Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2617 (starts 4/20/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/615653

    This week we present an entire side of a band that usually gets featured on our companion show, Rockin' in the Days of Confusion, along with a long battle of 60s songwriting superstars. And speaking of long, we have opening sequences from a couple of different albums along with lots of cool tracks ranging from 1964 to 1970, including Eric Clapton's last single with the Yardbirds and the opening track of his first album with John Mayall.

Artist:    Spencer Davis Group
Title:    I'm A Man
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer:    Winwood/Miller
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1967
    The Spencer Davis Group, featuring brothers Steve and Muff Winwood, was one of the UK's most successful white R&B bands of the sixties, cranking out a steady stream of hit singles. Two of them, the iconic Gimme Some Lovin' and I'm A Man, were also major hits in the US, the latter being the last song to feature the Winwood brothers. Muff Winwood became a successful record producer. The group itself continued on for several years, but were never able to duplicate their earlier successes. As for Steve Winwood, he quickly faded off into obscurity, never to be heard from again. Except as the leader of Traffic. And a member of Blind Faith. And Traffic again. And some critically-acclaimed collaborations in the early 1980s with Asian musicians. Oh yeah, and a few major solo hits like Back In The High Life Again and Roll With It in the late 80s. Other than that, nothing.

Artist:    Tol-Puddle Martyrs
Title:    Time Will Come
Source:    Mono CD: Tol-Pubble Martyrs (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Peter Rechter
Label:    Secret Deals (original labels: Pacific/Spiral)
Year:    1967
    The Tol-Puddle Martyrs' Time Will Come was originally released in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia on the Pacific label, until the owner of the Pacific label was informed that there was already a Pacific label operating in Melbourne. At that time the label was hastily changed to Spiral, with the record having the same catalogue number. Although not a popular release at the time, both Time Will Come and its B side, Social Cell, are now considered classic examples of garage-rock, Australian style.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Change Is Now
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer:    McGuinn/Hillman
Label:    Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1967
    1967 saw the departure of two of the Byrds' founders and most prolific songwriters: Gene Clark and David Crosby. The loss of Clark coincided with the emergence of Chris Hillman as a first-rate songwriter in his own right; the loss of Crosby later in the year, however, created an extra burden for Hillman and Roger McGuinn, who from that point on were the band's primary composers. Change Is Now was the B side of the band's first post-Crosby single, released in late 1967 and later included (in a stereo version) on their 1968 LP The Notorious Byrd Brothers.

Artist:    Pretty Things
Title:    Don't Bring Me Down
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: Golden Days Of British Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Johnnie Dee
Label:    Sire (original label: Fontana)
Year:    1964
    Once upon a time in London there was a band called Little Boy Blue And The Blue Boys. Well, it wasn't really so much a band as a bunch of schoolkids jamming in guitarist Dick Taylor's parents' garage on a semi-regular basis. In addition to Taylor, the group included classmate Mick Jagger and eventually another guitarist by the name of Keith Richards. When yet another guitarist, Brian Jones, entered the picture, the band, which was still an amateur outfit, began calling itself the Rollin' Stones. Taylor switched from guitar to bass to accomodate Jones, but when the Stones decided to add a "g" and go pro in late 1962, Taylor opted to stay in school. It wasn't long, however, before Taylor, now back on guitar, showed up on the scene with a new band called the Pretty Things. Fronted by vocalist Phil May, the Things were rock and roll bad boys like the Stones, except more so. Their second single, Don't Bring Me Down, was their biggest hit single, making it into the British top 10 in late 1964. As was the case with all the Pretty Things' records, Don't Bring Me Down was unable to crack the US charts.     

Artist:    Yardbirds
Title:    For Your Love
Source:    Mono CD: British Beat (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Graham Gouldman
Label:    K-Tel (original label: Epic)
Year:    1965
    The last Yardbirds song to feature guitarist Eric Clapton, For Your Love was the group's first US hit, peaking in the #6 slot. The song did even better in the UK, peaking at #3. Following its release, Clapton left the Yardbirds, citing the band's move toward a more commercial sound and this song in particular as reasons for his departure (ironic when you consider songs like his mid-90s hit Change the World or his slowed down lounge lizard version of Layla). For Your Love was written by Graham Gouldman, who would end up as a member of Wayne Fontana's Mindbenders and later 10cc with Kevin Godley and Lol Creme.

Artist:    John Mayall with Eric Clapton
Title:    All Your Love
Source:    Mono LP: Blues Breakers
Writer(s):    Otis Rush
Label:    London
Year:    1966
    Eric Clapton left the Yardbirds following the release of For Your Love, decrying the band's move toward a more commercial sound. Looking for a more blues-based group, Clapton soon hooked up with John Mayall, who already already released a well-received live LP. The two of them, with Jack Bruce on bass, recorded a live set at the Flamingo club that they hoped to release as an album, but the quality of the recordings was poor and the project was scrapped. In March of 1966, John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, which by now included John McVie on bass and drummer Hughie Flint, went into the studio to record the album Blues Breakers. Although there are a few original songs on the album by both Mayall and Clapton, the bulk of the material was covers of blues classics such as All Your Love, which opens the LP. The song was originally recorded in 1958 by Otis Rush and is generally considered to be the most well-known of Rush's compositions.

Artist:    13th Floor Elevators
Title:    Slip Inside This House
Source:    British import CD: Easter Everywhere
Writer(s):    Hall/Erickson
Label:    Charly (original US label: International Artists)
Year:    1967
    The 13th Floor Elevators returned from their only California tour in time to celebrate Christmas of 1966 in their native Texas. Not long after that things began to fall apart for the band. Much of this can be attributed to bad management, but at least some of the problems were internal in nature. Lead guitarist Stacy Southerland was caught with marijuana in the trunk of his car, thus causing his probation to be revoked, which in turn meant he was not allowed to leave the Lone Star state. This in turn caused the entire rhythm section to head off for San Francisco, leaving Southerland, along with electric juggest Tommy Hall and vocalist Roky Erickson, to find replacement members in time to start work on the band's second album, Easter Everywhere. Despite this, the album itself came out remarkably well, and is now considered a high point of the psychedelic era. Unlike the first 13th Floor Elevators album, Easter Everywhere was designed to be a primarily spiritual work. Nowhere is this more evident than on the album's opening track, the eight-minute epic Slip Inside This House. Written primarily by Hall, Slip Inside This House was intended to "establish the syncretic concepts behind Western and Eastern religions, science and mysticism, and consolidate them into one body of work that would help redefine the divine essence". While whether he succeeded or not is a matter of opinion, the track itself is certainly worth hearing for yourself. Enjoy.
    
Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Tie Me Down
Source:    German import CD: Wooden Head
Writer(s):    David Gates
Label:    Repertoire (original US label: White Whale)
Year:    1970
    Rather than continue butting heads with the shirts at White Whale Records, the Turtles chose to disband around 1970 or so, with Howard Kaylan, Mark Volman and Jim Pons hooking up with Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention in time to record the classic Fillmore East – June 1971 album. Meanwhile White Whale, which didn't have any other successful artists on its roster, dug up a bunch of B sides and unreleased recordings to put together an album called Wooden Head. Many of the tracks used came from the group's early years, including Tie Me Down. The song was written by David Gates, who would go on the achieve star status as the front man for Bread in the 1970s.

Artist:    Love
Title:    I'm With You
Source:    LP: Four Sail
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1969
    Following the success of the top 40 single 7&7 Is in 1966, the members of Love were faced with a choice: go on tour on the chance that they might gain a national following or stay in Los Angeles, where, as the house band at the Whisky a Go Go, they were kings of the Sunset Strip. They chose the latter, which led to unexpected consequences. Some of the band members became deeply involved in the local drug scene, which caused them to show up unprepared when it came time to record Love's third LP, Forever Changes. Although they did manage to get their act together in time to finish the album, and one subsequent single, the band's two songwriting members, Arthur Lee and Bryan MacLean, were increasingly distrustful of their bandmates. MacLean soon left the band for a solo career and Lee, as bandleader, fired everyone else. This left Lee with a problem, however, as Love was contractually obligated to provide Elektra Records with one more LP. Lee quickly assembled a new version of Love consisting of guitarist Jay Donnellan, drummer George Suranovich and bassist Frank Fayad, and used his own money to rent equipment to record a total of 27 songs with the new group. He then gave Elektra first choice of ten songs, which became the 1969 album Love Four Sail. Other than enhancing the tracks with reverb, Elektra used the songs as originally recorded and produced by Lee, without any remixing or overdubs. The result is a very personal sounding album, as can be heard on tracks like I'm With You.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    Dharma For One
Source:    CD: This Was
Writer(s):    Anderson/Bunker
Label:    Chrysalis/Capitol (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    By 1968 it was almost considered mandatory that a rock band would include a drum solo on at least one album, thanks to Ginger Baker's Toad (on Cream's Wheels Of Fire) and Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. Jethro Tull's contribution to the trend was Dharma For One, the only Tull song to give a writing credit to drummer Clive Bunker. Compared to most drum solos, Bunker's is fairly short (less than two minutes) and somewhat quirky, almost resembling a Spike Jones recording in places. 

Artist:    Janis Ian
Title:    Pro-Girl
Source:    LP: Janis Ian
Writer(s):    Janis Ian
Label:    Polydor (original label: Verve Forecast)
Year:    1967
    It took guts for a fifteen-year-old to write and record a song that is basically an open letter to a prostitute. It took maturity to do it without either condoning or condemning that kind of life. Janis Ian displayed both with the song Pro-Girl on her 1967 debut LP.
    
Artist:    Santana
Title:    Singing Winds, Crying Beasts/Black Magic Woman/Gypsy Queen/Oye Como Va
Source:    CD: Abraxas
Writer:    Carabello/Green/Szabo/Puente
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1970
    To finish out the first hour we have one of the greatest opening sequences in the history of rock: the first fifteen minutes of Santana's second LP, Abraxas, presented uncut in its entirety.

Artist:    Ventures
Title:    War Of The Satellites
Source:    LP: The Ventures In Space
Writer(s):    Danny Hamilton
Label:    Dolton/Sundazed
Year:    1964
    Despite having only three top 10 singles to their credit (two of which were different versions of Walk-Don't Run), the Ventures managed to record over 200 albums, by far the most by an instrumental rock band. Most of these albums were based around a particular theme; indeed, the Ventures are generally acknowledged to have invented the concept album. One of their most unusual albums was The Ventures In Space, from 1964. Joining the band for this effort was noted session man Red Rhodes, who created many of the album's unusual sounds using a pedal steel guitar. In fact, all of the effects heard on tracks like War Of The Satellites were created using just guitars, rather than electronic devices such as a theramin. Quite an achievement for 1964, and one that holds up remarkably well nearly 50 years later.

This week I thought it might be fun to have a battle of bands vs. a duo, but that whole concept sounded a bit awkward. Then I realized that all the songs I had selected were self-penned, and that the songwriters in question are considered among the greatest in rock history. Thus we have a battle of 60s superstar songwriters, specifically Paul Simon and the team of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Enjoy!

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Honky Tonk Women
Source:    Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London) 
Year:    1969
    After revitalizing their career with Jumpin' Jack Flash and Street Fighting Man in 1968, the Rolling Stones delivered the coup-de-grace the following year with a true monster of a hit: the classic Honky Tonk Women. The song was the first single without Brian Jones, who had been found dead in his swimming pool not long after being kicked out of the band. Jones's replacement, Mick Taylor (fresh from a stint with blues legend John Mayall), plays slide guitar on the track.

Artist:    Simon And Garfunkel
Title:    Punky's Dilemma
Source:    LP: Bookends
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1968
    Originally written specifically for the 1967 soundtrack of the movie The Graduate but rejected by the producers, Punky's Dilemma sat on the shelf until the following year, when it became the only track on side two of Simon And Garfunkel's Bookends LP that had not been previously released. The lyrics are about as psychedelic as Paul Simon ever got.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Back Street Girl
Source:    CD:  Flowers
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1967
    Back Street Girl is a tune that was originally released on the British version of the 1967 LP Between The Buttons, but left off the US album. Instead, the tune appeared later the same year on the US-only album Flowers. The album itself was a mixture of new and previously released material; in fact, half the songs on Flowers had already appeared on the US versions of Aftermath and Between The Buttons, while several more (including Back Street Girl) were available in the UK. This led critics to initially dismiss Flowers as a promotional ploy, but in more recent years the album has been recognized as a strong collection of songs based on the social scene surrounding the band itself. 
        
Artist:     Simon and Garfunkel
Title:     Somewhere They Can't Find Me
Source:     CD: Collected Works (originally released on LP: Sounds of Silence)
Writer:     Paul Simon
Label:     Columbia
Year:     1966
    Simon and Garfunkel's success as a folk-rock duo was actually due to the unauthorized actions of producer Tom Wilson, who, after working on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited album, got some of the musicians who had worked on that album to add new backing tracks to The Sound of Silence. The song had been recorded as an acoustic number for the album Wednesday Morning 3AM, which had, by 1965, been deleted from the Columbia catalog. The new version of the song was sent out to select radio stations, and got such positive response that it was released as a single, eventually making the top 10. Meanwhile, Paul Simon, who had since moved to London and recorded an album called the Paul Simon Songbook, found himself returning to the US and reuniting with Art Garfunkel. Armed with an array of quality studio musicians they set about making their first electric album, Sounds of Silence. The song Somewhere They Can't Find Me was one of the new songs recorded for that album. From a lyrical standpoint, the song is actually a reworking of the title track of Wednesday Morning 3AM. Musically, the song shows a strong influence from British folk guitarists Bert Jansch and Davey Graham, both of whom Simon greatly admired.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Paint It Black
Source:    Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1966
    The 1966 Rolling Stones album Aftermath was the first to be made up entirely of songs written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. The opening track of the LP, however, was not included on the British version of the album. That song, the iconic Paint It, Black, had already been released in the UK as a single, and would go on to become one of the Stones' defining recordings of the era.

Artist:    Simon And Garfunkel
Title:    We've Got A Groovey Thing Goin'
Source:    CD: Collected Works (originally released as 45 RPM B side and included on LP: Sounds Of Silence)
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1965
    In late 1965, a New York based Columbia Records staff producer, Tom Wilson, decided to perform an experiment. He had just put the finishing touches on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited album, and was high on the potential of integrating electric rock instruments into folk music. Around this same time, The Sound Of Silence, a song by the folk duo Simon & Garfunkel that Wilson had produced the previous year, had begun to get airplay on radio stations in Boston and throughout the state of Florida. Without the knowledge of the duo (who had by then split up) Wilson remixed the song, adding electric guitar, bass and drums, essentially creating a whole new version of the song and, for that matter, a whole new genre: folk-rock. The new electric version of The Sound of Silence, backed by We've Got a Groovey Thing Goin', was released in September of 1965, and it soon became obvious that it was going to be a hit. The only problem was that by the time all this happened, Simon and Garfunkel had gone their separate ways, briefly reuniting in April of 1965 to record We've Got a Groovey Thing Going, but not releasing it at the time. Simon had relocated to London and recorded a UK-only LP called the Paul Simon Songbook in June of 1965, releasing it two months later. By mid-November The Sound Of Silence was the #1 song in Boston, and had entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Simon returned to the states, got back together with Art Garfunkel and, on December 13, 1965 began recording tracks for a new album. On January 1, 1966 The Sound Of Silence hit the #1 spot on the Hot 100. Two weeks later the LP Sounds Of Silence, which included a new stereo mix of We've Got A Groovey Thing Going made from the original 4-track master tape, was released. By the way, this song is the only instance I know of of the word "groovy" being spelled "groovey". 

Artist:    Grateful Dead
Title:    Dupree's Diamond Blues
Source:    CD: Aoxomoxoa
Writer(s):    Hunter/Garcia/Lesh
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1969
    The third Grateful Dead LP, Aoxomoxoa, was one of the first albums to be recorded using state-of-the-art sixteen track equipment, and the band, in the words of guitarist Jerry Garcia, "tended to put too much on everything...A lot of the music was just lost in the mix, a lot of what was really there." Garcia and bassist Phil Lesh would return to the master tapes in 1971, remixing the entire album for the version that has appeared on vinyl and CD ever since then. In 2010, however, Warner Brothers and Rhino released a limited edition pressing of the original mix on vinyl as part of a five album box set and made a standalone version of the LP available a year later.  All of the music on Aoxomoxoa, including Dupree's Diamond Blues (which was also released as a single) is credited to guitarist Jerry Garcia and bassist Phil Lesh, with lyrics by poet Robert Hunter. 

Artist:    Steppenwolf
Title:    Magic Carpet Ride
Source:    LP: Vintage  Rock (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf The Second)
Writer(s):    Moreve/Kay
Label:    K-Tel (original label: Dunhill)
Year:    1968
    Steppenwolf's second top 10 single was Magic Carpet Ride, a song that combines feedback, prominent organ work by Goldy McJohn and an updated Bo Diddly beat with psychedelic lyrics. Along with Born To Be Wild, Magic Carpet Ride (co-written by vocalist John Kay and bassist Rushton Moreve) has become one of the defining songs of both Steppenwolf and the late 1960s.

Artist:    Genesis
Title:    From Genesis To Revelation (side one)
Source:    British import LP: In The Beginning
Writer(s):    Banks/Gabriel/Phillips/Rutherford
Label:    Decca
Year:    1969
    In 1967 a group of students from the Charterhouse School in the market town of Godalming, Surrey (about 30 miles southwest of London) recorded some demos, which found their way into the hands of Charterhouse alumni Jonathan King, who in 1965 had an international hit single with his own composition Everyone's Gone To The Moon. King, who was now looking to become a producer, booked studio time for the group, which consisted of guitarist Anthony Phillips, bassist Mike Rutherford, lead vocalist Peter Gabriel, keyboardist Tony Banks, and drummer Chris Stewart. They hadn't come up with a name for themselves yet, so King gave them one: Genesis. After recording a pair of light pop singles, King felt the band was ready to begin working on a full-length LP, but felt that Stewart's drumming wasn't up to par. On King's recommendation, Stewart was replaced by John Silver, whose drumming can be heard on From Genesis To Revelation. The album was initially a flop, reportedly selling less than 700 copies, and causing the group to disband, their contract with the British Decca label having been fulfilled. A few months later Phillips, Rutherford, Gabriel and Banks, who by then had graduated from high school, decided to reboot the band with yet another drummer, John Mayhew, who played on the 1970 album Trespass. Both Mayhew and Phillips (who suffered from stage fright) would leave the band following the recording of Trespass, to be replaced by guitarist Steve Hackett and drummer Phil Collins, thus completing the classic Genesis lineup.
 

Rockin' the Earth Days of Confusion # 2617 (starts 4/20/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/615651

    This week, in celebration of Earth Day, we take a look back at some of the earliest songs to show an awareness of environmental issues. The first set is pretty straightforward, with Joni Mitchell's original studio version of Big Yellow Taxi setting the tone. Our second set is more speculative, with songwriters like Jimi Hendrix and Neil Young letting their imaginations run wild. We wrap up the show with a 13-minute long version of Memphis Slim's classic Mother Earth, from the album Eric Burdon Declares War. Here's the complete lineup:

Artist:    Joni Mitchell
Title:    Big Yellow Taxi
Source:    LP: The Big Ball (originally released on LP: Ladies Of The Canyon)
Writer(s):    Joni Mitchell
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1970
    One of Joni Mitchell's best-known tunes, Big Yellow Taxi was originally released on the 1970 album Ladies Of The Canyon. The original studio version of the song hit the top 10 in Australia and the top 20 in the UK and Mitchell's native Canada, but only reached the #67 spot in the US. A later live version of the song, however, cracked the top 30 in the US in 1974. Mitchell says she was inspired to write the song on a visit to Hawaii, where she looked out her hotel window to view a mountain vista in the distance, only to be shocked back to reality when she looked down to see a parking lot "as far as the eye could see". 

Artist:    Spirit
Title:    Nature's Way
Source:    CD: Best Of Spirit (originally released on LP: Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus)
Writer:    Randy California
Label:    Epic
Year:    1970
    Nature's Way is one of the best-known and best-loved songs in the Spirit catalog. Originally released on the 1970 LP Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus, the song was finally issued as a single in 1973, long after lead vocalist Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes had left Spirit to form Jo Jo Gunne. 

Artist:    Marvin Gaye
Title:    Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)
Source:    LP: What's Going On
Writer(s):    Marvin Gaye
Label:    Tamla
Year:    1971
    No show celebrating Earth Day would be complete without Marvin Gaye's Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology). Released as the second single from the 1971 LP What's Going On, the song is considered one of Marvin Gaye's greatest songs and an anthem of the environmental movement.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Eskimo Blue Day
Source:    CD: Volunteers
Writer(s):    Slick/Kantner
Label:    BMG/RCA
Year:    1969
    Jefferson Airplane's sixth LP, Volunteers, was by far their most socio-political album, from the first track (We Can Be Together, with its famous "up against the wall" refrain) to the last (the song Volunteers itself). One of the more controversial tracks on the 1969 album is Eskimo Blue Day, which describes just how meaningless human concerns are in the greater scheme of things with the repeated use of the phrase "doesn't mean shit to a tree". Eskimo Blue Day was one of two songs from Volunteers performed by the Airplane at Woodstock.

Artist:    Queen
Title:    The Prophet's Song
Source:    LP: A Night At The Opera
Writer(s):    Brian May
Label:    Virgin (original label: Elektra)
Year:    1975
    When Queen's landmark LP, A Night At The Opera, was released in 1975, much attention was focused on the album's penultimate track, Freddy Mercury's Bohemian Rhapsody, which went all the way to the top of the British top 40 charts and is one of the most recognizable recordings of the 20th century. With all this attention focused on one song (albeit deservedly), several other outstanding tracks on the album have been somewhat neglected. Perhaps the best of these overlooked tracks is The Prophet's Song, a Brian May composition that opens side two of the vinyl LP. At over eight minutes in length, The Prophet's Song is Queen's longest song with vocals, and, like Bohemian Rhapsody, features layered overdubs by Mercury, including a fairly long acappella section in the middle of the track. The song also has powerful dynamics, ranging from the almost inaudible acoustic guitar and toy koto introduction to high volume electric lead guitar work set against a heavy metal background. As if that were not enough, The Prophet's Song also has a powerful message, making it one of Queen's most important works.

Artist:    Zager And Evans
Title:    In The Year 2525
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Rick Evans
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1969
    Since the advent of rock and roll in the 1950s there have been literally hundreds of one-hit wonders, artists who had one fairly big hit and then faded off into the background. Usually these artists recorded one or more a follow-up records that got minor airplay (and sometimes even major airplay in a limited number of markets), but were not successful enough to make a long-term career of it. A few of them get cited as the "ultimate" one-hit wonder, but for my money the title undisputedly belongs to folk-rockers Zager And Evans. The reason I say this is because they were more extreme than any other one-hit wonders, both in their success and their subsequent failures. The success part is impressive: In The Year 2525 spent six weeks in the number one spot on the US charts and finished second only to the 5th Dimension's Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In for the entire year 1969. Their subsequent failures were equally impressive: not only did they fail to crack the top 40 charts again, they couldn't even make the Billboard Hot 100 chart, making them the only artists in history to have a #1 hit without ever making another chart appearance.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    1983…(A Merman I Should Turn To Be)
Source:    CD: Electric Ladyland
Writer:    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    1983…(A Merman I Should Turn To Be)/Moon Turn The Tides (Gently, Gently Away) from the Electric Ladyland album is the longest work created purely in the studio by Jimi Hendrix, with a running time of over 16 minutes. The piece starts with tape effects that lead into the song's main guitar rift. The vocals and drums join in to tell a science fiction story set in a future world where the human race has had to move underwater in order to survive some unspecified catastrophe. After a couple verses, the piece goes into a long unstructured section made up mostly of guitar effects before returning to the main theme and closing out with more effects that combine volume control and stereo panning to create a circular effect. As is the case with several tracks on Electric Ladyland, 1983…(A Merman I Should Turn To Be)/Moon Turn The Tides (Gently, Gently Away) features Hendrix on both guitar and bass, with Mitch Mitchell on drums and special guest Chris Wood (from Traffic) on flute. 

Artist:    Neil Young
Title:    After The Gold Rush
Source:    CD: After The Gold Rush
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1970
    Once upon a time Dean Stockwell and Herb Bermann wrote a screenplay for a movie to be called After The Gold Rush. Neil Young read the script and decided that he wanted to do the soundtrack for the film, which Stockwell described as "sort of an end-of-the-world movie. I was gonna write a movie that was personal, a Jungian self-discovery of the gnosis... it involved the Kabala (sic), it involved a lot of arcane stuff." The movie was never made, and even the script is now long lost. However, Young did manage to write a couple of songs for the film, including the title track itself, which became the title track of his third album. The song itself describes a dream vision about the past, present and future of earth's environment. Young still performs After The Gold Rush, although he has updated one of the song's most famous lines ("Look at Mother Nature on the run in the 1970s") by replacing the words "the 1970s" with "the 21st century".

Artist:    Eric Burdon And War
Title:    Blues For Memphis Slim
Source:    LP: Eric Burdon Declares "War"
Writer(s):    War/Peter Chapman
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1970
    "When the acid trip is over, you've got to come back to Mother Blues." Eric Burdon's ad-libbed line from the track Blues From Memphis Slim, pretty much sums up the state of the former Animals lead vocalist's career as of 1970. The original Animals had been founded with the blues in mind, with the band members, including Burdon, preferring the cover tunes of artists like John Lee Hooker and Jimmy Reed featured on their albums to the hit singles provided to the band by their producer, Mickey Most. Finally, in 1966, the group officially disbanded, just as Burdon was discovering the mind-expanding qualities of hallucinogenic substances (he had been a hard drinker up to that point). In early 1967 Burdon formed a "New Animals" that would soon come to be called Eric Burdon And The Animals. This band had little in common with the original Animals (other than Burdon's distinctive vocals), and was, by any measure, pure acid rock. But after a couple of albums, even that group started to change, taking on more of an R&B sound with tracks like their extended version of River Deep, Mountain High. Finally, in 1969, this group disbanded as well, leaving Burdon and his producer, Jerry Goldstein, looking for a new band and a new sound for the singer. They found it in a Los Angeles nightclub, where a band called Nightshift was backing up former football star Deacon Jones. Burdon and Goldstein persuaded the multi-racial band to change their name to War, and got to work on an album called Eric Burdon Declares "War". The album featured mostly suites such as Blues For Memphis Slim, which was built around the bluesman's classic Mother Earth, with several added instrumental sections composed by the band. At thirteen and a half minutes, it is the longest track on the album. After a second album with the group (The double-LP The Black Man's Burdon), Eric Burdon left the group, leaving War to become one of the more popular bands of the 1970s.
 

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2616 (starts 4/13/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/614794

    This week we present almost the entire second side of the second Quicksilver Messenger Service LP, Happy Trails (ironically only leaving out the song Happy Trails). Also on tap: A set of tunes from the Byrds' Younger Than Yesterday album, an all-British set that includes a Who cover of a Rolling Stones song and several all-American sets.

Artist:    ? And The Mysterians
Title:    96 Tears
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    The Mysterians
Label:    Abkco (original label: Cameo)
Year:    1966
    Although his birth certificate gives the name Rudy Martinez, the leader of the Mysterians had his name legally changed to "?" several years ago. He asserts that he is actually from the planet Mars and has lived among dinosaurs in a past life. Sometimes I feel like I'm living among dinosaurs in this life, so I guess I can relate a little. The band's only major hit, 96 Tears, has the distinction of being the last top 10 single on the Cameo label before Cameo-Parkway went bankrupt and was bought by Allen Klein, who now operates the company as Abkco. 

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Light My Fire (single version)
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    Once in a while a song comes along that totally blows you away the very first time you hear it. The Doors' Light My Fire was one of those songs. I liked it so much that I immediately went out and bought the 45 RPM single. Apparently I was not the only one, as the song spent three weeks at the top of the charts in July of 1967. Despite this success, the single version of the song, which runs less than three minutes, is all but forgotten by modern radio stations, which universally choose to play the full-length album version. Nonetheless, the single version, which was created by editing out most of the solo instrumental sections of the piece, is a historical artifact worth an occasional listen.

Artist:    Blue Cheer
Title:    Parchman Farm
Source:    Dutch import LP: Vincebus Eruptum
Writer(s):    Mose Allison
Label:    Philips
Year:    1968
    If the release of the first Black Sabbath album in early 1970 marks the birth of heavy metal, then the release of the first Blue Cheer album in 1968 may be considered the point of conception for the form. Certainly, in terms of pure volume, Cheer was unequalled in their live performances (although the Grateful Dead's sound system had more wattage, Owsley Stanley used it judiciously to get the best sound quality as opposed to the sheer quantity of decibels favored by Blue Cheer), and managed to preserve that sense of loudness in the studio. Like Black Sabbath, the members of Blue Cheer had more than a passing familiarity with the blues as well, as evidenced by their inclusion of an old Mose Allison tune, Parchman Farm, on their debut LP, Vincebus Eruptum (the album included a cover of B.B. King's Rock Me, Baby as well). Contrary to rumors, guitarist Leigh Stephens did not go deaf and kill himself (although he did leave Blue Cheer after the band's second LP, moving to England and releasing a somewhat distortion-free solo album in 1969).

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Those Were The Days
Source:    LP: Wheels Of Fire
Writer(s):    Baker/Taylor
Label:    Atco
Year:    1968
    Drummer Ginger Baker only contributed a handful of songs to the Cream repertoire, but each was, in its own way, quite memorable. Those Are The Days, with its sudden changes of time and key, presages the progressive rock that would flourish in the mid-1970s. As was often the case with Baker-penned songs, bassist Jack Bruce provides the vocals from this Wheels Of Fire track that was also released as the B side of the single version of White Room.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite
Source:    CD: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year:    1967
    According to principal songwriter John Lennon, Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite was inspired by a turn of the century circus poster that the Beatles ran across while working on the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album. Most of the lyrics include references to items on the poster itself, such as the Hendersons and Henry the Horse. 

Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Can I Get To Know You Better
Source:    Mono CD: All The Singles (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Sloan/Barri
Label:    Manifesto (original label: White Whale)
Year:    1966
    Although it started well for them, with the song You Baby hitting the top 20, 1966 was overall a disappointing year for the Turtles. Their next four singles stiffed, with only two of them reaching the lower reaches of the Hot 100. The last of these was Can I Get To Know You Better. Like You Baby, it was written by the songwriting team of Steve Barri and P.F. Sloan, who would have great success as the producers and primary songwriters of the Grass Roots just a few months later. For some reason, however, Can I Get To Know You Better, released in October of 1966, only managed to hit the #89 spot on the charts, despite being a catchy tune with a strong hook that was performed to perfection by the Turtles themselves. The record marked the debut of the band's new bass player, Chip Douglas, who would (under the name Douglas Farthing Hatelid) be brought in to produce the Monkees' Headquarters album after that group successfully got Don Kirschner fired and (temporarily) became a real band. 

Artist:     Kingsmen
Title:     Louie Louie
Source:     Mono LP: The Kingsmen (originally released as a 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Richard Berry
Label:     Wand
Year:     1963
     Although Paul Revere and the Raiders had recorded the song just a few days earlier, the version of Louie Louie that is remembered as the greatest party song of all time came from another Portland, Oregon band, the Kingsmen. With its basic three-chord structure and incomprehensible lyrics, the most popular song to ever come out of the Pacific Northwest was considered a must-learn song for garage bands everywhere. 

Artist:    Sonics
Title:    Boss Hoss
Source:    Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 8-The Northwest (originally released on LP: Here Are The Sonics)
Writer(s):    Gerald Roslie
Label:    Rhino (original label: Etiquette)
Year:    1965
    Surf music hit its peak of popularity in 1963, and by 1964 groups like the Beach Boys and Jan & Dean had shifted their focus from the surfboard to the means of getting that surfboard to the beach in the first place: the hot rod. But by 1965 the hot rod craze itself had run its course, and it took the Sonics, from Tacoma, Washington to put the final nail in the tires with Boss Hoss, a track from their debut LP that was also issued as a B side of a non-LP single called The Hustler. Like everything else they recorded, Boss Hoss was over the (rag) top, thanks to the songwriting talents of vocalist Gerald Roslie.

Artist:    Lidos
Title:    Since I Last Saw You
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: Highs In The Mid Sixties Vol. 18-Colorado (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Nale/Fick/Silvis/Saunar
Label:    AIP (original label: Band Box)
Year:    1964
    The band known as the Lidos was formed in Aurora, Colorado by Aurora Central High School students Gary Nale (vocals, lead and rhythm guitar), Gary Flick (vocals,bass), Dwight Silvis (vocals, keyboards, lead and rhythm guitar) and Robert Sauner (drums). They recorded their only single in 1964 for Band Box Records, a label with its own recording studio. As can be heard on Since I Last Saw You, the sound quality of that studio left much to be desired. Then again, the total rawness of the song is its primary selling point.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    McGuinn/Hillman
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1967
    By early 1967 there was a building resentment among musicians and rock press alike concerning the instant (and in some eyes unearned) success of the Monkees. One notable expression of this resentment was the Byrds' So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star, which takes a somewhat sarcastic look at what it takes to succeed in the music business. Unfortunately, much of what they talk about in the song continues to apply today (although the guitar has been somewhat supplanted by the computer as the instrument of choice).

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Everybody's Been Burned
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    David Crosby
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    There is a common misconception that David Crosby's songwriting skills didn't fully develop until he began working with Stephen Stills and Graham Nash. A listen to Everybody's Been Burned from the Byrds' 1967 LP Younger Than Yesterday, however, puts the lie to that theory in a hurry. The track has all the hallmarks of a classic Crosby song: a strong melody, intelligent lyrics and an innovative chord structure. It's also my personal favorite tune from what is arguably the Byrds' best album.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Have You Seen Her Face
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    Chris Hillman
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1967
    Perhaps the greatest surprise on the fourth Byrds album, Younger Than Yesterday, was the emergence of bassist Chris Hillman as a top-tier songwriter, already on a par with David Crosby and the recently departed Gene Clark, and even exceeding Roger McGuinn as a solo writer (most of McGuinn's contributions being as a collaborator rather than a solo songwriter). Although Hillman would eventually find his greatest success as a country artist (with the Desert Rose Band) it was the hard-rocking Have You Seen Her Face that was chosen to become his first track to be released as a single.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Under My Thumb
Source:    Mono British import LP: Rarities
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Polydor (original label: Track)
Year:    1967
    One of the first major drug busts of rock stars happened on February 12, 1967, when police raided the home of Keith Richards during a party. Although there was relatively little contraband seized (and mostly from guests) Richards, as owner of the home, was charged with possession of what they did find. Of course, the establishment press made a big deal about it, so the members of the Who decided to make an even bigger noise in favor of their friends by releasing a pair of Stones cover songs as a single. Although not a huge hit, the Who's recording of The Last Time, backed with Under My Thumb, managed to hit the #44 spot on the British charts.

Artist:    Tintern Abbey
Title:    Vacuum Cleaner
Source:    Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969
Writer(s):    David MacTavish
Label:    Rhino
Year:    1967
    Although not a household name even in their native England, Tintern Alley managed to capture the essence of British psychedelia with Vacuum Cleaner, a B side released in 1967. It was the only known single from a band whose members went on to join various other equally obscure bands.

Artist:    Eric Burdon And The Animals
Title:    Good Times
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Burdon/Briggs/Weider/Jenkins/McCulloch
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1967
    By the end of the original Animals' run they were having greater chart success with their singles in the US than in their native UK. That trend continued with the formation of the "new" Animals in 1967 and their first single, When I Was Young. Shortly after the first LP by the band now known as Eric Burdon And The Animals came out, M-G-M decided to release the song San Franciscan Nights as a single to take advantage of the massive youth migration to the city that summer. Meanwhile the band's British label decided to instead issue Good Times, (an autobiographical song which was released in the US as the B side to San Franciscan Nights) as a single, and the band ended up with one of their biggest UK hits ever. Riding the wave of success of Good Times, San Franciscan Nights eventually did get released in the UK and was a hit there as well. 

Artist:    Joni Mitchell
Title:    Nathan La Franeer
Source:    LP: The 1969 Warner/Reprise Songbook (originally released on LP: Song To A Seagull)
Writer(s):    Joni Mitchell
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    Producer David Crosby came up with the idea of using the architecture of a grand piano to help shape Joni Mitchell's voice on her debut LP, Song To A Seagull, using extra microphones to capture the sound of her voice reverberating off the piano strings. Unfortunately, this idea resulted in excessive tape hiss, which was equalized out during the mastering process, leaving the entire album with a somewhat muddy sound that Mitchell later described as sounding like it was recorded under a Jello bowl. Nonetheless, Warner/Reprise chose Nathan La Franeer from that album for inclusion on The 1969 Warner/Reprise Songbook, the first of a series of budget-priced albums known as "Loss Leaders" that were available directly from the record company itself and advertised on all their record sleeves.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    You Never Had It Better
Source:    Mono CD: Underground (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Snagster/Schwartz/Poncher
Label:    Collector's Choice
Year:    1968
    Following the lack of a hit single from their second album, Underground, the Electric Prunes took one last shot at top 40 airplay with a song called Everybody Knows Your Not In Love. The band might have had better luck if they had pushed the flip side of the record, You Never Had It Better, which is a much stronger song. As it is, the record stiffed, and producer David Hassinger reacted by stripping the band of any creative freedom they might have had and made an album called Mass in F Minor using mostly studio musicians. The band, having signed away the rights to the name Electric Prunes to their manager before getting their record contract, could do nothing but watch helplessly as Hassinger, working with composer David Axelrod, created an album that had little in common with the original band other than their name. Because of this, the original members soon left, and Hassinger brought in a whole new group for two more albums before retiring the Prunes name for good. In recent years several members of the original band (including James Lowe and Mark Tulin, who were the actual songwriters of You Never Had It Better, despite what it says on the label) reformed the Electric Prunes. Whether or not they had to get permission to use the name is unknown.

Artist:    Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title:    Mona/Maiden Of The Cancer Moon/Calvary
Source:    LP: Happy Trails
Writer(s):    McDaniel/Duncan/Evans
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1969
    Most everyone familiar with Quicksilver Messenger Service agrees that the band's real strength was its live performances. Apparently the folks at Capitol Records realized this as well, since the band's second LP was recorded (mostly) live at Bill Graham's two Fillmore Auditoriums. The second side of the Happy Trails album starts with a Bo Diddly cover, Mona, which segues directly into a Gary Duncan composition, Maiden Of The Cancer Moon. The original performance segued directly into the more avant-garde Calvary (also credited to Duncan), but for the album a studio recreation of that performance was used (although the album sleeve makes it clear that it was recorded "live" at Golden State Recorders, indicating that it was done in a single take without any overdubs). 

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    Like A Rolling Stone
Source:    CD: Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Highway 61 Revisited)
Writer:    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1965
    Bob Dylan incurred the wrath of folk purists when he decided to use electric instruments for his 1965 LP Highway 61 Revisited. The opening track on the album is the six-minute Like A Rolling Stone, a song that was also selected to be the first single released from the new album. After the single was pressed, the shirts at Columbia Records decided to cancel the release due to its length. An acetate copy of the record, however, made it to a local New York club, where, by audience request, the record was played over and over until it was worn out (acetate copies not being as durable as their vinyl counterparts). When Columbia started getting calls from local radio stations demanding copies of the song the next morning they decided to release the single after all. Like A Rolling Stone ended up going all the way to the number two spot on the US charts, doing quite well in several other countries as well.

Artist:    Love
Title:    No Matter What You Do
Source:    Mono CD: Love Story (originally released on LP: Love)
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1966
    Many of the songs on Love's first album show the heavy influence of the folk-rock movement that was particularly popular in Los Angeles in 1965. This influence is particularly noticable on songs like No Matter What You Do. Arthur Lee's songwriting skills would develop quickly, however, and by mid-1967 he would be busy creating what has come to be recognized as one of the greatest rock albums of all time, Forever Changes.

Artist:    Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title:    Hummin' Happy
Source:    LP: Incense And Peppermints
Writer(s):    King/Bunnell/Freeman/Weitz/Seol
Label:    Sundazed/Uni
Year:    1967
    As soon as it became apparent that the song Incense And Peppermints was going to be a bit hit, the Strawberry Alarm Clock got to work on their first LP, also titled Incense And Peppermints. Most of the songs on the LP were band originals, with some, including the harmony-laden Hummin' Happy, co-credited to two of the band members, bassist George Bunnell and drummer Randy Seol, in addition to a group credit. I have no idea why they did it that way, but the 2009 reissue of the album lists all five individual members as songwriters.

Artist:     Frumious Bandersnatch
Title:     Hearts To Cry
Source:     CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on self-titled EP)
Writer:     Jack King
Label:     Rhino (original label: Muggles Gramophone)
Year:     1968
     Rock music and the real estate business have something in common: location can make all the difference. Take the San Francisco Bay Area. You have one of the world's great Cosmopolitan cities at the north end of a peninsula. South of the city, along the peninsula itself you have mostly redwood forest land interspersed with fairly affluent communities along the way to Silicon Valley and the city of San Jose at the south end of the bay. The eastern side of the bay, on the other hand, spans a socio-economic range from blue collar to ghetto and is politically conservative; not exactly the most receptive environment for a hippy band calling itself Frumious Bandersnatch, which is a shame, since they had at least as much talent as any other band in the area. Unable to develop much of a following, they are one of the great "should have beens" of the psychedelic era, as evidenced by Hearts To Cry, the lead track of their 1968 untitled EP.

Artist:     Iron Butterfly
Title:     In The Time Of Our Lives
Source:     LP: Ball
Writer:     Ingle/Bushy
Label:     Atco
Year:     1969
     One of the most eagerly-awaited albums of 1969 was Iron Butterfly's followup to In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. Although Ball was a strong seller, it overall left the listener feeling vaguely disappointed, and was the last album to feature Eric Brann on lead guitar. Subsequent albums did even worse, and Iron Butterfly is now mostly remembered as classic rock's first one-hit wonder. 

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix/Band Of Gypsys
Title:    Power Of Soul
Source:    CD: South Saturn Delta
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA
Year:    Recorded 1970, released 1997
    1969 was a strange year for Jimi Hendrix. For one thing, he did not release any new recordings that year, yet he remained the top money maker in rock music. One reason for the lack of new material was an ongoing dispute with Capitol Records over a contract he had signed in 1965. By the end of the year an agreement was reached for Hendrix to provide Capitol with one album's worth of new material. At this point Hendrix had not released any live albums, so it was decided to tape his New Year's performances at the Fillmore East with his new Band Of Gypsys (with drummer Buddy Miles and bassist Billy Cox), playing songs that had never been released in studio form. As it turns out, however, studio versions of many of the songs on that album did indeed exist, but were not issued until after Hendrix's death, when producer Alan Douglas put out a pair of LPs (Crash Landing and Midnight Lightning), that had some of the original drum and bass tracks (and even some guitar tracks) re-recorded by musicians that had never actually worked with Hendrix. One of those songs is Power Of Soul, which has finally been released in its original Band Of Gypsys studio version, with background vocals provided by Cox and Miles. 

Artist:    Blues Magoos
Title:    Gotta Get Away
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Gordon/Adams
Label:    Mercury
Year:    1966
    As was common with most 1966 LPs, the Blues Magoos debut album, Psychedelic Lollipop, included a handful of cover songs, not all of which had been hits for other groups. One of the non-hits was Gotta Get Away, a fairly typical piece of garage rock that opens side two of the LP. The song was also selected as the B side for the group's second (and by far most successful) single, (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet. As the usual practice was to bring in outside songwriters for a new band's early singles and let the band write their own B side, it is possible that Gotta Get Away, which was co-written by Alan Gordon (co-writer of the Turtles' Happy Together and several other tunes) may have been the intended A side of the single. 
 

 

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2616 (starts 4/13/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/614789

    This time around it's an even longer and stranger trip through the years than usual, going all the way from 1966 to 1976. No Grateful Dead tunes, though (but there is an entire album side from Frank Zappa).

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    For What It's Worth (Stop, Hey What's That Sound)
Source:    LP: Buffalo Springfield-Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Jim Messina, Bruce Palmer, Dewey Martin (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Label:    Atco
Year:    1966
    Most people associate the name Buffalo Springfield with the song For What It's Worth (Stop, Hey What's That Sound). And for good reason. The song is one of the greatest protest songs ever recorded, and to this day is in regular rotation on both oldies and classic rock radio stations. The song was written and recorded in November of 1966 and rush released two days before Christmas. By then the first Buffalo Springfield LP was already on the racks, but until that point had not sold particularly well. When it became clear that For What It's Worth was turning into a major hit, Atco Records quickly recalled the album and added the song to it (as the opening track). All subsequent pressings of the LP (and later the CD) contain For What It's Worth (Stop, Hey What's That Sound), making earlier copies of the album somewhat of a rarity and quite collectable.

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

Artist:    Spirit
Title:    I Got A Line On You
Source:    European import CD: Pure....Psychedelic Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: The Family That Plays Together)
Writer(s):    Randy California
Label:    Sony Music (original label: Ode)
Year:    1968
    Although not an instant hit by any measure, I Got A Line On You, from Spirit's second album, The Family That Plays Together, has proven to be the band's most popular song. Released in October of 1968, the song lingered below the top 100 for several weeks before college radio stations began playing it in late November. The tune finally peaked at #25 on March 15, 1969.

Artist:    Cheech & Chong
Title:    Sister Mary Elephant
Source:    CD: Big Bambu
Writer(s):    Marin/Chong
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Ode)
Year:    1972
    SHADDUP!!

Artist:    Savoy Brown
Title:    Poor Girl
Source:    CD: Looking In
Writer(s):    Kim Simmonds
Label:    Deram (original label: Parrot)
Year:    1970
     Poor Girl, from the 1970 album Looking In, is probably Savoy Brown's best known recording. Shortly after Looking In was released, the entire band except for leader Kim Simmonds left Savoy Brown to form a new band: Foghat.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    The WASP (Texas Radio And The Big Beat)
Source:    CD: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released on LP: L.A. Woman)
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1971
    Following a downward slide starting in 1968, the Doors ended their original run on a high note in 1971 with the L.A. Woman album. Among the strong blues-based tracks on the album is The WASP (Texas Radio And The Big Beat), an anthemic number that ranks up with other Doors album classics such as Five To One, When The Music's Over and The End. Big Beat indeed. 

Artist:    Mark Fry
Title:    The Witch
Source:    British Import CD: Love, Poetry And Revolution (originally released in Italy on LP: Dreaming With Alice)
Writer(s):    Mark Fry
Label:    Grapefruit (original label: IT)
Year:    1972
    One of the most obscure albums ever released, Dreaming With Alice is sometimes considered the ultimate example of acid folk music. Recorded in 1971 by teenaged British art student Mark Fry and released only in Italy on RCA's IT subsidiary, the album includes a track called The Witch, which is described in the book Galactic Ramble as "one of the creepiest songs you'll ever hear". Personally I don't really find anything creepy about it at all, although the track itself is quite hypnotic and highly listenable.
        
Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    Woman From Tokyo
Source:    CD: The Very Best Of Deep Purple (originally released on LP: Who Do We Think We Are)
Writer(s):    Blackmore/Gillan/Glover/Lord/Paice
Label:    Warner Archives/Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year:    1973
    Deep Purple's most successful period came to an end with the band's seventh LP, Who Do We Think We Are. The album, released in 1973, was the last for vocalist Ian Gillan and bassist Roger Glover, both of whom had joined the band three years earlier. Those three years saw the group go from semi-obscurity (especially in their home country) to one of the world's most popular rock bands. Songs like Smoke On The Water and Highway Star had become mainstays of FM rock radio worldwide, but tensions within the band itself were starting to tear it apart. Nonetheless, the final album by the classic lineup of Richie Blackmore, Ian Gillan, Roger Glover, Jon Lord and Ian Paice featured some of the band's best material, including the LP's opening track, My Woman From Tokyo, which is still heard with alarming regularity on classic rock radio stations.

Artist:    Frank Zappa
Title:    Don't Eat Yellow Snow/Nanook Rubs It/St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast/Father Oblivion
Source:    CD: Apostrophe (')
Writer(s):    Frank Zappa
Label:    Zappa (original label: Discreet)
Year:    1974
    Despite being one of the most prolific composer/performers of the 20th century, Frank Zappa only put three songs on the top 100 charts in his career. The first of these was an abbreviated version of Don't Eat Yellow Snow, the opening track on his 1974 LP Apostrophe ('). On the album itself the song segues directly into the next three tracks, Nanook Rubs It, St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast and the instrumental Father Oblivion to form a suite that is immediately followed by Cosmik Debris, the song that was released as the B side of Don't Eat Yellow Snow. Cosmik Debris was actually intended to be the A side of the single, but early airplay of the full-length version of Don't Eat Yellow Snow on FM rock radio prompted a change in plans.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    Sick Again
Source:    LP: Physical Graffiti
Writer(s):    Bonham/Jones/Page/Plant/Stewart/Mrs. Valens
Label:    Swan Song
Year:    1975
    By the mid-1970s one of the most notorious aspects of rock stardom was the constant presence of groupies backstage after a concert. Although some musicians embraced the practice as being just one of the perks of being a star, some, including Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant, were becoming uncomfortable with the whole thing. In particular, Plant found the fact that sometimes these girls were as young as twelve (particularly in the Los Angeles area) to be deeply disturbing, and so he wrote a song about it. Sick Again appears as the final track on the 1975 double LP Physical Graffitti.

Artist:    Heart
Title:    Sing Child
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Wilson/Wilson/Fossen/Fisher
Label:    Mushroom
Year:    1975
    I've always had a soft spot for Heart's first album, Dreamboat Annie. Maybe it's because the album's history parallels my entry into the world of college radio. Released in late 1975 in Canada, the album did not appear in the US until mid-1976. I had first started volunteering at KUNM in Albuquerque in late 1975. By the time Dreamboat Annie was released in the US, KUNM had moved into new facilities (with a significant power boost) and I had a regular daytime slot at the station. Having a musician's perspective, I focused on tracks like Sing Child, with its guitar solo, while the commercial FM rock stations were playing Magic Man and top 40 AM radio was playing Crazy On You. Such was the state of American radio in the mid-1970s. 

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2615 (starts 4/6/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/613804

    This week we have mostly long sets, including a battle of the bands that takes up an entire half hour and most of side one of the legendary Hawkwind debut LP.

Artist:    Animals
Title:    House Of The Rising Sun
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    trad., arr. Price
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1964
    These days the edited version of the Animals' House Of The Rising Sun is virtually impossible to find, but in 1964 this three-minute version of the tune was the only one to get played on top 40 radio. 

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)
Source:    Mono LP: Bringing It All Back Home
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1965
    I recently saw a picture of Bob Dylan sitting alone in a theater with the caption "Bob Dylan sitting with everyone that's a better songwriter than he is". While I may not go quite that far, I have to admit that you would have to search far and wide to find any song with lyrics equal to It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding). The song was first performed in October of 1964 and recorded in January of 1965 for inclusion on his album Bringing It All Back Home. Famous lines from the song include "Money doesn't talk, it swears," and "He not busy being born is busy dying." Dylan himself has repeatedly cited the song as one of his songs that means the most to him, and he has continued to perform it throughout his career (an estimated 772 times as of 2015).

Artist:    13th Floor Elevators
Title:    Fire Engine
Source:    CD: The Psychedelic Sounds Of The 13th Floor Elevators
Writer(s):    Hall/Sutherland/Erickson
Label:    Collectables (original label: International Artists)
Year:    1966
    In the summer of 1971 the band I was in, Sunn, did a cover of Black Sabbath's War Pigs as part of our regular repertoire. For the siren effect at the beginning of the song we used our voices, which always elicited smiles from some of the more perceptive members of the audience. Listening to Fire Engine, from The Psychedelic Sounds Of The 13th Floor Elevators, has the same effect on me, for pretty much the same reason. The main difference is that the Elevators actually did it with the tape rolling on one of their own original songs, something Sunn never got the opportunity to do. 

Artist:    Standells
Title:    Riot On Sunset Strip
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Riot On Sunset Strip soundtrack)
Writer(s):    Fleck/Valentino
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:    1967
    Anyone who doubts just how much influence bands like the Standells had on the punk-rock movement of the late 1970s need only listen to the 1967 title track from the movie Riot On Sunset Strip. The song, written by bandmembers Tony Valentino and John Fleck, sounds like it could have been an early Ramones recording. The song itself (and the movie) were based on a real life event. Local L.A. business owners had been complaining about the unruliness and rampant drug use among the teens hanging out in front of the various underage clubs that had been springing up on Sunset Strip in the wake of the success of the Whisky a Go Go, and in late 1966 the Los Angeles Police Department was called in to do something about the problem. What followed was a full-blown riot which ultimately led to local laws being passed that put many of the clubs out of business and severely curtailed the ability of the rest to make a profit. By 1968 the entire scene was a thing of the past, with the few remaining clubs converting to a more traditional over-21 approach. The unruliness and rampant drug use, meanwhile, seems to have migrated up the coast to San Francisco, where it managed to undo everything positive that had been previously accomplished in the Haight-Ashbury district.

Artist:    Electric Flag
Title:    Another Country
Source:    LP: The Best Of The Electric Flag (originally released on LP:  A Long Time Comin')
Writer(s):    Polte/Bloomfield
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1968
    In 1967, after leaving the Butterfield Blue Band, guitarist Michael Bloomfield decided to form what he called "An American Music Band." The band would incorporate all of Bloomfield's favorite musical genres, including jazz, rock, soul, and of course blues. Like his friend Al Kooper, Bloomfield wanted to work in a horn section as well. The result was the Electric Flag. After one soundtrack album for a Peter Fonda cult film that was mostly a Bloomfield solo effort (although credited to the band), the Electric Flag made its official debut with the 1968 LP A Long Time Comin'. Perhaps the track that came closest to incorporating all the elements that Bloomfield wanted into a single piece was Another Country, which, along with a short Bloomfield instrumental that served as a coda, takes up the last nine and a half minutes of A Long Time Comin'. Bloomfield would leave the group following the release of the LP, although the remaining members, including Barry Goldberg, Nick Gravenites and Buddy Miles, would record a follow-up without him.

Artist:    Koobas
Title:    Barricades
Source:    British import CD: Psychedelia At Abbey Road (originally released on LP: Koobas)
Writer(s):    Ellis/Stratton-Smith/Leathwood
Label:    EMI (original UK label: Columbia)
Year:    1969
    The Koobas were a Merseybeat band that never managed to achieve the level of success enjoyed by bands such as the Beatles or Gerry and the Pacemakers, despite having the patronage of Beatles manager Brian Epstein and even appearing in the film Ferry Across The Mersey.  They did record several singles for both Pye and Columbia, but with little to show for it. Nonetheless, EMI, the parent company of Columbia, commissioned an entire album from the band in 1969. Among the standout tracks from that self-titled LP was the five-minute long Barricades, a track that starts with a Motown beat, but before long morphs into a chaotic portrait of riot and revolution, complete with anarchic sound effects.

Artist:    Easybeats
Title:        Friday On My Mind
Source:    Mono CD: Battle Of The Bands-Vol. Two (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Vanda/Young
Label:    Era (original label: United Artists)
Year:        1966
       Considered by many to be the "greatest Australian song" ever recorded, the Easybeats' Friday On My Mind, released in late 1966, certainly was the first (and for many years only) major international hit by a band from the island continent. Technically, however, Friday On My Mind is not an Australian song at all, since it was recorded after the band had relocated to London. The group continued to release records for the next year or two, but were never able to duplicate the success of Friday On My Mind. Ultimately vocalist Stevie Wright returned to Australia, where he had a successful solo career. Guitarists Harry Vanda and George Young, who had written Friday On My Mind, also returned home to form a band called Flash And The Pan in the early 1970s. Later in the decade Young would help launch the careers of his two younger brothers, Angus and Malcolm, in their own band, AC/DC. 

Artist:    Cream
Title:    I Feel Free
Source:    LP: Fresh Cream
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    Atco
Year:    1966
    After an unsuccessful debut single (Wrapping Paper), Cream scored a bona-fide hit in the UK with their follow-up, I Feel Free. As was the case with nearly every British single at the time, the song was not included on Fresh Cream, the band's debut LP. In the US, however, hit singles were commonly given a prominent place on albums, and the US version of Fresh Cream actually opens with I Feel Free. To my knowledge the song, being purely a studio creation, was never performed live by the band.

Artist:    Yardbirds
Title:    Shapes Of Things
Source:    Mono CD: The Best Of 60s Supergroups (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Samwell-Smith/Relf/McCarty
Label:    Priority (original label: Epic)
Year:    1966
    Unlike earlier Yardbirds hits, 1966's Shapes Of Things was written by members of the band. The song, featuring one of guitarist Jeff Beck's most distinctive solos, just barely missed making it to the top 10 in the US, although it was a top 5 single in the UK.

Artist:    Leaves
Title:    Too Many People
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Pons/Rinehart
Label:    Rhino (original label: Mira)
Year:    1965
    The Leaves are a bit unusual in that in Los Angeles, a city known for drawing wannabes from across the world, this local band's members were all native Ellayins. Formed by members of a fraternity at Cal State Northridge, the Leaves had their greatest success when they took over as house band at Ciro's after the Byrds vacated the slot to go on tour. Like many bands of the time, they were given a song (Bob Dylan's Love Minus Zero) to record as a single by their producer and allowed to write their own B side. In this case the intended B side was Too Many People, written by bassist Jim Pons and  guitarist Bill Rhinehart. Before the record was released, however, the producers decided that Too Many People was the stronger track and designated it the A side. The song ended up getting more airplay on local radio stations than Love Minus Zero, making it their first regional hit. The Leaves had their only national hit the following year with their third attempt at recording the fast version of Hey Joe, the success of which led to their first LP, which included a watered down version of Too Many People. The version heard here is the 1965 original. Eventually Pons would leave the Leaves, hooking up first with the Turtles, then Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention.

Artist:    Lost And Found
Title:    Don't Move Girl
Source:    Mono German import LP: Sixties Rebellion Vol. 5: The Cave (originally released in US as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Al Manfredi
Label:    Way Back (original US label: Plus)
Year:    1966
    Originally formed as the Nuts & Bolts in San Clemente, California, the Lost And Found relocated to Phoenix while still in their teens and cut their one and only single for the local Plus label in 1966 before returning to California in early 1967. The A side of that single, Don't Move Girl, was written by bassist Al Manfredi. Rounding out the band were lead guitarist Jim Jeffers, rhythm guitarist Mike Ingram and drummer Mike Ryer.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Purple Haze
Source:    CD: The Ultimate Experience (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single and in US on LP: Are You Experienced?)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original US label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Following up on the success of their first UK single, Hey Joe, the Jimi Hendrix Experience released Purple Haze in early 1967. The popularity of the two singles (released only in Europe) led to a deal with Reprise Records to start issuing the band's material in the US. By then, however, the Experience had already released Are You Experienced without either of the two hit singles on it. Reprise, hedging their bets, included both singles (but not their B sides), as well as a third UK single, The Wind Cries Mary, deleting several tracks from the original version of Are You Experienced to make room for them.

Artist:    Art Of Lovin'
Title:    Paul's Circus
Source:    British import CD: All Kinds Of Highs (originally released in US on LP: The Art Of Lovin')
Writer(s):    Paul Applebaum
Label:    Big Beat (original US label: Mainstream)
Year:    1968
    Although the so-called Boss-Town Sound was in reality mostly hype foisted on the public in 1968 by executives at M-G-M Records who were chafing at having missed out almost entirely on the whole San Francisco thing the previous year, there was at least one local band that fully embraced the concept. Ironically, the Art Of Lovin', from the Boston suburb of Newton, was not in any way connected to M-G-M. Powered by the vocals of Gail Winnick and the songwriting skills of guitarist Paul Applebaum, the band also included organist Barry Tatleman, bassist Johnny Lank and drummer Sandy Winslow. They made enough of an impression on Mainstream Records owner Bob Shad to be able to record an entire self-titled LP for the label, which included the somewhat whimsical piece Paul's Circus. Rather than pursue their musical careers further, however, the band members opted to disband the group and go to college shortly after the album was released.

Artist:    Steve Miller Band
Title:    Brave New World 
Source:    LP: Homer soundtrack (originally released on LP: Brave New World)
Writer(s):    Steve Miller
Label:    Cotillion (original label: Capitol)
Year:    1969
    It took the Steve Miller Band half a dozen albums (plus appearances on a couple of movie soundtracks) to achieve star status in the early 1970s. Along the way they developed a cult following that added new members with each successive album. The fourth Miller album was Brave New World, the title track of which was used in the film Homer, a 1970 film that is better remembered for its soundtrack than for the movie itself.

Artist:      Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
Title:     4+20
Source:      CD: déjà vu
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Year:     1970
     Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young were always more a collection of individuals than a true group. 4+20, from their second album, déjà vu, is a good illustration of this. The song features Stephen Stills on acoustic guitar and vocal, with no other voices or instruments on the recording. 

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Love You To
Source:    CD: Revolver
Writer(s):    George Harrison
Label:    Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year:    1966
    Following the release of Rubber Soul in December of 1965, the Beatles' George Harrison began to make a serious effort to learn to play the Sitar, studying under the master, Ravi Shankar. Along with the instrument itself, Harrison studied Eastern forms of music. His first song written in the modal form favored by Indian composers was Love You To. The recording, featured on the 1966 Revolver album, also features Indian percussion instruments and suitably spiritual lyrics. 

Artist:    Love
Title:    7&7 Is
Source:    Mono German import CD: Da Capo
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1966
    The word "seven" does not appear anywhere in the song 7&7 Is. Truth to tell, I have no idea where Arthur Lee got that title from. Nonetheless, the song is among the most intense tracks to ever make the top 40. 7&7 Is starts off with power chords played over a constant drum roll (possibly played by Lee himself), with cymbals crashing over equally manic semi-spoken lyrics. The song builds up to an explosive climax: an atomic bomb blast followed by a slow post-apocalyptic instrumental that quickly fades away.

Artist:    Them
Title:    I Happen To Love You
Source:    Mono LP: Now And Them
Writer(s):    Goffin/King
Label:    Tower
Year:    1968
    I Happen To Love You was first recorded by the Electric Prunes for their 1967 album Underground. The band wanted to release the Gerry Goffin/Carole King tune as a single, but producer David Hassinger instead chose to issue a novelty track, To The Highest Bidder. Unlike the Prunes version, which emphasized the King melody line, Them's version of I Happen To Love You was done in much the same style as their earlier recordings with Van Morrison. Kenny McDowell provided the lead vocal.

Artist:    Love
Title:    The Castle
Source:    German import CD: Da Capo
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1966
    Considering that both of their first two LPs had cover photos taken against the backdrop of Bela Lugosi's former residence in the Hollywood Hills (known as Dracula's Castle), it is perhaps inevitable that Love would have a track called The Castle on one of these albums. Sure enough, one can be found near the end of the first side of the late1966 album Da Capo. The song is an early indication of the direction that band was moving in, away from the straight folk/garage-rock of their first LP toward the more sophiscated sound of Forever Changes, which would be released a year later. 

Artist:    Them
Title:    Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out
Source:    British import CD: Now And Them
Writer(s):    Jimmie Cox
Label:    Rev-Ola (original US label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    The artist that comes to mind when I see the title of this Jimmy Cox tune is, of course, Eric Clapton, who included it on the Derek and the Dominos Layla album. Them's version of Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out, from the album Now And Them featuring vocalist Kenny McDowell, actually predates Clapton's by a couple years.

Artist:    Love
Title:    Alone Again Or
Source:    CD: Forever Changes
Writer(s):    Bryan MacLean
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1967
    The only song Love ever released as a single that was not written by Arthur Lee was Alone Again Or, issued in 1970. The song had originally appeared as the opening track from the Forever Changes album three years earlier. Bryan McLean would later say that he was not happy with the recording due to his own vocal being buried beneath that of Lee, since Lee's part was meant to be a harmony line to McLean's melody. McLean would later re-record the song for a solo album, but reportedly was not satisfied with that version either.

Artist:    Them
Title:    Square Room
Source:    Mono LP: Now And Them
Writer(s):    Them
Label:    Tower
Year:    1968
     The first album Them recorded after relocating to the US was called Now and Them.  Recorded in late 1967, the LP was released in January of '68. The standout track of the album is the nearly ten minute long Square Room, an acid rock piece that showcases the work of guitarist Jim Armstrong. An edit of the track had already appeared as the B side of a single before the album was released.

Artist:    Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come
Title:    Gypsy Escape
Source:    British import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Galactic Zoo Dossier)
Writer(s):    Denis Taylor
Label:    Polydor
Year:    1971
    Arthur Brown became a household name in 1968 with the release of one of the great albums of British psychedelic music, The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown and it's #1 hit single, Fire. To help promote the album the band set out on a US tour; by the time the tour was over the band had decided to break up. After a series of unsuccessful projects, Brown re-emerged in 1970 with a new band, Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come. Unlike the Crazy World, which was one of the most purely psychedelic bands in British rock history, Kingdom Come was a pioneer of the new progressive rock movement and was one of the first bands to use synthesizers extensively. In fact, about the only thing the two bands had in common was Brown's distinctive vocals. Gypsy Escape, from the album Galactic Zoo Dossier, couldn't even make that claim, being an instrumental written by the band's light show guy, Denis Taylor (who was the only non-performing member of the band pictured on the album cover).
 
Artist:    Hawkwind
Title:    The Reason Is?/Be Yourself/Paranoia-Part 1
Source:    LP: Hawkwind
Writer(s):    Brock/Hawkwind
Label:    4 Men With Beards (original label: United Artists)
Year:    1970
    The psychedelic era in the UK was short-lived compared to its US counterpart, and is generally considered to have started with the Beatles' Revolver album and ended with the Beatles' White Album. Among the many musicians who formed psychedelic bands was Alan Brock, who formed a band called the Famous Cure that spent most of its existence playing gigs in continental European countries such as the Netherlands. Brock became a professional busker in 1968, touring and even appearing on an album in that capacity for the next couple of years. In 1969 he reunited with former Famous Chef bandmate Mick Slattery and bassist John Harrison to form a band they initially called Group X, and then Hawkwind Zoo before finally settling on Hawkwind as a permanent name. Slattery left the group before their first LP, which, in addition to Brock and Harrison, included saxophonist Nik Turner, lead guitarist Huw Lloyd-Langton and drummer Terry Ollis. The album itself is considered one of the earliest examples of space-rock, with instrumental pieces like The Reason Is sequeing directly into tunes like Be Yourself, which in turn seques into the short instrumental Paranoia-Part 1. Hawkwind has since released dozens of albums, EPs and singles (sometimes under assumed names) over the years, with Brock being the only continuous member of the group.

Artist:    Sly And The Family Stone
Title:    I Want To Take You Higher
Source:    CD: The Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Stand and as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Sly Stone
Label:    Priority (original label: Epic)
Year:    1969
    Sylvester Stewart was a major presence on the San Francisco music scene for several years, both as a producer for Autumn Records and as a popular local disc jockey. In 1967 he decided to take it to the next level, using his studio connections to put together Sly And The Family Stone. The band featured a solid lineup of musicians, including Larry Graham, whose growling bass line figures prominently in their 1969 recording of I Want To Take You Higher. The song was originally released as a B side, but after the group blew away the crowd at Woodstock the recording was re-released as a single the following year. 

Artist:    Max Frost And The Troopers aka The 13th Power
Title:    Shape Of Things To Come
Source:    CD: Even More Nuggets (originally released on LP: Wild In The Streets soundtrack)
Writer(s):    Mann/Weil
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    Max Frost was a politically savvy rock star who rode the youth movement all the way to the White House, first through getting the support of a hip young Senator, then getting the age requirements for holding high political office lowered to 21, and finally lowering the voting age to 14. Everyone over 30 was locked away in internment camps, similar to those used during WWII by various governments to hold those of questionable loyalty to the current regime. What? You don't remember any of that? You say it sounds like the plot of a cheapie late 60s teen exploitation flick? Right on all counts. "Wild in the Streets", released in 1968, starred Christopher Jones as the rock star, Hal Holbrook as the hip young senator, and a Poseidon Adventure-sized Shelly Winter as the rock star's interred mom. Richard Pryor, in his film debut, played the band's drummer/political activist Stanley X. Shape Of Things To Come was a surprise hit single taken from the film, and was long thought to be the work of studio musicians under the supervision of Mike Curb, but is now known to have been recorded by an actual band called the 13th Power, led by vocalist/songwriter Paul Wibier, that had released a single called I See A Change Is Gonna Come for Curb's own Sidewalk label the previous year.
 

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2615 (starts 4/6/26)

https://exchange.prx.org/p/613803

    We have quite a few tracks this time around that have been only played once before on Rockin' in the Days of Confusion, along with a few that haven't been played at all and, of course, a couple of old favorites as well.

Artist:    Edgar Winter Group
Title:    Frankenstein (edited version)
Source:    LP: They Only Come Out At Night
Writer:    Edgar Winter
Label:    Epic
Year:    1973
    A real monster hit (sorry, couldn't resist).

Artist:    Graham Nash/David Crosby
Title:    Immigration Man
Source:    45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s):    Graham Nash
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1972
    Graham Nash and David Crosby decided to make an album without Stephen Stills or Neil Young in 1972. The two songwriters' compositions alternated on the album, with the final track, Nash's Immigration Man (based on his own real life experience at customs), being released as a single.

Artist:    Allman Brothers Band
Title:    Done Somebody Wrong
Source:    LP: At Fillmore East
Writer(s):    Kirkland/James
Label:    Mercury (original label: Capricorn)
Year:    1971
    As a general rule, live albums by rock bands are made up mostly of tunes that the group had previously released on studio albums. The Allman Brothers Band, however, took a different path for their 1971 double LP At Fillmore East. Of the seven tracks spread across four album sides, only the last two had previously appeared on the band's two studio efforts. The first four tunes, in fact, were blues covers such as Done Somebody Wrong, a tune generally attributed to Elmore James, who recorded the song in 1960. James, however, had actually rearranged a song that Eddie Kirkland had released in 1959 called I Must Have Done Somebody Wrong. Kirkland had given James permission to record the song, but only if Kirkland was credited as the songwriter, however James's name appeared on the 1960 single as the sole songwriter. When the Allman Brothers Band performed the song at the Fillmore East they introduced it as "an old Elmore James" tune.

Artist:    Wishbone Ash
Title:    Phoenix
Source:    CD: Wishbone Ash
Writer(s):    Upton/Turner/Turner/Powell
Label:    MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:    1970
    The first Wishbone Ash album was characterized by the dual lead guitar work of Andy Powell and Ted Turner. This is particularly notable on the album's showcase piece, the ten and a half minute long Phoenix. Unfortunately, the lack of a powerful lead vocalist kept Wishbone Ash from becoming a first-tier band.

Artist:    Genesis
Title:    The Fountain Of Salmacis
Source:    Canadian import CD: Nursery Cryme
Writer(s):    Banks/Collins/Gabriel/Hackett/Rutherford
Label:    Atlantic (original label: Charisma)
Year:    1971
    Genesis' original guitarist, Anthony Phillips, left the group following their second LP, Trespass, in 1970. This almost caused the band to break up, but ultimately resulted in a revised lineup consisting of Peter Gabriel (vocals), Tony Banks (keyboards), and Mike Rutherford (bass), along with new members Steve Hackett (guitar) and Phil Collins (drums). Early in 1971 the five got to work on a new album, which eventually came to be called Nursery Cryme. Although the album was not a huge seller in their native England, it found enough of a following in European nations such as Belgium to allow the band to continue on. The Fountain Of Salmacis, the album's closing track, was inspired by the story of a water nymph who becomes a hermaphodite after bathing in cursed water (hey, blame the ancient Greeks for that story).

Artist:    Grand Funk Railroad
Title:    Aimless Lady
Source:    CD: Closer To Home
Writer(s):    Mark Farner
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1970
    Despite being universally panned by the rock press, Grand Funk Railroad managed to achieve gold record status three times in the year 1970. The first two of these were actually released the previous year, but it was the massive success of their third LP, Closer To Home, that spurred sales of the band's albums overall. All of the songs on Closer To Home were written and sung by guitarist Mark Farner, including Aimless Lady, probably the best example on the album of a "typical" Grand Funk Railroad song.

Artist:    Enoch Smoky
Title:    It's Cruel
Source:    Mono LP: Brown Acid: The Sixth Trip (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Douglas/Gedz/Collignon
Label:    RidingEasy (original label: Pumpkin Seed)
Year:    1969
    Enoch Light was one of the pioneers of high-fidelity stereo recording techniques in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He developed the Command label for ABC records specifically to showcase those techniques, and his album covers were prominently displayed in various retail stores. In the latter part of the decade a hard-rocking band from Iowa City decided to call themselves Enoch Smoky. Although regionally popular, their entire recorded output consisted of one single, released on the local Pumpkin Seed label in 1969. It's Cruel is the A side of that single.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Roadhouse Blues
Source:    CD: The Best Of The Doors (originally released on LP: Morrison Hotel)
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1970
    After getting less than favorable reviews for their fourth LP, The Soft Parade, the Doors decided to go back to their roots for 1970s Morrison Hotel. One of the many bluesier tunes on the album was Roadhouse Blues, a song that soon became a staple of the group's live performances.

Artist:    Mountain
Title:    Travellin' In The Dark (To E.M.P.)
Source:    LP: Nantucket Sleighride
Writer(s):    Pappalardi/Collins
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1971
    Mountain, formed in 1970, took its name from Leslie West's 1969 solo album, recorded after the guitarist shortened his name from Weinstein following the breakup of the Vagrants. Just as important to the band's sound, however, was Felix Pappalardi, sometimes known as the "fourth member" of Cream. Pappalardi had produced all but the first Cream album, and, along with his wife Janet Collins, helped write some of their best material, including Strange Brew, which opened the second Cream album, Disraeli Gears. As a member of Mountain, Pappalardi played keyboards and bass, as well as singing lead vocals on several of the band's most popular tunes, including Travellin' In The Dark from Mountain's second LP, Nantucket Sleighride. The song, which was subtitled To E.M.P. is somewhat autobiographical, E.M.P. being the initials of Pappalardi's mother.

Artist:    Hot Tuna
Title:    Half/Time Saturation
Source:    LP: Yellow Fever
Writer(s):    Kaukonen/Casady/Steeler
Label:    Grunt
Year:    1975
    Originally formed in 1969 as an offshoot of Jefferson Airplane, Hot Tuna started off as a mainly acoustic band doing mostly blues standards, and had performed as an opening act for the Airplane itself in 1970. In the early 1970s, with the Airplane winding down, Hot Tuna emerged as a fully electric band independent of the Airplane. In 1974 the band, which at that point consisted of guitarist Jorma Kaukonen, bassist Jack Casady and drummer Bob Steeler, decided that it would be "just fun to be loud" for a while, recording three albums in 1975-76 as a power trio. The second of these three was Yellow Fever. As can be heard on the track Half/Time Saturation, they certainly succeeded.

Artist:    Eric Clapton
Title:    Willie And The Hand Jive
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Johnny Otis
Label:    RSO
Year:    1974
    Bandleader Johnny Otis managed to outdo Bo Diddley at his own beat with the 1968 hit song Willie And The Hand Jive. Eric Clapton, always on the lookout for cover tunes, did his own version, somewhat de-emphasizing the Bo Diddley beat, in 1974.