released on LP: Electric Ladyland)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    When Chas Chandler first discovered Jimi Hendrix playing at a club in New York's Greenwich Village in 1966, he knew that he had found one seriously talented guitarist. Within two years Hendrix would prove to be an outstanding songwriter, vocalist and producer as well. This was fortunate for Hendrix, as Chandler would part company with Hendrix during the making of the Electric Ladyland album, leaving Hendrix as sole producer. Chandler's main issue was the slow pace Hendrix maintained in the studio, often reworking songs while the tape was rolling, recording multiple takes until he got exactly what he wanted. Adding to the general level of chaos was Hendrix's propensity for inviting just about anyone he felt like to join him in the studio. Among all these extra people were some of the best musicians around, including keyboardist Al Kooper, whose work can be heard on Long Hot Summer Night.

Artist:    Max Frost And The Troopers
Title:    Shape Of Things To Come
Source:    CD: Even More Nuggets (originally released on LP: Wild In The Streets soundtrack)
Writer(s):    Mann/Weil
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    Max Frost was a politically savvy rock star who rode the youth movement all the way to the White House, first through getting the support of a hip young Senator, then getting the age requirements for holding high political office lowered to 21, and finally lowering the voting age to 14. Everyone over 30 was locked away in internment camps, similar to those used during WWII by various governments to hold those of questionable loyalty to the current regime. What? You don't remember any of that? You say it sounds like the plot of a cheapie late 60s teen exploitation flick? Right on all counts. "Wild in the Streets" starred Christopher Jones as the rock star, Hal Holbrook as the hip young senator, and a Poseidon Adventure-sized Shelly Winter as the rock star's interred mom. Richard Pryor, in his film debut, played the band's drummer/political activist Stanley X. Shape Of Things To Come was a surprise hit single taken from the film, and was probably recorded by studio musicians, possibly members of Davie Allan And The Arrows, with vocals likely provided by Paul Wibier.

Artist:    Fleetwood Mac
Title:    Black Magic Woman
Source:    European import CD: The Essential Fleetwood Mac (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Peter Green
Label:    Columbia/Sony Music (original label: Blue Horizon)
Year:    1968
    The original version of Black Magic Woman was the third single released by Fleetwood Mac. Written by the band's founder, Peter Green, the song has become a classic rock standard thanks to the 1970 cover of the song released by Santana on the album Abraxas. Many blues-rock purists, however, prefer the Fleetwood Mac original.

Artist:    Phil Ochs
Title:    Power And The Glory
Source:    CD: There But For Fortune (originally released on LP: All The News That Fits)
Writer(s):    Phil Ochs
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1964
    Taking his cue from one of his heroes, Woody Guthrie, Phil Ochs composed the song Power And The Glory for his debut LP, All The News That Fits. At first the song seems to be a praise of America in the same vein as Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land, but, being written and sung by Phil Ochs in 1964, the song takes a momentary dark turn toward the end, pointing out that the benefits of living in the USA are not distributed equally among all its citizens, before returning to the its quasi-patriotic theme.
   
Artist:    Vanilla Fudge
Title:    Ticket To Ride
Source:    LP: Vanilla Fudge
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Atco
Year:    1967
    The late 1940s saw the beginning of a revolution in the way people consumed recorded music. For decades, the only available recorded media had been the brittle 78 RPM (revolutions per minute) discs made of a material known as shellac. These discs, officially known as gramophone records, generally came in three sizes: 7" (for children's records), 12" (used mostly for classical recordings) and the standard 10" discs, which held about three minutes' worth of material per side. The high revolution speed meant that even the 12" discs could only hold a maximum of five minutes' worth of music per side, making it necessary to spread out longer pieces such as operas and symphonies over several discs, severely disrupting the listening experience. Following the end of World War II the two largest record companies, RCA Victor and Columbia, each separately began working on replacements for the 78 RPM discs. RCA's replacement was pretty much one on one; the 10" 78s were replaced by the 7" 45 RPM singles with about the same running time. Columbia, on the other hand, concentrated their efforts on long playing 12" records that, revolving at 33 1/3 RPM, could contain over 20 minutes' worth of music per side. Naturally, the LPs were far more expensive than 45s, and were marketed to a more affluent class of consumer than their shorter counterparts. This in turn led to popular music being dominated by 45 RPM singles, especially among American teenagers, while albums tended to be favored by fans of jazz and classical music. This dichotomy persisted well into the 1960s, with relatively few pop stars, such as Elvis Presley and later, the Beatles, selling a signficant number of LPs. By 1967, however, teenagers were buying enough LPs to make it feasable to a youth-oriented act to be considered a success without the aid of a hit single. One of the first of these new types of rock bands was Vanilla Fudge, whose debut LP did not contain any hit singles when it was first released. It did, however, contain a pair of Beatles covers, including the album's opening track, Ticket To Ride. A year later, another cover song from the album, You Keep Me Hangin' On, which had been a hit for the Supremes around the same time that the Vanilla Fudge album first came out, began to get significant airplay and was re-released as a single.
   
Artist:    Vanilla Fudge
Title:    Voices In Time
Source:    LP: The Beat Goes On
Writer(s):    Audio montage compiled by Shadow Morton
Label:    Atco
Year:    1968
    Following the success of their debut LP (it hit #6 on the Billboard LP charts in September of 1967), the members of Vanilla Fudge concentrated their efforts on a pair of tunes that were released as a single in January of 1968. Meanwhile their producer, Shadow Morton, was working on a concept album without a whole lot of input from the band itself based around a recent Sonny And Cher hit single. The Beat Goes On was released in February of 1968. Each of the album four phases was centered around a different interpretation of Sonny Bono's composition. Phase Three, Voices In Time, is an eight-minute long compilation of spoken word excerpts from historical figures such as Nevill Chamberlain, Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt that includes a minimal amount of actual music from the band itself. Nonetheless, it is interesting to listen to over 50 years later.

rtist:    Vanilla Fudge
Title:    Take Me For A Little While/Eleanor Rigby
Source:    LP: Vanilla Fudge
Writer(s):    Martin/Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Atco
Year:    1967
    Vanilla Fudge made their mark by doing slowed down rocked out versions of popular songs such as the Supremes' You Keep Me Hangin' On. In fact, all of the tracks on their debut LP were songs of this nature, including two Beatles tunes. Side two of the original LP featured three tracks tied together by short psychedelic instrumental pieces knowns collectively as Illusions Of My Childhood. In addition to the aforementioned Supremes cover, the side features a Trade Martin composition called Take Me For A Little While that takes a diametrically opposed viewpoint to the first song, which leads directly into Eleanor Rigby, which sort of sums up both of the previous tracks lyrically. Although the Vanilla Fudge would stick around for a couple more years (and four more albums), they were never again able to match the commercial success of their 1967 debut LP.

Artist:     Ten Years After
Title:     50,000 Miles Beneath My Brain
Source:     CD: Cricklewood Green
Writer:     Alvin Lee
Label:     Chrysalis (original label: Deram)
Year:     1970
    Alvin Lee mentions going to every planet in the solar system in 50,000 Miles Beneath My Brain, a nearly eight-minute track from the 1970 Ten Years After album, Cricklewood Green. The album itself was the band's most successful until they changed labels and released A Space In Time, the LP that included their best known song, I'd Love To Change The World.

Artist:    Kak
Title:    HCO 97658
Source:    British import CD: Kak-Ola (originally released on LP: Kak)
Writer(s):    Yoder/Grelecki/Damrell/Patten/Lockheed)
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Epic)
Year:    1969
    Some songs sort of float around in a songwriter's head for months, or even years, before taking their final form. Others are created spontaneously in the recording studio. The opening track on the 1969 album Kak is an example of the latter. HCO 97658 was actually the studio session ID number.
   
Artist:    Donovan
Title:    Teas
Source:    British import CD: The Hurdy Gurdy Man
Writer(s):    Donovan Leitch
Label:    EMI (original label: Epic)
Year:    1968
    The final track on Donovan's 1968 LP The Hurdy Gurdy Man is a wistful tune about noticing changes in one's self. The setting for the song is a vacation spot on the English coast during the off-season. As was the case with most of Donovan's late 1960s albums, there are no musicians' credits on the cover, making it difficult to figure out who participated on the recording.

Artist:    Country Joe And The Fish
Title:    Grace
Source:    LP: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s):    Joe McDonald
Label:    Vanguard
Year:    1967
    Country Joe McDonald liked to write songs that were inspired by women he knew. Being Country Joe McDonald these included some women who would end up becoming quite famous as part of the San Francisco scene. One of the most famous of those was Grace Slick of the Jefferson Airplane, who inspired the final track on the first Country Joe And The Fish LP, Electric Music For The Mind And Body. Who would have guessed?

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Chauffeur Blues (alternate version)
Source:    LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer(s):    Lester Melrose (disputed, may have been Lizzie Douglas)
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1966
    Jefferson Airplane's original female vocalist was Signe Toly Anderson. Unlike Grace Slick, who basically shared lead vocals with founder Marty Balin, Anderson mostly functioned as a backup singer. The only Airplane recording to feature Anderson as a lead vocalist was Chauffeur Blues, a cover of an old Memphis Minnie tune. The song was featured on the band's first LP, Jefferson Airplane Takes Off. This alternate version is a touch longer and puts a bit more emphasis on Jorma Kaukonen's lead guitar.

Artist:      Paul Revere and the Raiders
Title:     Kicks
Source:      Mono LP: Midnight Ride (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Mann/Weil
Label:     Columbia
Year:     1966
     Kicks was not the first pop song with a strong anti-drug message, but it was the first one to be a certified hit, making it to the number four spot on the US charts and hitting number one in Canada. It was also the biggest hit for Paul Revere and the Raiders until Indian Reservation went all the way to the top in both countries five years later.
   
       

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 1935 (starts 8/26/19)

    The assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 had shaken many people's faith in the modern world , and left them searching for...well, for a lot of things. Among them were the Moody Blues, who took their inspiration from Arthur Sullivan's 1877 song about finding inner peace through music and recorded their third LP, In Search Of The Lost Chord. As August of 2019 comes to a close, we showcase the entire first side of that Moody Blues classic LP. On a lighter note, we also have a trio of tunes about various women and, to close out the show, a 1970 set.

Artist:    Moody Blues
Title:    In Search Of The Lost Chord (side one)
Source:    CD: In Search Of The Lost Chord
Writer(s):    Edge/Lodge/Thomas
Label:    Deram
Year:    1968
    The Moody Blues followed up their groundbreaking album Days Of Future Past with another concept album, this time tackling the subjects of search and discovery from various perspectives. In Search Of The Lost Chord opens with Departure, a poem by percussionist Graeme Edge. Normally Edge's poems were recited by Mike Pinder on the band's albums, but here Edge recites his own work, ending in maniacal laughter as the next track, Ride My See-Saw, fades in. Ride My See-Saw, written by bassist John Lodge, is one of the Moody Blues' most popular songs, and is often used as an encore when the band performs in concert. Dr. Livingstone I Presume is a bit of a change in pace from flautist Ray Thomas, about the famous African explorer. Oddly enough, there is no flute on the track. From there the album proceeds to Lodge's House Of Four Doors, one of the most complex pieces ever recorded by the group. Each verse of the song ends with the opening of a door (the sound effect having been created on a cello), followed by an interlude from a different era of Western music, including Minstrel, Baroque and Classical. The fourth door opens into an entirely different song altogether, Ray Thomas's Legend Of A Mind, with its signature lines: "Timothy Leary's dead. No, no, he's outside looking in." Although never released as a single, the track got a fair amount of airplay on college and progressive FM radio stations, and has long been considered a cult hit. The album's first side concludes with the final section of House Of Four Doors.

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

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Parachute Woman
Source:    CD: Beggar's Banquet
Writer:    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1968
    The last Rolling Stones album with the original lineup was Beggar's Banquet, released in 1968. The album itself was a conscious effort on the part of the band to get back to their roots after the psychedelic excesses of Their Satanic Majesties Request. Sadly, Brian Jones was fast deteriorating at the time and his contributions to the album are minimal compared to the band's earlier efforts. As a result, Keith Richards was responsible for most of the guitar work on Beggar's Banquet, including both lead and rhythm parts on Parachute Woman.

Artist:    Uriah Heep
Title:    Spider Woman
Source:    British import CD: The Magician's Birthday
Writer(s):    Box/Byron/Kerslake/Thain
Label:    Sanctuary (original US label: Mercury)
Year:    1972
    Although Uriah Heep was known as an album-oriented band in the US and their native UK, they did have some top 40 success in Scandanavia and Northern Europe, especially in Germany, where they scored three top 20 hits from 1970-72. The last of these was Spider Woman, from the Magician's Birthday album, which went to the #14 spot on the German charts.

Artist:    Neil Young/Crazy Horse
Title:    Cinnamon Girl
Source:    CD: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1969
    My favorite Neil Young song has always been Cinnamon Girl. I suspect this is because the band I was in the summer after I graduated from high school used an amped-up version of the song as our show opener (imagine Cinnamon Girl played like I Can See For Miles and you get a general idea of how it sounded). If we had ever recorded an album, we probably would have used that arrangement as our first single. I finally got to see Neil Young perform the song live (from the 16th row even) with Booker T. and the MGs as his stage band in the mid-1990s. It was worth the wait.

Artist:    Gypsy
Title:    Dead And Gone
Source:    LP: Gypsy
Writer(s):    Enrico Rosenbaum
Label:    Metromedia
Year:    1970
    Originally formed as the Underbeats in 1962, Gypsy had its greatest success after changing their name and moving to L.A. in 1969. They became the house band at the legendary Whisky-A-Go-Go for about eight months, starting in September of 1969, and during that time signed with Metromedia Records, a company owned by what would eventually become the Fox Television Network. The band made their recording debut with a double LP that included the single Gypsy Queen. Most of the band's material was written by guitarist/vocalist Enrico Rosenbaum, including the longest track on the album, Dead And Gone. After one more LP for Metromedia, the band started going through a series of personnel changes, eventually (after Rosenbaum's departure) changing their name to the James Walsh Gypsy Band (Walsh being the keyboardist of the group). Drummer Bill Lordan, after a short stint with Sly and the Family Stone, joined up with Robin Trower, an association that lasted many years.

Artist:    James Gang
Title:    There I Go Again
Source:    CD: James Gang Rides Again
Writer(s):    Joe Walsh
Label:    MCA (original label: ABC)
Year:    1970
    The two sides of James Gang Rides Again sound like two entirely different albums. As it turns out, this was somewhat intentional. According to bassist Dale Peters, guitarist Joe Walsh had written a set of acoustic tunes while the band was recording what would become side one of the album. Rather than try to hastily come up with another side's worth of tunes, the band decided just to let Walsh record the songs he had already written with a minimum of accompaniment. Among those tunes on side two of James Gang Rides Again is There I Go Again, a catchy number that features Walsh on both acoustic and (overdubbed) steel guitar.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix
Title:    Night Bird Flying
Source:    CD: First Rays Of The New Rising Sun (originally released on LP: The Cry Of Love)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1971
    Night Bird Flying was one of a handful of fully completed tracks that were slated for the next Jimi Hendrix album when the guitarist unexpectedly passed away in late1970. Naturally, the song was selected for inclusion of the first posthumous Hendrix LP, The Cry Of Love, as well as various CDs over the years, including Voodoo Soup and First Rays Of The New Rising Sun, both of which were attempts to assemble what would have been the fourth Jimi Hendrix studio album. In all cases, however, I think the compilers missed the obvious: Night Bird Flying should have been the second track on the album, following Freedom (which indeed does start off all three of the above cited collections). Don't ask me how I know this. I just do. Call it a gut feeling if you will, but Night Bird Flying belongs in that #2 slot. Period.

Artist:    David Bowie
Title:    Saviour Machine
Source:    CD: The Man Who Sold The World
Writer(s):    David Bowie
Label:    Parlophone (original label: Mercury)
Year:    1970
    David Bowie's third album, The Man Who Sold The World, was the first one in which his band played a major role in the development of the songs themselves. Indeed, producer/bassist Tony Visconti later said  "the songs were written by all four of us. We'd jam in a basement, and Bowie would just say whether he liked them or not." According to Bowie's biographer, Peter Doggett, "The band (sometimes with Bowie contributing guitar, sometimes not) would record an instrumental track, which might or might not be based upon an original Bowie idea. Then, at the last possible moment, Bowie would reluctantly uncurl himself from the sofa on which he was lounging with his wife, and dash off a set of lyrics." Bowie himself, however, later said that he was indeed the sole songwriter on the album, as evidenced by the chord changes in the songs themselves. As Bowie put it, "No one writes chord changes like that". Regardless of who actually wrote what, there is no question that The Man Who Sold The World rocked out harder than anything else Bowie had done up to that point (and perhaps never would again), and songs like Saviour Machine, about the pitfalls of turning to a higher power (in this case a omnipotent computer) for solutions to problems, are on a par with what Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin were doing around the same time.
   

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1934 (starts 8/19/19)

    All kinds of good stuff this week, including a British set, a blues set, a couple of folk songs and three artists' sets.

Artist:     Rolling Stones
Title:     (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
Source:     CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released on LP: Out Of Our Heads and as 45 RPM single )
Writer:     Jagger/Richards
Label:     Abkco (original label: London)
Year:     1965
     Singles released in the UK in the 60s tended to stay on the racks much longer than their US counterparts. This is because singles were generally not duplicated on LPs like they were in the US. (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction was a good example. In the US, the song was added to the Out Of Our Heads album, which had a considerably different song lineup than the original UK version. In the UK and Europe the song was unavailable as an LP track until Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass) was released, yet the single remained available at least until 1967, when I got the chance to listen to it in a German department store's record section that had individual listening booths with headsets.

Artist:    Seeds
Title:    Lose Your Mind
Source:    LP: The Seeds
Writer(s):    Sky Saxon
Label:    GNP Crescendo
Year:    1966
    If you have a reissued copy of the first Seeds it, you may not have heard the song Lose Your Mind. Being the shortest track on the original LP, it was left off some later versions of The Seeds, especially those that combined the album with the band's second effort, A Web Of Sound, on one compact disc. I guess some songs just don't get any respect.

Artist:    Tomorrow
Title:    My White Bicycle
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):    Hopkins/Burgess
Label:    Rhino (original label: Parlophone)
Year:    1967
    One of the most popular bands with the mid-60s London Mods was a group called the In Crowd. In 1967 the band abandoned its R&B/Soul sound for a more psychedelic approach, changing its name to Tomorrow in the process. Their debut single, My White Bicycle, was inspired by the practice in Amsterdam of leaving white bicycles at various stategic points throughout the city for anyone to use. The song sold well and got a lot of play at local discoteques, but did not chart. Soon after the record was released, however, lead vocalist Keith West had a hit of his own, Excerpt From A Teenage Opera, which did not sound at all like the music Tomorrow was making. After a second Tomorrow single failed to chart, the individual members drifted off in different directions, with West concentrating on his solo career, guitarist Steve Howe joining Bodast, and bassist Junior Wood and drummer Twink Alder forming a short-lived group called Aquarian Age. Twink would go on to greater fame as a member of the Pretty Things and a founder of the Pink Fairies, but it was Howe that became an international star in the 70s after replacing Peter Banks in Yes.

Artist:    Glass Family
Title:    House Of Glass
Source:    British import CD: My Mind Goes High (originally released in US on LP: The Glass Family Electric Band)
Writer(s):    Ralph Parrett
Label:    Warner Strategic Marketing (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year:    1968
    The Glass Family (Ralph Parrett, David Capilouto and Gary Green) first surfaced in 1967 with a single called Teenage Rebellion on Mike Curb's Sidewalk label. The following year they signed with Warner Brothers, releasing their only LP, The Glass Family Electric Band, that same year. The opening track from the album, House Of Glass, is, in the words of Capilouto, self-explanatory, which is a good thing, as it saves me the trouble of trying to figure out what it's about.

Artist:     It's A Beautiful Day
Title:     White Bird
Source:     CD: It's A Beautiful Day
Writer:     David and Linda LaFlamme
Label:     San Francisco Sound (original label: Columbia)
Year:     1968
     It's A Beautiful Day is a good illustration of how a band can be a part of a trend without intending to be or even realizing that they are. In their case, they were actually tied to two different trends. The first one was a positive thing: it was now possible for a band to be considered successful without a top 40 hit, as long as their album sales were healthy. The second trend was not such a good thing; as was true for way too many bands, It's A Beautiful Day was sorely mistreated by its own management, in this case one Matthew Katz. Katz already represented both Jefferson Airplane and Moby Grape when he signed up It's A Beautiful Day in 1967. What the members of It's A Beautiful Day did not know at the time was that both of the aforementioned bands were trying to get out of their contracts with Katz. The first thing Katz did after signing It's A Beautiful Day was to ship the band off to Seattle to become house band at a club Katz owned called the San Francisco Sound. Unfortunately for the band, Seattle already had a sound of its own and attendance at their gigs was sparse. Feeling downtrodden and caged (and having no means of transportation to boot) classically-trained 5-string violinist and lead vocalist David LaFlamme and his keyboardist wife Linda LaFlamme translated those feelings into a song that is at once sad and beautiful: the classic White Bird. As an aside, Linda LaFlamme was not the female vocalist heard on White Bird. Credit for those goes to one Pattie Santos, the other female band member. To this day Katz owns the rights to It's A Beautiful Day's recordings, which have been reissued on CD on Katz's San Francisco Sound label.

Artist:    Creedence Clearwater Revival
Title:    I Heard It Through The Grapevine
Source:    LP: Cosmo's Factory
Writer(s):    Whitfield/Stong
Label:    Fantasy
Year:    1970
    Creedence Clearwater Revival were known for their tight arrangements of relatively short songs at a time when album tracks, as a general rule, were getting longer and longer. Still, there are exceptions; the most obvious of these was their cover of Marvin Gaye's I Heard It Through The Grapevine on their 1970 LP Cosmo's Factory. At slightly over eleven minutes, Grapevine is CCR's longest studio recording. Despite this, according to bassist Stu Cook, the song was performed in the studio exactly as planned, with "no room for noodling". Although not a major top 40 hit, I Heard It Through The Grapevine has proved to be one of CCR's most enduring tracks, still getting occasional airplay on classic rock radio.

Artist:    West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title:    As The World Rises And Falls
Source:    CD: Volume III-A Child's Guide To Good And Evil
Writer(s):    Markley/Morgan
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band's third album for Reprise, Volume III-A Child's Guide To Good And Evil, is generally considered their best, and for good reason. The album includes some of guitarist Ron Morgan's finest contributions, including the gently flowing As The World Rises And Falls. Even Bob Markley's lyrics, which could run the range from inane to somewhat disturbing, here come across as poetic and original. Unfortunately for the band, Morgan was by this time quite disenchanted with the whole thing, and would often not even show up to record. Nonetheless, the band continued on for a couple more years (and two more albums) before finally calling it quits in 1970.

Artist:    West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title:    I Won't Hurt You
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released on LP: Part One)
Writer:    Harris/Lloyd/Markley
Label:    Rhino (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Unlike more famous L.A. groups like Love and the Doors, the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band was not a Sunset Strip club band. In fact, the WCPAEB really didn't play that many live performances in their career, although those they did tended to be at high profile venues such as the Hollywood Bowl. The band was formed when the Harris brothers, sons of an accomplished classical musician, decided to record their own album and release it on the small Fifa label. Only a few copies of that album, Volume One, were made and finding one now is next to impossible. That might have been the end of the story except for the fact that they were acquaintances of Kim Fowley, the Zelig-like record producer and all-around Hollywood hustler. Fowley invited them to a party where the Yardbirds were playing; a party also attended by one Bob Markley. Markley, who was nearly ten years older than the Harris brothers, was a former TV show host from the midwest who had moved out to the coast to try his luck in Hollywood. Impressed by the flock of young girls surrounding the Yardbirds, Markley expressed to Fowley his desire to be a rock and roll star and have the girls flock around him, too. Fowley, ever the deal-maker, responded by introducing Markley to the Harris Brothers and the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band was born. With the addition of guitarist Michael Lloyd and the influence of Markley's not-inconsiderable family money, the group soon landed a contract with Reprise Records, where they proceeded to record the album Part One, which includes the turn I Won't Hurt You, which uses a simulated heartbeat to keep the...umm, beat.

Artist:     West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title:     A Child Of A Few Hours Is Burning To Death
Source:     CD: A Child's Guide To Good and Evil
Writer:     Markley/Morgan
Label:     Sundazed (original label: Reprise)
Year:     1968
     A Child's Guide To Good and Evil is generally considered the best album from the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band as well as their most political one. A Child Of A Few Hours Is Burning To Death has a kind of creepy humor to it that makes it stand out from the many antiwar songs of the time.
   
Artist:    Zombies
Title:    She's Not There
Source:    Mono CD: The Best Of 60s Supergroups (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Rod Argent
Label:    Priority (original label: Parrot)
Year:    1964
    Most of the original British invasion bands were guitar-oriented, like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. One notable exception was the Zombies, whose leader, Rod Argent, built the group around his electric piano. Their first single, She's Not There, was a major hit on both sides of the Atlantic and is ranked among the top British rock songs of all time.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Such A Shame
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1966
    The B side of a 45 RPM record was usually thought of as filler material, but in reality often served another purpose entirely. Sometimes it was used to make an instrumental version of the hit side available for use in clubs or even as a kind of early kind of Karioke. As often as not it was a chance for bands who were given material by their producer to record for the A side to get their own compositions on record, thus giving them an equal share of the royalties. Sometimes the B sides went on to become classics in their own right. Possibly the band with the highest percentage of this type of B side was the Kinks, who seemed to have a great song on the flip side of every record they released. One such B side is Such A Shame, released as the B side of A Well Respected Man in 1966. It doesn't get much better than this.

Artist:    Eric Burdon And The Animals
Title:    That Ain't Where It's At
Source:    LP: The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals-Vol. II (originally released as 45 RPM single B side and included on LP: Eric Is Here)
Writer(s):    Martin Siegel
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1966
    In late 1966, following the departure of several key members, the original Animals decided to call it quits. Vocalist Eric Burdon, along with drummer Barry Jenkins, would eventually form a "new Animals" that would soon come to be known as Eric Burdon And The Animals. Along the way, however, things took a strange and unexpected turn. Burdon had long expressed his distaste for the "pop" songs that producer Mickey Most had provided for the Animals to record and release as singles, preferring instead to cover blues and R&B standards by John Lee Hooker, Jimmy Reed and the like. Yet somehow, in early 1967, Burdon (and Jenkins) appeared on an album called Eric Is Here credited to Eric Burdon And The Animals. The album itself was made up entirely of the kinds of songs that Burdon said he hated, and featured a string orchestra led by Horace Ott. Two of the songs from the album were released in December of 1966 as a single. The B side of that single, a Martin Siegel tune called That Ain't Where It's At, was probably the best track on the entire album, and was included on the later M-G-M release The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals-Vol. II.

Artist:    Winston's Fumbs
Title:    Real Crazy Apartment
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):    Jimmy Winston
Label:    Rhino (original label: RCA Victor)
Year:    1967
    Vocalist/guitarist Jimmy Winston was a child actor turned musician who was one of the original members of the Small Faces, where he played organ. In 1965 he was basically kicked out of the band for unknown reasons, but soon resurfaced with his own band, Winston's Reflection, which released one single on the British Decca label in 1966. By the following year the band had changed its name to Winston's Fumbs and signed with RCA Records, releasing Real Crazy Apartment before disbanding. By then Winston had switched from organ to guitar, and would next surface as a cast member of the London production of Hair. Meanwhile, Winston's Fumbs organist Tony Kaye had become a founding member of some obscure band called Yes.

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    The Times They Are A-Changin'
Source:    Mono CD: The Best Of The Original Mono Recordings (originally released on LP: The Times They Are A-Changin')
Writer:    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1964
    I vaguely remember seeing a movie back in the 80s (I think it may have been called The Wanderers) about a late-50s gang from an Italian-American neighborhood somewhere in New York City. I really don't remember much about the plot of the film, but I do remember the film's end, where the main character walks down a street in Greenwich Village and hears the sound of Bob Dylan coming from a coffee house singing The Times They Are A-Changin'. I've often thought of that scene and how it symbolized the shift from the conformist culture of the late 50s (represented by the peer pressure-driven gang life) giving way to the turbulence that would characterize the 1960s.

Artist:    Donovan
Title:    Universal Soldier
Source:    CD: Songs Of Protest (originally released in UK as 45 RPM EP and in US as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Buffy Sainte-Marie
Label:    Rhino (original labels: UK: Pye, US: Hickory)
Year:    1965
    Before Sunshine Superman became a huge hit in the US, Scottish folk singer Donovan Leitch was making a name for himself in the UK as the "British Dylan." One of his most popular early tunes was Universal Soldier, an antiwar piece that was originally released in the UK on a four-song EP. The EP charted well, but Hickory Records, which had the US rights to Donovan's records, was reluctant to release the song in a format (EP) that had long since run its course in the US and was, by 1965, only used by off-brand labels to crank out soundalike hits performed by anonymous studio musicians. Eventually Hickory decided to release Universal Soldier as a single, but the record failed to make the US charts.

Artist:    Young Rascals
Title:    You Better Run
Source:    CD: Groovin' (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Cavaliere/Brigati
Label:    Warner Special Products (original label: Atlantic)
Year:    1966
    The Young Rascals were riding high in 1966, thanks to their second single, Good Lovin', going all the way to the top of the charts early in the year. Rather than to follow up Good Lovin' with another single the band's label, Atlantic, chose to instead release a new album, Collections, on May 10th. This was somewhat unusual for the time, as having a successful single was considered essential to an artist's career, while albums were still viewed as somewhat of a luxury item. Three weeks later, a new non-album single, You Better Run, was released, with a song from Collections, Love Is A Beautiful Thing, as the B side. The stereo version of the song appeared on the 1967 LP Groovin'.

Artist:    John Kay (Sparrow)
Title:    Twisted
Source:    CD: Born To Be Wild-A Retrospective (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    John Kay
Label:    MCA (original label: Columbia)
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 1969
    Toronto, Ontario's Yorkville Village had a thriving music scene in the mid-1960s that included such future stars as Joni Mitchell, David Clayton-Thomas, Neil Young, Gordon Lightfood and Rick James, among others. Also on the scene was a young singer who had spent most of his formative years in the area before his family had relocated to Buffalo, and later, Los Angeles. John Kay eventually found his way back to Toronto, where he joined a band called Sparrow. Not long after Kay joined the band, they decided to relocate to New York, where they managed to record a few tracks at the Columbia Records studios in 1966. Four of the songs were released as a pair of singles in 1966, but neither record charted. Among the unreleased tracks was a Kay song called Twisted, which remained unreleased until 1969, when Columbia, in the wake of the band's success under their new name, Steppenwolf, released all but one of the tunes on an album called John Kay and Sparrow. The label also released a single from the album that featured Twisted as the B side. Twisted, along with the Sparrow's cover of Good Morning Little Schoolgirl, is now available on the double-CD Steppenwolf anthology Born To Be Wild-A Retrospective.

Artist:    Steppenwolf
Title:    Everybody's Next One
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Kay/Mekler
Label:    MCA (original label: Dunhill)
Year:    1968
    We all knew someone in high school who made no distinction between making love and having sex. We also knew people who would take advantage of that person, usually bragging about it to their friends afterward. Thus was the stage set for the B side of Steppenwolf's 1968 hit single Born To Be Wild. Everybody's Next One, written by Steppenwolf's lead vocalist, John Kay and producer Gabriel Mekler, originally appeared on the band's debut LP.
   
Artist:     Steppenwolf
Title:     Don't Step On The Grass, Sam
Source:     CD: Steppenwolf the Second
Writer:     John Kay
Label:     MCA (original label: Dunhill)
Year:     1968
     Never afraid to make his social and political views known, Steppenwolf's John Kay wrote Don't Step On The Grass, Sam for the band's second LP, released in 1968. It's taken over 50 years, but it looks like Kay's finally starting to get his wish.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Burning of the Midnight Lamp
Source:    Mono German import 45 RPM single
Writer:    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Polydor
Year:    1967
    For the first few months of their existence as a band, the Jimi Hendrix Experience were an entirely European phenomena, despite being led by an American guitarist/vocalist. By mid-1967 the group had released three singles that made the charts all over Europe and the UK, as well as an album that was only kept out of the # 1 spot by something called Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The band's next project was Burning Of The Midnight Lamp, the most complex piece of production yet attempted by the band, and their first using state of the art eight-track recording equipment. The song had two notable firsts: it was the first song to feature Hendrix playing a keyboard instrument (a harpsichord) in addition to his usual guitar, and it was his first recording to use the new "wah-wah" effect. The original mono mix of the song heard here has never been released in the US, as Hendrix himself supervised a remix of the song for inclusion on his 1968 Electric Ladyland LP, which was only released in stereo.

Artist:    Ten Years After
Title:    Help Me
Source:    European import CD: Ten Years After
Writer(s):    Williamson/Dixon/Bass
Label:    Deram
Year:    1967
    For this one I'm just going to quote the liner notes from the first Ten Years After album, written by the legendary John Gee, manager of London's Marquee Club, circa 1967: "Help Me is the old Sonny Boy Williamson favourite which breaks up more clubs than the Move ever did. Here it is recorded on one take in a studio plunged in atmospheric darkness. Nine minutes plus of the Blues which sends shivers up and down your spine. A truly great performance from the Ten Years After."

Artist:    John Mayall's Bluesbreakers
Title:    The Death Of J.B. Lenoir
Source:    LP: Crusade
Writer(s):    John Mayall
Label:    London
Year:    1967
    J.B. Lenoir was a Chicago bluesman who was active throughout the 1950s and 60s until his death from complications following a car accident in April of1967. He was one of John Mayall's personal heroes, and Mayall wrote The Death Of J.B. Lenoir shortly after the bluesman's passing, recording it with his band the Bluesbreakers in July of that same year. The song was included on Mayall's fourth LP, Crusade, which introduced the world to 18-year-old guitarist Mick Taylor, who had replaced Peter Green (who subsequently formed his own band, Fleetwood Mac, named for his favorite rhythm section of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie) in the Bluesbreakers. Interestingly enough John McVie was, at this point, still a member of the Bluesbreakers, and would not actually join the band partially named for him until after Crusade was released in September of 1967. The other members of the Bluesbreakers on the Crusade album included drummer Keef Hartley and saxophonists Chris Mercer and Rip Kant.

Artist:     Buffalo Springfield
Title:     Bluebird
Source:     CD: Retrospective (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again)
Writer:     Stephen Stills
Label:     Atco
Year:     1967
     When it comes right down to it Buffalo Springfield has one of the highest ratios of songs recorded to songs played on the radio of any band in history, especially if you only count the two albums' worth of material that was released while the band was still active. This is probably because Buffalo Springfield had more raw songwriting talent than just about any two other bands. Although Neil Young and Richie Furay were just starting to hit their respective strides as songwriters, bandmate Stephen Stills was already at an early peak, as songs like Bluebird clearly demonstrate.

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Dance The Night Away
Source:    CD: Disraeli Gears
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1967
    The album Fresh Cream was perhaps the first LP from a rock supergroup, although at the time a more accurate description would have been British blues supergroup. Much of the album was reworking of blues standards by the trio of Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker, all of whom had established their credentials with various British blues bands. With their second album, Disraeli Gears, Cream showed a psychedelic side as well as their original blues orientation. Most of the more psychedelic material, such as Dance the Night Away, was from the songwriting team of Bruce and lyricist Pete Brown.

Artist:    Spencer Davis Group
Title:    I'm A Man
Source:    Mono LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Winwood/Miller
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1967
    The Spencer Davis Group, featuring Steve and Muff Winwood, was one of the UK's most successful white R&B bands of the sixties, cranking out a steady stream of hit singles. Two of them, the iconic Gimme Some Lovin' and I'm A Man, were also major hits in the US, the latter being the last song to feature the Winwood brothers. Muff Winwood became a successful record producer. The group itself continued on for several years, but were never able to duplicate their earlier successes. As for Steve Winwood, he quickly faded off into obscurity, never to be heard from again. Except as the leader of Traffic. And a member of Blind Faith. And Traffic again. And some critically-acclaimed collaborations in the early 1980s with Asian musicians. Oh yeah, and a few major solo hits (Higher Love, Roll With It...that kinda thing) in the mid-to-late 1980s. Other than that, nothing.

Artist:    Monkees
Title:    (Theme From) The Monkees
Source:    CD: Greatest Hits (originally released on LP: The Monkees)
Writer(s):    Boyce/Hart
Label:    Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year:    1966
            Fun facts about the Monkees: Songwriters Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart got involved in the whole Monkees thing thinking that a) The Monkees would be an actual performing band that happened to be stars of their own TV show, and b) they (Boyce and Hart) would be core members of the band itself. They even recorded a demo of the Monkees theme song. The powers that be, however, decided (after briefly considering making the show about the Lovin' Spoonful) that using four guys from entirely different backgrounds who were almost complete strangers was a better idea [shrugs]. Everyone knows that the Monkees did not play their own instruments of their first two albums, but did you know that there is not a single song on the first LP that features all four members on it, even as vocalists? Most of the backup vocals, in fact, were provided by studio musicians.
       
Artist:    Monkees
Title:    Valleri
Source:    CD: Nuggets-Classics From The Psychedelic 60s (originally released on LP: The Birds, The Bees, And The Monkees)
Writer(s):    Boyce/Hart
Label:    Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year:    1968
    The last Monkees top 10 single was also Michael Nesmith's least favorite Monkees song. Valleri was a Tommy Boyce/Bobby Hart composition that the group had first recorded for the first season of their TV show in 1966. Apparently nobody was happy with the recording, however, and the song was never issed on vinyl. Two years later the song was re-recorded for the album The Birds, The Bees And The Monkees and subsequently released as a single. The flamenco-style guitar on the intro (and repeated throughout the song) was played by studio guitarist Louie Shelton, after Nesmith refused to participate in the recording.

Artist:    Monkees
Title:    Porpoise Song
Source:    CD: Greatest Hits (originally released on LP: Head soundtrack)
Writer(s):    Goffin/King
Label:    Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year:    1968
    In 1968 the Monkees, trying desperately to shed a teeny-bopper image, enlisted Jack Nicholson to co-write a feature film that was a 180-degree departure from their recently-cancelled TV show. This made sense, since the original fans of the show were by then already outgrowing the group. Unfortunately, by 1968 the Monkees brand was irrevocably tainted by the fact that the Monkees had not been allowed to play their own instruments on their first two albums. The movie Head itself was the type of film that was best suited to being shown in theaters that specialized in "art" films, but that audience was among the most hostile to the Monkees and the movie bombed. It is now considered a cult classic. Porpoise Song, a Gerry Goffin/Carole King composition used as the theme for Head, was also a departure in style for the Monkees, yet managed to retain a decidedly Monkees sound due to the distinctive lead vocals of Mickey Dolenz.

Artist:     Beach Boys
Title:     Let's Go Away For Awhile
Source:     45 RPM single B side (originally released on LP: Pet Sounds)
Writer:     Brian Wilson
Label:     Capitol
Year:     1966
     Although the Beach Boys are known primarily as a vocal group, their catalog is sprinkled with occassional instrumental pieces, usually featuring the youngest Wilson brother, Carl, on lead guitar. By 1966, however, the band was using studio musicians extensively on their recordings. This was taken to its extreme on the Pet Sounds album with the tune Let's Go Away For Awhile, which was made without the participation of any of the actual band members (except composer/producer Brian Wilson, who said at the time that the track was the most satisfying piece of music he had ever made). To give the song even greater exposure, Wilson used the track as the B side of the band's next single, Good Vibrations.

   
   

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 1934 (starts 8/19/19)

    The late 60s and early 1970s saw the emergence of a new kind of comedy, that took its cues from the emerging counter-culture. Among the most successful of these "underground" comedy groups was the Firesign Theatre. Originally formed as an audio improv group appreaing on an L.A. radio station, the Firesign Theatre soon found itself with a record contract. Their most successful album was How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All, featuring (as the entire second side of the LP) The Further Adventures Of Nick Danger. This week we feature that first Nick Danger adventure in its entirety. As for the rest of the show, read on....

Artist:    Eric Clapton
Title:    Let It Rain
Source:    CD: The Best Of Eric Clapton (originally released on LP: Eric Clapton)
Writer(s):    Bramlett/Clapton
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1970
    Following the breakup of Blind Faith in 1969, Eric Clapton attempted to lower his profile by touring as a member of Delaney And Bonnie (Bramlett) And Friends. Still, he was Eric Clapton, and there was no way his fans or his record company were going to treat him like an anonymous sideman. As a result, the live album released by Delaney And Bonnie And Friends in early 1970 was titled On Tour With Eric Clapton. Nonetheless, the influence the Bramletts had on Clapton was evident on his self-titled solo LP, released later the same year. Many of the same musicians participated in the making of the album and in fact would continue to work with Clapton in his next band, Derek And The Dominos. More than half of the songs on the album were co-written by one or both of the Bramletts, including Let It Rain, which originally was called She Rides and had entirely different lyrics by Bonnie Bramlett. Let It Rain, released in 1972 as a five-minute long single, features a guest appearance on guitar by Stephen Stills, as well as an extended solo by Clapton himself.

Artist:    Grand Funk Railroad
Title:    Nothing Is The Same
Source:    CD: Closer To Home
Writer(s):    Mark Farner
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1970
    Grand Funk Railroad's fans continued to defy the rock press by buying copies of the band's albums throughout 1970, despite universally negative reviews. In fact, the band was awarded no less than three gold records that year, including their third studio LP, Closer To Home. The album includes some of their best recordings, including Nothing Is The Same, a hard rocker that includes both tempo and key changes, as well as some of Mark Farner's best lead vocals.

Artist:    Uriah Heep
Title:    Time To Live (alternate version)
Source:    British import CD: Salisbury
Writer(s):    Box/Byron/Hensley
Label:    Sanctuary
Year:    Recorded 1971, released 2003
    For their second LP, Salisbury, Uriah Heep attempted to explore new ground while maintaining their "heavy" image established on their first effort. For the most part they succeeded. One of the heavier tunes on the album, Time To Live, was actually put together in the recording studio itself, and tells the story of a man being released from prison after serving a 20-year sentence. Obviously, the song was not written from personal experience, since the band members were all in their early 20s at the time. The alternate version of Time To Live heard here was mixed and edited for a possible single release, but never issued. Oddly enough, it is actually about 15 seconds longer than the LP version.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix
Title:    Belly Button Window
Source:    LP: The Cry Of Love
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1971
                Following the death of Jimi Hendrix, Reprise Records got to work compiling tracks for The Cry Of Love, the first of many posthumous Hendrix albums released by the label. The final track on the LP was an unfinished piece called Belly Button Window that featured Hendrix on vocals and electric guitar, with no other musicians appearing on the track.

Artist:    Stevie Wonder
Title:    Superstition
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Stevie Wonder
Label:    Tamla
Year:    1972
    Superstition was not originally meant to be a Stevie Wonder hit record. The song was actually written with the intention of giving it to guitarist Jeff Beck, in return for his participation of Wonder's Talking Book album. In fact, it was Beck that came up with the song's opening drum riff, creating, with Wonder, the first demo of the song. The plan was for Beck to release the song first as the lead single from the album Beck, Bogert & Appice. However, that album's release got delayed, and Motown CEO Barry Gordy Jr. insisted that Wonder go ahead and release his own version of the song first, as Barry saw the song as a potential #1 hit. It turned out Gordy was right, and Superstition ended up topping both the pop and soul charts in 1973, doing well in other countries as well. A 1986 live version of the song by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble continues to get a lot of airplay on classic rock radio.

Artist:    Firesign Theatre
Title:    The Further Adventures Of Nick Danger
Source:    CD: How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All
Writer(s):    Proctor/Bergman/Austin/Ossman
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1969
    The Firesign Theatre, consisting of Phil Proctor, Peter Bergman, Phil Austin and David Ossman, pioneered a type of "counter-culture comedy" that would be followed up on by such stars as Cheech and Chong, George Carlin, and the Credibility Gap (with Harry Shearer and Michael McKean), as well as the National Lampoon Radio Hour (featuring Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, Christopher Guest and others). Their most famous work is The Further Adventures Of Nick Danger from the 1969 album How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All. The piece itself runs over 28 minutes, taking up the entire second side of the original LP. It is a parody of old-time radio detective dramas, done in a noir style that has itself become a standard comedy trope. The plot itself is secondary to the jokes, many of which are references to counter-cultural icons such as the Beatles. There have been several more Nick Danger pieces by the Firesign Theatre over the years, the most recent being The Bride Of Firesign, released in 2001.

Artist:    ZZ Top
Title:    Waitin' For The Bus/Jesus Just Left Chicago
Source:    LP: The Best Of ZZ Top (originally released on LP: Tres Hombres)
Writer(s):    Gibbons/Hill/Beard
Label:    London
Year:    1973
    There have been a handful of instances in rock history where two consecutive tracks on an album have fit so well together that it's almost impossible to hear one without expecting the other to follow it. The Beatles (Back In The USSR/Dear Prudence) may have been the first, but others, including Led Zeppelin (Heartbreaker/Living Loving Maid (She's Just A Woman) and Queen (We Will Rock You/We Are The Champions) are also instantly recognizable. Add to that list ZZ Top, whose one-two punch of Waitin' For The Bus and Jesus Just Left Chicago opened their third album, Tres Hombres, in 1973. It was the group's first collaboration with engineer Terry Manning, who (despite persistent rumors to the contrary) deliberately spliced the two songs together without a break between them when mastering the album. Not coincidentally, Tres Hombres was ZZ Top's commercial breakthrough, proving that a good recording engineer can make a significant contribution to a band's success.



   

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1933 (starts 8/12/19)

    This week we have a special Advanced Psych segment featuring three relatively new tracks from one of the truly legendary bands of the psychedelic era: The Electric Prunes. Also on the docket: a set of Beatles tunes (including their longest single song) and lots of familiar and not-so-familiar nuggets from 1965-1969.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Set Me Free
Source:    Mono LP: Kinda Kinks
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1965
    After scoring international success with a series of R&B influenced rockers in 1964, the Kinks started to mellow a bit in 1965, releasing more melodic songs such as Set Me Free. The band would continue to evolve throughout the decade, eventually becoming one of the first groups to release a concept album, Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire), in 1969.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Who's Driving Your Plane
Source:    Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1966
    By 1966 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were writing everything the Rolling Stones recorded. As their songwriting skills became more sophisticated the band began to lose touch with its R&B roots. To counteract this, Jagger and Richards would occasionally come up with tunes like Who's Driving Your Plane, a bluesy number that nonetheless is consistent with the band's cultivated image as the bad boys of rock. The song appeared as the B side (mistitled on the US version as Who's Driving My Plane) of their loudest single to date, the feedback-drenched Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    3/5 Of A Mile In 10 Seconds
Source:    Mono LP: Surrealistic Pillow
Writer(s):    Marty Balin
Label:    Sundazed/BMG (original label: RCA Victor)
Year:    1967
    Marty Balin says he came up with the title of the opening track of side two of Jefferson Airplane's Surrealistic Pillow album by combining a couple of random phrases from the sports section of a newspaper. 3/5 Of A Mile In 10 Seconds works out to 216 MPH, by the way.

Artist:    Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title:    Acapulco Gold And Silver
Source:    CD: Quicksilver Messenger Service (bonus track)
Writer(s):    Duncan/Schuster
Label:    Rock Beat (original label: Capitol)
Year:    Recorded 1968, released 2011
    One of the highlights of the first Quicksilver Messenger Service album was Gold And Silver, a six minute long instrumental which has drawn comparisons with Dave Brubeck's Take Five. This shorter version of the tune, entitled Acapulco Gold And Silver, was included on the 2011 CD reissue of the album.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star
Source:    Mono LP: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    Hillman/McGuinn
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    By early 1967 there was a building resentment among musicians and rock press alike concerning the instant (and in many eyes unearned) success of the Monkees. One notable expression of this resentment was the Byrds' So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star, which takes a somewhat sarcastic look at what it takes to succeed in the music business. Unfortunately, much of what they talk about in the song continues to apply today (although the guitar has been somewhat supplanted by the computer as the instrument of choice).
   
Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    Rock And Roll Woman
Source:    LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Label:    Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year:    1967
    Buffalo Springfield did not sell huge numbers of records (except for the single For What It's Worth) while they were together. Nor did they pack in the crowds. As a matter of fact, when they played the club across the street from where Love was playing, they barely had any audience at all. Artistically, though, it's a whole 'nother story. During their brief existence Buffalo Springfield launched the careers of no less than four major artists: Neil Young, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and Stephen Stills. They also recorded more than their share of tracks that have held up better than most of what else was being recorded at the time. Case in point: Rock And Roll Woman, a Stephen Stills tune that still sounds fresh well over 50 years after it was recorded.

Artist:    Tomorrow
Title:    My White Bicycle
Source:    British CD: Psychedelia At Abbey Road-1965-1969 (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Hopkins/Burgess
Label:    EMI (original label: Parlophone)
Year:    1967
    Along with Pink Floyd and the Soft Machine, Tomorrow was among the most influential of the British psychedelic bands that popped up in the wake of the Beatles' Revolver and Sgt. Pepper's albums. Evolving out of the In Crowd, a popular British R&B group in the mold of the Spencer Davis Group and the early Who, Tomorrow featured a young Steve Howe (who go on to stardom as a member of Yes) on lead guitar and Keith West on vocals. The group was slated to appear in the film Blow-Up, but ultimately lost out to the Yardbirds, who had just recruited Jimmy Page as a second lead guitarist. Unfazed, Tomorrow went into Abbey Road studios and cut My White Bicycle, a song inspired by the practice in Amsterdam of providing free bicycles to anyone who wanted to use one as long as they left it for someone else to use when they were done with it.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Love Or Confusion
Source:    LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer:    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Experience Hendrix/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. It's actually kind of fun to listen to with headphones on, as I did when I bought my first copy of the album on reel-to-reel tape.

Artist:     Cream
Title:     Pressed Rat And Warthog
Source:     CD: Wheels Of Fire
Writer:     Baker/Taylor
Label:     Polydor (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:    Turtles (recording as The Atomic Enchilada)
Title:    The Last Thing I Remember
Source:    CD: The Turtles Present The Battle Of The Bands
Writer(s):    The Turtles
Label:    Manifesto (original label: White Whale)
Year:    1968
    The Turtles hit their commercial peak in 1967 with their Happy Together album, which included two top 10 singles. Later that year they scored two more top 20 hits. By 1968, however, things were starting the change. Neither of their two non-album singles that year were able to crack the top 40, and the band itself was feeling creatively stifled by the pressure from their record label (which had no commercially viable acts other than the Turtles) to record "another Happy Together". Instead, they went the opposite direction, writing and producing a set of psychedelic tunes which were, or course, rejected by the label. Not long after that the band was reunited with producer Chip Douglas, who had briefly played bass for the Turtles before being persuaded to help the Monkees make the transition from a studio creation to an actual band. Working with Douglas, the Turtles came up with a concept album called The Turtles Present The Battle Of The Bands. Each song on the LP was produced and performed as if it were by an entirely different group. For example, The Last Thing I Remember (a reworking of one of their self-produced tracks) was credited to The Atomic Enchilada. As it turned out, the album contained the last two Turtles songs to make the top 10, and by 1970 the group, tired of the constant fights with their label, chose to disband.

Artist:    Spirit
Title:    Girl In Your Eye
Source:    CD: Spirit
Writer(s):    Jay Ferguson
Label:    Ode/Epic/Legacy
Year:    1968
    Spirit was born in 1965 when drummer Ed Cassidy left the Rising Sons after breaking his arm and settled down with his new wife, who had a teenaged son named Randy. It wasn't long before Ed and Randy (who played guitar) formed a new band called the Red Roosters. The group lasted until the spring of 1966, when the family moved to New York for a few months, and Randy met an up and coming guitarist named James Marshall Hendrix. Hendrix was impressed with the teenaged Cassidy (whom he nicknamed Randy California) and invited him to become a member of his band, Jimmy James And The Blue Flames, that was performing regularly in Greenwich Village that summer.  After being denied permission to accompany Hendrix to London that fall, Randy returned with his family to California, where he soon ran into two of his Red Roosters bandmates, singer Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes. The three of them decided to form a new band with Ed Cassidy and keyboardist John Locke. Both Cassidy and Locke had played in jazz bands, and the new band, Spirit, incorporated both rock and jazz elements into their sound. Most of the songs of the band's 1968 debut album were written by Ferguson, who tended to favor a softer sound on tracks like Girl In Your Eye. On later albums Randy California would take a greater share in the songwriting, eventually becoming the de facto leader of Spirit.

Artist:    Steppenwolf
Title:    Magic Carpet Ride
Source:    CD: The Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf The Second)
Writer(s):    Moreve/Kay
Label:    Priority (original label: Dunhill)
Year:    1968
    Steppenwolf's second top 10 single was Magic Carpet Ride, a song that combines feedback, prominent organ work by Goldy McJohn and an updated Bo Diddly beat with psychedelic lyrics. Along with Born To Be Wild, Magic Carpet Ride (co-written by vocalist John Kay and bassist Rushton Moreve) has become one of the defining songs of both Steppenwolf and the late 60s.

Artist:     Simon and Garfunkel
Title:     America
Source:     45 RPM single B side (song originally released on LP: Bookends)
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Year:     1968/1972
     Four years after the release of the album Bookends (and two years after the breakup of Simon and Garfunkel), Columbia decided to release the song For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her, from their final album Bridge Over Troubled Water, as a single, to coincide with the release of their Greatest Hits album. For the B side, they went even further back, pulling out the original tapes for the song America. The tracks on the Bookends album were deliberately overlapped to form a continuous audio montage, making this the first standalone version of America to be released by the duo.

Artist:    Them
Title:    But It's Alright
Source:    Mono British import CD: Time Out! Time In! For Them (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jackson/Tubbs
Label:    Rev-Ola (original US label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    Following the departure of original founding member and front man Van Morrison, the remaining members of Them, with new vocalist Kenny McDowell, decided to relocate to the US and make a go of it there. Unfortunately, rather than to forge a whole new identity of their own, they chose to remain Them, which, as it turned out, was actually more of a hindrance than a help when it came to establishing a consistent sound. Their first LP, Now And Them, while containing some good music, reflects this lack of direction. Before embarking on a second LP the group cut a cover of JJ Jackson's R&B hit But It's Alright, mostly to satisfy their label's demand for a new single. Them's version of the tune used a similar arrangement to Jackson's original, but with fuzz guitar and a more snarling vocal track. Although the record was not a hit, it did give an indication of where the band was headed as they began work on their next studio album, Time Out! Time In! For Them.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Happy Jack (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: Meaty, Beaty, Big And Bouncy
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:    1967
    Happy Jack was originally released as a single in the UK in late 1966. It did not hit the US airwaves, however, until the early months of 1967. (I heard it for the first time on KLZ-FM, a Denver station whose format was a forerunner of progressive rock. KLZ-FM didn't call themselves a rock station. They instead marketed themselves as playing the top 100, as opposed to the top 60 played on KIMN, the dominant AM station in the city.) Although the song was not intended to be on an album, Decca Records quickly rearranged the track order of the Who's second album, A Quick One, to make room for the song, changing the name of the album itself to Happy Jack in the process. This rechanneled stereo mix of the song (using a much more realistic process than Capitol used with the Beach Boys' records) came out on the LP Meaty, Beaty, Big and Bouncy in the early 1970s, but when the album was reissued on CD the original mono master was used instead.

Artist:    Animals
Title:    See See Rider
Source:    LP: The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals Vol. II (originally released on LP: Animalization)
Writer(s):    Ma Rainey
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1966
    One of the last singles released by the original incarnation of the Animals, See See Rider traces its roots back to the 1920s, when it was first recorded by Ma Rainey. The Animals version is considerably faster than most other recordings of the song, and includes a signature opening rift by organist Dave Rowberry (who had replaced founder Alan Price prior to the recording of the Animalization album that the song first appeared on) that is unique to the Animals' take on the tune. The record label itself credits Rowberry as the songwriter, rather than Rainey, perhaps because the Animals' arrangement was so radically different from various earlier recordings of the song, such as the #1 R&B hit by Chuck Willis and LaVerne Baker's early 60s version..
       
Artist:    Standells
Title:    Dirty Water
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets-Classics From The Psychedelic 60s (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Ed Cobb
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:    1966
    The Standells were not from Boston (they were a Los Angeles club band). Ed Cobb, who wrote and produced Dirty Water, was. The rest is history.

Artist:     Procol Harum
Title:     Lime Street Blues
Source:     Mono LP: Best of Procol Harum (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer:     Brooker/Reid
Label:     A&M (original label: Deram)
Year:     1967
     Anyone expecting more of the same when flipping over their new copy of A Whiter Shade Of Pale got a big surprise when they heard Lime Street Blues. The song, reminiscent of an early Ray Charles track, was strong enough to be included on their first greatest hits collection, no mean feat for a B side.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Innerlight Transcendence
Source:    CD: Feedback
Writer(s):    Lowe/Tulin
Label:    PruneTwang
Year:    2006
    Over 30 years after moving on to other things, the original core members of the Electric Prunes began making records again in the new millenium, releasing three CDs in the first decade of the 21st century. The third of these, Feedback, is generally considered the hardest rocking of the three, although it does contain spacier tracks such as Innerlight Transcendence, which features guest guitarist Peter Lewis (Moby Grape) on 12-string.
   
Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Left In Blue
Source:    CD: California 66   
Writer(s):    D'Agostino/Lamb
Label:    PruneTwang
Year:    2009
    In 2009, the Electric Prunes, Love, and the Sky Saxon of the Seeds, were planning a combined tourn of the US East Coast when word arrived of Saxon's passing. The tour was cancelled, however, a special tour CD featuring all three acts had already been prepared and was subsequently released under the planned tour's name, California 66. One of the Electric Prunes tracks, Left In Blue, is a moody piece that showcases the band's strengths.
   
Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Hollywood Hype
Source:    CD: WaS
Writer(s):    Lowe/Tulin
Label:    PruneTwang
Year:    2014
    After the passing of bassist/keyboardist Mark Tulin in 2011, the Electric Prunes went on hiatus, returning to touring in 2013. The following year they released WaS, an album of new material featuring the last recordings made with Tulin. Among those tunes is Hollywood Hype, a high energy rocker that ventures into territory only hinted at in the Eagles' Life In The Fast Lane.
   
Artist:    Beach Boys
Title:    Caroline No
Source:    Mono LP: Pet Sounds
Writer(s):    Wilson/Asher
Label:    Capitol/EMI
Year:    1966
    According to lyricist Peter Asher, Caroline No was written because Brian Wilson was "saddened to see how sweet little girls turned out to be kind of bitchy, hardened adults". Though the song was originally included on the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds album, it ended up being the only single ever released by Capitol credited to Brian Wilson as a solo artist.

Artist:    Amboy Dukes
Title:    It's Not True
Source:    German import CD: The Amboy Dukes
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Repertoire (original US label: Mainstream)
Year:    1967
    In the  mid-1960s a lot of American bands were covering early Who songs. This is only natural, since the Who, despite having several charted singles in their native UK, did not hit the US charts until 1967, when Happy Jack made it to the #24 spot. Still, It's Not True was kind of an odd choice for Ted Nugent's band, the Amboy Dukes, to include on their first album. For one thing, the song was not particularly known for its guitar parts. More importantly, it was never released as a single and was considered to be little more than filler material on the Who's first LP, My Generation, and album that the Who themselves considered rushed and not representative of their true sound.

Artist:     Blood, Sweat and Tears
Title:     So Much Love/Underture
Source:     LP: Child Is Father To The Man
Writer(s):    Goffin/King/Kooper
Label:     Columbia
Year:     1968
     After leaving the Blues Project in early 1967, keyboardist/vocalist Al Kooper made an appearance at Monterey with a pickup band then reunited with BP bandmate Steve Katz to form Blood, Sweat and Tears. Although Kooper wrote much of the material, there were also songs written by outside songwriters such as Harry Nilsson, Randy Newman and the husband and wife team of Gerry Goffin and Carole King, who wrote So Much Love.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    Jeffrey Goes To Leicester Square
Source:    CD: Stand Up
Writer:    Ian Anderson
Label:    Chrysalis/Capitol (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1969
    Jethro Tull incorporated traditional Indian instruments on Jeffrey Goes To Leicester Square, one of a pair of tunes named for future Tull bassist Jeffrey Hammond by the band's primary songwriter, Ian Anderson.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    I Want You (She's So Heavy)
Source:    LP: Abbey Road
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Apple
Year:    1969
    With the exception of John Lennon's 1968 audio collage Revolution 9, the longest Beatle song ever recorded was I Want You (She's So Heavy), from the Abbey Road album. The track alternates between two distinct sections: the jazz-like I Want You, which contains most of the song's lyrical content, and the primal-scream based She's So Heavy, which repeats the same phrase endlessly in 6/8 time while an increasingly loud wall of white noise eventually leads to an abrupt cut-off at 7:47.

Artist:     Beatles
Title:     Good Morning Good Morning/Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)/A Day In The Life
Source:     LP: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Writer:     Lennon/McCartney
Label:     Capitol/EMI
Year:     1967
     One of the great accidents of record production was the splice that turned the chicken at the end of Good Morning Good Morning into a guitar, starting off Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) and ultimately leading into A Day In The Life, with it's slowly dissolving orchestral chord that brings the number one album of 1967 to a close.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Come Together
Source:    LP: Abbey Road
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Apple
Year:    1969
    After the Beatles released their 1968 double LP (the so-called White Album), they went to work on their final film project, a documentary about the band making an album. Unfortunately, what the cameras captured was a group on the verge of disintegration, and both the album and the film itself were shelved indefinitely. Instead, the band went to work recording an entirely new group of compositions. Somehow, despite the internal difficulties the band was going through, they managed to turn out a masterpiece: Abbey Road. Before the album itself came out, a single was released. The official A side was George Harrison's Something, the first Harrison song ever to be released as a Beatle A side. The other side was the song that opened the album itself, John Lennon's Come Together. In later years Come Together came to be Lennon's signature song and was a staple of his live performances.
   
Artist:    Doors
Title:    Who Scared You
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Morrison/Krieger
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1969
    Recorded during sessions for the Doors' fourth album, The Soft Parade, Who Scared You was issued as the B side of a Jim Morrison/Robby Krieger collaboration called Wishful Sinful in March of 1969. Wishful Sinful, however, performed poorly on the charts and was quickly taken out of circulation. When The Soft Parade was finally released in July of that year, Wishful Sinful was included on the album. Who Scared You, on the other hand, was nowhere to be found, at least until 1972, when it appeared on the double-LP compilation Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine. Given its unique history, it's no wonder that Who Scared You is often considered the most obscure Doors track released during Morrison's tenure with the group.