https://exchange.prx.org/p/550410
This week's show starts with the kind of stuff you'd expect in our last half hour, including an entire set of tunes that have never been played on Stuck in the Psychedelic Era before, while our final half hour sounds more like our usual first half hour. In between we have a battle of California bands, one from San Francisco and the other from Los Angeles, along with a few surprises.
Artist: Creedence Clearwater Revival
Title: Fortunate Son
Source: LP: Willy And The Poor Boys
Writer(s): John Fogerty
Label: Fantasy
Year: 1969
John Fogerty says it only took him 20 minutes to write what has become one of the iconic antiwar songs of the late 1960s. But Fortunate Son is not so much a condemnation of war as it is an indictment of the political elite who send the less fortunate off to die in wars without any risk to themselves. In addition to being a major hit single upon its release in late 1969 (peaking at #3 as half of a double-A sided single), Fortunate Son has made several "best of" lists over the years, including Rolling Stone magazine's all-time top 100. Additionally, in 2014 the song was added to the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young
Title: Sea Of Madness
Source: LP: Woodstock-Music From The Original Soundtrack And More
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Cotillion
Year: 1969
Neil Young joined Crosby, Stills and Nash to perform a few songs at Woodstock, including one of his own compositions, Sea Of Madness, and would be a full member of the group when their next album, Deja Vu, came out. The recording used for the Woodstock soundtrack album, however, was made in September of 1969 at the Fillmore East.
Artist: Ten Years After
Title: Woman Trouble
Source: CD: Stonedhenge
Writer(s): Alvin Lee
Label: Deram
Year: 1969
In the late 60s and early 70s it was fashionable for a garage band to use a jazzy-sounding instrumental for its break song. Don't ask me why, it just was. Sunn, the band I was in (in various iterations) from 1969-71, was no exception. Hell, maybe we were the only ones doing it, for all I know. The first incarnation of the band used a piece inspired by Bobby Troup (the writer of Route 66), who appeared in short segments between shows of AFTV, the only English language TV station in Germany at the time. He'd always start the segment with a quick guitar lick and the words "Hi! I'm Bobby Troup". Our guitarist borrowed the rift and came up our first break song, which he called "Dedicated to Bobby Troup". We kept on using that one up through the summer of 1970, when both of our fathers' overseas tours ended. I ended up in New Mexico, while Dave found himself in Oklahoma. In early 1971 Dave hopped on a Greyhound bus, bound for California, but only had enough money ($48.60) for a ticket to Alamogordo, NM, where I was living. By then Dave had already gone through two more incarnations of Sunn, so when we decided to reform the band it was (unofficially) Sunn IV. Late that spring, Dave decided to return to Oklahoma; two weeks later (right after graduation) our other guitarist, Doug, and I followed Dave there to form the fifth and final incarnation of Sunn. It was, by far, the most professional version of the band, once we had settled on a final lineup that included a third guitarist DeWayne, on rhythm (Dave and Doug split the lead guitar duties), and his close friend Mike on drums (I played bass). Rather than revive our old instrumental break song, we decided to use Woman Trouble, a Ten Years After track from the Stonedhenge album, instead. The song was different enough from our hard rock repertoire (mostly covers of LP tracks) that it served notice to the audience that something was up. After a verse and chorus I would introduce each band member at the end of their solo (except DeWayne, who, like the guy in the Sultans Of Swing, had no desire to do anything but play chords). We then went back for a repeat of the verse, then took our break. Good times, those.
Artist: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title: The Hat
Source: British import CD: Just For Love
Writer(s): Chet Powers (using an alias)
Label: BGO (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1970
There are several different versions circulating about how Chet Powers, aka Dino Valenti, aka Jesse Oris Farrow, came to be a member of Quicksilver Messenger Service. From what I can tell, the most likely of these is that sometime in the mid-1960s, when he was trying to establish himself as a solo artist, he invited guitarists John Cipollina and Jim Murray to come over and jam, with the intention of possibly using them as a backup band. Soon after that, however, he was busted for pot possession and spent the next two years at San Quentin. Meanwhile, Cipollina and Murray decided to go ahead and from a band anyway, which, after a few personnel changes, took the name Quicksilver Messenger Service. After Valenti (as he was usually known) was released from prison he tried to resume his solo career, but in 1970 ended up joining the band he helped inspire. His own songwriting dominated the next Quicksilver album, Just For Love, with some songs, such as the ten minute long jam The Hat, credited to Farrow, and others credited to Valenti.
Artist: Fleetwood Mac
Title: Man Of The World (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Source: LP: Vintage Years
Writer(s): Peter Green
Label: Sire (original UK label: Immediate)
Year: 1969
The importance of attention to detail cannot be overstated. For example, the people at Blue Horizon Records failed to notice that their contract with the most popular band on the label, Fleetwood Mac, was about to expire. When it did, the band's management immediately (sorry about the pun) got to work negotiating a new contract with a different label, Reprise. While that was going on, they quickly released a single on a third label, Immediate, knowing that the label was on its last legs but wanting to take the time to get the best contract with Reprise they could. That single was a song called Man Of The World, a highly introspective piece by guitarist/bandleader Peter Green that reflected his own growing discomfort with rock stardom that would eventually lead to him leaving Fleetwood Mac.
Artist: Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title: Sea Shell
Source: LP: The Best Of The Strawberry Alarm Clock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Gilbert
Label: Sundazed/Uni
Year: 1968
You'd think that after John Carter and Tim Gilbert took full credit for a song (Incense And Peppermints) originally conceived as an instrumental by band members Mark Weitz and Ed King the members of the Strawberry Alarm Clock would want nothing more to do with the two professional songwriters. Yet, a year and a half later the band released another song credited to the same duo, Sea Shell. It turns out that the song, and several others on the 1968 LP The World in a Sea Shell , were recorded under duress at the insistence of the band's management after the commercial failure of their second LP, Wake Up...It's Tomorrow. The World in a Sea Shell, however, also tanked, and after one more LP the band called it quits, with King going on to join a group that had opened for the Strawberry Alarm Clock named Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Artist: Steppenwolf
Title: Hoochie Coochie Man
Source: CD: Steppenwolf
Writer(s): Willie Dixon
Label: MCA (original label: Dunhill)
Year: 1968
A major driving force behind the renewed interest in the blues in the 1960s was the updating and re-recording of classic blues tunes by contempory rock musicians. This trend started in England, with bands like the Yardbirds and the Animals in the early part of the decade. By the end of the 60s a growing number of US bands were playing songs such as Hoochie Coochie Man, a tune originally recorded by Muddy Waters in 1954. Like Cream's Spoonful and Led Zeppelin's You Shook Me, Hoochie Coochie Man was written by Willie Dixon. The 1968 Steppenwolf version of the song slows the tempo down a touch from the original version and features exquisite sustained guitar work from Michael Monarch.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Daily Nightly
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released on LP: Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD.)
Writer(s): Michael Nesmith
Label: Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year: 1967
One of the first rock songs to feature a Moog synthesizer was the Monkees' Daily Nightly from the album Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones LTD. Micky Dolenz, who had a reputation for nailing it on the first take but being unable to duplicate his success in subsequent attempts, was at the controls of the new technology for this recording of Michael Nesmith's most psychedelic song (he also sang lead on it). The Moog itself had been programmed by electronic music pioneer Paul Beaver especially for this recording.
Artist: Groupies
Title: Primitive
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Cortez/Derosiers/Hendleman/McLaren/Peters/Venet
Label: Rhino (original label: Atco)
Year: 1966
You know, with a name like the Groupies you would expect an all-female band or at least something like the Mothers of Invention. Instead we get a band from New York City that billed itself as "abstract rock." I guess that's using the term abstract in the same sense that scientific journals use it: to distill something complicated down to its basic essence, because these guys were musically exactly what the title of their only single implied: primitive.
Artist: Guess Who
Title: American Woman
Source: CD: The Best Of The Guess Who (originally released on LP: American Woman)
Writer: Bachman/Cummings/Peterson/Kale
Label: BMG/RCA
Year: 1970
From 1968-1970 I was living on Ramstein Air Base, which was and is a huge base in Germany with enough Canadian personnel stationed there to justify their own on-base school. For much of the time I lived there I found myself hanging out with a bunch of Canadian kids and I gotta tell you, they absolutely loved everything by the Guess Who, who were, after all, the most successful Canadian band in history. In particular, they all loved the band's most political (and controversial) hit, the 1970 tune American Woman. I rather liked it myself, and immediately went out and bought a copy of the album, one of the first to be pressed on RCA's Dynaflex vinyl. Luckily, the album is now available on CD, which sounds much better than Dynaflex ever did.
Artist: King Crimson
Title: Peace: A Beginning/Pictures Of A City
Source: LP: In The Wake Of Poseidon
Writer(s): Fripp/Sinfield
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1970
The second King Crimson album, In The Wake Of Poseidon, was very much in the mold of the band's popular debut LP, In The Court Of The Crimson King. If anything, the album was musically tighter than its predecessor, but did not receive as much airplay. There are similarities between individual tracks on the albums as well, with Pictures Of A City, which opens the LP, bearing some resemblance to 21st Century Schizoid Man, the main difference being an extremely quiet 51 second long intro called Peace: A Beginning. The next LP would see the first of several personnel changes in the band, with Robert Fripp being the only member to remain with King Crimson over its entire existence.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Eleanor Rigby
Source: CD: Revolver
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Capitol/EMI
Year: 1966
The Beatles' Revolver album is usually cited as the beginning of the British psychedelic era, and with good reason. Although the band still had one last tour in them in 1966, they were already far more focused on their studio work than on their live performances, and thus turned out an album full of short masterpieces such as Paul McCartney's Eleanor Rigby. As always, the song was credited to both McCartney and John Lennon, but in reality the only Beatle to appear on the recording was McCartney himself, and then only in a vocal capacity. The instrumentation consisted of simply a string quartet, arranged and conducted by producer George Martin. Released as a double-A-sided single, along with Yellow Submarine, the song shot to the upper echelons of the charts in nearly every country in the western world and remains one of the band's most popular and recognizable tunes.
Artist: Doors
Title: Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)
Source: CD: The Doors
Writer(s): Weill/Brecht
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
1967 was a breakthrough year for Elektra Records, which had only signed its first full-fledged rock band (Love) the previous year. Between Love's second and third albums and the first two Doors LPs, Elektra had by the end of the year established itself as a player. Although never released as a single, Alabama Song, a reworking of the song from the 1927 play Little Mahogonny, managed to make it onto the Best of the Doors album and has been a classic rock staple for years.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Somebody To Love
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Darby Slick
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1967
Over 40 years after the fact, it's hard to imagine just how big an impact Jefferson Airplane's fifth single had on the garage band scene. Whereas before Somebody To Love came out you could just dismiss hard-to-cover songs as being not worth learning, here was a tune that was undeniably cool, and yet virtually impossible for anyone but the Airplane to play well (and even they were unable to get it to sound quite the same when they performed it live). The mono single mix of the song heard here has noticeably less reverb than the more familiar stereo album version.
Artist: Doors
Title: The Spy
Source: LP: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released on LP: Morrison Hotel)
Writer(s): Jim Morrison
Label: Elektra
Year: 1970
As the 1960s drew to a close, the Doors, who had been riding high since 1967, were at a low point. In fact, it could be argued that the last few months of 1969 were the worst in the band's career. Vocalist Jim Morrison had been arrested for indecent exposure for an incident onstage in Miami the previous March. This had resulted in the cancellation of over two dozen performances as well as a sizable number of radio stations refusing to play their records. In June, the band released their fourth album, The Soft Parade, which was critically panned for its overuse of horns and strings. The album was also the first to give individual members of the band songwriting credits (previously all songwriting credits were shared by the four band members). This was brought about by Morrison's wish to distance himself from the lyrics of the album's opening track, Tell All The People, which had been written by guitarist Robby Krieger. Adding to the problems, Morrison had been arrested for causing a disturbance on an airplane and charged under a new hijacking law that carried a fine up of to $10,000 and ten years in prison. In November, the Doors started work on their fifth album, to be called Morrison Hotel (with the second side subtitled Hard Rock Cafe). After the poor reception of The Soft Parade the band decided to take a back to basics approach. One thing that did not change, however, was the policy of band members taking individual song credits. Thus, we have songs like The Spy (originally called Spy In The House Of Love), which was inspired by Morrison's fiery relationship with his longtime girlfriend Pamela Coulson. Morrison Hotel would end up being a turning point for the Doors; their next LP, L.A. Woman, is universally considered one of their best.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: White Rabbit
Source: LP: Surrealistic Pillow
Writer(s): Grace Slick
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1967
The first time I heard White Rabbit was on Denver's first FM rock station, KLZ-FM. The station branded itself as having a top 100 (as opposed to local ratings leader KIMN's top 60), and prided itself on being the first station in town to play new releases and album tracks. It wasn't long before White Rabbit was officially released as a single, and went on to become a top 10 hit, the last for the Airplane.
Artist: Doors
Title: Ship Of Fools
Source: LP: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released on LP: Morrison Hotel)
Writer(s): Morrison/Krieger
Label: Elektra
Year: 1970
In July, the Doors released their fourth album, The Soft Parade, which was heavily criticized for its use of strings and horns and an overall more commercial sound that the band had previously exhibited. That same month Morrison gave an interview to Rolling Stone magazine in which he stressed the importance of country and blues to American culture. It was not a big surprise then, that the band's next album, Morrison Hotel, featured a more stripped down sound, perhaps even more so than their first LP. Side one of the album, subtitled Hard Rock Cafe, starts off strong with one of the band's most iconic songs, Roadhouse Blues, and ends on a similar note with Ship Of Fools. The group would continue in this direction and even improve on it on their next LP, L.A. Woman. Sadly, L.A. Woman would be the last Doors studio album before Morrison's death in 1971.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: She Has Funny Cars
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Kaukonen/Balin
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1967
She Has Funny Cars, the opening track of Jefferson Airplane's second LP, Surrealistic Pillow, was a reference to some unusual possessions belonging to new drummer Spencer Dryden's girlfriend. As was the case with many of the early Airplane tracks, the title has nothing to do with the lyrics of the song itself. The song was also released as the B side to the band's first top 10 single, Somebody To Love. The mono mix used for the single has noticably less reverb than the more familiar stereo version of the song.
Artist: Orange Bicycle
Title: Amy Peate
Source: British import CD: Lets Take A Trip On An Orange Bicycle (The Anthology) originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Wilson Malone
Label: Morgan Blue Town (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1969
The Orange Bicycle were a somewhat obscure British group led by drummer/vocalist Wil Malone. The band had one successful single, Hyacinth Threads, which topped the French charts in the summer of 1967. Amy Peate was the B side of that first single.
Artist: Circus Maximus
Title: Lost Sea Shanty
Source: LP: Circus Maximus
Writer(s): Jerry Jeff Walker
Label: Vanguard
Year: 1967
Circus Maximus was formed in Greenwich Village by keyboardist Bob Bruno and guitarist Jerry Jeff Walker. Although Bruno's compositions initially got the most airplay on progressive FM radio, it was Walker who ultimately went on to become a star as a singer/songwriter. Lost Sea Shanty, from the first Circus Maximus album, may well be his first recorded work.
Artist: Love
Title: Stephanie Knows Who
Source: Mono Germian import CD: Da Capo
Writer(s): Arthur Lee
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
Following up on a strong, if not spectacular debut LP followed by a national hit record (7&7 Is), Love went into the studio with two new members to record their second album, Da Capo. By this point Love had established itself as the most popular band on the Sunset Strip, and the music on Da Capo is a fair representation of what the group was doing onstage (including the 17 minute Revelation, which takes up the entire second side of the LP). The opening track, Stephanie Knows Who, is hard proto-punk, showcasing the band's tightness with abrupt changes in tempo throughout the song. The tune, originally released as a single in October of 1966 but quickly withdrawn in favor of She Comes In Colors, also features the harpsichord playing of "Snoopy" Pfisterer, who switched over from drums to keyboards for the LP, making way for Michael Stewart, who stayed with the band for their next LP, Forever Changes.
Artist: Love
Title: 7&7 Is
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets vol. 2 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Arthur Lee
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
The word "seven" does not appear anywhere in the song 7&7 Is. In fact, I have no idea where Arthur Lee got that title from. Nonetheless, the song is among the most intense tracks to ever make the top 40. 7&7 Is starts off with power chords played over a constant drum roll (possibly played by Lee himself), with cymbals crashing over equally manic semi-spoken lyrics. The song builds up to an explosive climax: an atomic bomb blast followed by a slow post-apocalyptic instrumental that quickly fades away.
Artist: Love
Title: The Castle
Source: German import CD: Da Capo
Writer(s): Arthur Lee
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
Considering that both of their first two LPs had cover photos taken against the backdrop of Bela Lugosi's former residence in the Hollywood Hills (known as Dracula's Castle), it is perhaps inevitable that Love would have a track called The Castle on one of these albums. Sure enough, one can be found near the end of the first side of 1967's Da Capo, an album that was all but buried by the attention being given to the debut LP of Love's new labelmates, the Doors, which came out around the same time. The song itself is an indication of the direction that band was moving in, away from the straight folk/garage-rock of their first LP toward the more sophiscated sound of Forever Changes, which would be released later the same year.
Artist: Butterfield Blues Band
Title: All These Blues
Source: CD: East-West
Writer(s): Traditional
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
The second Butterfield Blues Band album, East-West, saw the group starting to experiment with variations on the Chicago blues style that characterized their debut LP. There were still plenty of more traditional tracks on the album, however, such as All These Blues, which some sources credit to Walter Johnson.
Artist: Blues Project
Title: Cheryl's Going Home
Source: Mono CD: Projections
Writer: Bob Lind
Label: Sundazed/Verve Folkways
Year: 1966
One of the more unlikely songs to appear on an album by one of rock's first jam bands, Cheryl's Going Home was originally a B side, released by Bob Lind in 1965. It's possible that the Blues Project recorded it as a possible single of their own but for some reason decided against it. Only the band members and producer Tom Wilson know for sure.
Artist: Standells
Title: Why Did You Hurt Me
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer: Dodd/Valentine
Label: Tower
Year: 1966
Why Did You Hurt Me is a bit of a musical oddity. The song, which was released B side of their second single, Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White, starts off as a growling three-chord bit of classic garage rock, but then goes into a bridge that sounds more like flower pop, with flowing melodic harmonies. This leads into a short transitional section that has little in common with what had come before and finally (somewhat awkwardly) segues back into the three chord main section to finish the song. The important thing, however, is that the piece was written by band members Dick Dodd and Tony Valentine, thus generating royalties for the two (royalties on singles were divided equally among the songwriters on both sides of a record, regardless of which song what actually a hit).
Artist: Jury
Title: Who Dat?
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Canada as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Bill Ivaniuk
Label: Rhino (original label: Quality)
Year: 1966
Formed by members of two Winnipeg bands, the Chord-U-Roys and the Phantoms, in 1964, the Jury released three Beatles-inspired singles on the Canadian London label in 1965 before switching to the locally-owned Quality label the following year. Their only single for Quality was Who Dat?, a savage piece of garage rock that got enough regional airplay to pique the interest of a small American label, Port, which promptly reissued the single in the US. Nonetheless, the group disbanded before 1966 was over.
Artist: Lovin' Spoonful
Title: Summer In The City
Source: LP: Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful
Writer(s): Sebastian/Sebastian/Boone
Label: Sundazed/Kama Sutra
Year: 1966
The Lovin' Spoonful changed gears completely for what would become their biggest hit of 1966: Summer In The City. Inspired by a poem by John Sebastian's brother, the song was recorded for the album Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful. That album was an attempt by the band to deliberately record in a variety of styles; in the case of Summer In The City, it was a rare foray into psychedelic rock for the band. Not coincidentally, Summer In The City is also my favorite Lovin' Spoonful song.
Artist: Traffic
Title: Dear Mr. Fantasy
Source: LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released on LP: Heaven Is In Your Mind)
Writer(s): Capaldi/Winwood/Wood
Label: United Artists
Year: 1967
Steve Winwood is one of those artists that has multiple signature songs, having a career that has spanned decades (so far). Still, if there is any one song that is most closely associated with the guitarist/keyboardist/vocalist, it's the title track of Traffic's Mr. Fantasy album.
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