https://exchange.prx.org/p/569130
The free-form rock continues with contributions from Stephen Stills, Rory Gallagher, Elton John, Rick Wakemen and a whole bunch of bands this week, including our first-ever appearance of the New York Rock Ensemble.
Artist: Stephen Stills
Title: Love the One You're With
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo promo)
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1971
Depending on your point of view Crosby, Stills and Nash (and sometimes Young) have either split up several times over the years or have never actually split up at all. It was during one of these maybe split-ups that Stills recorded Love the One You're With, one of his most popular tunes. Presumably he and singer Judy Collins were no longer an item at that point.
Artist: Mountain
Title: Don't Look Around
Source: CD: Nantucket Sleighride
Writer(s): West/Palmer/Pappalardi/Collins
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1971
One of Mountain's most popular tracks was Nantucket Sleighride, released on an album of the same name in 1971. The opening track of that album, Don't Look Around, is a power rocker that was considered good enough in its own right to make the band's greatest hits collection.
Artist: National Lampoon
Title: Music Perspective With Ron Fields (pt. 1)
Source: CD: The Best Of The National Lampoon Radio Hour vol. 3
Writer(s): unknown
Label: Rhino
Year: 1974
The National Lampoon Radio Hour was a weekly radio show that ran for slightly over a year, from November of 1973 to December of 1974. Created and originally produced by Michael O'Donoghue (best known as storyteller Mr. Mike on early seasons of NBC Saturday Night Live), the show featured several young performers who would go on to greater fame, including John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray and Gilda Radner, who would all go on to become members of the Not Ready For Prime Time Players. Other familiar names associated with the Radio Hour include Harold Ramis, Richard Belzer, Brian Doyle-Murray, Joe Flaherty, Christopher Guest and Douglas Kenney. Music Perspective With Ron Fields (pt. 1), features Guest and Doyle-Murray as a New York record promoter being interviewed by a laid-back FM radio jock.
Artist: Spirit
Title: Space Child/When I Touch You
Source: CD: Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus
Writer(s): Locke/Ferguson
Label: Epic/Legacy
Year: 1970
Spirit keyboardist John Locke used a combination of piano, organ and synthesizers (then a still-new technology) to set the mood for the entire Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus recording sessions with his instrumental piece Space Child. The tune starts with a rolling piano riff that gives bassist Mark Andes a rare opportunity to carry the melody line before switching to a jazzier tempo that manages to seamlessly transition from a waltz tempo to straight time without anyone noticing. After a short reprise of the tune's opening riff the track segues into Jay Ferguson's When I Touch You, a song that manages to be light and heavy at the same time.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Love Or Confusion
Source: LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
A little-known fact is that the original UK 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 the rhythm section 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 had to when I bought my first copy of the album on reel-to-reel tape, since the tape deck was in the same room as the TV.
Artist: Rory Gallagher
Title: Can't Believe It's True
Source: British import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Rory Gallagher)
Writer(s): Rory Gallagher
Label: Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year: 1971
In addition to his obvious prowess on guitar, Rory Gallagher was an accomplished saxophonist (although he largely abandoned the instrument in the mid-1970s). Excellent examples of both his guitar and saxophone work can be found on Can't Believe It's True, the final and longest track on Gallagher's first solo album, recorded in 1971. Accompanying Gallagher on the album were drummer Wilgar Campbell and bass guitarist Gerry McAvoy. Gallagher had set up practice sessions with Campbell and McAvoy, as well as former Jimi Hendrix Experience members Mitch Mitchell and Noel Redding following the breakup of his original band, Taste, but ultimately decided to form a power trio with the two Belfast natives for his solo debut.
Artist: New York Rock Ensemble
Title: Kiss Your Future
Source: LP: Freedomburger
Writer(s): Nivison/Barber/Kamen
Label: Columbia
Year: 1972
The New York Rock & Roll Ensemble was one of the first bands to combine rock and classical music. Intially made up of three Juilliard students and two rock musicians, the group was known for using rock instrumentation on classical pieces and classical instruments on rock songs. They made several appearances on various TV shows, including one of Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts and the Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson. They eventually abandoned their originally approach, shortening their name to the New York Rock Ensemble and becoming a more or less straight rock band by the time their fifth and final album, Freedomburger, was released in 1972. Both multi-instrumentalist Michael Kamen and percussionist Marty Fulterman went on to have successful careers as soundtrack writers for movies and TV. Fulterman, now known as Mark Snow, famously scored the X-Files, while Kamen has worked with dozens of well-known artists (the orchestral arrangements on Pink Floyd's Comfortably Numb being just one example).
Artist: Steppenwolf
Title: Magic Carpet Ride
Source: LP: Vintage Rock (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf The Second)
Writer(s): Moreve/Kay
Label: K-Tel (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: Black Sabbath
Title: Wicked World
Source: LP: Black Sabbath
Writer(s): Iommi/Osborne/Butler/Ward
Label: Warner Brothers
Year: 1969
The Secret Origin of Heavy Metal-Part One: After a short (one month) stint as Mick Abrahams's replacement in Jethro Tull, guitarist Tony Iommi rejoined his former bandmates Ozzy Osborne, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward in the blues-rock band Earth in January of 1969. Later that year they realized that there was already another English band called Earth and decided to change their name. Taking inspiration from a playbill of a movie theater showing classic Boris Karloff horror films across the street from where they were rehearsing, they started calling themselves Black Sabbath in August of 1969 and began to forge a new sound for the band in keeping with their new name. Three months later Black Sabbath got their first record contract, releasing a cover of Crow's Evil Woman in November. They followed the (UK only) single up with their self-titled debut LP, recorded in just two days, on Friday, February 13th, 1970. The album was released three months later in the US, and spent over a year on the Billboard Top 200 albums chart. Although Evil Woman was included on the UK version of the LP, Warner Brothers chose to instead include the B side of the band's British single, a song called Wicked World that was not on the UK version of the album. Most Black Sabbath fans, it turns out, consider Wicked World a stronger track, as it shows a trace of the band's original blues-rock sound, especially on its fast paced intro and closing sections.
Artist: Led Zeppelin
Title: Going To California
Source: CD: Led Zeppelin IV
Writer(s): Page/Plant
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1971
The fourth Led Zeppelin album is known for the band's return to a harder rock sound after the acoustic leanings of Led Zeppelin III. There were, however, a couple of acoustic songs on LZ IV, including Going To California, a song that vocalist Robert Plant has since said was about Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. The tune features Plant on vocals, Jimmy Page on acoustic guitar and John Paul Jones on Mandolin.
Artist: Elton John
Title: Honky Cat
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): John/Taupin
Label: Uni
Year: 1972
Elton John hit the top of the US charts with his fifth LP, Honky Chateau, in 1972. It was the first of seven consecutive #1 albums for the singer/songwriter and included two major hit singles. The second of these was the album's opening track, Honky Cat, which made the top 10 that same year, despite having a length of over five minutes at a time when most radio stations still observed the three and a half minute standard for top 40 singles.
Artist: Rick Wakeman
Title: Anne Boleyn 'The Day Thou Gavest Lord Hath Ended'
Source: LP: The Six Wives Of Henry VIII
Writer(s): Rick Wakeman
Label: A&M
Year: 1973
Rick Wakeman left the band Strawbs in 1971 to replace keyboardist Tony Kaye in the more successful Yes. Kaye had been asked to leave Yes over his reluctance to use synthesizers. By the end of the year Wakeman had signed a five-year deal with A&M Records as a solo artist, although he continued to perform as a member of Yes as well. His first album for A&M, released in 1973, was The Six Wives Of Henry VIII, a series of instrumental pieces that Wakeman described as "my personal conception of their characters in relation to keyboard instruments." In addition to Wakeman, Anne Boleyn 'The Day Thou Gavest Lord Hath Ended' features Yes drummer Bill Bruford and bassist Chris Squire, along with guitarist Mike Egan, percussionist Ray Cooper and several vocalists.
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