Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2632 (starts 8/3/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/629201 

    The great rock & roll rivalry of the mid to late 1960s was, of course, between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, or more accurately between the fans of the two groups, since the members of the bands actually had a lot in common, especially when it came to dealings with non-musicians in the business like Allen Klein. Accordingly, this week's battle of the bands is really a battle of fan favorites. And speaking of fan favorites, we threw in a Doors set as well as the usual assortment of singles, B sides and album tracks from 1965-1969.

Artist:    Yardbirds
Title:    Heart Full Of Soul
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Graham Gouldman
Label:    Epic
Year:    1965
    Heart Full Of Soul, the Yardbirds' follow-up single to For Your Love was a huge hit, making the top 10 on both sides of the Atlantic in 1965. The song, the first to feature guitarist Jeff Beck prominently, was written by Graham Gouldman, who was then a member of Wayne Fontana's Mindbenders and would later be a founding member of 10cc.

Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Grim Reaper Of Love
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer:    Portz/Nichol
Label:    FloEdCo (original label: White Whale)
Year:    1966
    The Turtles had some early success in 1965 as a folk-rock band, recording the hit version of Bob Dylan's It Ain't Me Babe and PF Sloan's Let Me Be. By 1966, however, it was getting harder and harder for the group to get a hit record. One attempt was Grim Reaper Of Love, co-written by Turtles lead guitarist Al Nichol and bassist Chuck Portz. Personally I think it's a pretty cool tune, but was probably a bit too weird to appeal to the average top 40 radio listener in 1966. Grim Reaper Of Love did manage to make it to the #81 spot on the charts, unlike the band's next two singles that failed to chart at all. It wasn't until the following year, when the Turtles recorded Happy Together, that the band would return to the top 40 charts, making it all the way to the top.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Pictures Of Lily
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Decca
Year:    1967
    Pictures of Lily was the first single released by the Who in 1967. It hit the #4 spot on the British charts, but only made it to #51 in the US. This was nothing new for the Who, as several of their early singles, including Substitute, I Can't Explain and even My Generation hit the British top 10 without getting any US airplay (or chart action) at all.

Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    Hush
Source:    LP: Shades Of Deep Purple
Writer:    Joe South
Label:    Tetragrammaton
Year:    1968
    Deep Purple scored a huge US hit in 1968 with their rocked out cover of Hush, a tune written by Joe South that had been an international hit for Billy Joe Royal the previous year. Oddly enough, the song was virtually ignored in their native England. The song was included on the album Shades Of Deep Purple, the first of three LPs to be released in the US on Tetragrammaton Records, a label partially owned by actor/comedian Bill Cosby. When Tetragrammaton folded shortly after the release of the third Deep Purple album the band was left without a US label, and went through some personnel changes, including adding new lead vocalist Ian Gilliam (who had sung the part of Jesus on the original Jesus Christ Superstar album) before signing to Warner Brothers and becoming a major force in 70s rock. Meanwhile, original vocalist Rod Evans hooked up with drummer Bobby Caldwell and two former members of Iron Butterfly to form Captain Beyond before fading from public view.

Artist:    Sagittarius
Title:    The Truth Is Not Real
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Present Tense)
Writer:    Gary Usher
Label:    Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1968
    After the success of the first Sagittarius single, My World Fell Down, Gary Usher enlisted the aid of Curt Boettcher, who had been working on a studio project of his own called the Ballroom for another production company. Using many of the same studio musicians they created a follow-up single, The Truth Is Not Real. It's interesting to compare Usher's lyrics with those of In My Room, a Brian Wilson tune that Usher had provided lyrics for in 1965.

Artist:    Adrian Pride
Title:    Her Name Is Melody
Source:    Mono British import CD: My Mind Goes High (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Schwartz/Slater
Label:    Warner Strategic Marketing (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year:    1967
    Seriously? You've never heard of Adrian Pride? How about Don Atello? Bernie Ballantine? The Comfortable Chair? No? These are all names used by Bernie Schwartz, either as a solo artist or with a band (you can probably figure out which one that was). After recording a few self-penned singles in the early 60s, Schwartz came to the attention of the Everly Brothers, who in turn got him signed to Warner Brothers Records, at that time a medium-sized label owned by a large Hollywood movie studio. Schwartz recorded a pair of singles, the second of which was Her Name Was Melody, before forming the Comfortable Chair. Interestingly, Schwartz later claimed that, although he received a songwriting credit for the tune, it was actually written by Don Everly and Terry Slater. Schwartz eventually retired from music and became an author of such self-help books as A Guide To Fashionable Psychological Disorders and Are You A Newrotic?

Artist:    Seeds
Title:    Pictures And Designs
Source:    LP: A Web Of Sound
Writer(s):    Saxon/Hooper
Label:    GNP Crescendo
Year:    1966
    The first Seeds album was somewhat unusual for its time in that all the songs on the album (including both singles from the album) were written by members of the band itself. Unfortunately this resulted in a sort of formulaic sameness from one track to the next, with many tunes sounding like attempts to recapture the magic of their most famous song, Pushin' Too Hard. The second Seeds album, A Web Of Sound, also was made up of (mostly) original material, but this time Sky Saxon and company made an effort to expand beyond the formula with tracks like Pictures And Designs, which starts off sounding a bit like the Yardbirds, but soon becomes a snarling punk drone that manages to break new ground for the band while maintaining the distinctive Seeds sound.

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    A Most Peculiar Man
Source:    CD: Collected Works (originally released on LP: Sounds Of Silence)
Writer:    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    You would think that a high school on a US military facility would be inclined to use the most staunchly traditional teaching methods known to mankind. Surprisingly, though, this was not the case at General H. H. Arnold High School in Weisbaden, Germany, in 1967. In fact, the English department was teaching some sort of new system that dispensed with terms such as verb and noun and replaced them with a more conceptual approach to language. What I best remember about my Freshman English class is the day that my rather Bohemian teacher (he wore sandals to class!), actually brought in a copy of the Sounds Of Silence and had us dissect two songs from the album, Richard Cory and A Most Peculiar Man. We spent several classes discussing the similarities (they both deal with a suicide by someone representing a particular archetype) and differences (the methods used and the archetypes themselves) between the songs. I have forgotten everything else about that class and its so-called revolutionary approach (and even the teacher's name), but those two songs have stayed with me my entire life. I guess that teacher was on to something.

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    Flying On The Ground Is Wrong
Source:    Mono CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Atco
Year:    1966
    It's a fact: the people at Atco Records thought Neil Young's voice was "too weird" to record, and insisted that fellow Buffalo Springfield member Richie Furay sing most of his songs instead of Young himself. Among the Young tunes sung by Furay on the first Buffalo Springfield album is Flying On The Ground Is Wrong. By the time the band got around to recording a second LP things had changed a bit and Young sang all his own material.

Artist:    Donovan
Title:    Wear Your Love Like Heaven
Source:    LP: Wear Your Love Like Heaven
Writer(s):    Donovan Leitch
Label:    Epic
Year:    1967
    Following the release of his Mellow Yellow album in early 1967 Donovan decided to take a break from the studio, only recording a pair of singles over the next few months. Finally, in October, the Scottish singer/songwriter began work on his next album, a double LP to be called A Gift From A Flower To A Garden. The first disc was a collection of electric pop songs subtitled Wear Your Love Like Heaven, while the second, For Little Ones, featured more acoustic material and was oriented to a younger audience. As a way of hedging their bets, Epic Records also issued the project as a pair of separate albums. The lead single from the album was the title track from the first disc, Wear Your Love Like Heaven, which also opens the entire album. The song did fairly well on the charts, peaking at #23 in the US, and is considered a highlight of Donovan's psychedelic period. 

Artist:    Spirit
Title:    Elijah
Source:    CD: Spirit
Writer:    John Locke
Label:    Ode/Epic/Legacy
Year:    1968
    Since the mid-1960s many bands have had one long piece that they play in concert that is specifically designed to allow individual band members to strut their stuff. In a few cases, such as Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida or Lynnard Skynnard's Freebird, it becomes their best-known song. In most cases, though, a studio version of the piece gets put on an early album and never gets heard on the radio. Such is the case with Spirit's show-stopper Elijah, which was reportedly never played the same way twice. Elijah, written by keyboardist John Locke, starts with a hard-rockin' main theme that is followed by a jazzier second theme that showcases one of the lead instruments (guitar, keyboards). The piece then comes to a dead stop while one of the members has a solo section of their own devising. This is followed by the main theme, repeating several times until every member has had their own solo section. The piece ends with a return to the main theme followed by a classic power rock ending. 

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Running Blue
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Robby Krieger
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1969
    On the recommendation of producer Paul Rothchild, the Doors made a complete departure from the sound that had won them critical and commercial success on their first three albums with the release of The Soft Parade in 1969. The band was supplemented by strings and horns on most of the album. At the same time Jim Morrison, battling personal and legal issues, was less involved with the songwriting on The Soft Parade, with the slack being taken up primarily by guitarist Robby Krieger. In fact, Krieger wrote all four singles released from the album, including Running Blue, which only made it to the #64 spot on the Billboard Hot 100. The song itself was meant to be a tribute to Otis Redding, with lyrics based on an old Leadbelly song, but the country-style vocals provided by Krieger on the song's "back eight" (supplemented by bluegrass-style mandolin played by Jesse McReynolds) undermine his intentions.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Who Scared You
Source:    CD: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Doors
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1969
    The Doors only released two non-album tracks while Jim Morrison was alive. The first of these was Who Scared You, which appeared as the B side of Wishful Sinful, a minor hit from the 1969 album The Soft Parade. Unlike the songs on that album, Who Scared You is credited to the entire band, rather than one or more of its individual members. The song made its album debut in 1972, when it was included in the double-LP compilation Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine. 

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Do It
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Morrison/Krieger
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1969
    One sign of a truly great band is that even at the lowest point in their history they manage to create songs that are above and beyond most other bands. Case in point: the Doors. 1969 was a horrendous year for the band. Jim Morrison was looking at possible jail time for indecent exposure and their producer, Paul Rothchild, was pressuring them to add strings and horns to their recordings. The result was what is universally considered the weakest of the Doors' studio albums, The Soft Parade. Recorded over a period of nine months, The Soft Parade was the first Doors album to give individual writing credits, reportedly because vocalist Jim Morrison did not want his name associated with some of guitarist Robby Kreiger's lyrics. Despite all this, there were some hidden gems on The Soft Parade. Do It, also released as a B side of a failed single, is one such gem. 

Artist:    Grammy Fones
Title:    Now He's Gone
Source:    Mono British import CD: All Kinds Of Highs (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Mike Butler
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Brent)
Year:    1967
    Once upon a time in Houston there was a band called the Druids, made up of Mike Butler, Charlie Knight, Jim Scalise and John Deer. They recorded a pair of tunes for the Brent label at a local studio, but for some reason were identified as the Spectacles on the tape box. When the single itself came out the band's name had changed once again, this time to the Grammy Fones. The somewhat forgettable A side was credited to Scott and Vivian Holtzman, who would go on to write and produce four Fever Tree albums, but the B side, the much stronger Now He's Gone, was written by Butler. 

Artist:    Mind Garage
Title:    Asphalt Mother
Source:    Mono CD: A Lethal Dose Of Hard Psych (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Larry McClure
Label:    Arf! Arf! (original label: Morning Glori)
Year:    1968
    The Mind Garage, presumably from somewhere in or around Morgantown, West Virginia, made their intentions clear with Asphalt Mother, the B side of the first and only single released on the local Morning Glori label. The band later signed with RCA, but toned down their sound (and attitude) considerably for their two albums.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Revolution 1
Source:    CD: The Beatles
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone (original label: Apple)
Year:    1968
    The Beatles' Revolution has a somewhat convoluted history. The song, the first album track to be recorded for the band's own Apple label, was over eight minutes long and included what eventually became Revolution 1 and part of Revolution 9. The song's writer, John Lennon, at some point decided to separate the sections into two distinct tracks, both of which ended up on the Beatles self-titled double LP (aka the White Album). Lennon wanted to release Revolution 1 as a single, but was voted down by both George Harrison and Paul McCartney on the grounds that the song's tempo was too slow. Lennon then came up with a faster version of the song, which ended up being released a few weeks before the album came out as the B side to the band's 1968 single Hey Jude. As a result, many of the band's fans erroneously assumed that Revolution 1 was the newer version of the song.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Street Fighting Man
Source:    LP: Through The Past, Darkly (originally released on LP: Beggar's Banquet)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1968
    The Rolling Stones were at a low point in their career following their most psychedelic album, Their Satanic Majesties Request, which came out in late 1967. As a response to charges in the rock press that they were no longer relevant the Stones released Jumpin' Jack Flash as a single in early 1968, following it up with the Beggar's Banquet album later in the year. The new album included the band's follow-up single, Street Fighting Man, a song that was almost as anthemic as Jumpin' Jack Flash itself and went a long ways toward insuring that the Rolling Stones would be making music on their own terms for as long as they chose to.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Under My Thumb
Source:    CD: Aftermath
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1966
    With the exception of certain Beatles tracks, pretty much every popular song from the beginning of recorded music through the year 1966 had been released as a single either on 45 or 78 RPM records (and for a while in the 1950s, on both). With Under My Thumb, from the Aftermath album, the Rolling Stones proved that someone besides the fab four could record a classic that was available only as a 33 1/3 RPM LP track. In a sense, then, Aftermath can be considered the very foundation of album rock, as more and groups put their most creative energy into making albums rather than singles in the ensuing years. Thanks, Stones. 

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Your Mother Should Know
Source:    Stereo British import 45 RPM EP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone
Year:    1967
    Here's a trivia question for you: what song were the Beatles working on the last time manager Brian Epstein attended one of the band's recording sessions? If your answer was Paul McCartney's Your Mother Should Know, you'd be absolutely right (what, you thought it was a trick question?). EMI's Abbey Road studios were unavailable on August 22nd and 23rd of 1967, so the band used Chappell Recording Studios instead, recording late into the night. Epstein dropped in to see how things were going before heading home. He was found dead on August 27th of that year. Could that be the real reason Paul McCartney wore a black carnation when the Beatles performed the number as part of their Magical Mystery Tour telefilm? Of course at the time the rumor mill took it as one of the many hints that Paul had died and been replaced by a lookalike.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Paint It Black
Source:    Mono CD: Aftermath
Writer:    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1966
    One of the truly great Rolling Stones songs, Paint It Black was not included on the original UK release of the 1966 Aftermath album. This was because of the British custom of not including songs on LPs that were also available as 45 RPM singles (which, unlike their American counterparts, remained available for sale indefinitely) or extended play 45s (which had no US counterpart). In the US, however, Paint It Black was used to open the album, giving the entire LP a different feel from the British version (it had a different cover as well). Paint It Black is also the only song on Aftermath that was mixed only in mono, although US stereo pressings used an electronic rechannelling process to create a fake stereo sound. Luckily for everyone's ears, modern CDs use the unenhanced mono mix of the tune.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    I Am The Walrus
Source:    Stereo British import 45 RPM EP: Magical Mystery Tour 
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone
Year:    1967
    Common practice in the UK in the 1960s was to avoid duplication between single releases and album tracks. This led to a unique situation for the Beatles and their British label, EMI/Parlophone, in December of 1967. The band had self-produced a new telefilm to be shown on BBC-TV called Magical Mystery Tour and wanted to make the songs from the film available to the record-buying public in time for Christmas. The problem was that there were only six songs in the one-hour telefilm, not nearly enough to fill an entire album. The solution was to release the songs on a pair of Extended Play 45 RPM records, along with several pages of song lyrics, illustrations and stills from the film itself. My own introduction to Magical Mystery Tour was a friend's German copy of the EPs, and when years later I had the opportunity to pick up a copy of the original UK version, I of course couldn't resist. That copy got totalled in a flood a few years back, but in 2012 I was finally able to locate another copy of the EP set, which is the source of this week's airing of the ultimate British psychedelic recording, I Am The Walrus. This British EP version has a slightly longer intro than the more familiar US LP/CD release. 

Artist:    Dion
Title:    Abraham, Martin And John
Source:    CD: Songs Of Protest (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Dick Holler
Label:    Rhino (original label: Laurie)
Year:    1968
    Although sometimes characterized as a protest song, Dion DiMucci's 1968 hit Abraham, Martin And John is really a tribute to three famous Americans, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy (with a reference to the recently-assassinated Bobby Kennedy included in the final verse of the song). Most people in the business saw Dion, perhaps the most successful doo-wop artist of all time, as being near the end of his career by 1967, although he was one of only two rock musicians included on the cover collage of the Beatles' 1967 LP Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band beside the Beatles themselves (the other being Bob Dylan).  In April of 1968, however, Dion experienced what he later called "a powerful religious experience" which led to him approaching his old label, Laurie Records, for a new contract. The label agreed on the condition that he record Abraham, Martin And John. The song, written by Dick Holler (who also wrote, strangely enough, Snoopy vs. The Red Baron), ended up being one of Dion's biggest hits and led to the revitalization of his career. 

Artist:    Sly And The Family Stone
Title:    Underdog
Source:    CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: A Whole New Thing)
Writer(s):    Sylvester Stewart
Label:    Rhino (original label: Epic)
Year:    1967
    Sly and the Family Stone were a showstopper at the Woodstock festival in 1969, but their story starts years before that historic performance. Sylvester Stewart was a popular DJ and producer for Tom Donahue's Autumn Records in mid-60s San Francisco, and was heavily involved with the first recordings of the Warlocks (later the Grateful Dead) and the Great Society, among others. During that time he became acquainted with a wealth of talent, including bassist Larry Graham. In 1967, with Autumn Records having been sold to and closed down by Warner Brothers, he decided to form his own band. Anchored by Graham, Sly and the Family Stone's first LP, A Whole New Thing, was possibly the very first pure funk album ever released. 

Artist:    Chris And Craig
Title:    Isha
Source:    Mono import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Chris Ducey
Label:    Zonophone UK (original US label: Capitol)
Year:    1966
    Before the Monkees, there were the Happeners...almost. In 1965, college student Chris Ducey and singer/songwriter Craig Smith were chosen to play a folk-rock duo on a TV show. Although the show itself never made it past pre-production, the two did record a single for Capitol Records, the Ducey-penned Isha, before going their separate ways. Craig Smith auditioned for yet another TV show the following year, but was not one of the four young men chosen to become the Monkees. He did, however, strike up a friendship with fellow applicant Michael Nesmith, who would end up recording one of Smith's songs, Salesman, and later produce Smith's new band, Penny Arkade. Ducey, meanwhile, became a bizarre early victim of identity theft. Folk singer Bobby Jameson, for reasons unknown, recorded an entire album using not only Ducey's name, but his song titles as well. The real Ducey hasn't been heard from since.

Artist:    Them
Title:    Here Comes The Night
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    Bert Berns
Label:    London (original label: Parrot)
Year:    1965
    Them's first album was originally released in the UK as The Angry Young Them, and did not include the single Here Comes The Night. Originally recorded by Lulu (of To Sir With Love fame) and the Luvvers, this track was not only added to the US version of the LP (retitled simply Them), it was given the coveted opening slot. The guitar leads on Here Comes The Night were provided by a young studio guitarist named Jimmy Page.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Little Olive
Source:    Mono CD: The Complete Reprise Singles (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    James Lowe
Label:    Real Gone Music/Rhino (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1966
    Allowing a band to compose its own B side was a fairly common practice in the mid-1960s, as it saved the producer from having to pay for the rights to a composition by professional songwriters and generated a little royalty money for the band. As a result, many B sides were actually a better indication of what a band really was about, since most A sides were picked by the record's producer, rather than the band. Such is the case with Little Olive, a song written by the Electric Prunes' Jim Lowe and released as the B side of their debut single in 1966.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Plastic Fantastic Lover
Source:    45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s):    Marty Balin
Label:    RCA 
Year:    1967
    Jefferson Airplane scored their first top 10 hit with Somebody To Love, the second single released from the Surrealistic Pillow album. Almost immediately, forward-thinking FM stations began playing other tracks from the album. One of those favored album tracks, Plastic Fantastic Lover, ended up being the B side of the band's follow-up single, White Rabbit. When the Airplane reunited in 1989 and issued their two-disc retrospective, 2400 Fulton Street, they issued a special stereo pressing of the single on white vinyl as a way of promoting the collection.

Artist:     Traffic
Title:     Feelin' Alright
Source:     CD: Traffic
Writer:     Dave Mason
Label:     Island (original label: United Artists)
Year:     1968    
    Dave Mason left Traffic after the band's first album, Mr. Fantasy, but returned in time to contribute several songs to the band's eponymous second album. Among those was his most memorable song, Feelin' Alright, which would become one of the most covered songs in rock history.

Artist:     Pleasure (featuring Billy Elder)
Title:     Poor Old Organ Grinder
Source:     CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Tandyn Almer
Label:     Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:     1969
     Tandyn Almer had one of the most innovative minds in late 60s L.A., both in and out of the recording studio (he was the inventor of the dual-chamber bong, for instance). Poor Old Organ Grinder was a song originally intended for Tommy Flanders, the original lead vocalist for the Blues Project. Flanders, however, was not able to hit the high notes. As Almers was about to cancel the entire project one of the recording engineers, Billy Elder, convinced Almer to let him take a shot at the song, and the result is the recording heard here. 
     

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2632 (starts 8/3/26

https://exchange.prx.org/p/629199

    What??? Free-form rock from the early '70s again?? Yep. Enjoy!

Artist:    Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Title:    Roll On Down The Highway
Source:    Ecuadorian import LP: Best Of BTO (So Far) (originally released on LP: Not Fragile)
Writer(s):    Bachman/Turner
Label:    Mercury
Year:    1974
    Not Fragile was the most successful album from the Canadian band Bachman-Turner Overdrive, being their only LP to hit the #1 spot of the Billboard album chart. It was also the debut of second lead guitarist Blair Thornton, who replaced Tim Bachman in the band originally founded by his brother Randy, former lead guitarist of the Guess Who. A third Bachman brother, Rob, co-wrote (with bassist Fred Turner) the second top 20 single from the album, Roll On Down The Highway. The album title itself, according to Randy Bachman, was actually a parody of Yes's Fragile album title, which Bachman thought was "strange." He said he figured that BTO's music, on the other hand, could be dropped and kicked without breaking; thus the title Not Fragile. 

Artist:    Faces
Title:    Ooh-La-La
Source:    45 RPM single (promo copy)
Writer(s):    Wood/Lane
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1973
    Rod Stewart does not perform on the song Ooh-La-La (that's Ronnie Wood on lead vocals). In fact, he is entirely missing from three of the ten tracks on the 1973 album Ooh La La. This is because by 1973 Rod Stewart was a Big Solo Rock Star who apparently had little interest in honoring his commitments to his bandmates. He missed the first two weeks of sessions for the album entirely and appeared to be distracted when he did bother to show up. After the album was released he went out of his way to tell anyone that would listen how bad the album was. Now do you understand why I have zero respect for Rod Stewart?

Artist:    Sweathog
Title:    Hallelujah
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Zelkey/Bottler/Twain
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1971
    In 1972 I was barely still a teenager, hanging out at the Teen Club on Holloman AFB (formerly the Airmen's club), playing pool for free (but sometimes you had to wait for one of the two tables to open up), pinball (not free) and, on nearly every weekend, dancing to the music of a live band (when I wasn't a member of the band itself). All of the bands that played the Teen Club were cover bands, of course, and several of them were from El Paso, playing three or four 45 minute sets for what was hopefully enough money to pay for the gas money it took to make the 180 mile round trip. I don't remember too many band names from back then, but I do remember one of them doing a truly kickass version of Sweathog's Hallelujah. As for Sweathog itself, the band was formed sometime in the late 1960s by members of various San Jose, California area bands. By 1970 they had relocated to the Los Angeles area and become the house band at a club in the San Fernando valley. This in turn led to the band signing with Columbia in 1971. Late in the year they released Hallelujah as a single, following it up with an album of the same name in early 1972. Given all this, can someone explain to me why a band formed in California by Californians seems to always get described as a Southern Rock band? 

Artist:    David Bowie
Title:    Drive-In Saturday
Source:    CD: Nothing Has Changed (originally released on LP: Aladdin Sane)
Writer(s):    David Bowie
Label:    Columbia/Legacy (original label: RCA Victor)
Year:    1973
    The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars transformed David Bowie from a cult figure to an international star. This led to a US tour, which influenced the songwriting for his next LP, Aladdin Sane. Bowie had only released one single, Starman, from the Ziggy Stardust album, preferring to instead put out a series of brand new songs while working on his new album, Aladdin Sane. The third of these new singles was Drive-In Saturday, a science-fiction piece about how people in a dystopian future need to watch old films from the 20th century to remember how to have sex. The song was released a week ahead of the album that it ended up appearing on and went into the top 5 in Ireland and the UK, but did not chart elsewhere (in fact it wasn't even released as a single in the US).

Artist:    National Lampoon
Title:    Classic Riddles (pt. 1 & 2)/Public Disservice Message: Care Packages To Europe
Source:    CD: The Best Of The National Lampoon Radio Hour, volume 3
Writer(s):    group effort
Label:    Rhino
Year:    Recorded 1973-74, released 1996
    The National Lampoon Radio Hour only ran for a little over a year, and was actually only a half hour long for most of its run. The show, created and produced by Michael O'Donoghue, featured material written by the same people who did the National Lampoon magazine, and featured an array of voice talent, including many of the performers who would later become the original Not Ready For Prime Time Players for NBC's Saturday Night Live. In 1996 Rhino Records put out a three CD box set called The Best Of The National Lampoon Radio Hour that included extensive liner notes. Unfortunately, all I have is the third CD in the set and no liner notes, thus I have no idea who the actual writers or performers were who gave us Classic Riddles, interrupted by a Public Disservice Message: Care Packages To Europe. It sure sounds like the work of O'Donoghue, who went on to become head writer for Saturday Night Live for its first three seasons, making occasional on-camera appearances as bedtime storyteller Mr. Mike.
 
Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    My God
Source:    CD: Aqualung
Writer:    Ian Anderson
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1971
    The fortunes of Jethro Tull improved drastically with the release of the Aqualung album in 1971. The group had done well in their native UK but were still considered a second-tier band in the US. Aqualung, however, propelled the group to star status, with several tracks getting heavy airplay on FM rock radio. Although Ian Anderson has always maintained that Aqualung was a concept album, that doesn't account for the fact that the two sides of the album were subtitled Aqualung and My God. Maybe that means Aqualung was actually two HALF concept albums, I don't know. Speaking of My God, in addition to being the obvious theme of the entire second side of the LP, it was also the title of the first (and longest) track on that side, and lyrically lays down all the basic ideas presented on the second half of the Aqualung album.

Artist:    Derek And The Dominos
Title:    Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out
Source:    CD: Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs
Writer(s):    Jimmie Cox
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1970
    After seeing the Allman Brothers Band in concert, Eric Clapton invited Duane Allman to an after-hours jam session at which the two guitarists hit it off immediately. Clapton then asked Allman to join him in the studio, where his new band Derek And The Dominos had just begun recording what would become the double-length album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs. The first song for the album that Allman played on was Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out, a tune written in 1923 by Jimmie Cox and popularized by Bessie Smith during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The song was recorded in a single take with no overdubs, and contains outstanding guitar solos from both Allman and Clapton.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    The Lemon Song
Source:    CD: Led Zeppelin II
Writer(s):    Page/Plant/Bonham/Jones/Burnett
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1969
    If I had to choose just one Led Zeppelin song as representative of the band's early work it would have to be The Lemon Song, from their second album. The track has all the elements that made the Zep's reputation: Jimmy Page's distinctive guitar work, John Bonham's stuttered (but always timely) drum fills, John Paul Jones's funky bass line and Robert Plant's gutsy vocals (with lyrics famously derived from classic blues tunes). Squeeze my lemon, baby indeed!

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Abbey Road Medley #1
Source:    CD: Abbey Road
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Apple/Parlophone
Year:    1969
    Much of the second side of the last album to be recorded by the Beatles, Abbey Road, is taken up by (depending on whose view you take) either one long medley or two not-quite-so-long medleys of songs written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Personally I take the former view, as there is just a bit too much quiet space at the end of She Came In Through The Bathroom Window for me to consider it linked to the next song, Golden Slumbers. Regardless, the whole thing starts with You Never Give Me Your Money, a Paul McCartney composition reputed to be a jab at the band's second (and last) manager, Allen Klein. This leads into three John Lennon pieces, Sun King, Mean Mr. Mustard and Polythene Pam, ending finally with another McCartney piece, She Came In Through The Bathroom Window, that was inspired by a real life break-in by an overzealous Beatle fan. 

Artist:    Allman Brothers Band
Title:    Black Hearted Woman
Source:    CD: Beginnings (originally released on LP: The Allman Brothers Band)
Writer(s):    Gregg Allman
Label:    Polydor/Polygram (original label: Atco)
Year:    1969
    It's almost a cliche that a rock and roll songwriter will get at least one good song out of a relationship that ends badly. If this is indeed the case, Gregg Allman's relationship with a woman in Los Angeles named Stacy must have been particularly rocky, as it served as the inspiration for no less than three songs on the Allman Brothers Band's debut LP. Perhaps the most "to the point" of these was Black Hearted Woman, which pulls no punches whatsoever.

Artist:    Savoy Brown
Title:    I Can't Get Next To You
Source:    LP: Street Corner Talking
Writer(s):    Whitfield/Strong
Label:    Parrot
Year:    1971
    Following the release of the album Looking In, Savoy Brown founder Kim Simmonds decided to take the band in an entirely new direction. His enthusiasm for the change was not shared by his bandmates, however, and Simmonds ended up firing the lot of them and hiring a whole new crew for the 7th Savoy Brown LP, Street Corner Talking. This new lineup consisted of members of the band Chicken Shack, which had fallen apart when their front person, Christine Perfect (later to be Christine McVie) left to join Fleetwood Mac. One indication of the band's new direction was a bluesy arrangement of Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong's I Can't Get Next To You, which had been a hit single for the Temptations a few years earlier. The Savoy Brown arrangement of the song, with its infectious beat and bass line, was inspired by Al Green's version of the song.
 

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2631 (starts 7/27/26)

 https://exchange.prx.org/p/628304

    This week, among other things, we have a track from the second studio Super Session, a new Advanced Psych segment and the album side credited with inspiring the Rolling Stones to go full psychedelic in late 1967. 

Artist:     Brogues
Title:     I Ain't No Miracle Worker
Source:     Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Tucker/Mantz
Label:     Rhino (original label: Challenge)
Year:     1965
     Over a year before the Electric Prunes recorded I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night), the songwriting team of Annette Tucker and Nancie Mantz came up with a song that has come to be regarded as a garage-punk classic. I Ain't No Miracle Worker, recorded by the Merced, California band the Brogues, was a modest regional hit in 1965. Brogues vocalist/guitarist Gary Cole (using the name Gary Duncan) and drummer Greg Elmore would resurface a few months later in San Francisco as founding members of Quicksilver Messenger Service.

Artist:    Animals
Title:    See See Rider
Source:    CD: The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals 1966-1968 (originally released on LP: Animalization and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Ma Rainey
Label:    Polydor (original label: M-G-M)
Year:    1966
    One of the last singles released by the original incarnation of the Animals (and the first to use the name Eric Burdon And The Animals on the label), 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. 

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 (Ithaca, NY currently does the same thing, except theirs are yellow and green). 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:    Johnny Winter
Title:    Rollin' And Tumblin'
Source:    LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released on LP: The Progressive Blues Experiment)
Writer(s):    McKinley Morganfield
Label:    United Artists (original labels: Sonobeat/Imperial)
Year:    1968
    Johnny Winter's first album, The Progressive Blues Experiment, was originally released in 1968 on the Texas-based Sonobeat label. A ctitical success, it was picked up and reissued on the Imperial label a year later. Most of the songs on the album are covers of blues classics such as Muddy Waters's Rollin' And Tumblin'.

Artist:    Al Kooper/Shuggie Otis/Wells Kelly/Stu Woods/Mark Klingman
Title:    12:15 Slow Goonbash Blues
Source:    British import CD: Kooper Session
Writer(s):    Kooper/Otis
Label:    Acadia (original US label: Columbia)
Year:    1969
    Following up on the unexpected commercial success of the Super Session album in 1968, keyboardist Al Kooper organized a series of six concerts over a three day period at the Fillmore West featuring Mike Bloomfield on guitar, John Kahn on bass and Skip Prokop on drums. The performances were recorded and released in January of 1969 as The Live Adventures Of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper. He then invited 15-year-old Shuggie Otis, the son of legendary performer Johnny Otis (Willie And The Hand Jive) to make a new studio album, which was released under the title Kooper Session: Super Session Vol. II. The first side of the LP features a set of cover songs, while the second features original tunes by Kooper and Otis. The longest of these is 12:15 Goonbash Blues, which, at nine and a half minutes, gives all involved a chance to strut their stuff.

Artist:    Sunshine Company
Title:    Happy
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 11-Pop part 4 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Michaels/Gormann
Label:    Rhino (original label: Imperial)
Year:    1967
    Los Angeles' Sunshine Company may not have invented the term "sunshine pop" but they were certainly one of its most ardent practitioners. Originally formed as a duo by Mary Nance (vocals) and Maury Manseau (vocals, guitar), they added bassist Larry Sims and drummer Merel Bregante when the signed with Imperial Records, releasing the debut LP, Happy Is The Sunshine Company, in 1967. Their first single from the album, Up, Up And Away, was scheduled to be released in May of 1967 but was withdrawn when the Fifth Dimension beat them to the punch. Instead the group got to work on their first LP, Happy Is The Sunshine Company, with the song Happy released as their first official single. The song hit #50 on the charts, which was apparently good enough for Imperial Records, as by the time they disbanded in late 1968 they had recorded three LPs and released a half dozen singles.

Artist:    Thunderclap Newman
Title:    Something In The Air
Source:    CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    John Keen
Label:    Polydor (original label: Marmalade)
Year:    1969
    Thunderclap Newman was actually the creation of the Who's Pete Townshend, who assembled a bunch of studio musicians to work with drummer (and former Who roadie) John "Speedy" Keen. Keen had written Armenia City In The Sky, the opening track on The Who Sell Out, and Townshend set up the studio project to return the favor. Joining Keen were 15-year-old guitarist Jimmy McCulloch (who would eventually join Paul McCartney's Wings before dying of a heroin overdose in 1979), studio engineer Andy "Thunderclap" Newman (who had worked with Pink Floyd, among others) on piano, and Townshend himself on bass. Following the success of Something In The Air, the group recorded an album, but sales were disappointing and the group soon disbanded. 

Artist:    Canned Heat
Title:    Going Up The Country 
Source:    British import CD: Living The Blues
Writer(s):    Alan Wilson
Label:    BGO (original US label: Liberty)
Year:    1968
    Canned Heat built up a solid reputation as one of the best blues-rock bands in history, recording several critically-acclaimed albums over a period of years. What they did not have, however, was a top 10 single. The nearest they got was Going Up The Country from their late 1968 LP Living The Blues, which peaked in the #11 spot in early 1969. 

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    My Back Pages
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    One of the items of contention between David Crosby and Roger McGuinn was the latter's insistence on continuing to record covers of Bob Dylan songs when the band members themselves had a wealth of their own material available. Indeed, it was reportedly an argument over whether or not to include Crosby's Triad on the next album that resulted in Crosby being fired from the band in October of 1967 (although other factors certainly played into it as well). Nonetheless, the last Dylan cover with Crosby still in the band was perhaps their best as well. Although not as big a hit as Mr. Tambourine Man, My Back Pages from the Younger Than Yesterday album did respectably well on the charts, becoming one of the Byrds' last top 40 hits.
 
Artist:    Cyrkle
Title:    Turn Down Day
Source:    Mono LP: Red Rubber Ball
Writer(s):    Keller/Blume
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    If there was ever a song that embodies the feel of late summer, it's the Cyrkle's Turn Down Day, from late summer of 1966. The song was the band's second consecutive top 20 hit, although it fell short of the nearly chart topping performace of the band's debut single, Red Rubber Ball. Subsequent singles by the band did progressively worse over the next year and a half and the Cyrkle disbanded in 1968, with two of its members going on to have successful careers as commercial jingle writers (remember Plop Plop Fizz Fizz?). 

Artist:    The Ban
Title:    Place Of Sin
Source:    Mono British import CD: With Love-A Pot Of Flowers (bonus track)
Writer(s):    Tony McGuire
Label:    Big Beat
Year:    Recorded 1965, released 2010
    The Ban was a garage band from Lompoc, California, consisting of vocalist/guitarist Tony McGuire, organist Oilver McKinney, bassist Frank Strait and drummer Randy Gordon. They made a handful of recordings for the Brent label in 1965, with the song Bye Bye being released as a single. Among the other McGuire compositions the Ban recorded was Place Of Sin, a song that was probably too far ahead of its time to be released in 1965. Unfortunately, before the Ban could generate interest in their single, McGuire was drafted, and the Ban moved to San Bernadino, adding a new member and changing their name to the Now. Later, they relocated to San Francisco, where they were snagged by the infamous manager Matthew Katz, who renamed them the Tripsichord Music Box. 

Artist:    Dillards
Title:    Don't You Cry
Source:    LP: Early L.A.
Writer:    Bill Martin
Label:    Rhino (original label: Capitol)
Year:    Recorded 1964, released 1970
    The Dillards are best known as the Darlings, the fictional bluegrass band that occassionally showed up on TV's Andy Griffith show. They were also quite infamous as the first bluegrass band to embrace electric instruments, as can be heard on Don't You Cry, a track recorded in 1964 by not released until 1970, when it appeared on a compilation album sponsored by Los Angeles radio station KFWB. If Don't You Cry had been released in 1964, it would now be known as the first folk-rock single.

Artist:    Chocolate Watchband
Title:    And She's Lonely
Source:    CD: One Step Beyond
Writer(s):    Loomis/Tolby
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Tower)
Year:    1969
    The Chocolate Watchband went through more than its share of personnel changes over its short life, with a different lineup in place pretty much every time they walked into a recording studio. Interestingly enough, the lineup for their third and final LP, One Step Beyond, included several members that had, at one time or another, left the band, only to return by 1968. These included two of the founding members, vocalist Danny Phay and guitarist Ned Tormey (who had left the group before it got off the ground) as well as the group's original leader, Mark Loomis, who, along with drummer Gary Andrijasevich, had left after the band's first LP was released. As frontman Dave Aguilar had also left the group, it looked like the Watchband was history. However, the band still had a month's worth of gigs lined up, and so the remaining two members, guitarist Sean Tolby and bassist Bill Flores, recruited three new members to carry on the Watchband name until the fall of 1967. A year later Tolby and Flores got the word that producer Ed Cobb and Tower Records wanted to release a third Chocolate Watchband album, so the two of them brought the above-mentioned former members (but not Aguilar) back to record a far different sounding album than what had gone before. One major difference is that, unlike on the first two albums, which included several filler tracks by studio musicians, all the songs on One Step Beyond were performed by the band members themselves. Also, the album was made up mostly of original material, such as And She's Lonely, written by Loomis and Tolby. The album did not sell well, however, and the Watchband disbanded for a third time in 1970.

Artist:    Mops
Title:    I'm Just A Mops
Source:    CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Japan on LP: Psychedelic Sounds In Japan)
Writer(s):    Suzuki/Hoshi
Label:    Rhino (original label: Victor)
Year:    1968
            Popular rock in the mid-60s UK was known collectively as beat music, which was basically inspired by the Beatles and other Merseybeat bands and taken to its greatest success by London bands such as the Rolling Stones. The rest of the world soon followed suit with their own British-inspired movements such as garage rock in the US and something called group sounds, or GS, in Japan. Among the more successful GS bands was a group called the Mops. Formed in 1966, the band followed in the footsteps of the Animals, who had taken a decidedly psychedelic turn in early 1967. By the time the Mops released their first single in November of 1967 they were being billed as the "First Psychedelic Band in Japan." Six months later they cemented this reputation with the release of their first LP, Psychedelic Sounds In Japan. Mixed in among their own arrangements of such standards as San Franciscan Nights and Somebody To Love were a handful of original tunes, the most notable of which was the grammatically weird I'm Just A Mops, which served as a kind of theme song. With the arrival of Led Zeppelin on the international music scene, the Mops took on a heavier sound, releasing eight more albums before disbanding in 1974.
        
Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Fire
Source:    LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Experience Hendrix/Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Sometime in late 1966 Jimi Hendrix was visiting his girlfriend's mother's house in London for the first time. It was a cold rainy night and Jimi immediately noticed that there was a dog curled up in front of the fireplace. Jimi's first action was to scoot the dog out of the way so he himself could benefit from the fire's warmth, using the phrase "Move over Rover and let Jimi take over." The phrase got stuck in his head and eventually became the basis for one of his most popular songs. Fire was a highlight of the Jimi Hendrix Experience's live performances, often serving as a set opener. In 1969, two years after its original UK appearance on the mono LP Are You Experienced, the stereo remix of Fire from the US version of the album (which had never been released outside of the US and Canada) was issued in the UK, along with a handful of European countries and New Zealand, as a single called Let Me Light Your Fire.
    
Artist:    Fraternity Of Man
Title:    Don't Bogart Me
Source:    LP: Fraternity Of Man
Writer(s):    Fraternity Of Man
Label:    ABC
Year:    1968
    In the late 60s there was a certain disconnect between rock musicians and their audience on the subject of country music. Whereas the youth culture of the time associated it with rednecks and conservative attitudes, their musical heroes often held the country music tradition in high regard. One of the first songs to bridge the gap was Don't Bogart Me from the Fraternity Of Man. The band itself was made up of former members of the Factory, a popular L.A. club band led by Lowell George, and the Mothers of Invention, led by Frank Zappa. Although the band's 1968 LP remains somewhat obscure, Don't Bogart Me itself was made famous by its inclusion in the 1969 movie Easy Rider.

Artist:    Jean Jacques Burnel
Title:    Do The European
Source:    EP: The Stranglers (included as bonus disc with Stranglers LP: IV)
Writer(s):    Jean Jacques Burnel
Label:    IRS
Year:    1980
    The fourth Stranglers album, The Raven, was not released in North America. Instead, an album called IV came out a year later in the US and Canada. Early pressings of the album included a free four-song EP; three of the songs had previously been issued, while the fourth, Do The European, was a  live track by Stranglers bassist J.J. Burnel that was unavailable anywhere else until 1992, when it appeared on Burnel's first solo LP.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Hello Out There
Source:    CD: Feedback
Writer(s):    Lowe/Tulin
Label:    PruneTwang
Year:    2006
    The 2006 Electric Prunes album Feedback sounds like a group of talented musicians with nothing to prove having the time of their lives. Which, of course, is exactly what it is. The album opens with, appropriately, Hello Out There, which I gotta say sounds nothing like any previous Electric Prunes song.

Artist:    Baby Charles & The Bedwetters
Title:    Dick Swift & His Electric Power Ring
Source:    CD: Message To The Youth Of America (bonus EP)
Writer(s):    Kim Draheim
Label:    self-released
Year:    2021
    It was early 2020. The Infrared Radiation Orchestra had just completed recording tracks for the album Message To The Youth Of America, but wanted to add some bonus tracks that didn't quite fit on the album itself. Then COVID hit, disrupting everything. After the three original bonus tracks went missing bandleader Kim Draheim, with the original band members unavailable to re-record the songs, assembled a group of musicians consisting of bassist Jan Arliss, keyboardist/recording engineer Paul Nolan, guitarist Terry Quill, drummer Joe Sarofeen and accordionist/guitarist Theresa Walsh, calling them Baby Charles & The Bedwetters. The bonus tracks were included on a separate disc when Message To The Youth Of America was released in 2021. The first of the three tracks was a Draheim original called Dick Swift & His Electric Power Ring, which begins and ends with a parody of old science fiction matinee movie serials.

Artist:    Derek And The Dominos
Title:    Little Wing
Source:    CD: Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1970
    The Jimi Hendrix Experience often performed an instrumental jam based on Cream's Sunshine Of Your Love, so it seems only fair that Eric Clapton would someday return the favor. When he did, it was memorable. Little Wing is one of the standout tracks on an album full of standout tracks. As such, it is often overlooked in favor of other tunes from Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs. Still, it is a unique arrangement of the Hendrix classic, enhanced by the presence of Duane Allman on slide guitar. 

Artist:    Velvet Underground
Title:    Candy Says
Source:    British import CD: The Best Of Lou Reed And The Velvet Underground (originally released on LP: The Velvet Underground.
Writer:    Lou Reed
Label:    Global Television (original US label: M-G-M)
Year:    1969
    Following the release of the 1968 album White Light/White Heat, multi-instrumentalist John Cale was kicked out of the Velvet Underground and replaced by bassist Doug Yule. Principal songwriter Lou Reed was adamant that the next album not be a repeat of the group's previous two albums, fearing that the band would end up being locked in to a particular style. Reed also wanted other band members to contribute vocals on the album. One example is Candy Says, the album's opening track, which is sung by Yule. In a later interview Reed called Candy Says "probably the best song I've written". The album, simply titled The Velvet Underground, was released in 1969.

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Politician
Source:    LP: Wheels Of Fire
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    RSO (original label: Atco)
Year:    1968
    Although the songwriting team of Jack Bruce and Pete Brown are best known for providing Cream with its more psychedelic songs such as White Room and Swlabr, they did occasionally come up with bluesier numbers such as Politician from the Wheels Of Fire album. The song quickly became a staple of Cream's live performances.

Artist:    Grass Roots
Title:    Mr. Jones (A Ballad Of A Thin Man)
Source:    45 RPM single (promo copy)
Writer:    Bob Dylan
Label:    Dunhill
Year:    1965
    In late 1965 songwriters/producers P.F. Sloan (Eve of Destruction) and Steve Barri decided to create a series of records by a band called the Grass Roots. The problem was that there was already a band calling themselves the Grass Roots  that was not interested in recording Sloan and Barri's songs, and whose members weren't particularly diplomatic when rejecting Sloan and Barri's offer. Unfortunately for that first band, they had never bothered to copyright the name, so Sloan and Barri decided to recruit another band and talk them into changing their name to the Grass Roots. The band they found was the Bedouins, one of the early San Francisco bands. As the rush to sign SF bands was still months away, the Bedouins were more than happy to come down to L.A. and record the songs Sloan and Barri picked out for them. The first single by the newly-named Grass Roots was a cover of Bob Dylan's A Ballad Of A Thin Man, released under the title Mr. Jones. The band soon got to work promoting the single to Southern California radio stations, but with both the Byrds and the Turtles already on the charts with Dylan covers it soon became obvious that the market was quickly getting saturated. After a period of months the band, who wanted more freedom to write and record their own material, had a falling out with Sloan and Barri and it wasn't long before they moved back to San Francisco, leaving drummer Joel Larson in L.A. The group, with another drummer, continued to perform as the Grass Roots until Dunhill Records ordered them to stop. Eventually Dunhill would hire a local L.A. band called the 13th Floor to be the final incarnation of the Grass Roots who would crank out a series of top 40 hits in the early 70s. Meanwhile the original lineup changed their name but never had the opportunity to make records again. Oh, and that band that hadn't copyrighted the name Grass Roots in the first place? They let their own fans choose a new name for them. That new name was Love.

Artist:     Buffalo Springfield
Title:     Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing
Source:     CD: Retrospective (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Buffalo Springfield)
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Atco
Year:     1966
     One of the most influential folk-rock bands to come out of the L.A. scene was Buffalo Springfield. The band had several quality songwriters, including Neil Young, whose voice was deemed "too weird" by certain record company people. Thus we have Richie Furay singing a Young tune on the band's first single, Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing.
    
Artist:    Hapshash And The Coloured Coat
Title:    Empires Of The Sun
Source:    LP: Featuring The Human Host And The Heavy Metal Kids
Writer(s):    English/Waymouth/Stevens
Label:    Imperial
Year:    1967
    Hapshash And The Coloured Coat was the collective name taken by Michael English and Nigel Waymouth for their graphic design partnership formed in 1966. Their first project was to design posters advertising London's UFO club. At first they called themselves Cosmic Colors, but soon changed it to Jacob and the Coloured Coat. In March of 1967 they settled on Hapshash And The Coloured Coat, setting up a small studio in London's Holland Park neighborhood and doing prodigious amounts of LSD, usually with the Who's Pete Townshend. In addition to making posters advertising rock bands and the venues they played at, Hapshash And The Coloured Coat recorded their own music, releasing two albums. The first of these, Featuring The Human Host And The Heavy Metal Kids, was released in 1967 and included musical contributions from members of a recently disbanded rock group called Art, including guitarist Luther Grosvenor, bassist Greg Ridley, drummer Mike Kellie and keyboardist Mike Harrison, all of whom would go on to form the band Spooky Tooth later that same year. The entire second side of the album consists of a single sixteen-minute long track called Empire Of The Sun, which is said to have inspired members of the Rolling Stones to include similar extended psychedelic passages on their late 1967 LP Their Satanic Majesties Request.

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. Also like many former frontmen, Jones's solo career, beginning in 1966, was less than stellar. Most of Jones's records were done in an almost lounge lizard style. One notable exception is The Dog Presides, the B side of a forgettable 1968 single called And The Sun Will Shine. In addition to Jones on vocals and harmonica, The Dog Presides features former Yardbirds guitarist Jeff Beck and bassist Paul-Samwell Smith and some guy named Paul McCartney on drums. This bit of psychedelic insanity was officially credited to Jones himself, but in all likelihood was a collaborative effort by the four of them. 

 

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2631 (starts 7/27/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/628303

    This time around we have about 54 minutes of the kind of free-form rock you could find on the FM radio band across the US in the early 1970s. First, though, a track released as a single fifty years ago this month that is perhaps even more relevant now than it was then.

Artist:    Blue Oyster Cult
Title:    (Don't Fear) The Reaper
Source:    European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Agents Of Fortune)
Writer(s):    Donald Roeser
Label:    Sony Music
Year:    1976
    Guitarist/vocalist Buck Dharma wrote (Don't Fear) The Reaper in his late 20s. At the time, he said, he was expecting to die at a young age. Dharma (real name Donald Roeser), is now 78 years old. Personally, I can't hear this track without thinking of the 1994 miniseries adaptation of Stephen King's The Stand.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    Living In The Past
Source:    LP: Living In The Past (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Ian Anderson
Label:    Chrysalis (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1969
    By the end of the 1960s most UK labels had abandoned the British practice of not including singles on LPs. One notable exception was Island Records, who continued to issue mutually exclusive Jethro Tull albums, singles and EPs into the early 1970s. Among those non-LP tracks was the 1969 single Living In The Past, which would not be included on an LP until 1972, when the song became the title track of a double LP Jethro Tull retrospective. The song then became a hit all over again, including in the US, where the original single had failed to chart. 

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Born Under A Bad Sign
Source:    CD: Wheels Of Fire
Writer:    Jones/Bell
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1968
    Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker were pretty much considered the cream of the crop of the British blues scene in the mid 1960s, so it came as no surprise when they decided to call their new band Cream. Although the trio would go on to record several memorable non-blues tunes such as I Feel Free and White Room, they never completely abandoned the blues. Born Under A Bad Sign, originally recorded by Albert King  for the Stax label and written by labelmates William Bell and Booker T. Jones, is one of the better known tracks from Cream's double-LP Wheels Of Fire, the last album released while the band was still together.

Artist:    Santana
Title:    Evil Ways
Source:    CD: Santana
Writer(s):    Clarence Henry
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1969
    Evil Ways was originally released in 1968 by jazz percussionist Willie Bobo on an album of the same name. When Carlos Santana took his new band into the studio to record their first LP, they made the song their own, taking it into the top 10 in 1969.

Artist:    Al Kooper/Mike Bloomfield/Barry Goldberg/Harvey Brooks/Eddie Hoh
Title:    Albert's Shuffle (remix without horns)
Source:    LP: Super Session
Writer(s):    Bloomfield/Kooper
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1968
    There is no doubt that one of the most important and influential albums of the late 1960s was the Super Session album. Released in 1968, the album was conceived in part because keyboardist/producer Al Kooper felt that Michael Bloomfield had never been recorded in the right context to truly showcase his prowess as a guitarist. Taking advantage of his position as staff producer for Columbia Records, Kooper enlisted  keyboardist Barry Goldberg and bassist Harvey Brooks (both of which had been Bloomfield's bandmates in the Electric Flag), as well as ace studio drummer Eddie Hoh for a series of taped jam sessions. Although Bloomfield himself went AWOL midway through the sessions, the quintet managed to get several outstanding tracks recorded, including Albert's Shuffle, which opens the LP. As originally released, several tracks included horn overdubs added by Kooper to fill out the sound. In 2003, two of these tracks, including Albert's Shuffle, were included with the horns removed as bonus tracks on the CD version of the Super Session album.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix/Gypsy Sun & Rainbows
Title:    Isabella
Source:    CD: Woodstock Two
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Atlantic (original label: Cotillion)
Year:    Recorded 1969, released 1972
    After disbanding the Experience in June of 1969, Jimi Hendrix retreated to the eight-bedroom 'Ashokan House' in the hamlet of Boiceville near Woodstock in upstate New York, where he found himself jamming with a larger group of musicians (including a rhythm guitarist, Jerry Lee) than he had previously had the opportunity to work with. He took this group (which he referred to onstage as Gypsy Sun and Rainbows) with him to the Woodstock Festival in June, where they performed several new numbers Hendrix was working on, including a song called Isabella. A studio version of the song was recorded the following year, and is now considered to be part of a double LP Hendrix planned to release in 1971. Meanwhile the live recording of Isabella, which was not included on the Woodstock soundtrack album, ended up being released on the album Woodstock Two in 1972.

Artist:    Grateful Dead
Title:    Friend Of The Devil
Source:    CD: Skeletons From The Closet (originally released on LP: American Beauty)
Writer(s):    Garcia/Dawson/Hunter
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1970
    The Grateful Dead spent three years and four albums trying to capture the energy of their live performances on vinyl. Having finally succeeded with the 1969 Live Dead album the group began to focus more on their songwriting capabilities. The result was two outstanding studio albums, both released in 1970: Workingman's Dead and American Beauty. Of the two, American Beauty is made up almost entirely of songs played on acoustic instruments, including pedal steel guitar, which was played by Jerry Garcia. One of the best-known tracks on American Beauty is Friend Of The Devil, which lyricist Robert Hunter referred to as "the closest we've come to what may be a classic song."

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Love Her Madly
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1971    
    Released as a single in advance of the 1971 Doors album L.A. Woman, Love Her Madly was a major success, peaking just outside the top 10 in the US, and going all the way to the #3 spot in Canada. The album itself was a return to a more blues-based sound by the Doors, a change that did not sit well with producer Paul Rothchild, who left the project early on, leaving engineer Bruce Botnik to assume production duties. Rothchild's opinion aside, it was exactly what the Doors needed to end their run (in their original four man incarnation) on a positive note. 

Artist:    Lighthouse
Title:    Sunny Days
Source:    Mono 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Skip Prokop
Label:    Evolution
Year:    1972
    After three albums for RCA Victor, the Toronto based Lighthouse changed labels, at the same time undergoing personnel changes that resulted in the band having a new front man, Bob McBride. Five of the original members, including drummer Skip Prokop, remained with the band, which had its greatest success on the Evolution label with the hits One Fine Morning and Sunny Days, both written by Prokop. Not long after the release of Sunny Days in 1972 Prokop decided to retire from live performing, although he did stay on as executive producer. When sessions began in New York for the 1973 album Can You Feel It, McBride was nowhere to be found and was subsequently fired from the band. Although Lighthouse continues as a working band to this day, they've never been able to equal the success of their Evolution years.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    Over The Hills And Far Away
Source:    CD: Houses Of The Holy
Writer(s):    Page/Plant
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1973
    Although it was released in 1973 on the album Houses Of The Holy, Over The Hills And Far Away actually dates back to the 1970 songwriting sessions at Bron-Y-Aur that produced most of the music for the Led Zeppelin III album. The band started playing the song in concert in 1972 and released it as a single in advance of the Houses Of The Holy album in early 1973. Although it only got a lukewarm reception from the rock press when it was first released, Over The Hills And Far Away has since come to be regarded as one of Led Zeppelin's top songs, making several "best of" lists over the years. 

Artist:    Genesis
Title:    Horizons
Source:    CD: Foxtrot
Writer(s):    Banks/Collins/Gabriel/Hackett/Rutherford
Label:    Rhino/Atlantic (original label: Charisma)
Year:    1972
    Although credited to the entire band, Horizons is a short acoustic guitar instrumental written by Steve Hackett, who is the only member of Genesis to actually play on the track. The tune, based on a piece by J.S. Bach, opens side two of the 1972 LP Foxtrot.

Artist:    Uriah Heep
Title:    Dreamer
Source:    CD: Sweet Freedom
Writer(s):    Thain/Box
Label:    Sequel (original US label: Warner Brothers)
Year:    1973
     Even though Uriah Heep was known for their high energy rock, there always seemed to be one song on each album that managed to rock out even harder than the rest of them. On the band's sixth LP, Sweet Freedom, that song was Dreamer, the album's opening track. Co-written by guitarist Mick Box and bassist Gary Thain (the only known collaboration between the two), Dreamer has an energy level that approaches frenetic, especially on the song's fadeout ending. Wild stuff!

Artist:    Captain Beyond
Title:    Dancing Madly Backward (On A Sea Of Air)/Armworth/Myopic Void
Source:    LP: Captain Beyond
Writer(s):    Evans/Caldwell
Label:    Capricorn
Year:    1972
    Never in my life have I been as impressed with a band I had never heard of before seeing them perform live as I was with Captain Beyond when I saw them in El Paso in 1972. They were so good I barely remember how the second band, Jo Jo Gunne sounded, and I'd totally forgotten who the actual headliner was (it turns out it was Alice Cooper). The next day I went out and bought Captain Beyond's debut LP and immediately saw on the back cover the words "Dedicated to the memory of Duane Allman". That was, for me, simply icing on an already tasty cake. Captain Beyond opened their set the same way they opened the album itself, with Bobby Caldwell's solo drum rift setting things up for Larry (Rhino) Reinhardt's opening power chords, played in unison with Lee Dorman's bass. Rod Evans's vocals were every bit as good, if not better, than they had been when he was an original member of Deep Purple, and the group was so tight it sounded like you were listening to the album itself. The first three songs, Dancing Madly Backward (On A Sea Of Air), Armworth and Myopic Void play as a single piece. Although all the songs are officially credited only to Evans and Caldwell, it turns out that there were contractual issues concerning Reinhardt and Dorman's status as members of Iron Butterfly at the time that prevented them from sharing songwriting credits on the Captain Beyond LP.
 

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2630 (starts 7/20/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/627230

    This week's show, recorded five years ago but never broadcast, features some rather obscure tunes at the beginning, but quickly settles into more familiar territory, including an artists' set from the Rolling Stones, before moving on to Iron Butterfly's most famous song. From there it gets interesting, ending with a nearly eight minute long track from Eric Burdon and War.

Artist:    Action
Title:    I'll Keep Holding On
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):    Hunter/Stevenson
Label:    Rhino (original label: Parlophone)
Year:    1966
    The Action was probably the most popular band among the so-called Mods in mid-60s London. Formed in 1963 Kentish Town as the Boys, the group recorded a pair of singles before changing their name to the Action in 1965. Following the name change the band came to the attention of producer George Martin, who signed the group to his AIR production company, releasing several successful singles on the Parlophone label. The second of these was I'll Keep Holding On, which had been a minor hit for the Marvelettes in the US. The Action version, while remaining faithful to the original in terms of vocals, placed a greater emphasis on the instrumental parts, especially the guitar and drums. 

Artist:    Yellow Payges
Title:    Our Time Is Running Out
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jimmy Webb
Label:    Rhino (original label: Uni)
Year:    1967
    Why the Yellow Payges were never a household name is a bit of a mystery. They were the headliner of Dick Clark's Happening '67 tour of 45 cities in 45 days, they were signed to a major record label, and they recorded songs by established songwriters like Jimmy Webb, yet they never were able to make a sizable dent on the top 40 charts. Maybe the timing was just wrong. Or it could have been the constantly fluctuating lineup of the band itself, that at one time included the son of Mickey Rooney. But most likely it was the strategic blunder of appearing in a series of commercial for (who else?) the Yellow Pages. According to founder and lead vocalist Dan Hortter "We were put in these hideous yellow satin ruffled shirts with black velvet pants, and did these ridiculous commercials. It pretty much destroyed everything we worked so hard to accomplish." Our Time Is Running Out was their first single for Uni, released in December of 1967.

Artist:    Beacon Street Union
Title:    Now I Taste The Tears
Source:    Mono CD: The Clown Died In Marvin Gardens
Writer(s):    Clifford
Label:    See For Miles (original label: M-G-M)
Year:    1968
    The second LP from the Beacon Street Union, The Clown Died In Marvin Gardens, was a departure from the sound of the band's first album. If anything, it featured an even more eclectic mix of songs than The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union, including the humorous King of the Jungle and a nearly 17 minute version of Baby, Please Don't Go. The band took an R&B turn with the closing track on side one of the LP, Now I Taste The Tears, which features a horn section led by band member Robert Rhodes.

Artist:    Humble Pie
Title:    Down Home Again
Source:    LP: Lost And Found (originally released in UK on LP: Town And Country)
Writer(s):    Steve Marriott
Label:    A&M (original label: Immediate)
Year:    1969
    Released only three months after the band's debut LP, Humble Pie's Town And Country was a mostly acoustic departure from the group's hard rock sound. Guitarist/vocalist Steve Marriott's compsitions such as Down Home Again actually took on a country-rock vibe. The album itself came out just as Immediate Records was going out of business; as a result the album got no promotion, or even a US release from the label. The two Immediate albums were eventually released in the US in 1973 as a double-LP called Lost And Found on A&M Records.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience (II)
Title:    Lover Man
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Experience Hendrix/Legacy/Sundazed
Year:    1970
    When the original Jimi Hendrix Experience made its US debut at the Monterey International Pop Festival in June of 1967, they opened with a fast-paced high-energy version of the Muddy Waters classic Killing Floor. In fact, except for the lyrics, Hendrix's arrangement of the song was essentially a brand-new song. Hendrix must have realized at some point that all he had to do is write new lyrics for the tune to create an entirely new composition, because he made not one, but two recordings of what came to be called Lover Man. The first was made prior to the recording of the Band Of Gypsys live album in late 1969, while the later version heard here features his final power trio, consisting of Hendrix, bassist Billy Cox and drummer Mitch Mitchell, who were already being billed as the Jimi Hendrix Experience when they recorded the song in 1970.

Artist:    Simon And Garfunkel
Title:    Homeward Bound
Source:    LP: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1966
    Following the success of Sounds Of Silence, Paul Simon And Art Garfunkel set about making an album of all new material (Sounds Of Silence had featured several re-recorded versions of tunes from the 1965 British album The Paul Simon Songbook). The result was Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, one of the finest folk-rock albums ever recorded. The album contained several successful singles, including Homeward Bound.

Artist:     Buffalo Springfield
Title:     Broken Arrow
Source:     LP: Retrospective-The Best Of Buffalo Springfield (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again)
Writer:     Neil Young
Label:     Atco
Year:     1967
    The most experimental track ever to appear on a Buffalo Springfield album, Broken Arrow is basically a Neil Young solo piece with orchestra, arranged and co-produced by Jack Nitzsche. The track uses extensive editing and studio effects to highlight Young's highly personal lyrics. 

Artist:     Spirit
Title:     Free Spirit
Source:     CD: Spirit (bonus track)
Writer:     John Locke
Label:     Ode/Epic/Legacy
Year:     1967
     When Spirit entered the recording studio to work on their first album they recorded more music than they could fit on an LP. One of the tracks that got cut from the final lineup was Free Spirit, an instrumental piece written by keyboardist John Locke. Like most of Spirit's early material, Free Spirit incorporates jazz into the band's sound to a much greater degree than on later recordings.

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

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Mother's Little Helper
Source:    Mono CD: Flowers 
Writer:    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1966
    By 1966 the Rolling Stones had already had a few brushes with the law over their use of illegal drugs. Mother's Little Helper, released in Spring of '66, is a scathing criticism of the abuse of legal prescription drugs by the parents of the Stones' fans. Perhaps more than any other song of the time, Mother's Little Helper illustrates the increasingly hostile generation gap that had sprung up between the young baby boomers and the previous generation.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    You Can't Always Get What You Want
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1969
    When the Rolling Stones called for singers to back them up on their recording of You Can't Always Get What You Want, they expected maybe 30 to show up. Instead they got twice that many, and ended up using them all on the record. The song, which also features Al Kooper on organ, was orginally released as the B side of Honky Tonk Women in 1969. In the mid-1970s, after the Stones had established their own record label, Allen Klein, who had bought the rights to the band's pre-1970 recordings, reissued the single, this time promoting You Can't Always Get What You Want as the A side. Klein's strategy worked and the song ended up making the top 40.

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    Tombstone Blues
Source:    Mono CD: The Best Of The Original Mono Recordings (originally released on LP: Highway 61 Revisited)
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1965
    One of the most influential albums in rock history was Bob Dylan's 1965 LP Highway 61 Revisited. Although he had experimented with adding electric guitar, bass and drums to some of the songs on his previous album, Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited was his first LP to feature electric instruments on every track. Of these, the most notable was probably the guitar work of Michael Bloomfield, who would soon come to prominence as lead guitarist for the Butterfield Blues Band. Bloomfield's work is most prominent on blues-based tracks such as Tombstone Blues, which follows the classic Like A Rolling Stone on side one of the original LP.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    And I Like It (alternate version)
Source:    CD: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off (bonus track)
Writer:    Balin/Kantner
Label:    RCA/BMG Heritage
Year:    1966
    Jorma Kaukonen was giving guitar lessons when he was approached by Marty Balin about joining a new band that Balin was forming. Kaukonen said yes and became a founding member of Jefferson Airplane. The two seldom collaborated on songwriting, though. One of the few examples of a Balin/Kaukonen composition is And I Like It, the track that closes out the band's first album. A few months later, just prior to the album's release, drummer Skip Spence left the Airplane to co-found Moby Grape, and the band recruited experienced jazz drummer Spencer Dryden as his replacement. This longer version of And I Like It, recorded in July of 1966, is one of the first recordings to include Dryden as a member of the band.

Artist:    Otis Redding
Title:    Mr. Pitiful
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    Redding/Cropper
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1965
    Otis Redding got his first big break when he recorded These Arms Of Mine in late 1962. The song took off on the R&B charts the following year, eventually selling over 800,000 copies. Redding followed the song up with a series of R&B hits in the same slow soulful style, leading one music critic to dub him Mr. Pitiful. Redding, always one to recognize an opportunity, took the title and, along with co-writer Steve Cropper, came up with his first up-tempo hit in 1965. By the time of his death in late 1967 Redding had established himself as one of the top R&B acts in the country, and, thanks to a electrifying set at the Monterey International Pop Festival in June of 1967, was well on the way to becoming a major star on top 40 radio as well. 
    
Artist:    Iron Butterfly
Title:    In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida
Source:    CD: In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida
Writer(s):    Doug Ingle
Label:    Atco
Year:    1969
    I think there is a law on the books somewhere that says I need to play the full version of Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida at least once a year to retain the show's psychedelic cred, so here it is.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Not Guilty
Source:    CD: Anthology 3
Writer(s):    George Harrison
Label:    Capitol/Apple
Year:    Recorded 1968, released 1996
    One of the most legendary unreleased Beatles recordings, Not Guilty was written by George Harrison after returning from the band members' spiritual retreat in Rishikesh, India, where they studied Transcendental Meditation under Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The song addresses his growing dissatisfaction with his role in the band, while defending himself against accusations that he led the group "astray on the road to Mandalay". The recording process was a difficult one, taking over 100 takes to get right, and even then Harrison was unsatisfied with the final recording, which may explain why the song, originally slated for inclusion on the White Album, remained unreleased for nearly 30 years.

Artist:    Grass Roots
Title:    Dinner For Eight
Source:    LP: Feelings
Writer(s):    Creed Bratton
Label:    Dunhill
Year:    1968
    The battle between the desires of recording artists for more creative freedom and record company people for more hit records is about as old as the music industry itself. As recorded music became more popular in the 1960s the battle intensified. Sometimes the artists won. More often it was the record companies. On occasion, the artist would have a brief window of opportunity to show they could succeed doing it their own way, only to have the door shut on them when things didn't work out as well as planned. So it was with the Grass Roots. The most famous incarnation of the band actually started off as a local L.A. band called the 13th Floor. When the first Grass Roots lineup balked at the demands made on them by their producers and left town, those producers, P.F. Sloan and Steve Barri, promptly went out and hired the 13th Floor to become the new Grass Roots. After some success in 1967 with the hit song Let's Live For Today and a couple of lesser hits, the band demanded, and got, the opportunity to do an album their own way. The result was Feelings, which featured several songs such as Dinner For Eight that were written by the band member themselves. Unfortunately for the band, Feelings did not perform well commercially, and from that point on the Grass Roots did things the Sloan-Barri way. As it turns out, the Sloan-Barri way led to lots and lots of hit singles, but little respect within the rock community itself.

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:    Spooky Tooth
Title:    Tobacco Road
Source:    LP: Spooky Tooth
Writer(s):    J.D. Loudermilk
Label:    Bell
Year:    1968
    Spooky Tooth was formed in 1967, when American organist Gary Wright hooked up with a British band that had been known as the V.I.P.s, but had recently renamed themselves Art. They released one LP, Supernatural Fairy Tales, before changing their name to Spooky Tooth in 1968. Unlike most other bands (Procol Harum being a notable exception), Spooky Tooth featured two keyboardists, Wright on organ and Mike Harrison on piano, in addition to the usual guitar (Luther Grosvenor) bass (Greg Ridley and drums (Mike Kellie). This lineup recorded two albums as Spooky Tooth, before Ridley left to join Humble Pie. The longest track on their debut LP, It's All About (self-titled in the US) was a cover version of J.D. Loudermilk's Tobacco, slowed down Vanilla Fudge style. Apparently someone at the record company liked it, because the album itself was retitled Tobacco Road for its 1972 re-release in the UK. Wright would go on to greater fame as a solo artist with his international hits Dream Weaver and Love Is Alive in the mid-1970s.

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. Besides, it's July. Gotta play it.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Funny Face
Source:    LP: Something Else
Writer(s):    Dave Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1967
    Kinks lead guitarist Dave Davies has always been overshadowed by his brother, bandmate Ray Davies. Nonetheless, Dave has the second most writing credits among the band members, and nearly every Kinks album had at least one of his own compositions. The younger Davies actually flirted with a solo career in 1967 when his song Death Of A Clown was released under his own name. The song was included on the next Kinks album, Something Else, along with two more of Dave's compositions. One of those, Funny Face, is notable for its unusual time and tempo changes. 

Artist:    Al Kooper/Mike Bloomfield/Barry Goldberg/Harvey Brooks/Eddie Hoh
Title:    Albert's Shuffle
Source:    LP: Super Session
Writer(s):    Bloomfield/Kooper
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1968
    There is no doubt that one of the most important and influential albums of the late 1960s was the Super Session album. Released in 1968, the album was conceived in part because keyboardist/producer Al Kooper felt that Michael Bloomfield had never been recorded in the right context to truly showcase his prowess as a guitarist. Taking advantage of his position as staff producer for Columbia Records, Kooper enlisted  keyboardist Barry Goldberg and bassist Harvey Brooks (both of which had been Bloomfield's bandmates in the Electric Flag), as well as ace studio drummer Eddie Hoh for a series of taped jam sessions. Although Bloomfield himself went AWOL midway through the sessions, the quintet managed to get several outstanding tracks recorded, including Albert's Shuffle, which opens the LP. As originally released, several tracks included horn overdubs added by Kooper to fill out the sound. In 2003, two of these tracks, including Albert's Shuffle, were included with the horns removed as bonus tracks on the CD version of the Super Session album.

Artist:    Eric Burdon And War
Title:    The Vision Of Rassan
Source:    LP: Eric Burdon Declares War
Writer(s):    Burdon/Miller/Scott/Dickerson/Jordan/Brown/Allen/Oskar
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1970
    In 1969 record producer Jerry Goldstein, went to see a band called Nightshift that was backing up blues singer (and L.A. Rams Defensive End) Deacon Jones in a Los Angeles night club called the Rag Doll. He contacted vocalist Eric Burdon, who had recently disbanded the Animals and was looking to get more into an R&B groove, and introduced him to the band. They soon began recording together as Eric Burdon And War, releasing the album Eric Burdon Declares War in 1970. The opening track, The Vision Of Rassan, is a two-part paeon to jazz multi-instrumentalist Roland Kirk, who had recently started calling himself Raahsan Roland Kirk.