https://exchange.prx.org/p/603037
We're keeping it simple this week. First we rock out, then it gets mellow. When all is said and done it really is an Amazing Journey, even if it does start with a bit of Madness.
Artist: James Gang
Title: Madness/Kick Back Man
Source: LP: Straight Shooter
Writer(s): Troiano/Kenner
Label: ABC
Year: 1972
With the departure of Joe Walsh in 1971 the remaining members of the James Gang, drummer Jim Fox and bassist Dale Peters, were in a bit of a bind. Walsh had been the band's primary songwriter and vocalist, as well as lead guitarist, and the James Gang still had a record contract to fulfill. Meanwhile, in Toronto, a band called Bush (that had evolved from an earlier band called Mandala), found itself falling apart after releasing one album in 1970. As the two groups were kind of label mates (James Gang on ABC and Bush on ABC/Dunhill) it made sense for the primary songwriters of Bush, vocalist Roy Kenner and guitarist Dominic Troiano, to join Peters and Fox, keeping the better-known James Gang name. The first album released by the quartet was Straight Shooter, which came out in 1972. The LP opened with two songs that ran together as a single piece, Madness and Kick Back Man, both by Kenner and Troiano. This incarnation of the James Gang would release one more LP before Troiano left the group, eventually ending up back in Canada as a member of the Guess Who. The James Gang then recruited Tommy Bolin (formerly of Zephyr) as lead guitarist for their next two albums, with Kenner still on lead vocals for most of the songs. After even more personnel changes, the James Gang disbanded in 1977.
Artist: Gun
Title: Race With The Devil
Source: European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Gun)
Writer(s): Adrian Gurvitz
Label: Repertoire (original UK label: Columbia)
Year: 1968
One of the most popular songs on the jukebox at the teen club on Ramstein Air Force Base, Germany in 1969 was a song called Race With The Devil by a band called Gun. The song was so popular, in fact, that at least two local bands covered it (including the one I was in). Nobody seemed to know much about Gun at the time, but it turns out that the group was fronted by the Gurvitz brothers, Adrian and Paul (who at the time were using the last name Curtis); the two would later be members of the Baker-Gurvitz Army with drummer Ginger Baker. I've also learned recently that Gun spent much of its time touring in Europe, particularly in Germany, where Race With The Devil hit its peak in January of 1969 (it had made the top 10 in the UK in 1968, the year it was released).
Artist: Johnny Winter
Title: Highway 61 Revisited
Source: LP: Second Winter
Writer(s): Bob Dylan
Label: Columbia
Year: 1969
As good as the original Bob Dylan version of Highway 61 Revisited is, most would agree that Johnny Winter has managed to do it even better, to the point of making it his own signature song. His first recorded version of the song was on his 1969 album Second Winter, which was actually his third LP, but his second for Columbia. About a third of the tracks on the three-sided album were cover tunes, but Highway 61 Revisited blows the rest of them out of the water.
Artist: Wishbone Ash
Title: Queen Of Torture
Source: 45 RPM single B side (originally released on LP: Wishbone Ash)
Writer: Upton/Turner/Turner/Powell
Label: Decca
Year: 1970
One of the first bands to use dual lead guitars was Wishbone Ash. When the original guitarist of the band known as the Empty Vessels had to leave auditions were held, but the two remaining members, bassist Martin Turner and drummer Steve Upton, couldn't decide between the two finalists so they kept both of them, or so the story goes. Queen Of Torture, from their 1969 debut album, shows just how well the styles of guitarists Andy Powell and Ted Turner meshed.
Artist: Zephyr
Title: Going Back To Colorado
Source: LP: Going Back To Colorado
Writer(s): Bolin/Tesar/Givens
Label: Warner Brothers
Year: 1971
Zephyr's second album, Going Back To Colorado, was different in several ways from their debut LP. The most obvious change was that the band was no longer on the ABC/Probe label, which had been shut down in 1970, and was now signed to Warner Brothers Records. Gone was original drummer Robbie Chamberlin, replaced by Bobby Berge. Additionally, a change from Wally Heider Studios in Los Angeles to Electric Lady Studios in New York gave the band the opportunity to work with engineer Eddie Kramer, but unfortunately for the band, Kramer was still in shock over the death of studio founder Jimi Hendrix at the time and was not at his best. Still, the album had its good points, such as the title track, but was a commercial disappointment. Guitarist Tommy Bolin left Zephyr shortly after the released of Going Back To Colorado, and the band went though several personnel changes of the next dozen years or so, finally disbanding following the death of lead vocalist Candy Givens in 1984.
Artist: Steely Dan
Title: Reeling In The Years
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s): Becker/Fagen
Label: MCA (original label: ABC)
Year: 1972
My first radio gig (sort of), was volunteering at the Voice Of Holloman, a closed-circuit station that served a handful of locations on Holloman AFB, about 10 miles from Alamogordo, NM. I had been taking broadcasting courses through a community college program that was taught by Sgt. Tim Daniels, who was the NCO in charge of the base Information Office. As such he ran the station, as well as a free weekly newspaper that was distributed on base. After completing the classes, Tim gave me the opportunity to do a daily two-hour show on the VOH, using records that had been sent to the station by various record labels. We got excellent singles service from some labels (Warner Brothers and Capitol in particular), but virtually nothing from others, such as ABC. This was unfortunate, as one of the best songs out at the time was Steely Dan's Reeling In The Years, from their 1972 Can't Buy A Thrill album. Tim, whose previous gig was with the Armed Forces Vietnam Network, was a big rock fan, however, and went out and bought his own copy of the album, making a copy of Reeling In The Years on reel to reel tape, which we then played extensively until the song had run its course on the charts. Thus the Voice Of Holloman, with its audience consisting mostly of guys working out at the base gym, was playing the longer album version of a song that was also getting airplay on Alamogordo's daytime-only top 40 AM station, KINN, in its edited single form. It was just about the nearest the Voice Of Holloman ever got to being an underground rock station (although I did manage to sneak in some Procol Harum, Little Feat and once even Deep Purple from the aformentioned Warner Brothers singles).
Artist: Grand Funk
Title: We're An American Band
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer: Don Brewer
Label: Capitol
Year: 1973
In 1972 I was the bass player/vocalist in a power trio that played a lot of Grand Funk Railroad, Black Sabbath and the like. Shortly after that band split up I started taking broadcasting classes from Tim Daniels, an Air Force Sergeant who had previously worked for the Armed Forces Vietnam Network (the same station that Adrian Cronauer worked at, although at that time nobody outside the military had ever heard of him). That led to my first regular airshift on the "Voice of Holloman", a closed-circuit station that was piped into the gym and bowling alley and some of the barracks at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico for about four hours a day. One of the hot new records that the station got promo copies of was We're An American Band, pressed on bright yellow translucent vinyl with the stereo version on one side and the mono mix on the other. I snagged one of the extra copies Capitol sent and have somehow managed to hang onto it over the years.
Artist: Frank Zappa
Title: Don't Eat Yellow Snow/Nanook Rubs It/St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast/Father Oblivion
Source: CD: Apostrophe (')
Writer(s): Frank Zappa
Label: Zappa (original label: Discreet)
Year: 1974
Despite being one of the most prolific composer/performers of the 20th century, Frank Zappa only put three songs on the top 100 charts in his career. The first of these was an abbreviated version of Don't Eat Yellow Snow, the opening track on his 1974 LP Apostrophe ('). On the album itself the song segues directly into the next three tracks, Nanook Rubs It, St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast and the instrumental Father Oblivion to form the suite heard here.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Little Wing
Source: LP: Axis: Bold As Love
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Experience Hendrix/Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1967
Although it didn't have any hit singles on it, Axis: Bold As Love, the second album by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, was full of memorable tunes, including one of Hendrix's most covered songs, Little Wing. The album itself is a showcase for Hendrix's rapidly developing skills, both as a songwriter and in the studio. The actual production of the album was a true collaborative effort, combining Hendrix's creativity, engineer Eddie Kramer's expertise and producer Chas Chandler's strong sense of how a record should sound, acquired through years of recording experience as a member of the Animals. The result was nothing short of a masterpiece.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Serenade To A Cuckoo
Source: CD: This Was
Writer(s): Roland Kirk
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Jethro Tull did not, as a general rule, record cover tunes. The most notable exception is Roland Kirk's classic jazz piece Serenade To A Cuckoo, which was included on their first LP, This Was. For years, the Kirk version was out of print, making Jethro Tull's cover the only available version of this classic tune throughout the 1970s.
Artist: Who
Title: Amazing Journey
Source: British Import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Tommy)
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: Polydor UK (original US label: Decca)
Year: 1969
After achieving major success in their native England with a series of hit singles in 1965-67, the Who began to concentrate more on their albums from 1968 on. The first of these concept albums was The Who Sell Out, released in December of 1967. The Who Sell Out was a collection of songs connected by faux radio spots and actual jingles from England's most popular pirate radio station, Radio London. After releasing a few more singles in 1968, the Who began work on their most ambitious project yet: the world's first rock opera. Tommy, released in 1969, was a double LP telling the story of a boy who, after being tramautized into becoming a blind deaf-mute, eventually emerges as a kind of messiah, only to have his followers ultimately abandon him. One of the early tracks on the album is Amazing Journey, describing Tommy's voyage into the recesses of his own mind in response to the traumatic event that results in his "deaf, dumb and blind" condition.
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