Artist: Byrds
Title: Mr. Spaceman
Source: LP: Fifth Dimension
Writer(s): Jim McGuinn
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
Both Jim (now Roger) McGuinn and David Crosby were science fiction fans, which became evident with the release of the Byrds' third album, Fifth Dimension. The third single released from that album, Mr. Spaceman, was in fact, a deliberate attempt to contact extra-terrestrials through the medium of AM radio. It was McGuinn's hope that ETs monitoring Earth's airwaves would hear the song and in some way respond to it, perhaps even contacting the band members themselves. Of course McGuinn didn't realize at the time that AM radio waves tend to disperse as they travel away from the Earth, making it unlikely that the signals would be picked up at all. Now if someone wants to upload this week's edition of Stuck in the Psychedelic Era to a satellite...
Artist: Music Machine
Title: The People In Me
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released on LP: Turn On The Music Machine and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Sean Bonniwell
Label: Rhino (original label: Original Sound)
Year: 1967
After Talk Talk soared into the upper reaches of the US charts the Music Machine's management made a tactical error. Instead of promoting the follow-up single, The People In Me, to the largest possible audience, the band's manager gave exclusive air rights to a new station at the far end of the Los Angeles AM radio dial. As local bands like the Music Machine depended on airplay in L.A. as a necessary step to getting national exposure, the move proved disastrous. Without any airplay on influential stations such as KFI, The People In Me was unable to get any higher than the # 66 spot on the national charts. Even worse for the band, the big stations remembered the slight when subsequent singles by the Music Machine were released, and by mid-1967 the original lineup had disbanded.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Run Around
Source: LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer(s): Balin/Kantner
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1966
The first Jefferson Airplane album was dominated by the songwriting of the band's founder, Marty Balin, both as a solo writer and as a collaborator with other band members. Run Around, from Balin and rhythm guitarist Paul Kantner is fairly typical of the early Jefferson Airplane sound.
Artist: 4 Seasons
Title: American Crucifixion Resurrection
Source: LP: Genuine Imitation Life Gazette
Writer(s): Gaudio/Holmes
Label: Philips
Year: 1969
The 4 Seasons had one of the most recognizable sounds on 60s top 40 radio, thanks in large part to the lead vocals of Frankie Valli, who managed to hit impossibly high notes with regularity. They also had one of the most successful runs of any vocal group in history, with hits like Sherry, Big Girls Don't Cry, Rag Doll and Let's Hang On, among many others. In the mid 70s they had a resurgence with a pair of dance hits, Who Loves You and December 1963. In 1969, however, the band was not doing so well, with no major hits since Valli's solo hit Can't Take My Eyes Off You two years earlier. Looking to attract new listeners, the group released their most ambitious album, the Genuine Imitation Life Gazette. The cover was done in the style of an old-style newspaper, with various faux articles about various social goings on interspersed with disguised information about the songs themselves. Musically, the album covered a lot of new ground, including the deep psychedelia of American Crucifixion Resurrection, which at nearly seven minutes is the longest track the band ever released.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Magical Mystery Tour
Source: Stereo British import 45 RPM EP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone
Year: 1967
1967 had been a great year for the Beatles, starting with their double-sided hit single Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane, followed by the iconic Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album and their late summer hit All You Need Is Love, with its worldwide TV debut (one of the few events of the time to utilize satellite technology). The next project, however, did not go over quite so well. It had been over two years since the group's last major movie (HELP!), and the band decided that their next film would be an exclusive for broadcast on BBC-TV. Unlike the previous two films, this new project would not follow traditional filmmaking procedures. Instead it would be a more experimental piece; a series of loosely related songs and comedy vignettes connected by a loose plot about a bus trip to the countryside. Magical Mystery Tour made its debut in early December of 1967 to overwhelmingly negative reaction by viewers and critics alike (partially because the film was shown in black and white on the tradition minded BBC-1 network; a later rebroadcast in color on BBC-2 went over much better). The songs used in the film, however, were quite popular. Since there were only six of them, far too few for a regular LP, it was decided to issue the album as a pair of 45 RPM EPs, complete with lyric sheets and booklet recounting the story from the film. The original EPs were available in both stereo and mono versions in Europe and the UK. In the US, where the six tunes were supplemented by the band's five remaining single sides from 1967 to create an LP, Magical Mystery Tour was only available in stereo. Although both the EP and LP versions have different song orders than the telefilm, all three open the same way, with the film's title song.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Strawberry Fields Forever
Source: CD: Magical Mystery Tour (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Apple/Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1967
The first song recorded for the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, Strawberry Fields Forever was instead issued as a single (along with Penny Lane) a few months before the album came out. The song went into the top 10, but was not released on an album until December of 1967, when it was included on the US version of Magical Mystery Tour.
Artist: Beatles
Title: I Am The Walrus
Source: Stereo British import 45 RPM EP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone
Year: 1967
Common practice in the UK in the 1960s was to avoid duplication between single releases and album tracks. This led to a unique situation for the Beatles and their British label, EMI/Parlophone, in December of 1967. The band had self-produced a new telefilm to be shown on BBC-TV called Magical Mystery Tour and wanted to make the songs from the film available to the record-buying public in time for Christmas. The problem was that there were only six songs in the one-hour telefilm, not nearly enough to fill an entire album. The solution was to release the songs on a pair of Extended Play 45 RPM records, along with several pages of song lyrics, illustrations and stills from the film itself. My own introduction to Magical Mystery Tour was a friend's German copy of the EPs, and when years later I had the opportunity to pick up a copy of the original UK version, I of course couldn't resist. That copy got totalled in a flood a few years back, but in 2012 I was finally able to locate another copy of the EP set, which is the source of this week's airing of the ultimate British psychedelic recording, I Am The Walrus.
Artist: Mockingbirds
Title: You Stole My Love
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in the UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Graham Gouldman
Label: Rhino (original label: Immediate)
Year: 1965
After writing two consecutive hit songs for the Yardbirds (For Your Love and Heart Full Of Soul), you would think that the next record released by Graham Gouldman's own band would be a sure thing. That was not the case, however, for the Mockingbirds, who released You Stole My Love in October of 1965. The single, the third for the band, was co-produced by Yardbirds manager Giorgio Gomelsky and bassist Paul Samwell-Smith and features backup vocals by Julie Driscoll, who would become well-known as vocalist with Brian Augur's Trinity. Nonetheless, despite such a pedrigree the song failed to chart, and although Gouldman would continue to have success as a songwriter with songs for bands such as Herman's Hermits (Listen People, No Milk Today) and the Hollies (Look Through Any Window, Bus Stop), he would not find himself in a successful band until the 1970s, when he was an integral part of 10cc.
Artist: Mad River
Title: High All The Time
Source: LP: Mad River
Writer(s): Lawrence Hammond
Label: Sundazed/EMI (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1968
When Mad River's debut LP was released, the San Francisco rock press hailed it as "taking rock music as far as it could go." Indeed, songs like High All The Time certainly pushed the envelope in 1968, when bubble gum was king of top 40 radio and progressive FM stations were still in the process of finding an audience. One thing that helped was the band members' friendship with avant-garde poet Richard Brautigan, who pulled whatever strings he could to get attention for his favorite local band. Still, the time was not yet right for such a band as Mad River, who had quietly faded away by the early 1970s.
Artist: Steppenwolf
Title: Berry Rides Again
Source: 45 RPM single B side (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf)
Writer(s): John Kay
Label: Dunhill
Year: 1968
With almost all of the tracks on the Monster album having, er, monstrous length, Dunhill Records went back to Steppenwolf's debut album for the B side of the 1970 Monster single, which itself was severely edited. Berry Rides Again, as the title implies, is a tribute to rock and roll pioneer Chuck Berry, and contains many of Berry's signature lyrics and guitar riffs.
Artist: Eric Burdon and the Animals
Title: Ain't That So
Source: Mono CD: Winds Of Change (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM B side)
Writer: Burdon/Briggs/Weider/Jenkins/McCulloch
Label: Repertoire (original label: M-G-M)
Year: 1967
Originally released in the UK as the B side to the 1967 single Good Times (which was itself a B side in the US), Ain't That So made its US debut in 1968, as the B side to the song Monterey (which was a US-only single). Like all the originals released by Eric Burdon and the Animals, writing credits on Ain't That So were shared by the entire band.
Artist: Captain Beefheart And His Magic Band
Title: Frying Pan
Source: LP: The Legendary A&M Sessions (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Don Van Vliet
Label: A&M
Year: 1966
Captain Beefheart (Don Van Vliet) and His Magic Band made their recording debut in 1966 with a pair of singles for Herb Alpert's A&M label. At the time the Captain was known for his covers of early rock and roll and blues artists such as Muddy Waters and Bo Diddley, and both A sides were typical of that sound. Although the B side of the second single, Frying Pan, was a Van Vliet original, it sounded far more like 50s blues than the avant-garde style that the Captain would become famous for.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Not Fade Away
Source: Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Hardin/Petty
Label: Abkco (original label: London)
Year: 1964
The Rolling Stones first top 5 hit in the UK was an updated version of Buddy Holly's Not Fade Away. The Stones put a greater emphasis on the Bo Diddley beat than Holly did and ended up with their first charted single in the US as well, establishing the Rolling Stones as the Yang of the British Invasion to the Beatles' Ying. It was a role that fit the top band from the city they call "The Smoke" well.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Your Auntie Grizelda
Source: CD: More Of The Monkees
Writer(s): Hilderbrand/Keller
Label: Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year: 1967
Despite being, in the words of bandmate Michael Nesmith, the best musician in the Monkees, Peter Tork had very little to do on the band's second LP, More of the Monkees. This was mostly because Don Kirschner, the music director for the Monkees project, did pretty much what he wanted with little regard for the wishes of the band members themselves. In fact, when More of the Monkees was released in January of 1967, the band members were unaware of the album's existence. Since Kirschner's policy was to use studio musicians exclusively for the instrumental parts, Tork was left with a few backup vocals and one track, Your Auntie Grizelda, that he sang lead on. The song was played for laughs, as Tork was generally portrayed as the goofy guy in the group on the Monkees TV show. This lack of respect would soon change, however, as a Tork composition would end up being used as the show's closing theme for the second and final season, and Tork himself would be featured playing a variety of instruments on subsequent Monkees records following Kirschner's dismissal.
Artist: Love
Title: My Little Red Book
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released on LP: Love)
Writer(s): Bacharach/David
Label: Rhino (original label: Elektra)
Year: 1966
The first rock record ever released by Elektra Records was a single by Love called My Little Red Book. The track itself (which also opens Love's debut LP), is a punked out version of tune originally recorded by Manfred Mann for the What's New Pussycat movie soundtrack. Needless to say, Love's version was not exactly what Burt Bacharach and Hal David had in mind.
Artist: Castaways
Title: Liar Liar
Source: CD: More Nuggets (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Donna/Craswell
Label: Rhino (original label: Soma)
Year: 1965
The Castaways were a popular local band in the Minneapolis area led by keyboardist James Donna, who, for less than two minutes at a time, dominated the national airwaves with their song Liar Liar for a couple months before fading off into obscurity.
Artist: Blues Magoos
Title: Pipe Dream
Source: Mono LP: Electric Comic Book
Writer: Gilbert/Scala
Label: Mercury
Year: 1967
Pipe Dream, the Blues Magoos strong follow-up single to (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet was handicapped by having an equally strong track, There's A Chance We Can Make It, on the other side of the record. As it was not Mercury's policy to push one side of a single over the other, stations were confused about which song to play. The result was that each tune got about an equal amount of airplay. With each song getting airplay on only half the available stations, neither tune was able to make a strong showing in the charts. This had the ripple effect of slowing down album sales of Electric Comic Book, which in turn hurt the careers of the members of the Blues Magoos.
Artist: Doors
Title: When The Music's Over
Source: LP: Strange Days
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
I remember the first time I heard When The Music's Over. My girlfriend's older brother had a copy of the Strange Days album on the stereo in his room and told us to get real close to the speakers so we could hear the sound of a butterfly while he turned the volume way up. What we got, of course, was a blast of "...we want the world and we want it now." Good times.
Artist: Chambers Brothers
Title: Time Has Come Today
Source: CD: The Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: The Time Has Come)
Writer(s): Joe and Willie Chambers
Label: Priority (original label: Columbia)
Year: LP released 1967, single edit released 1968
Time Has Come Today has one of the most complex histories of any song of the psychedelic era. First recorded in 1966 and released as a two-and-a-half minute single the song flopped. The following year an entirely new eleven minute version of the song was recorded for the album The Time Has Come, featuring an extended pyschedelic section filled with various studio effects. In late 1967 a three minute edited version of the song was released that left out virtually the entire psychedelic section of the recording. Soon after that, the single was pulled from the shelf and replaced by a longer edited version that included part of the psychedelic section. That version became a hit record in 1968, peaking just outside the top 10. This is actually a stereo recreation of that mono second edited version.
Artist: Shadows Of Knight
Title: Three For Love
Source: Mono CD: Dark Sides (originally released on LP: Back Door Men)
Writer(s): Joe Kelley
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
The Shadows Of Knight moved way out of their garage/punk comfort zone for the song Three For Love, a folk-rock piece laden with harmony vocals. The tune, from the second LP, Back Door Men, is the only Shadows song I know of written by guitarist Joe Kelley. Kelley himself had started out as the band's bass player, but midway through sessions for the band's first LP, Gloria, it became obvious that he was a much better guitarist than Warren Rogers. As a result, the two traded roles, with Kelley handling all the leads on Back Door Men. Kelly, however, did not sing the lead vocals on Three For Love, despite being the song's composer. That task fell to rhythm guitarist Jerry McGeorge. It was his only credit as lead vocalist on the album.
Artist: Move
Title: (Here We Go Round) The Lemon Tree
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Roy Wood
Label: A&M
Year: 1967
The most successful British band of the psychedelic era not to have a US hit was the Move, a band that featured Roy Wood and Jeff Lynne, among other notables. The band was already well established in the UK by 1967, when their single Flowers In The Rain was picked to be the first record played on the new BBC Radio One. The B side of that record was the equally-catchy (Here We Go Round) The Lemon Tree. Both songs were written by Wood, although he only sang lead vocals on the B side.
Artist: Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger and the Trinity
Title: This Wheel's On Fire
Source: Mono CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Dylan/Danko
Label: Polydor (original label: Marmalade)
Year: 1968
Julie Driscoll got her start as secretary of the Yardbirds' fan club while still in her late teens. The band's manager, Giorgio Gomelsky, was so impressed with her voice that he himself got her first single released in late 1963. From there she joined a band called Steampacket, working with two other vocalists, Long John Baldry and Rod Stewart. Another member of Steampacket was organist Brian Auger, who, after the demise of Steampacket, formed his own band, the Trinity, in 1967. Working with Driscoll, Brian Auger and the Trinity recorded an LP, Open, for Gomelsky's new Marmalade label in 1968. The featured single from Open was This Wheel's On Fire, a song written by Bob Dylan and Rick Danko of The Band. Driscoll, over a period of time, gravitated toward jazz, eventually moving to the US where she continues to perform.
Artist: Seeds
Title: Pushin' Too Hard
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released on LP: The Seeds)
Writer(s): Sky Saxon
Label: Rhino (original label: GNP Crescendo)
Year: 1966
The Seeds originally released their biggest hit in late 1965 under the title You're Pushin' Too Hard. It wasn't until the song was re-released in 1966 under the more familiar title Pushin' Too Hard that it became a local L.A. hit, and it wasn't until spring of 1967 that the tune took off nationally. The timing was perfect for me, as the new FM station I was listening to jumped right on it.
Artist: Simon And Garfunkel
Title: Anji
Source: CD: Collected Works (originally released on LP: Sounds Of Silence)
Writer(s): Davey Graham
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
Paul Simon wrote nearly all the material that he and Art Garfunkel recorded. One notable exception is Davey Graham's instrumental Anji, which Simon played as a solo acoustic piece on the Sounds Of Silence. The song immediately follows a Simon composition, Somewhere They Can't Find Me, that is built around a similar-sounding guitar riff, making Anji sound somewhat like an instrumental reprise of the first tune.
Artist: Moby Grape
Title: Changes
Source: Great Grape
Writer(s): Miller/Stevenson
Label: Columbia
Year: 1967
All of the members of Moby Grape were songwriters as well as performers. Most contributed songs individually, but one songwriting team did emerge early on. Guitarist Jerry Miller and drummer Don Stevenson formed a durable partnership that was responsible for many of the group's best tracks, including Changes from the band's 1967 debut LP.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Still Raining, Still Dreaming
Source: LP: Electric Ladyland
Writer: Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1968
Still Raining, Still Dreaming, from the third Jimi Hendrix Experience album Electric Ladyland, is the second half of a live studio recording featuring guest drummer Buddy Miles, who would later join Hendrix and bassist Billy Cox to form Band Of Gypsys. The recording also features Mike Finnegan on organ, Freddie Smith on tenor sax and Larry Faucett on congas, as well as Experience member Noel Redding on bass.
Artist: Turtles
Title: John And Julie
Source: CD: Turtle Soup
Writer(s): The Turtles
Label: Repertoire (original label: White Whale)
Year: 1969
The Turtles were the only truly successful act in the history of White Whale Records. This created a love/hate relationship between the band and its label, with the band always wanting more creative freedom and the label wanting more hit records. This sometimes resulted in great records such as Elenore, but often led to even more problems. Things came to a head after the band's final album, Turtle Soup, produced by the Kinks' Ray Davies, failed to provide any top 40 hits (the highest charting single stalling out at # 51). The album did have some creative high points, however, such as the lavishly produced John And Julie. Nonetheless, rather than record another album for White Whale, the Turtles officially disbanded, with two of the core members, Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, hooking up with the Mothers Of Invention, recording the classic Live At The Fillmore East album in 1970.
Artist: Modern Folk Quintet
Title: Night Time Girl
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Kooper/Levine
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunhill)
Year: 1966
The Modern Folk Quintet can be seen two ways: either as a group that constantly strived to be on the cutting edge or simply as fad followers. Starting off in the early 60s, the MFQ found themselves working with Phil Spector in the middle of the decade, complete with Spector's trademark "wall of sound" production techniques. When that didn't work out they signed with Lou Adler's Dunhill Records, cutting this track that sounds like a psychedelicized version of the Mamas and the Papas.
Artist: Traffic
Title: Hole In My Shoe
Source: CD: Smiling Phases (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single and in US on LP: Heaven Is In Your Mind)
Writer(s): Dave Mason
Label: Island (original label: United Artists)
Year: 1967
Since the 1970s Traffic has been known as Steve Winwood's (and to a lesser degree, Jim Capaldi and Chris Wood's) band, but in the early days the group's most popular songs were written and sung by co-founder Dave Mason. Hole In My Shoe was a single that received considerable airplay in the UK. As was common practice in the UK at the time, the song was not included on the band's debut album. In the US, however, both Hole In My Shoe and the other then-current Traffic single, Paper Sun, were added to the album, replacing (ironically) a couple of Mason's other tunes.
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1334 (starts 8/22/13)
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: It's Breaking Me Up
Source: LP: This Was
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Jethro Tull originally was part of the British blues scene, but even in the early days the band's principal songwriter Ian Anderson wanted to expand beyond the confines of that particular genre. Ironically It's Breaking Me Up, from Jethro Tull's first LP, is an Anderson composition that is rooted solidly in the British blues style.
Artist: Cream
Title: What A Bringdown
Source: CD: Goodbye Cream
Writer(s): Ginger Baker
Label: Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year: 1969
Right around the time that Cream's third LP, Wheels Of Fire, was released, the band announced that it would be splitting up following its upcoming tour. Before starting the tour the band recorded three tracks, each one written by one of the three band members. Both Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce worked with collaborators on their songs, while drummer Ginger Baker was given full credit for his tune, What A Bringdown (which was sung by Bruce). As it turned out those would be the only studio recordings on the final Cream album, Goodbye Cream, released in 1969, which in addition to the three new songs had several live tracks from a 1968 performance at the Los Angeles Palladium.
Artist: Neil Young
Title: Birds
Source: 45 RPM single B side (originally released on LP: After The Gold Rush)
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Reprise
Year: 1970
Following their appearance at Woodstock and the release of the deja vu album, the individual members of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young went to work on solo albums. Unlike the other members, whose albums came out on the Atlantic label (which also issued the group recordings), Young was under contract to Reprise Records, and had already released two solo LPs prior to 1970. As expected, After The Gold Rush was a major success for Young, with several songs, including Only Love Can Break Your Heart, being released as singles. The B side of Only Love was Birds, one of the shortest tracks on the album.
Artist: Country Joe And The Fish
Title: Porpoise Mouth
Source: LP: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s): Joe McDonald
Label: Vanguard
Year: 1967
The songs on the first Country Joe And The Fish album ranged from silly satire (Super Bird) to downright spacey. One of the spaciest tracks on the album is Porpoise Mouth, both lyrically and musically.
Artist: Uncalled For
Title: Do Like Me
Source: Mono LP: Pebbles Vol. 8
Writer(s): Uncalled For
Label: BFD (original labels Dollie, Laurie)
Year: 1967
Virtually nothing is known about the Uncalled For other than that they came from Youngstown, Ohio (which was still a vital steel-making center with a thriving local music scene in the 1960s) and recorded one 1967 single, Do Like Me, for the local Dollie label. The song was apparently successful enough to be picked up by a national label, Laurie, and re-released later in the year. If anyone knows more about the Uncalled For, feel free to drop me a line.
Artist: Love
Title: Alone Again Or
Source: CD: Forever Changes
Writer(s): Bryan MacLean
Label: Elektra
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: Blues Magoos
Title: Sometimes I Think About
Source: LP: Psychedelic Lollipop
Writer(s): Gilbert/Scala/Theilheim/Esposito
Label: Mercury
Year: 1966
Although it sounds like it could have been a remake of an old blues tune, Sometimes I Think About is actually a Blues Magoos original. The song, from their debut Psychedelic Lollipop album, is slow and moody, yet actually rocks out pretty hard, a pattern that would become somewhat of a hard rock cliche in the 1970s (think Grand Funk Railroad's Heartbreaker).
Artist: Chocolate Watchband
Title: Psychedelic Trip
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Loomis/Flores/Tolby/Aguilar/Andrijasevich
Label: Tower/Sundazed
Year: Recorded 1966, released 2012
Psychedelic Trip is essentially an early instrumental version of what would eventually become the title track for the No Way Out album. Although Psychedelic Trip is credited to the entire band, producer/manager Ed Cobb (the Ed Wood of psychedelic music) took sole credit for the song No Way Out.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Tomorrow Never Knows
Source: British import LP: Revolver
Writer: Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1966
Several years ago I started to compile an (admittedly subjective) list of the top psychedelic songs ever recorded. Although I never finished ranking the songs, one of the top contenders for the number one spot was the Beatles' Tomorrow Never Knows, from the Revolver album. The track is one of the first to use studio techniques such as backwards masking and has been hailed as the beginning of the psychedelic era in the UK.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Change Is Now
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
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 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: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
Source: CD: Electric Ladyland
Writer: Jimi Hendrix
Label: Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Although never released as a single (although it was released posthumously on an EP in the UK and Europe), Voodoo Child (Slight Return), has become a staple of classic rock radio over the years. The song was originally an outgrowth of a jam session at New York's Record Plant, which itself takes up most of side one of the third Jimi Hendrix Experience album Electric Ladyland. This more familiar studio reworking of the piece has been covered by a variety of artists over the years.
Artist: Big Brother And The Holding Company
Title: Turtle Blues
Source: LP: Cheap Thrills
Writer(s): Janis Joplin
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
Sometimes I do play favorites. Turtle Blues, from the Big Brother And The Holding Company album Cheap Thrills, is certainly one of them. Besides vocalist Janis Joplin, who wrote the tune, the only other band member heard on the track is guitarist Peter Albin. Legendary producer John Simon provides the piano playing.
Artist: Fairport Convention
Title: Jack Of Diamonds
Source: CD: Fairport Convention
Writer(s): Dylan/Carruthers
Label: Polydor
Year: 1968
The recording history of the premier English folk-rock band, Fairport Convention, can be more than a little confusing. A large part of the problem was caused by A&M Records, who had the rights to release the band's material in the US, starting with the band's second LP. Rather than go with the original album title, What We Did On Our Holidays, A&M retitled the album Fairport Convention, releasing it in 1970. The problem is that the band's first album, released in the UK on Polydor in 1968, was also titled Fairport Convention. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the lineup on the 1968 Polydor LP differs from that of every other Fairport album, most notably in the absence of the band's most visible member, vocalist Sandy Denny. Fairport Convention (the band) was formed in 1967, and was consciously following in the footsteps of Jefferson Airplane, albeit from a British perspective. Like the Airplane, the original Fairport lineup had a wealth of talent, including Martin Lamble on violin, Simon Nicol on guitars, Judy Dibble on autoharp, recorder and piano, Richard Thompson on guitar and mandolin, Ashley Hutchings (then known as Tyger Hutchings) on bass and Ian MacDonald, who shared lead vocals with Dyble. Musically the band was far more rock-oriented than on later LPs, as can be heard on tracks like Jack Of Diamonds, a song that the band credited to Bob Dylan and Ben Carruthers. This can be attributed, at least in part, to a general disdain among the youth of Britain for the traditional English folk music that was taught to every schoolchild in the country (whether they wanted it or not). Later albums would find Fairport Convention doing more and more traditional folk, eventually becoming the most world's popular practicioners of the art, although they never entirely abandoned their rock roots.
Artist: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title: Light Your Windows
Source: CD: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Writer(s): Duncan/Freiberg
Label: Rock Beat (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1968
There are differing opinions on just how serious legendary San Francisco singer/songwriter and general iconoclast Dino Valenti was being when, at a jam session with guitarist John Cippolina one night, he suggested that the two of them form a band. Since Valenti was busted for drugs the very next day (and ended up spending the next two years in jail), we'll never know for sure. Cippolina, however, was motivated enough to begin finding members for the new band, including bassist David Freiberg (later to join Starship) and drummer Skip Spence. When Marty Balin stole Spence away to join his own new band (Jefferson Airplane), he tried to make up for it by introducing Cippolina to vocalist/guitarist Gary Duncan and drummer Greg Elmore, whose own band, the Brogues, had recently disbanded. Taking the name Quicksilver Messenger Service (so named for all the member's astrological connections with the planet Mercury), the new band soon became a fixture on the San Francisco scene. Inspired by the Blues Project, Cippolina and Duncan quickly established a reputation for their dual guitar improvisational abilities. Unlike other San Francisco bands such as the Airplane and the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service did not jump at their first offer from a major record label, preferring to hold out for the best deal. This meant their debut album did not come out until 1968, missing out on the initial buzz surrounding the summer of love.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Connection
Source: LP: Between The Buttons
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
Often dismissed as the beginning of a departure from their blues roots, the Rolling Stones first LP of 1967, Between The Buttons, actually has a lot of good tunes on it, such as Connection, a song with multiple meanings. Most studios at that time only had four tracks available and would use two tape machines to mix the first tracks recorded on one machine (usually the instrumental tracks) down to a single track on the other machine, freeing up the remaining tracks for overdubs. This process, known as "bouncing", sometimes happened two or three times on a single recording if extra overdubs were needed. Unfortunately each pass resulted in a loss of quality on the bounced tracks, especially if the equipment was not properly maintained. This is particularly noticeable on Connection, as the final mix seems to have lost most of its high and low frequencies, resulting in an unintentionally "lo-fi" recording.
Artist: Shindogs
Title: Who Do You Think You Are
Source: Mono LP: Ain't It Hard (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Bramlett/Cooper
Label: Sundazed (original label: Viva)
Year: 1966
In the early 60s the ABC TV network ran a show called Hootenanny, which was a musical variety show built around the folk music revival that had swept the nation. With the advent of the British Invasion, however, Hootenanny took a ratings hit and found itself replaced with a new, more pop/rock oriented show called Shindig in the fall of 1964. The show had its own house band, the Shindiggers, who later became the Shindogs. The Shindogs had a wealth of talent, including Delaney Bramlett, who would go on to greater fame working with Eric Clapton in the early 70s with his own band, Delaney And Bonnie And Friends. Shindig was cancelled in January of 1966 (to be replaced by a new show, Batman), but the Shindogs stayed together long enough to record a single, Who Do You Think You Are, for Snuff Garrett's Viva label.
Artist: Music Machine
Title: Bottom Of The Soul
Source: CD: Beyond The Garage (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Bonniwell Music Machine)
Writer(s): Sean Bonniwell
Label: Sundazed (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1967
After severing ties with Original Sound Records in early 1967, Sean Bonniwell and his band, the Music Machine, signed a contract with Warner Brothers, a label that was already well on its way to becoming one of the world's top record companies. Although the first single released on the label featured the original lineup, the song, Bottom Of The Soul, was credited to the Bonniwell Music Machine, as were all subsequent releases by the band. The song itself, in the words of Bonniwell himself, "celebrates the courage of those homeless whose criterion...measures the burdon of living life at the bottom of the soul".
Artist: Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title: Incense And Peppermints
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Gilbert/Weitz/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Uni)
Year: 1967
Incense and Peppermints is one of the iconic songs of the psychedelic era, yet when it was originally released to Los Angeles area radio stations it was intended to be the B side of The Birdman of Alkatrash. Somewhere along the line a DJ flipped the record over and started playing Incense And Peppermints instead. The song caught on and Uni Records (short for Universal, which is now the world's largest record company) picked up the Strawberry Alarm Clock's contract and reissued the record nationally with Incense And Peppermints as the A side.
Artist: Balloon Farm
Title: A Question Of Temperature
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Appel/Schnug/Henny
Label: Rhino (original label: Laurie)
Year: 1967
Few, if any, bands managed to successfully cross bubble gum and punk like the Balloon Farm with A Question Of Temperature, originally released on the Laurie label in 1967. Band member Mike Appel went on to greater notoriety as Bruce Springsteen's first manager.
Artist: Castaways
Title: Liar Liar
Source: CD: More Nuggets (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Donna/Craswell
Label: Rhino (original label: Soma)
Year: 1965
The Castaways were a popular local band in the Minneapolis area led by keyboardist James Donna, who, for less than two minutes at a time, dominated the national airwaves with their song Liar Liar for a couple months before fading off into obscurity.
Artist: Standells
Title: Why Pick On Me
Source: CD: Nuggets-Classics From The Psychedelic 60s (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ed Cobb
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1966
Ed Cobb was, in many ways, the Ed Wood of the late 60s record industry. The bands who recorded under his guidance, such as LA.'s Standells, have become legends of garage rock. Wood wrote the first three singles released by the Standells, including their biggest hit, Dirty Water, and its follow-up, Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White. Why Pick On Me, the title track of the band's second LP, was the third single released by the band, although it did not chart as well as its predecessors.
Artist: Who
Title: Rael 1
Source: LP: The Who Sell Out
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: Decca
Year: 1967
The Who Sell Out, released in December 1967, was the last album by the group before their 1969 rock-opera Tommy. The last track on the LP, Rael, is itself a mini-opera that tells the story of a wealthy man who has taken on the role of a crusader, out to free his ancestral homeland from its current occupiers. He tells the captain of his ship to come back for him on Christmas Day to see if he is ready to return. If not, he tells the captain, the boat is yours. Of course the captain has no intention of returning, as he declares soon after putting back out to sea. The piece then goes into an instrumental passage that would be copied pretty much note for note on the Tommy album as part of the Underture. The track ends with a repeat of the owner's instructions to the captain. The events surrounding the recording of Rael have become the stuff of legend. The band spent an entire day recording and mixing the song, and were apparently so exhausted at the end of the session that they left without securing the multi-track master in a safe place. The cleaning woman came in the next morning and tossed the tape into the waste basket. She then emptied the ashtrays and other trash into the same waste basket. When the band came in around noon the recording engineer who had found the tape had the unenviable task of telling them what had happened. Pete Townsend was in a rage, and the engineer tried to placate him by saying "these things happen". Townshend then proceeded to throw a chair through the glass wall separating the studio from the control room, informing the engineer that "these things happen".
Artist: Al Kooper/Stephen Stills/Harvey Brooks/Eddie Hoh
Title: CD: You Don't Love Me
Source: Super Session
Writer(s): Willie Cobbs
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1968
You Don't Love Me was originally recorded and released as a single by Willie Cobbs in 1960. Although the song is credited solely to Cobbs, it strongly resembles a 1955 Bo Diddley B side, She's Fine She's Mine, in its melody, lyrics and repeated guitar riff. The Cobbs single was a regional hit on the Mojo label in Memphis, but stalled out nationally after being reissued on Vee-Jay Records, due to the label pulling promotional support from the song due to copyright issues. A 1965 version by Junior Wells with Buddy Guy saw some minor changes in the lyrics to the song; it was this version that was covered by Al Kooper and Stephen Stills for the 1968 Super Session album. The recording extensively uses an effect called flanging, a type of phase-shifting that was first used on the Jimi Hendrix track Bold As Love.
Artist: Kinks
Title: Dead End Street
Source: 45 RPM single
Year: 1967
The last major Kinks hit in the US was Sunny Afternoon in the summer of 1966. The November follow-up, Dead End Street, was in much the same style, but did not achieve the same kind of success in the US (although it was a top five hit in the UK). The Kinks would not have another major US hit until Lola in 1970.
Artist: Atlantics
Title: Come On
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Australia as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Peter Hood
Label: Rhino (original label: Sunshine)
Year: 1967
One of Australia's most popular and prolific bands, the Atlantics were formed in 1961 as a surf band. By 1964 they were also recording songs with vocals, usually backing up singer Johnny Rebb. Additionally, they released a handful of records with their own vocals provided by guitarist Jim Addams and/or drummer Peter Hood. Among those singles was Come On, a 1967 track written by Hood.
Artist: People
Title: I Love You
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Chris White
Label: Rhino (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1968
By 1968 the major labels had signed just about every San Francisco band with any perceived potential. Capitol, having had some success with the Chocolate Watchband from San Jose on its Tower subsidiary, decided to sign another south bay band, People, to the parent label. The most successful single for the band was a new recording of an obscure Zombies B side. I Love You ended up hitting the top 20 nationally, despite the active efforts of two of the most powerful men in the music industry, who set out to squash the song as a way of punishing the record's producer for something having nothing to do with the song or the band itself.
Artist: Donovan
Title: The Observation
Source: Mono LP: Mellow Yellow
Writer: Donovan Leitch
Label: Epic
Year: 1967
Donovan was at first hailed as Britain's answer to Bob Dylan, but by 1967 he was proving that he was much more than that. The Observation, with its distinctive use of an acoustic double-bass, is one of many innovative tunes that helped redefine Donovan from folk singer to singer/songwriter, transforming the entire genre in the process.
Artist: Pink Floyd
Title: Bike
Source: CD: The Piper At the Gates of Dawn
Writer: Syd Barrett
Label: Capitol (originally released on EMI/Columbia in UK)
Year: 1967
Due to an inherent cheapness in Tower Records' approach to pretty much everything, four songs were left off the US version of the first Pink Floyd album, The Piper At the Gates of Dawn, with the band's first UK single, Arnold Layne, being inserted in their stead (shortening the album's running time by nearly ten minutes). Among the missing songs was Syd Barrett's Bike, which did not appear in the US until the early 70s, when the Relics compilation was released. All CD releases of Piper in the US have restored the original song lineup and running order.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Go And Say Goodbye
Source: CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
After failing his audition for the Monkees, Stephen Stills met up with his former bandmate Neil Young, and, along with Richie Furay, Bruce Palmer and Dewey Martin formed the Buffalo Springfield in 1966. Their first single was a Young tune, Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing, sung by Furay. The B side of that record, Stills's Go And Say Goodbye, is one of the first modern country-rock songs ever recorded.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Rock And Roll Woman
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
Buffalo Springfield did not sell huge numbers of records (except for the single For What It's Worth). Nor did they pack in the crowds. As a matter of fact, when they played the club across the street from where Love was playing, they barely had any audience at all. Artistically, though, it's a whole 'nother story. During their brief existence Buffalo Springfield launched the careers of no less than four major artists: Neil Young, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and Stephen Stills. They also recorded more than their share of tracks that have held up better than most of what else was being recorded at the time. Case in point: Rock and Roll Woman, a Stephen Stills tune that still sounds fresh well over 40 years after it was recorded.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: For What It's Worth
Source: CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atco
Year: 1967
Most people associate the name Buffalo Springfield with the song For What It's Worth. 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 released in January of 1967. 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 becoming a breakout 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, making earlier copies of the album somewhat of a rarity and quite collectable.
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.
Title: It's Breaking Me Up
Source: LP: This Was
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Jethro Tull originally was part of the British blues scene, but even in the early days the band's principal songwriter Ian Anderson wanted to expand beyond the confines of that particular genre. Ironically It's Breaking Me Up, from Jethro Tull's first LP, is an Anderson composition that is rooted solidly in the British blues style.
Artist: Cream
Title: What A Bringdown
Source: CD: Goodbye Cream
Writer(s): Ginger Baker
Label: Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year: 1969
Right around the time that Cream's third LP, Wheels Of Fire, was released, the band announced that it would be splitting up following its upcoming tour. Before starting the tour the band recorded three tracks, each one written by one of the three band members. Both Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce worked with collaborators on their songs, while drummer Ginger Baker was given full credit for his tune, What A Bringdown (which was sung by Bruce). As it turned out those would be the only studio recordings on the final Cream album, Goodbye Cream, released in 1969, which in addition to the three new songs had several live tracks from a 1968 performance at the Los Angeles Palladium.
Artist: Neil Young
Title: Birds
Source: 45 RPM single B side (originally released on LP: After The Gold Rush)
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Reprise
Year: 1970
Following their appearance at Woodstock and the release of the deja vu album, the individual members of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young went to work on solo albums. Unlike the other members, whose albums came out on the Atlantic label (which also issued the group recordings), Young was under contract to Reprise Records, and had already released two solo LPs prior to 1970. As expected, After The Gold Rush was a major success for Young, with several songs, including Only Love Can Break Your Heart, being released as singles. The B side of Only Love was Birds, one of the shortest tracks on the album.
Artist: Country Joe And The Fish
Title: Porpoise Mouth
Source: LP: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s): Joe McDonald
Label: Vanguard
Year: 1967
The songs on the first Country Joe And The Fish album ranged from silly satire (Super Bird) to downright spacey. One of the spaciest tracks on the album is Porpoise Mouth, both lyrically and musically.
Artist: Uncalled For
Title: Do Like Me
Source: Mono LP: Pebbles Vol. 8
Writer(s): Uncalled For
Label: BFD (original labels Dollie, Laurie)
Year: 1967
Virtually nothing is known about the Uncalled For other than that they came from Youngstown, Ohio (which was still a vital steel-making center with a thriving local music scene in the 1960s) and recorded one 1967 single, Do Like Me, for the local Dollie label. The song was apparently successful enough to be picked up by a national label, Laurie, and re-released later in the year. If anyone knows more about the Uncalled For, feel free to drop me a line.
Artist: Love
Title: Alone Again Or
Source: CD: Forever Changes
Writer(s): Bryan MacLean
Label: Elektra
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: Blues Magoos
Title: Sometimes I Think About
Source: LP: Psychedelic Lollipop
Writer(s): Gilbert/Scala/Theilheim/Esposito
Label: Mercury
Year: 1966
Although it sounds like it could have been a remake of an old blues tune, Sometimes I Think About is actually a Blues Magoos original. The song, from their debut Psychedelic Lollipop album, is slow and moody, yet actually rocks out pretty hard, a pattern that would become somewhat of a hard rock cliche in the 1970s (think Grand Funk Railroad's Heartbreaker).
Artist: Chocolate Watchband
Title: Psychedelic Trip
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Loomis/Flores/Tolby/Aguilar/Andrijasevich
Label: Tower/Sundazed
Year: Recorded 1966, released 2012
Psychedelic Trip is essentially an early instrumental version of what would eventually become the title track for the No Way Out album. Although Psychedelic Trip is credited to the entire band, producer/manager Ed Cobb (the Ed Wood of psychedelic music) took sole credit for the song No Way Out.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Tomorrow Never Knows
Source: British import LP: Revolver
Writer: Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1966
Several years ago I started to compile an (admittedly subjective) list of the top psychedelic songs ever recorded. Although I never finished ranking the songs, one of the top contenders for the number one spot was the Beatles' Tomorrow Never Knows, from the Revolver album. The track is one of the first to use studio techniques such as backwards masking and has been hailed as the beginning of the psychedelic era in the UK.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Change Is Now
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
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 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: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
Source: CD: Electric Ladyland
Writer: Jimi Hendrix
Label: Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Although never released as a single (although it was released posthumously on an EP in the UK and Europe), Voodoo Child (Slight Return), has become a staple of classic rock radio over the years. The song was originally an outgrowth of a jam session at New York's Record Plant, which itself takes up most of side one of the third Jimi Hendrix Experience album Electric Ladyland. This more familiar studio reworking of the piece has been covered by a variety of artists over the years.
Artist: Big Brother And The Holding Company
Title: Turtle Blues
Source: LP: Cheap Thrills
Writer(s): Janis Joplin
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
Sometimes I do play favorites. Turtle Blues, from the Big Brother And The Holding Company album Cheap Thrills, is certainly one of them. Besides vocalist Janis Joplin, who wrote the tune, the only other band member heard on the track is guitarist Peter Albin. Legendary producer John Simon provides the piano playing.
Artist: Fairport Convention
Title: Jack Of Diamonds
Source: CD: Fairport Convention
Writer(s): Dylan/Carruthers
Label: Polydor
Year: 1968
The recording history of the premier English folk-rock band, Fairport Convention, can be more than a little confusing. A large part of the problem was caused by A&M Records, who had the rights to release the band's material in the US, starting with the band's second LP. Rather than go with the original album title, What We Did On Our Holidays, A&M retitled the album Fairport Convention, releasing it in 1970. The problem is that the band's first album, released in the UK on Polydor in 1968, was also titled Fairport Convention. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the lineup on the 1968 Polydor LP differs from that of every other Fairport album, most notably in the absence of the band's most visible member, vocalist Sandy Denny. Fairport Convention (the band) was formed in 1967, and was consciously following in the footsteps of Jefferson Airplane, albeit from a British perspective. Like the Airplane, the original Fairport lineup had a wealth of talent, including Martin Lamble on violin, Simon Nicol on guitars, Judy Dibble on autoharp, recorder and piano, Richard Thompson on guitar and mandolin, Ashley Hutchings (then known as Tyger Hutchings) on bass and Ian MacDonald, who shared lead vocals with Dyble. Musically the band was far more rock-oriented than on later LPs, as can be heard on tracks like Jack Of Diamonds, a song that the band credited to Bob Dylan and Ben Carruthers. This can be attributed, at least in part, to a general disdain among the youth of Britain for the traditional English folk music that was taught to every schoolchild in the country (whether they wanted it or not). Later albums would find Fairport Convention doing more and more traditional folk, eventually becoming the most world's popular practicioners of the art, although they never entirely abandoned their rock roots.
Artist: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title: Light Your Windows
Source: CD: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Writer(s): Duncan/Freiberg
Label: Rock Beat (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1968
There are differing opinions on just how serious legendary San Francisco singer/songwriter and general iconoclast Dino Valenti was being when, at a jam session with guitarist John Cippolina one night, he suggested that the two of them form a band. Since Valenti was busted for drugs the very next day (and ended up spending the next two years in jail), we'll never know for sure. Cippolina, however, was motivated enough to begin finding members for the new band, including bassist David Freiberg (later to join Starship) and drummer Skip Spence. When Marty Balin stole Spence away to join his own new band (Jefferson Airplane), he tried to make up for it by introducing Cippolina to vocalist/guitarist Gary Duncan and drummer Greg Elmore, whose own band, the Brogues, had recently disbanded. Taking the name Quicksilver Messenger Service (so named for all the member's astrological connections with the planet Mercury), the new band soon became a fixture on the San Francisco scene. Inspired by the Blues Project, Cippolina and Duncan quickly established a reputation for their dual guitar improvisational abilities. Unlike other San Francisco bands such as the Airplane and the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service did not jump at their first offer from a major record label, preferring to hold out for the best deal. This meant their debut album did not come out until 1968, missing out on the initial buzz surrounding the summer of love.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Connection
Source: LP: Between The Buttons
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
Often dismissed as the beginning of a departure from their blues roots, the Rolling Stones first LP of 1967, Between The Buttons, actually has a lot of good tunes on it, such as Connection, a song with multiple meanings. Most studios at that time only had four tracks available and would use two tape machines to mix the first tracks recorded on one machine (usually the instrumental tracks) down to a single track on the other machine, freeing up the remaining tracks for overdubs. This process, known as "bouncing", sometimes happened two or three times on a single recording if extra overdubs were needed. Unfortunately each pass resulted in a loss of quality on the bounced tracks, especially if the equipment was not properly maintained. This is particularly noticeable on Connection, as the final mix seems to have lost most of its high and low frequencies, resulting in an unintentionally "lo-fi" recording.
Artist: Shindogs
Title: Who Do You Think You Are
Source: Mono LP: Ain't It Hard (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Bramlett/Cooper
Label: Sundazed (original label: Viva)
Year: 1966
In the early 60s the ABC TV network ran a show called Hootenanny, which was a musical variety show built around the folk music revival that had swept the nation. With the advent of the British Invasion, however, Hootenanny took a ratings hit and found itself replaced with a new, more pop/rock oriented show called Shindig in the fall of 1964. The show had its own house band, the Shindiggers, who later became the Shindogs. The Shindogs had a wealth of talent, including Delaney Bramlett, who would go on to greater fame working with Eric Clapton in the early 70s with his own band, Delaney And Bonnie And Friends. Shindig was cancelled in January of 1966 (to be replaced by a new show, Batman), but the Shindogs stayed together long enough to record a single, Who Do You Think You Are, for Snuff Garrett's Viva label.
Artist: Music Machine
Title: Bottom Of The Soul
Source: CD: Beyond The Garage (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Bonniwell Music Machine)
Writer(s): Sean Bonniwell
Label: Sundazed (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1967
After severing ties with Original Sound Records in early 1967, Sean Bonniwell and his band, the Music Machine, signed a contract with Warner Brothers, a label that was already well on its way to becoming one of the world's top record companies. Although the first single released on the label featured the original lineup, the song, Bottom Of The Soul, was credited to the Bonniwell Music Machine, as were all subsequent releases by the band. The song itself, in the words of Bonniwell himself, "celebrates the courage of those homeless whose criterion...measures the burdon of living life at the bottom of the soul".
Artist: Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title: Incense And Peppermints
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Gilbert/Weitz/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Uni)
Year: 1967
Incense and Peppermints is one of the iconic songs of the psychedelic era, yet when it was originally released to Los Angeles area radio stations it was intended to be the B side of The Birdman of Alkatrash. Somewhere along the line a DJ flipped the record over and started playing Incense And Peppermints instead. The song caught on and Uni Records (short for Universal, which is now the world's largest record company) picked up the Strawberry Alarm Clock's contract and reissued the record nationally with Incense And Peppermints as the A side.
Artist: Balloon Farm
Title: A Question Of Temperature
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Appel/Schnug/Henny
Label: Rhino (original label: Laurie)
Year: 1967
Few, if any, bands managed to successfully cross bubble gum and punk like the Balloon Farm with A Question Of Temperature, originally released on the Laurie label in 1967. Band member Mike Appel went on to greater notoriety as Bruce Springsteen's first manager.
Artist: Castaways
Title: Liar Liar
Source: CD: More Nuggets (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Donna/Craswell
Label: Rhino (original label: Soma)
Year: 1965
The Castaways were a popular local band in the Minneapolis area led by keyboardist James Donna, who, for less than two minutes at a time, dominated the national airwaves with their song Liar Liar for a couple months before fading off into obscurity.
Artist: Standells
Title: Why Pick On Me
Source: CD: Nuggets-Classics From The Psychedelic 60s (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ed Cobb
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1966
Ed Cobb was, in many ways, the Ed Wood of the late 60s record industry. The bands who recorded under his guidance, such as LA.'s Standells, have become legends of garage rock. Wood wrote the first three singles released by the Standells, including their biggest hit, Dirty Water, and its follow-up, Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White. Why Pick On Me, the title track of the band's second LP, was the third single released by the band, although it did not chart as well as its predecessors.
Artist: Who
Title: Rael 1
Source: LP: The Who Sell Out
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: Decca
Year: 1967
The Who Sell Out, released in December 1967, was the last album by the group before their 1969 rock-opera Tommy. The last track on the LP, Rael, is itself a mini-opera that tells the story of a wealthy man who has taken on the role of a crusader, out to free his ancestral homeland from its current occupiers. He tells the captain of his ship to come back for him on Christmas Day to see if he is ready to return. If not, he tells the captain, the boat is yours. Of course the captain has no intention of returning, as he declares soon after putting back out to sea. The piece then goes into an instrumental passage that would be copied pretty much note for note on the Tommy album as part of the Underture. The track ends with a repeat of the owner's instructions to the captain. The events surrounding the recording of Rael have become the stuff of legend. The band spent an entire day recording and mixing the song, and were apparently so exhausted at the end of the session that they left without securing the multi-track master in a safe place. The cleaning woman came in the next morning and tossed the tape into the waste basket. She then emptied the ashtrays and other trash into the same waste basket. When the band came in around noon the recording engineer who had found the tape had the unenviable task of telling them what had happened. Pete Townsend was in a rage, and the engineer tried to placate him by saying "these things happen". Townshend then proceeded to throw a chair through the glass wall separating the studio from the control room, informing the engineer that "these things happen".
Artist: Al Kooper/Stephen Stills/Harvey Brooks/Eddie Hoh
Title: CD: You Don't Love Me
Source: Super Session
Writer(s): Willie Cobbs
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1968
You Don't Love Me was originally recorded and released as a single by Willie Cobbs in 1960. Although the song is credited solely to Cobbs, it strongly resembles a 1955 Bo Diddley B side, She's Fine She's Mine, in its melody, lyrics and repeated guitar riff. The Cobbs single was a regional hit on the Mojo label in Memphis, but stalled out nationally after being reissued on Vee-Jay Records, due to the label pulling promotional support from the song due to copyright issues. A 1965 version by Junior Wells with Buddy Guy saw some minor changes in the lyrics to the song; it was this version that was covered by Al Kooper and Stephen Stills for the 1968 Super Session album. The recording extensively uses an effect called flanging, a type of phase-shifting that was first used on the Jimi Hendrix track Bold As Love.
Artist: Kinks
Title: Dead End Street
Source: 45 RPM single
Year: 1967
The last major Kinks hit in the US was Sunny Afternoon in the summer of 1966. The November follow-up, Dead End Street, was in much the same style, but did not achieve the same kind of success in the US (although it was a top five hit in the UK). The Kinks would not have another major US hit until Lola in 1970.
Artist: Atlantics
Title: Come On
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Australia as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Peter Hood
Label: Rhino (original label: Sunshine)
Year: 1967
One of Australia's most popular and prolific bands, the Atlantics were formed in 1961 as a surf band. By 1964 they were also recording songs with vocals, usually backing up singer Johnny Rebb. Additionally, they released a handful of records with their own vocals provided by guitarist Jim Addams and/or drummer Peter Hood. Among those singles was Come On, a 1967 track written by Hood.
Artist: People
Title: I Love You
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Chris White
Label: Rhino (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1968
By 1968 the major labels had signed just about every San Francisco band with any perceived potential. Capitol, having had some success with the Chocolate Watchband from San Jose on its Tower subsidiary, decided to sign another south bay band, People, to the parent label. The most successful single for the band was a new recording of an obscure Zombies B side. I Love You ended up hitting the top 20 nationally, despite the active efforts of two of the most powerful men in the music industry, who set out to squash the song as a way of punishing the record's producer for something having nothing to do with the song or the band itself.
Artist: Donovan
Title: The Observation
Source: Mono LP: Mellow Yellow
Writer: Donovan Leitch
Label: Epic
Year: 1967
Donovan was at first hailed as Britain's answer to Bob Dylan, but by 1967 he was proving that he was much more than that. The Observation, with its distinctive use of an acoustic double-bass, is one of many innovative tunes that helped redefine Donovan from folk singer to singer/songwriter, transforming the entire genre in the process.
Artist: Pink Floyd
Title: Bike
Source: CD: The Piper At the Gates of Dawn
Writer: Syd Barrett
Label: Capitol (originally released on EMI/Columbia in UK)
Year: 1967
Due to an inherent cheapness in Tower Records' approach to pretty much everything, four songs were left off the US version of the first Pink Floyd album, The Piper At the Gates of Dawn, with the band's first UK single, Arnold Layne, being inserted in their stead (shortening the album's running time by nearly ten minutes). Among the missing songs was Syd Barrett's Bike, which did not appear in the US until the early 70s, when the Relics compilation was released. All CD releases of Piper in the US have restored the original song lineup and running order.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Go And Say Goodbye
Source: CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
After failing his audition for the Monkees, Stephen Stills met up with his former bandmate Neil Young, and, along with Richie Furay, Bruce Palmer and Dewey Martin formed the Buffalo Springfield in 1966. Their first single was a Young tune, Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing, sung by Furay. The B side of that record, Stills's Go And Say Goodbye, is one of the first modern country-rock songs ever recorded.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Rock And Roll Woman
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
Buffalo Springfield did not sell huge numbers of records (except for the single For What It's Worth). Nor did they pack in the crowds. As a matter of fact, when they played the club across the street from where Love was playing, they barely had any audience at all. Artistically, though, it's a whole 'nother story. During their brief existence Buffalo Springfield launched the careers of no less than four major artists: Neil Young, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and Stephen Stills. They also recorded more than their share of tracks that have held up better than most of what else was being recorded at the time. Case in point: Rock and Roll Woman, a Stephen Stills tune that still sounds fresh well over 40 years after it was recorded.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: For What It's Worth
Source: CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atco
Year: 1967
Most people associate the name Buffalo Springfield with the song For What It's Worth. 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 released in January of 1967. 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 becoming a breakout 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, making earlier copies of the album somewhat of a rarity and quite collectable.
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.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1333 (starts 8/15/13)
Artist: Leaves
Title: Hey Joe
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Billy Roberts
Label: Rhino (original label: Mira)
Year: 1966
In 1966 there were certain songs you had to know how to play if you had any aspirations of being in a band. Among those were Louie Louie, Gloria and Hey Joe. The Byrds' David Crosby claims to have discovered Hey Joe, but was not able to convince his bandmates to record it before their third album. In the meantime, several other bands had recorded the song, including Love (on their first album) and the Leaves. The version of Hey Joe heard here is actually the third recording the Leaves made of the tune. After the first two versions tanked, guitarist Bobby Arlin, who had recently replaced founding member Bill Rinehart on lead guitar, came up with the idea of adding fuzz guitar to the song. It was the missing element that transformed a rather bland song into a hit record (the only national hit the Leaves would have). As a side note, the Leaves credited Chet Powers (aka Dino Valenti) as the writer of Hey Joe, but California-based folk singer Billy Roberts had copyrighted the song in 1962 and had reportedly been heard playing the tune as early as 1958.
Artist: Lemon Drops
Title: I Live In The Springtime
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era
Writer(s): Roger Weiss
Label: Rhino (original label: Rembrandt)
Year: 1967
Sometimes it's all about being in the right place at the right time. Unfortunately for the Lemon Drops, that place and time was not the Chicago suburbs in early 1967. Otherwise they might have had a hit record with I Live In The Springtime, a rather nice piece of psychedelia. It probably didn't help that their label, Rembrandt, was not able to put together the same kind of national distribution deal that another Chicago label, Dunwich, had been able to the previous year with the Shadows Of Knight's version of Gloria. Another, somewhat unique, problem was that there were two different pressings of the single, one with no drums and the other with the guitar almost lost in the mix. It is thought that the original mix was in stereo (with the drums on one side and the guitar on the other) and the two pressings each used only one channel from that mix. The version heard here is the one without drums.
Artist: Blue Cheer
Title: Summertime Blues
Source: CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: Vincebus Eruptum)
Writer: Cochrane/Capehart
Label: Rhino (original label: Philips)
Year: 1968
If 1967 was the summer of love, then 1968 was the summer of violence. Framed by the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, both major anti-establishment movements of the time (civil rights and anti-war) became increasing radicalized and more violent. The hippies gave way to the Yippies, LSD gave way to crystal meth, and there were riots in the streets of several US cities. Against this backdrop Blue Cheer released one of the loudest and angriest recordings ever to grace the top 40: the proto-metal arrangement of Eddie Cochrane's 1958 classic Summertime Blues. It was the perfect soundtrack of its time.
Artist: 13th Power
Title: Fifty-Two Percent
Source: LP: Wild In The Streets soundtrack
Writer(s): Mann/Weil
Label: Tower
Year: 1968
Critics and audiences alike were divided on how to interpret the movie Wild In The Streets. Was it speculative fiction about a distopian future or simply a teen exploitation flick? The film certainly had enough big Hollywood names in it (Christopher Jones, Hal Holbrook and Shelley Winters, among others) to be taken seriously, yet the basic premise, that teens, led by a popular rock band, would rise up and take power, putting anyone over 30 into concentration camps, was a bit over-the-top. Regardless of the creators' intentions, Wild In The Streets is now viewed as a cult film that helped launch the career of Richard Pryor (who played bassist Stanley X), and had some decent tunes written by the songwriting team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil (writers of the Paul Revere and the Raiders hit Hungry). The hit single from the movie, Shape Of Things To Come, was attributed on the label to Max Frost and the Troopers, the fictional band that led the revolution, but on the soundtrack album the song was credited to the 13th Power. The reality was that all the songs on the album were the work of studio musicians, although they were credited to a variety of groups such as the Gurus and the Senators. The songs credited to the 13th Power, such as Fifty-Two Percent (the percentage of US citizens under the age of 30 at the time), were possibly the work of Davie Allen and the Arrows, with lead vocals by Paul Wibier, although that has never been substantiated. It is even possible that Jones himself sang on the soundtrack album.
Artist: Beacon Street Union
Title: Mystic Mourning
Source: CD: The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union
Writer(s): Ulaky/Weisberg/Rhodes
Label: See For Miles (original label: M-G-M)
Year: 1967
If I had to choose one single recording that represents the psychedelic era, my choice would be Mystic Mourning, from the album The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union. Everything about the tune screams psychedelic, starting with a short spacy intro of electric piano over cymbals, leading into a raga beat with a solo bass line that builds up to a repeating riff that ends up getting played at various times by guitar, bass, and/or piano. The lyrics are appropriately existential, and both guitar and piano get a chance to show their stuff over the course of the nearly six-minute track.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Helter Skelter
Source: Mono LP: Rarities (originally released in UK on LP: The Beatles)
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Capitol (original label: Apple)
Year: 1968
By 1968 most rock songs released in the US were being mixed in stereo only, since all the major US labels were only selling stereo copies in the stores. A few promotional mono pressings were made, mostly for non-stereo radio stations, but those simply "folded down" the stereo mix to one channel. In the UK, however, the conversion to stereo took a bit longer, and the 1968 double-LP The Beatles (aka the White Album) was released in both stereo and mono versions, with the mono version using entirely different mixes that were unavailable in the US. In some cases the differences were more noticable than on others, such as the mono mix for Helter Skelter, which has an entirely different drum part at the end of the song than the stereo version and is missing the famous line "I've got blisters on my fingers".
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Let's Get Together
Source: Mono LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer(s): Dino Valenti
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1966
Although Dino Valenti recorded a demo version of his song Let's Get Together in 1964, it wasn't until two years later that the song made its first appearance on vinyl as a track on Jefferson Airplane Takes Off. The Airplane version of the song is unique in that the lead vocals alternate between Paul Kantner, Signe Anderson and Marty Balin, with each one taking a verse and all of them singing on the chorus.
Artist: Blues Magoos
Title: Tobacco Road
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Psychedelic Lollipop)
Writer(s): J.D.Loudermilk
Label: Rhino (original label: Mercury)
Year: 1966
For years I've been trying to find a DVD copy of a video I saw on YouTube. It was the Blues Magoos, complete with electric suits and smoke generators, performing Tobacco Road on a Bob Hope TV special. The performance itself was a vintage piece of psychedelia, but the true appeal of the video is in Hope's reaction to the band immediately following the song. You can practically hear him thinking "Well, that's one act I'm not taking with me on the next USO tour."
Artist: Bluestars
Title: Social End Product
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in New Zealand as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): John Harris
Label: Rhino (original label: Allied Int'l)
Year: 1966
The Bluestars were formed in Auckland, New Zealand in 1964. Led by John Harris, a reporter for the Auckland Star, the band was known for its anti-establishment stance, with lines such as "I don't stand for the Queen" (which refers to the usual practice of standing up any time God Save The Queen was played, even in a movie theater) being somewhat the norm for them. Despite their rebel cred, the group signed a deal with the British Decca label, releasing their first single in December of 1965 in the UK, but not until several months later in their own country. After a falling out with Decca, the Bluestars went with locally-based Allied International Records, releasing Social End Product in September of 1966. The band even opened their own teen club, the Gallows, shortly after the record's release, but were forced to shut down following complaints from the neighbors. After one more single the group disbanded in early 1967.
Artist: Ipsissimus
Title: Hold On
Source: Mono import CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Haskell/Condor/Lynton
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Parlophone)
Year: 1969
The song Hold On was originally recorded as a B side in 1967 by a band called Les Fleur De Lys, although the label credited the track to Rupert's People, who recorded the A side of the record. Le Fleur De Lys later recorded another version of Hold On with South African-born singer Sharon Tandy. Finally, the heaviest version of the song was cut by an obscure band from Barnet called Ipsissimus. To my knowledge it was their only record.
Artist: Ultimate Spinach
Title: Your Head Is Reeling
Source: LP: Ultimate Spinach
Writer: Ian Bruce-Douglas
Label: M-G-M
Year: 1967
Ultimate Spinach was one of a group of bands signed by M-G-M in 1967 and marketed as being representative of the "Boss-town sound". Unfortunately for all involved, there really was no such thing as a "Boss-town sound" (for that matter there was no such thing as a "San Francisco sound" either, but that's another story). All the hype aside, Ultimate Spinach itself was the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist Ian Bruce-Palmer, who wrote and arranged all the band's material. The opening track of side two of the band's debut album is a piece called Your Head Is Reeling, which is as good or better than any other raga styled song of the time.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Renaissance Fair
Source: CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s): Crosby/McGuinn
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1967
Younger Than Yesterday was David Crosby's last official album with the Byrds (he was fired midway through the recording of The Notorious Byrd Brothers) and the last one containing any collaborations between Crosby and Jim (now Roger) McGuinn. Renaissance Fair, a song that Crosby was inspired to write after attending the Renaissance Pleasure Faire Of Southern California, is one of those collaborations, although the actual extent of McGuinn's participation is debatable.
Artist: Shadows Of Knight
Title: I'm Gonna Make You Mine
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carr/Derrico/Sager
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
Possibly the loudest rockin' recordings of 1966 came from the Shadows of Knight. A product of the Chicago suburbs, the Shadows (as they were originally known) quickly established a reputation as the region's resident bad boy rockers (lead vocalist Jim Sohns was reportedly banned from more than one high school campus for his attempts at increasing the local teen pregnancy rate). After signing a record deal with the local Dunwich label, the band learned that there was already a band called the Shadows and added the Knight part (after their own high school sports teams' name). Their first single was a cover of Van Morrison's Gloria that changed one line ("around here" in place of "up to my room") and thus avoided the mass radio bannings that had derailed the original Them version. I'm Gonna Make You Mine was the follow up to Gloria, but its lack of commercial success consigned the Shadows to one-hit wonder status until years after the band's breakup, when they finally got the recognition they deserved as one of the founding bands of garage/punk, and perhaps its greatest practicioner.
Artist: Warlocks
Title: Can't Come Down
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70
Writer: Garcia/Kreutzmann/Lesh/McKernan/Weir
Label: Rhino
Year: Recorded 1965
In 1965 Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters were travelling around conducting the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests, basically an excuse to turn on people to LSD. Part of Kesey's entourage was a group of young musicians calling themselves the Warlocks, who had formed earlier that year. Around the time of the first acid test in November of 1965 group made their first visit to a recording studio, cutting a set of demos for Autumn Records. After hearing that there was already a band named the Warlocks making records, they booked studio time under the name Emergency Crew. The songs themselves, which were produced by Autumn Records' owners Tom "Big Daddy" Donahue and Bobby Mitchell, did not get released until 1999, when the Warlocks (who began calling themselves the Grateful Dead just days after the recording sessions) decided to include them on an anthology album. The lead vocals on Can't Come Down are by guitarist Jerry Garcia, although they don't sound much like his later Grateful Dead recordings.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Time Is On My Side
Source: 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer: Jerry Ragovoy
Label: London
Year: 1964
I got word a while back of the passing of songwriter Jerry Ragovoy, who died on July 13, 2011 at the age of 83. Ragovoy's writing career extended back to the 1940s and included classics by artists such as Kai Winding. In later years he wrote several tunes that were recorded by Janis Joplin, including Try (Just A Little Bit Harder), My Baby, Cry Baby and the classic Piece Of My Heart. He occassionally used a pseudonym as well, and it was as Norman Meade he published his best-known song: Time Is On My Side, an R&B hit for Irma Thomas that became one of the first US hits for the Rolling Stones.
Artist: Left Banke
Title: Walk Away Renee
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s): Brown/Calilli/Sansune
Label: Smash
Year: 1966
The Left Banke's Walk Away Renee is one of the most covered songs in rock history, starting with a version by the Four Tops less than two years after the original recording had graced the top 5. The Left Banke version kicked off what was thought at the time to be the latest trend: baroque rock. The trend died an early death when the band members themselves made some tactical errors resulting in radio stations being hesitant to play their records.
Artist: Rutles
Title: Let's Be Natural
Source: CD: The Rutles
Writer(s): Neil Innes
Label: Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1978
The Rutles released their last LP, Shabby Road, in September of 1969, following a contentious series of recording sessions that would later be documented in the film Let It Rot. Although the band was on the verge of dissolving, they managed to pull things together one last time for the album, which included the prefab four's final hit, Let's Be Natural. OK, none of that actually happened. The Rutles were in reality a clever Beatle parody conceived by Monty Python's Eric Idle and the Bonzo Dog Band's Neil Innes in 1976, with songs written by Innes. The centerpiece of the project was a 1978 mock documentary entitled All You Need Is Cash, which included all the songs heard on the Rutles LP, as well as several that were released years later as bonus tracks on the CD reissue of the album. In addition, the group released two singles in the UK, the second of which was Let's Be Natural.
Artist: Bob Seger System
Title: Gone
Source: LP: Ramblin' Gamblin' Man
Writer(s): Dan Honaker
Label: Capitol
Year: 1969
Most of Bob Seger's original compositions in the early days were hard rockers such as Ramblin' Gamblin' Man and 2+2=? For the slower material on his first LP he went with outside songwriters such as Dan Honaker, who wrote the song Gone. Elements of Gone can be heard in Seger's own later compositions such as Turn The Page.
Artist: Chicago
Title: South California Purples
Source: CD: Chicago Transit Authority
Writer(s): Robert Lamm
Label: Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1969
Chicago never considered themselves a jazz-rock band, despite all the hype from the rock press and the publicity people at Columbia Records. Rather, the defined themselves as a rock band with a horn section. Songs like Robert Lamm's South California Purples, which is basically a blues progression, lend creedence to this view. The track, which showcases the guitar work of Terry Kath, was one of the most popular songs on the band's debut album and continued to be a concert staple until Kath's death in 1978.
Artist: Zombies
Title: She's Not There
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer: Rod Argent
Label: London (original label: Parrot)
Year: 1964
Most of the original British invasion bands were guitar-oriented, like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. One notable exception was the Zombies, whose leader, Rod Argent, built the group around his electric piano. Their first single, She's Not There, was a major hit on both sides of the Atlantic and is ranked among the top British rock songs of all time.
Artist: Misunderstood
Title: I'm Not Talking
Source: British simulated stereo CD: Before The Dream Faded
Writer(s): Traditional
Label: Cherry Red
Year: Recorded 1965, released 1982
The story of the legendary band the Misunderstood actually started in 1963 when three teenagers from Riverside, California decided to form a band called the Blue Notes. Like most of the bands at the time, the group played a mixture of surf and 50s rock and roll cover songs, slowly developing a sound of their own as they went through a series of personnel changes. In 1965 the band changed their name to the Misunderstood and recorded six songs at a local recording studio. Among those was I'm Not Talking, a blues tune in much the same style as the early Yardbirds recordings. Although the recordings were not released, the band caught the attention of a San Bernardino disc jockey named John Ravencroft, and Englishman with an extensive knowledge of the British music scene. In June of 1966 the band, with Ravencroft's help, relocated to London, where they were eventually joined by Ravencroft himself, who changed his name to John Peel and became one of the most popular DJs in the country. The Misunderstood recorded six more songs in the UK, releasing their one and only single in late 1966 before being deported back to the US (where one of the members was immediately drafted into military service).
Artist: Cream
Title: N.S.U.
Source: LP: Fresh Cream
Writer: Jack Bruce
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
The first Cream album starts off the with powerful one-two punch of I Feel Free and N.S.U. Although I Feel Free was a purely studio creation that never got performed live, N.S.U. became a staple of the band's concert performances, and was even performed by various other bands that bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce was a member of over the years.
Artist: Doors
Title: Break On Through (To The Other Side)
Source: LP: The Doors
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
The first Doors song to be released as a single was not, as usually assumed, Light My Fire. Rather, it was Break On Through (To The Other Side), the opening track from the band's debut LP, that was chosen to do introduce the band to top 40 radio. Although the single was not an immediate hit, it did eventually catch on with progressive FM radio listeners and still is heard on classic rock stations from time to time.
Artist: Sonics
Title: Strychnine
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the Psychedelic Era (originally released on LP: Here Are The Sonics)
Writer(s): Gerald Roslie
Label: Rhino (original label: Etiquette)
Year: 1965
From 1965 we have a band that maintains a cult following to this day: the legendary Sonics, generally considered one of the foundation stones of the Seattle music scene. Although the majority of songs on their albums were cover tunes, virtually all of their originals, such as Strychnine from their debut LP, are now considered punk classics; indeed, the Sonics, along with their labelmates the Wailers, are often cited as the first true punk rock bands.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Grim Reaper Of Love
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Portz/Nichol
Label: Rhino (original label: White Whale)
Year: 1966
The Turtles had some early success in 1965 as a folk-rock band, recording the hit version of Bob Dylan's It Ain't Me Babe and PF Sloan's Let Me Be. By 1966, however, it was getting harder and harder for the group to get a hit record. One attempt was Grim Reaper Of Love, co-written by Turtles lead guitarist Al Nichol. Personally I think it's a pretty cool tune, but was probably a bit too weird to appeal to the average top 40 radio listener in 1966. Grim Reaper Of Love did manage to make it to the # 81 spot on the charts, unlike the band's next two singles that failed to chart at all. It wasn't until the following year, when the Turtles recorded Happy Together, that the band would make it back onto the charts.
Artist: Creedence Clearwater Revival (originally released as by the Golliwogs)
Title: Porterville
Source: LP: More Creedence Gold (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): John Fogerty
Label: Fantasy (original label: Scorpio)
Year: 1967
The last single recorded by San Francisco's Golliwogs was a song called Porterville, released on the Scorpio label in late 1967. Not long after that, the same recording was issued on Fantasy Records using the Golliwogs' new name: Creedence Clearwater Revival. The rest is history.
Artist: Spirit
Title: Girl In Your Eye
Source: CD: Spirit
Writer(s): Jay Ferguson
Label: Ode/Epic/Legacy
Year: 1968
Spirit was born in 1965 when drummer Ed Cassidy left the Rising Sons after breaking his arm and settled down with his new wife, who had a teenaged son named Randy. It wasn't long before Ed and Randy (who played guitar) formed a new band called the Red Roosters. The group lasted until the spring of 1966, when the family moved to New York for a few months. After returning to California, Randy ran into two of his Red Roosters bandmates, singer Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes, and decided to form a new band with Cassidy and keyboardist John Locke. Both Cassidy and Locke had played in jazz bands, and the new band, Spirit, incorporated both rock and jazz elements into their sound. Most of the songs of the band's 1968 debut album were written by Ferguson, who tended to favor a softer sound on tracks like Girl In Your Eye. On later albums Randy California would take a greater share in the songwriting, eventually becoming the only original member to stay with the band throughout its history.
Artist: Pentangle
Title: Cruel Sister
Source: British Import CD: Cruel Sister
Writer(s): Trad., arr. Pentangle
Label: Sanctuary (original US label: Reprise)
Year: 1970
Nearly four years after their self-titled debut LP was released, Pentangle was one of the most (if not the most) popular British folk music based bands in the world. The members of Pentangle, however, were beginning to feel constricted by the expectations that came with their own success and were determined to remain true to their musical roots, regardless of the commercial consequences. With this in mind they set about to record their fourth LP, Cruel Sister. The title track of the album demonstrates the band's willingness to try out new ideas such as extended jazz-style improvisations on a traditional folk tune. Cruel Sister also marked guitarist John Renbourne's first use of an electric guitar on an album, an ironic move considering the entire album was made up of traditional songs.
Artist: Deep Purple
Title: Faultline/The Painter
Source: LP: Deep Purple
Writer(s): Lord/Blackmore/Evans/Paice/Simper
Label: Tetragrammaton
Year: 1969
The third and final album by the original Deep Purple lineup was plagued with bad luck, the worst being that the band's US label, Tetragrammaton Records, ran into financial trouble right after the album was released and was unable to promote either the album or the band itself. The music was also a departure from the band's previous style, which could be described as England's answer to Vanilla Fudge. Deep Purple (the album) was entirely made up of original material, such as the track combining the instrumental Faultline with The Painter, a piece credited to the entire band. Following the release of the album singer Rod Evans left the band to form Captain Beyond, and Deep Purple (the band) would move in a harder rock direction with new lead vocalist Ian Gillan.
Title: Hey Joe
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Billy Roberts
Label: Rhino (original label: Mira)
Year: 1966
In 1966 there were certain songs you had to know how to play if you had any aspirations of being in a band. Among those were Louie Louie, Gloria and Hey Joe. The Byrds' David Crosby claims to have discovered Hey Joe, but was not able to convince his bandmates to record it before their third album. In the meantime, several other bands had recorded the song, including Love (on their first album) and the Leaves. The version of Hey Joe heard here is actually the third recording the Leaves made of the tune. After the first two versions tanked, guitarist Bobby Arlin, who had recently replaced founding member Bill Rinehart on lead guitar, came up with the idea of adding fuzz guitar to the song. It was the missing element that transformed a rather bland song into a hit record (the only national hit the Leaves would have). As a side note, the Leaves credited Chet Powers (aka Dino Valenti) as the writer of Hey Joe, but California-based folk singer Billy Roberts had copyrighted the song in 1962 and had reportedly been heard playing the tune as early as 1958.
Artist: Lemon Drops
Title: I Live In The Springtime
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era
Writer(s): Roger Weiss
Label: Rhino (original label: Rembrandt)
Year: 1967
Sometimes it's all about being in the right place at the right time. Unfortunately for the Lemon Drops, that place and time was not the Chicago suburbs in early 1967. Otherwise they might have had a hit record with I Live In The Springtime, a rather nice piece of psychedelia. It probably didn't help that their label, Rembrandt, was not able to put together the same kind of national distribution deal that another Chicago label, Dunwich, had been able to the previous year with the Shadows Of Knight's version of Gloria. Another, somewhat unique, problem was that there were two different pressings of the single, one with no drums and the other with the guitar almost lost in the mix. It is thought that the original mix was in stereo (with the drums on one side and the guitar on the other) and the two pressings each used only one channel from that mix. The version heard here is the one without drums.
Artist: Blue Cheer
Title: Summertime Blues
Source: CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: Vincebus Eruptum)
Writer: Cochrane/Capehart
Label: Rhino (original label: Philips)
Year: 1968
If 1967 was the summer of love, then 1968 was the summer of violence. Framed by the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, both major anti-establishment movements of the time (civil rights and anti-war) became increasing radicalized and more violent. The hippies gave way to the Yippies, LSD gave way to crystal meth, and there were riots in the streets of several US cities. Against this backdrop Blue Cheer released one of the loudest and angriest recordings ever to grace the top 40: the proto-metal arrangement of Eddie Cochrane's 1958 classic Summertime Blues. It was the perfect soundtrack of its time.
Artist: 13th Power
Title: Fifty-Two Percent
Source: LP: Wild In The Streets soundtrack
Writer(s): Mann/Weil
Label: Tower
Year: 1968
Critics and audiences alike were divided on how to interpret the movie Wild In The Streets. Was it speculative fiction about a distopian future or simply a teen exploitation flick? The film certainly had enough big Hollywood names in it (Christopher Jones, Hal Holbrook and Shelley Winters, among others) to be taken seriously, yet the basic premise, that teens, led by a popular rock band, would rise up and take power, putting anyone over 30 into concentration camps, was a bit over-the-top. Regardless of the creators' intentions, Wild In The Streets is now viewed as a cult film that helped launch the career of Richard Pryor (who played bassist Stanley X), and had some decent tunes written by the songwriting team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil (writers of the Paul Revere and the Raiders hit Hungry). The hit single from the movie, Shape Of Things To Come, was attributed on the label to Max Frost and the Troopers, the fictional band that led the revolution, but on the soundtrack album the song was credited to the 13th Power. The reality was that all the songs on the album were the work of studio musicians, although they were credited to a variety of groups such as the Gurus and the Senators. The songs credited to the 13th Power, such as Fifty-Two Percent (the percentage of US citizens under the age of 30 at the time), were possibly the work of Davie Allen and the Arrows, with lead vocals by Paul Wibier, although that has never been substantiated. It is even possible that Jones himself sang on the soundtrack album.
Artist: Beacon Street Union
Title: Mystic Mourning
Source: CD: The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union
Writer(s): Ulaky/Weisberg/Rhodes
Label: See For Miles (original label: M-G-M)
Year: 1967
If I had to choose one single recording that represents the psychedelic era, my choice would be Mystic Mourning, from the album The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union. Everything about the tune screams psychedelic, starting with a short spacy intro of electric piano over cymbals, leading into a raga beat with a solo bass line that builds up to a repeating riff that ends up getting played at various times by guitar, bass, and/or piano. The lyrics are appropriately existential, and both guitar and piano get a chance to show their stuff over the course of the nearly six-minute track.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Helter Skelter
Source: Mono LP: Rarities (originally released in UK on LP: The Beatles)
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Capitol (original label: Apple)
Year: 1968
By 1968 most rock songs released in the US were being mixed in stereo only, since all the major US labels were only selling stereo copies in the stores. A few promotional mono pressings were made, mostly for non-stereo radio stations, but those simply "folded down" the stereo mix to one channel. In the UK, however, the conversion to stereo took a bit longer, and the 1968 double-LP The Beatles (aka the White Album) was released in both stereo and mono versions, with the mono version using entirely different mixes that were unavailable in the US. In some cases the differences were more noticable than on others, such as the mono mix for Helter Skelter, which has an entirely different drum part at the end of the song than the stereo version and is missing the famous line "I've got blisters on my fingers".
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Let's Get Together
Source: Mono LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer(s): Dino Valenti
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1966
Although Dino Valenti recorded a demo version of his song Let's Get Together in 1964, it wasn't until two years later that the song made its first appearance on vinyl as a track on Jefferson Airplane Takes Off. The Airplane version of the song is unique in that the lead vocals alternate between Paul Kantner, Signe Anderson and Marty Balin, with each one taking a verse and all of them singing on the chorus.
Artist: Blues Magoos
Title: Tobacco Road
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Psychedelic Lollipop)
Writer(s): J.D.Loudermilk
Label: Rhino (original label: Mercury)
Year: 1966
For years I've been trying to find a DVD copy of a video I saw on YouTube. It was the Blues Magoos, complete with electric suits and smoke generators, performing Tobacco Road on a Bob Hope TV special. The performance itself was a vintage piece of psychedelia, but the true appeal of the video is in Hope's reaction to the band immediately following the song. You can practically hear him thinking "Well, that's one act I'm not taking with me on the next USO tour."
Artist: Bluestars
Title: Social End Product
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in New Zealand as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): John Harris
Label: Rhino (original label: Allied Int'l)
Year: 1966
The Bluestars were formed in Auckland, New Zealand in 1964. Led by John Harris, a reporter for the Auckland Star, the band was known for its anti-establishment stance, with lines such as "I don't stand for the Queen" (which refers to the usual practice of standing up any time God Save The Queen was played, even in a movie theater) being somewhat the norm for them. Despite their rebel cred, the group signed a deal with the British Decca label, releasing their first single in December of 1965 in the UK, but not until several months later in their own country. After a falling out with Decca, the Bluestars went with locally-based Allied International Records, releasing Social End Product in September of 1966. The band even opened their own teen club, the Gallows, shortly after the record's release, but were forced to shut down following complaints from the neighbors. After one more single the group disbanded in early 1967.
Artist: Ipsissimus
Title: Hold On
Source: Mono import CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Haskell/Condor/Lynton
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Parlophone)
Year: 1969
The song Hold On was originally recorded as a B side in 1967 by a band called Les Fleur De Lys, although the label credited the track to Rupert's People, who recorded the A side of the record. Le Fleur De Lys later recorded another version of Hold On with South African-born singer Sharon Tandy. Finally, the heaviest version of the song was cut by an obscure band from Barnet called Ipsissimus. To my knowledge it was their only record.
Artist: Ultimate Spinach
Title: Your Head Is Reeling
Source: LP: Ultimate Spinach
Writer: Ian Bruce-Douglas
Label: M-G-M
Year: 1967
Ultimate Spinach was one of a group of bands signed by M-G-M in 1967 and marketed as being representative of the "Boss-town sound". Unfortunately for all involved, there really was no such thing as a "Boss-town sound" (for that matter there was no such thing as a "San Francisco sound" either, but that's another story). All the hype aside, Ultimate Spinach itself was the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist Ian Bruce-Palmer, who wrote and arranged all the band's material. The opening track of side two of the band's debut album is a piece called Your Head Is Reeling, which is as good or better than any other raga styled song of the time.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Renaissance Fair
Source: CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s): Crosby/McGuinn
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1967
Younger Than Yesterday was David Crosby's last official album with the Byrds (he was fired midway through the recording of The Notorious Byrd Brothers) and the last one containing any collaborations between Crosby and Jim (now Roger) McGuinn. Renaissance Fair, a song that Crosby was inspired to write after attending the Renaissance Pleasure Faire Of Southern California, is one of those collaborations, although the actual extent of McGuinn's participation is debatable.
Artist: Shadows Of Knight
Title: I'm Gonna Make You Mine
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carr/Derrico/Sager
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
Possibly the loudest rockin' recordings of 1966 came from the Shadows of Knight. A product of the Chicago suburbs, the Shadows (as they were originally known) quickly established a reputation as the region's resident bad boy rockers (lead vocalist Jim Sohns was reportedly banned from more than one high school campus for his attempts at increasing the local teen pregnancy rate). After signing a record deal with the local Dunwich label, the band learned that there was already a band called the Shadows and added the Knight part (after their own high school sports teams' name). Their first single was a cover of Van Morrison's Gloria that changed one line ("around here" in place of "up to my room") and thus avoided the mass radio bannings that had derailed the original Them version. I'm Gonna Make You Mine was the follow up to Gloria, but its lack of commercial success consigned the Shadows to one-hit wonder status until years after the band's breakup, when they finally got the recognition they deserved as one of the founding bands of garage/punk, and perhaps its greatest practicioner.
Artist: Warlocks
Title: Can't Come Down
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70
Writer: Garcia/Kreutzmann/Lesh/McKernan/Weir
Label: Rhino
Year: Recorded 1965
In 1965 Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters were travelling around conducting the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests, basically an excuse to turn on people to LSD. Part of Kesey's entourage was a group of young musicians calling themselves the Warlocks, who had formed earlier that year. Around the time of the first acid test in November of 1965 group made their first visit to a recording studio, cutting a set of demos for Autumn Records. After hearing that there was already a band named the Warlocks making records, they booked studio time under the name Emergency Crew. The songs themselves, which were produced by Autumn Records' owners Tom "Big Daddy" Donahue and Bobby Mitchell, did not get released until 1999, when the Warlocks (who began calling themselves the Grateful Dead just days after the recording sessions) decided to include them on an anthology album. The lead vocals on Can't Come Down are by guitarist Jerry Garcia, although they don't sound much like his later Grateful Dead recordings.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Time Is On My Side
Source: 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer: Jerry Ragovoy
Label: London
Year: 1964
I got word a while back of the passing of songwriter Jerry Ragovoy, who died on July 13, 2011 at the age of 83. Ragovoy's writing career extended back to the 1940s and included classics by artists such as Kai Winding. In later years he wrote several tunes that were recorded by Janis Joplin, including Try (Just A Little Bit Harder), My Baby, Cry Baby and the classic Piece Of My Heart. He occassionally used a pseudonym as well, and it was as Norman Meade he published his best-known song: Time Is On My Side, an R&B hit for Irma Thomas that became one of the first US hits for the Rolling Stones.
Artist: Left Banke
Title: Walk Away Renee
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s): Brown/Calilli/Sansune
Label: Smash
Year: 1966
The Left Banke's Walk Away Renee is one of the most covered songs in rock history, starting with a version by the Four Tops less than two years after the original recording had graced the top 5. The Left Banke version kicked off what was thought at the time to be the latest trend: baroque rock. The trend died an early death when the band members themselves made some tactical errors resulting in radio stations being hesitant to play their records.
Artist: Rutles
Title: Let's Be Natural
Source: CD: The Rutles
Writer(s): Neil Innes
Label: Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1978
The Rutles released their last LP, Shabby Road, in September of 1969, following a contentious series of recording sessions that would later be documented in the film Let It Rot. Although the band was on the verge of dissolving, they managed to pull things together one last time for the album, which included the prefab four's final hit, Let's Be Natural. OK, none of that actually happened. The Rutles were in reality a clever Beatle parody conceived by Monty Python's Eric Idle and the Bonzo Dog Band's Neil Innes in 1976, with songs written by Innes. The centerpiece of the project was a 1978 mock documentary entitled All You Need Is Cash, which included all the songs heard on the Rutles LP, as well as several that were released years later as bonus tracks on the CD reissue of the album. In addition, the group released two singles in the UK, the second of which was Let's Be Natural.
Artist: Bob Seger System
Title: Gone
Source: LP: Ramblin' Gamblin' Man
Writer(s): Dan Honaker
Label: Capitol
Year: 1969
Most of Bob Seger's original compositions in the early days were hard rockers such as Ramblin' Gamblin' Man and 2+2=? For the slower material on his first LP he went with outside songwriters such as Dan Honaker, who wrote the song Gone. Elements of Gone can be heard in Seger's own later compositions such as Turn The Page.
Artist: Chicago
Title: South California Purples
Source: CD: Chicago Transit Authority
Writer(s): Robert Lamm
Label: Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1969
Chicago never considered themselves a jazz-rock band, despite all the hype from the rock press and the publicity people at Columbia Records. Rather, the defined themselves as a rock band with a horn section. Songs like Robert Lamm's South California Purples, which is basically a blues progression, lend creedence to this view. The track, which showcases the guitar work of Terry Kath, was one of the most popular songs on the band's debut album and continued to be a concert staple until Kath's death in 1978.
Artist: Zombies
Title: She's Not There
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer: Rod Argent
Label: London (original label: Parrot)
Year: 1964
Most of the original British invasion bands were guitar-oriented, like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. One notable exception was the Zombies, whose leader, Rod Argent, built the group around his electric piano. Their first single, She's Not There, was a major hit on both sides of the Atlantic and is ranked among the top British rock songs of all time.
Artist: Misunderstood
Title: I'm Not Talking
Source: British simulated stereo CD: Before The Dream Faded
Writer(s): Traditional
Label: Cherry Red
Year: Recorded 1965, released 1982
The story of the legendary band the Misunderstood actually started in 1963 when three teenagers from Riverside, California decided to form a band called the Blue Notes. Like most of the bands at the time, the group played a mixture of surf and 50s rock and roll cover songs, slowly developing a sound of their own as they went through a series of personnel changes. In 1965 the band changed their name to the Misunderstood and recorded six songs at a local recording studio. Among those was I'm Not Talking, a blues tune in much the same style as the early Yardbirds recordings. Although the recordings were not released, the band caught the attention of a San Bernardino disc jockey named John Ravencroft, and Englishman with an extensive knowledge of the British music scene. In June of 1966 the band, with Ravencroft's help, relocated to London, where they were eventually joined by Ravencroft himself, who changed his name to John Peel and became one of the most popular DJs in the country. The Misunderstood recorded six more songs in the UK, releasing their one and only single in late 1966 before being deported back to the US (where one of the members was immediately drafted into military service).
Artist: Cream
Title: N.S.U.
Source: LP: Fresh Cream
Writer: Jack Bruce
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
The first Cream album starts off the with powerful one-two punch of I Feel Free and N.S.U. Although I Feel Free was a purely studio creation that never got performed live, N.S.U. became a staple of the band's concert performances, and was even performed by various other bands that bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce was a member of over the years.
Artist: Doors
Title: Break On Through (To The Other Side)
Source: LP: The Doors
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
The first Doors song to be released as a single was not, as usually assumed, Light My Fire. Rather, it was Break On Through (To The Other Side), the opening track from the band's debut LP, that was chosen to do introduce the band to top 40 radio. Although the single was not an immediate hit, it did eventually catch on with progressive FM radio listeners and still is heard on classic rock stations from time to time.
Artist: Sonics
Title: Strychnine
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the Psychedelic Era (originally released on LP: Here Are The Sonics)
Writer(s): Gerald Roslie
Label: Rhino (original label: Etiquette)
Year: 1965
From 1965 we have a band that maintains a cult following to this day: the legendary Sonics, generally considered one of the foundation stones of the Seattle music scene. Although the majority of songs on their albums were cover tunes, virtually all of their originals, such as Strychnine from their debut LP, are now considered punk classics; indeed, the Sonics, along with their labelmates the Wailers, are often cited as the first true punk rock bands.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Grim Reaper Of Love
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Portz/Nichol
Label: Rhino (original label: White Whale)
Year: 1966
The Turtles had some early success in 1965 as a folk-rock band, recording the hit version of Bob Dylan's It Ain't Me Babe and PF Sloan's Let Me Be. By 1966, however, it was getting harder and harder for the group to get a hit record. One attempt was Grim Reaper Of Love, co-written by Turtles lead guitarist Al Nichol. Personally I think it's a pretty cool tune, but was probably a bit too weird to appeal to the average top 40 radio listener in 1966. Grim Reaper Of Love did manage to make it to the # 81 spot on the charts, unlike the band's next two singles that failed to chart at all. It wasn't until the following year, when the Turtles recorded Happy Together, that the band would make it back onto the charts.
Artist: Creedence Clearwater Revival (originally released as by the Golliwogs)
Title: Porterville
Source: LP: More Creedence Gold (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): John Fogerty
Label: Fantasy (original label: Scorpio)
Year: 1967
The last single recorded by San Francisco's Golliwogs was a song called Porterville, released on the Scorpio label in late 1967. Not long after that, the same recording was issued on Fantasy Records using the Golliwogs' new name: Creedence Clearwater Revival. The rest is history.
Artist: Spirit
Title: Girl In Your Eye
Source: CD: Spirit
Writer(s): Jay Ferguson
Label: Ode/Epic/Legacy
Year: 1968
Spirit was born in 1965 when drummer Ed Cassidy left the Rising Sons after breaking his arm and settled down with his new wife, who had a teenaged son named Randy. It wasn't long before Ed and Randy (who played guitar) formed a new band called the Red Roosters. The group lasted until the spring of 1966, when the family moved to New York for a few months. After returning to California, Randy ran into two of his Red Roosters bandmates, singer Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes, and decided to form a new band with Cassidy and keyboardist John Locke. Both Cassidy and Locke had played in jazz bands, and the new band, Spirit, incorporated both rock and jazz elements into their sound. Most of the songs of the band's 1968 debut album were written by Ferguson, who tended to favor a softer sound on tracks like Girl In Your Eye. On later albums Randy California would take a greater share in the songwriting, eventually becoming the only original member to stay with the band throughout its history.
Artist: Pentangle
Title: Cruel Sister
Source: British Import CD: Cruel Sister
Writer(s): Trad., arr. Pentangle
Label: Sanctuary (original US label: Reprise)
Year: 1970
Nearly four years after their self-titled debut LP was released, Pentangle was one of the most (if not the most) popular British folk music based bands in the world. The members of Pentangle, however, were beginning to feel constricted by the expectations that came with their own success and were determined to remain true to their musical roots, regardless of the commercial consequences. With this in mind they set about to record their fourth LP, Cruel Sister. The title track of the album demonstrates the band's willingness to try out new ideas such as extended jazz-style improvisations on a traditional folk tune. Cruel Sister also marked guitarist John Renbourne's first use of an electric guitar on an album, an ironic move considering the entire album was made up of traditional songs.
Artist: Deep Purple
Title: Faultline/The Painter
Source: LP: Deep Purple
Writer(s): Lord/Blackmore/Evans/Paice/Simper
Label: Tetragrammaton
Year: 1969
The third and final album by the original Deep Purple lineup was plagued with bad luck, the worst being that the band's US label, Tetragrammaton Records, ran into financial trouble right after the album was released and was unable to promote either the album or the band itself. The music was also a departure from the band's previous style, which could be described as England's answer to Vanilla Fudge. Deep Purple (the album) was entirely made up of original material, such as the track combining the instrumental Faultline with The Painter, a piece credited to the entire band. Following the release of the album singer Rod Evans left the band to form Captain Beyond, and Deep Purple (the band) would move in a harder rock direction with new lead vocalist Ian Gillan.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1332 (starts 8/8/13)
Artist: Who
Title: The Kids Are Alright
Source: Simulated stereo LP: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy (originally released on LP: My Generation)
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: MCA (original label: Decca)
Year: 1965
When the Who Sings My Generation album came out in the US in 1966, it featured several songs that had originally been issued as singles in the UK, including a song that would later be used as a title for the band's first concert film. The Kids Are Alright, one of the group's first charted hits in 1965, is probably the most Beatle-sounding of all Who songs.
Artist: Cream
Title: Sleepy Time Time
Source: LP: Fresh Cream
Writer(s): Bruce/Godfrey
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
When Cream was first formed, both Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker worked with co-writers on original material for the band. Baker's partner was Pete Brown, while Bruce worked with his wife, Janet Godfrey. Eventually Bruce and Brown began collaborating, creating some of Cream's most memorable songs, but not before Bruce and Godfrey wrote Sleepy Time Time, one of the high points of the Fresh Cream album.
Artist: Beatles
Title: All You Need Is Love
Source: LP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Capitol
Year: 1967
So, you're the Beatles, it's mid-1967 and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the most popular album in the world. What do you do for an encore? How about setting up the first live worldwide television broadcast in history to premier your new single? That's exactly what happened with All You Need Is Love. Needless to say the song was soon occupying the #1 spot on the singles charts.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Are You Experienced?
Source: LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
Before the release of Are You Experienced by the Jimi Hendrix Experience the emphasis in rock music (then called pop) was on the 45 RPM single, with albums seen as a luxury item that supplemented an artist's career rather than defined it. Are You Experience helped change all that. The album was not only highly influential, it was a major seller, despite getting virtually no airplay on US top 40 radio. The grand finale of the LP was the title track, which features an array of studio effects, including backwards masking and tape loops. Interestingly enough, the album was originally issued only in a mono version in the UK, with European pressings using a simulated stereo mix. After Reprise bought the rights to release the LP in the US it hired its own engineers to create stereo mixes of the songs from the four-track master tapes.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Come On (part one)
Source: LP: Electric Ladyland
Writer(s): Earl King
Label: Reprise
Year: 1968
Despite being rated by many as the greatest rock guitarist of all time, Jimi Hendrix's roots were in the blues. One of his most performed songs was Red House (a track that was left off the US release of Are You Experienced?), and the Experience's debut US performance at Monterey featured a amped-up version of the B.B. King classic Rock Me Baby. For the Electric Ladyland album Hendrix chose a relatively obscure tune from Earl King, originally recorded in 1962. Come On (Pt. 1) was one of only two cover songs on Electric Ladyland (the other being Dylan's All Along the Watchtower).
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Purple Haze
Source: LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
Purple Haze has one of the most convoluted release histories of any song ever recorded. Originally issued in the UK as a single, it scored high on the British charts. When Reprise, a division of what is now WEA, got the rights to release the first Hendrix album, Are You Experienced?, they chose to replace the first track on the album with Purple Haze, moving the original opening track, Foxy Lady, to side two of the LP. The song next appeared on the Smash Hits album, which in Europe was on the Polydor label. This was the way things stayed until the early 1990s, when MCA (now Universal) acquired the rights to the Hendrix catalog and re-issued Are You Experienced? with the tracks restored to the UK ordering, but preceded by the six non-album sides (including Purple Haze) that had originally been released prior to the album. Most recently, the Hendrix Family Trust has again changed labels and the US version of Are You Experienced? is once again in print, this time on Sony's Legacy label. This means that Purple Haze, as well as the rest of the Jimi Hendrix Experience catalog, has the distinction of having been released by every major record company in the world (yes, there are only three now).
Artist: First Edition
Title: Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer: Mickey Newbury
Label: Reprise
Year: 1968
Kenny Rogers has, on more than one occassion, tried to put as much distance between himself and the 1968 First Edition hit Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In) as possible. I feel it's my civic duty to remind everyone that he was the lead vocalist on the recording, and that this song was the one that launched his career. So there.
Artist: Doors
Title: The End
Source: CD: The Best Of The Doors (originally released on LP: The Doors)
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
Prior to recording their first album the Doors' honed their craft at various Sunset Strip clubs, working up live versions of the songs they would soon record, including their show-stopper, The End. Originally written as a breakup song by singer/lyricist Jim Morrison, The End runs nearly twelve minutes and includes a controversial spoken "Oedipus section". My own take on the famous "blue bus" line is that Morrison, being a military brat, was probably familiar with the blue shuttle buses used on military bases for a variety of purposes, including taking kids to school, and simply incorporated his experiences with them into his lyrics. The End got its greatest exposure in 1979, when Oliver Stone used it in his film Apocalypse Now.
Artist: Third Bardo
Title: I'm Five Years Ahead Of My Time
Source: Mono British CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Evans/Pike
Label: Zonophone (original label: Roulette)
Year: 1967
The Third Bardo (the name coming from the Tibetan Book of the Dead) only released one single, but I'm Five Years Ahead Of My Time has become, over a period of time, one of the most sought-after records of the psychedelic era. Not much is known of this New York band made up of Jeffrey Moon (vocals), Bruce Ginsberg (drums), Ricky Goldclang (lead guitar), Damian Kelly (bass) and Richy Seslowe (guitar).
Artist: Young-Holt Unlimited
Title: Country Slicker Joe
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Young/Chaney/Holt
Label: Brunswick
Year: 1968
If the Monkees lost credibility when word got out that they were not playing the instruments on their first two albums, imagine how the members of Young-Holt Unlimited must have felt when it was learned that the band itself had nothing to do with the recording of the song Soulful Strut, which was not only their only major hit, but an instrumental as well! On the other hand, the B side of that record was the real Young-Holt Unlimited, who were in reality an offshoot of the Ramsey Lewis Trio, a highly respected jazz/R&B band from the mid-1960s that had scored several instrumental hits of their own, including Wade In The Water and The In Crowd. Although Country Slicker Joe has vocals (mostly spoken), the song is structured more as a jazz instrumental, with each member taking a shot at the spotlight.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Surfer Dan
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer: The Turtles
Label: White Whale
Year: 1968
In 1968 the Turtles decided to self-produce four recordings without the knowledge of their record label, White Whale. When company executives heard the tapes they rejected all but one of the recordings. That lone exception was Surfer Dan, which was included on the band's 1968 concept album Battle of the Bands. The idea was that each track (or band, as the divisions on LPs were sometimes called) would sound like it was recorded by a different group. As the Turtles had originally evolved out of a surf band called the Crossfires, that name was the obvious choice for the Surfer Dan track. The song was also chosen to be the B side of She's My Girl, the Turtles biggest hit of 1968.
Artist: Turtles
Title: She's My Girl
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Bonner/Gordon
Label: Rhino (original label: White Whale)
Year: 1967
A favorite among the Turtles' members themselves, She's My Girl is full of hidden studio tricks that are barely (if at all) audible on the final recording. Written by the same team as Happy Together, the song is a worthy follow up to that monster hit.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Elenore
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): The Turtles
Label: White Whale
Year: 1968
In 1968 White Whale Records was not particularly happy with the recent activities of their primary money makers, the Turtles. The band had been asserting its independence, even going so far as to self-produce a set of recordings that the label in turn rejected as having no commercial potential. The label wanted another Happy Together. The band responded by creating a facetious new song called Elenore. The song had deliberately silly lyrics such as "Elenore gee I think you're swell" and "you're my pride and joy etcetera" and gave production credit to former Turtles bassist Chip Douglas for the "Douglas F. Hatelid Foundation", which was in itself an in-joke referring to the pseudonym Douglas was forced to use as producer for the Monkees in 1967. Then a strange thing happened: the record became a hit. I suspect this was the event that began Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman's eventually metamorphosis into rock parody act Flo and Eddie.
Artist: Temptations
Title: Psychedelic Shack
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer: Whitfield/Strong
Label: Motown Yesteryear
Year: 1970
Starting in 1969 the songwriting/production team of Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong began to carve out their own company within a company at Motown, producing a series of recordings with a far more psychedelic feel than anything else coming out of the Motor City's biggest label. The most blatantly obvious example of this is the Temptations tune Psychedelic Shack, which graced the charts in 1970. Whitfield would eventually form his own company, taking another Motown act, the Undisputed Truth, with him, but would not be able to equal the success of the songs he and Strong produced for the Temptations, such as 1972's Papa Was A Rolling Stone.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: A Whiter Shade Of Pale (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Source: LP: The Best Of Procol Harum
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M (original label: Deram)
Year: 1967
Often credited as the first progressive rock band, Procol Harum drew heavily from classical music sources, such as the Bach inspired theme used by organist Matthew Fisher as the signature rift for A Whiter Shade of Pale. The song itself hold the distinction of being the most-played song on the British airwaves of the past 70 years.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: 2000 Light Years From Home
Source: LP: Their Satanic Majesties Request
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
Nowhere was the ripple effect of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band more noticable than on the Rolling Stones fall 1967 release Their Satanic Majesties Request. The cover featured the band members in various sorcerous regalia in a seven-inch picture on the kind of holographic paper used for "magic rings" found in bubble-gum machines and pasted over regular album-cover stock, which was a simple pattern of faded white circles on a blue background (it kind of looked like dark wallpaper). Musically it was the most psychedelic Stones album ever released. Interesting enough, different songs were released as singles in different countries. In the US the single was She's A Rainbow, while in Germany 2,000 Light Years From Home (the US B side of She's A Rainbow) made the top 40 charts.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Why
Source: CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s): McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Columbia
Year: 1967
One of the earliest collaborations between Byrds songwriters David Crosby and Roger McGuinn was the up-tempo raga rocker Why. The song was first recorded at RCA studios in Los Angeles in late 1965 as an intended B side for Eight Miles High, but due to the fact that the band's label, Columbia, refused to release recordings made at their main rival's studios, the band ended up having to re-record both songs at Columbia's own studios in early 1966. Although the band members felt the newer versions were inferior to the 1965 recordings, they were released as a single in March of 1966. Later that year, for reasons that are still unclear, Crosby insisted the band record a new version of Why, and that version was used for the band's next LP, Younger Than Yesterday.
Artist: Blood, Sweat And Tears
Title: The Modern Adventures Of Diogenes And Freud
Source: LP: Child Is Father To The Man
Writer(s): Al Kooper
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
In the liner notes for the debut Blood, Sweat And Tears album, Child Is Father To The Man, bandleader Al Kooper describes The Modern Adventures Of Diogenes And Freud as being about "the professions of psychiatry and messiahtry." The song is somewhat unusual in that it features none of the standard rock instruments. The recording instead consists entirely of Kooper's vocals and strings arranged by producer John Simon.
Artist: Dave Van Ronk And The Hudson Dusters
Title: New Dreams
Source: LP: Dave Van Ronk And The Hudson Dusters
Writer(s): Dave and Doris Woods
Label: Verve Forecast
Year: 1967
Although not exactly a household name, Dave Van Ronk was, in fact, one of the most important and influential figures on the Greenwich Village scene in the early 60s, serving as mentor to a host of young folk and blue musicians including Bob Dylan, whom he met when the latter first arrived in New York. Van Ronk was not known as a songwriter, preferring to put his unique stamp on songs by other composers such as Reverend Gary Davis, Joni Mitchell and even Dylan himself. Although Van Ronk generally worked as a solo artist, he did record an album in 1967 with an electric band called the Hudson Dusters. Alongside the kinds of songs you might expect from someone like Van Ronk, the Hudson Dusters included tunes such as New Dreams, probably the most psychedelic track Van Ronk ever recorded.
Artist: Blues Magoos
Title: (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet
Source: CD: More Nuggets (originally released on LP: Psychedelic Lollipop)
Writer(s): Gilbert/Scala/Esposito/Thielhelm
Label: Rhino (original label: Mercury)
Year: 1966
The Blues Magoos (original spelling: Bloos) were either the first or second band to use the word psychedelic in an album title. Both they and the 13th Floor Elevators released their debut albums in 1966 and it is unclear which one actually came out first. What's not in dispute is the fact that Psychedelic Lollipop far outsold The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators. One major reason for this was the fact that (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet was a huge national hit in early 1967, which helped album sales considerably. Despite having a unique sound and a look to match (including electric suits), the Magoos were unable to duplicate the success of Nothin' Yet on subsequent releases, partially due to Mercury's pairing of two equally marketable songs on the band's next single without indicating to stations which one they were supposed to be playing.
Artist: Lovin' Spoonful
Title: Nashville Cats
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful)
Writer(s): John B. Sebastian
Label: Cotillion (original label: Kama Sutra)
Year: 1966
After the success of their debut LP, Do You Believe In Magic, The Lovin' Spoonful deliberately set out to make a followup album that sounded like it was recorded by several different bands, as a way of showcasing their versatility. With Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful, released in 1966, they did just that. Songs on the album ranged from the folky Darlin' Be Home Soon to the rockin' psychedelic classic Summer In The City, with a liberal dose of what would come to be called country rock a few years later. The best example of the latter was Nashville Cats, a song that surprisingly went into the top 40 and became a staple of progressive FM radio in the early 70s.
Artist: Leaves
Title: Back On The Avenue
Source: CD: Hey Joe
Writer(s): The Leaves
Label: One Way (original label: Mira)
Year: 1966
The Leaves were a group of college fraternity brothers from Los Angeles who decided to form their own band in the mid-1960s. As folk-rock was currently in vogue, this became the music they were most identified with, although their biggest hit, the fast version of Hey Joe, has long been considered a classic example of garage-rock. The group showed on their 1966 debut LP that they were also able to channel the Rolling Stones reasonably well, as Back On The Avenue, an "answer song" to the Stones' 2120 Michigan Avenue, aptly demonstrates.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: God Only Knows
Source: CD: Pet Sounds
Writer(s): Wilson/Asher
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
Possibly the first time a deity appeared in the title of a pop song was the Beach Boys song God Only Knows on the Pet Sounds album. Both Brian and Carl Wilson were going through a spiritual phase and were in the habit of praying for guidance throughout the making of Pet Sounds. The song was released, along with Wouldn't It Be Nice, as a double A sided single a few weeks after the album came out, and both songs made the top 40, although Wouldn't It Be Nice was the bigger hit in the US. In the UK, where Beatle Paul McCartney was enthusiastic in his support of the tune, God Only Knows went all the way to the # 5 slot, considerably higher than in the US.
Artist: We All Together
Title: It's A Sin To Go Away
Source: CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Peru on LP: We All Together)
Writer(s): Guerrero/Cornejo/Salom/Samame/Cornejo
Label: Rhino (original label: Mag)
Year: 1970
Although Lima, Peru is probably not the first place one thinks of as a hotbed of the psychedelic music scene, it was home to a group called We All Together that recorded two LPs for the Mag label. The first of these was a self-titled collection of covers of British rock tunes (i.e. Beatles), with a few originals, such as It's A Sin To Go Away, tossed in.
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young
Title: Country Girl
Source: CD: déjà vu
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1970
The second Crosby, Stills and Nash album, déjà vu, was enhanced by the addition of singer/songwriter/guitarist Neil Young, along with drummer Dallas Taylor and bassist Greg Reeves. The LP itself was printed on textured cardboard with gold offset lettering, giving the package a unique look. But it was the music itself that made the album one of the top sellers of 1970, with three singles going into the top 40. One of the non-single tracks was a song that could just as easily have appeared on a Neil Young solo album was Country Girl, which was actually a medley of two or three unfinished Young songs that had not yet been recorded.
Artist: Kinks
Title: Ev'rybody's Gonna Be Happy
Source: LP: Kinda Kinks
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: Reprise
Year: 1965
Ev'rybody's Gonna Be Happy is perhaps recognizable from a TV commercial from a few years back (don't ask me who the ad was for, as I tend to ignore such things). The song was originally the opening track from the 1965 album Kinda Kinks, which, like most British albums of the time, had a different song lineup on its US release than the original UK version. In this case, it also had entirely different cover art, for reasons that are not entirely clear.
Artist: Outsiders
Title: Touch
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in the Netherlands as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Tax/Splinter
Label: Rhino (original label: Relax)
Year: 1966
The Outsiders were formed in Holland in 1964 by vocalist Wally Tax and guitarist Ronald Splinter. Although most of the band members were only 15, they managed to get a four night a week gig at a local club, and by 1966 had become one of the top bands in the country. Touch was the fifth of many hit singles for the band, which split up in 1969.
Artist: Yardbirds
Title: Heart Full Of Soul
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Graham Gouldman
Label: Epic
Year: 1965
Heart Full Of Soul, the Yardbirds' follow-up single to For Your Love was a huge hit, making the top 10 on both sides of the Atlantic in 1965. The song, the first to feature guitarist Jeff Beck prominently, was written by Graham Gouldman, who was then a member of Wayne Fontana's Mindbenders and would later be a founding member of 10cc.
Title: The Kids Are Alright
Source: Simulated stereo LP: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy (originally released on LP: My Generation)
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: MCA (original label: Decca)
Year: 1965
When the Who Sings My Generation album came out in the US in 1966, it featured several songs that had originally been issued as singles in the UK, including a song that would later be used as a title for the band's first concert film. The Kids Are Alright, one of the group's first charted hits in 1965, is probably the most Beatle-sounding of all Who songs.
Artist: Cream
Title: Sleepy Time Time
Source: LP: Fresh Cream
Writer(s): Bruce/Godfrey
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
When Cream was first formed, both Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker worked with co-writers on original material for the band. Baker's partner was Pete Brown, while Bruce worked with his wife, Janet Godfrey. Eventually Bruce and Brown began collaborating, creating some of Cream's most memorable songs, but not before Bruce and Godfrey wrote Sleepy Time Time, one of the high points of the Fresh Cream album.
Artist: Beatles
Title: All You Need Is Love
Source: LP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Capitol
Year: 1967
So, you're the Beatles, it's mid-1967 and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the most popular album in the world. What do you do for an encore? How about setting up the first live worldwide television broadcast in history to premier your new single? That's exactly what happened with All You Need Is Love. Needless to say the song was soon occupying the #1 spot on the singles charts.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Are You Experienced?
Source: LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
Before the release of Are You Experienced by the Jimi Hendrix Experience the emphasis in rock music (then called pop) was on the 45 RPM single, with albums seen as a luxury item that supplemented an artist's career rather than defined it. Are You Experience helped change all that. The album was not only highly influential, it was a major seller, despite getting virtually no airplay on US top 40 radio. The grand finale of the LP was the title track, which features an array of studio effects, including backwards masking and tape loops. Interestingly enough, the album was originally issued only in a mono version in the UK, with European pressings using a simulated stereo mix. After Reprise bought the rights to release the LP in the US it hired its own engineers to create stereo mixes of the songs from the four-track master tapes.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Come On (part one)
Source: LP: Electric Ladyland
Writer(s): Earl King
Label: Reprise
Year: 1968
Despite being rated by many as the greatest rock guitarist of all time, Jimi Hendrix's roots were in the blues. One of his most performed songs was Red House (a track that was left off the US release of Are You Experienced?), and the Experience's debut US performance at Monterey featured a amped-up version of the B.B. King classic Rock Me Baby. For the Electric Ladyland album Hendrix chose a relatively obscure tune from Earl King, originally recorded in 1962. Come On (Pt. 1) was one of only two cover songs on Electric Ladyland (the other being Dylan's All Along the Watchtower).
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Purple Haze
Source: LP: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
Purple Haze has one of the most convoluted release histories of any song ever recorded. Originally issued in the UK as a single, it scored high on the British charts. When Reprise, a division of what is now WEA, got the rights to release the first Hendrix album, Are You Experienced?, they chose to replace the first track on the album with Purple Haze, moving the original opening track, Foxy Lady, to side two of the LP. The song next appeared on the Smash Hits album, which in Europe was on the Polydor label. This was the way things stayed until the early 1990s, when MCA (now Universal) acquired the rights to the Hendrix catalog and re-issued Are You Experienced? with the tracks restored to the UK ordering, but preceded by the six non-album sides (including Purple Haze) that had originally been released prior to the album. Most recently, the Hendrix Family Trust has again changed labels and the US version of Are You Experienced? is once again in print, this time on Sony's Legacy label. This means that Purple Haze, as well as the rest of the Jimi Hendrix Experience catalog, has the distinction of having been released by every major record company in the world (yes, there are only three now).
Artist: First Edition
Title: Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer: Mickey Newbury
Label: Reprise
Year: 1968
Kenny Rogers has, on more than one occassion, tried to put as much distance between himself and the 1968 First Edition hit Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In) as possible. I feel it's my civic duty to remind everyone that he was the lead vocalist on the recording, and that this song was the one that launched his career. So there.
Artist: Doors
Title: The End
Source: CD: The Best Of The Doors (originally released on LP: The Doors)
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
Prior to recording their first album the Doors' honed their craft at various Sunset Strip clubs, working up live versions of the songs they would soon record, including their show-stopper, The End. Originally written as a breakup song by singer/lyricist Jim Morrison, The End runs nearly twelve minutes and includes a controversial spoken "Oedipus section". My own take on the famous "blue bus" line is that Morrison, being a military brat, was probably familiar with the blue shuttle buses used on military bases for a variety of purposes, including taking kids to school, and simply incorporated his experiences with them into his lyrics. The End got its greatest exposure in 1979, when Oliver Stone used it in his film Apocalypse Now.
Artist: Third Bardo
Title: I'm Five Years Ahead Of My Time
Source: Mono British CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Evans/Pike
Label: Zonophone (original label: Roulette)
Year: 1967
The Third Bardo (the name coming from the Tibetan Book of the Dead) only released one single, but I'm Five Years Ahead Of My Time has become, over a period of time, one of the most sought-after records of the psychedelic era. Not much is known of this New York band made up of Jeffrey Moon (vocals), Bruce Ginsberg (drums), Ricky Goldclang (lead guitar), Damian Kelly (bass) and Richy Seslowe (guitar).
Artist: Young-Holt Unlimited
Title: Country Slicker Joe
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Young/Chaney/Holt
Label: Brunswick
Year: 1968
If the Monkees lost credibility when word got out that they were not playing the instruments on their first two albums, imagine how the members of Young-Holt Unlimited must have felt when it was learned that the band itself had nothing to do with the recording of the song Soulful Strut, which was not only their only major hit, but an instrumental as well! On the other hand, the B side of that record was the real Young-Holt Unlimited, who were in reality an offshoot of the Ramsey Lewis Trio, a highly respected jazz/R&B band from the mid-1960s that had scored several instrumental hits of their own, including Wade In The Water and The In Crowd. Although Country Slicker Joe has vocals (mostly spoken), the song is structured more as a jazz instrumental, with each member taking a shot at the spotlight.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Surfer Dan
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer: The Turtles
Label: White Whale
Year: 1968
In 1968 the Turtles decided to self-produce four recordings without the knowledge of their record label, White Whale. When company executives heard the tapes they rejected all but one of the recordings. That lone exception was Surfer Dan, which was included on the band's 1968 concept album Battle of the Bands. The idea was that each track (or band, as the divisions on LPs were sometimes called) would sound like it was recorded by a different group. As the Turtles had originally evolved out of a surf band called the Crossfires, that name was the obvious choice for the Surfer Dan track. The song was also chosen to be the B side of She's My Girl, the Turtles biggest hit of 1968.
Artist: Turtles
Title: She's My Girl
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Bonner/Gordon
Label: Rhino (original label: White Whale)
Year: 1967
A favorite among the Turtles' members themselves, She's My Girl is full of hidden studio tricks that are barely (if at all) audible on the final recording. Written by the same team as Happy Together, the song is a worthy follow up to that monster hit.
Artist: Turtles
Title: Elenore
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): The Turtles
Label: White Whale
Year: 1968
In 1968 White Whale Records was not particularly happy with the recent activities of their primary money makers, the Turtles. The band had been asserting its independence, even going so far as to self-produce a set of recordings that the label in turn rejected as having no commercial potential. The label wanted another Happy Together. The band responded by creating a facetious new song called Elenore. The song had deliberately silly lyrics such as "Elenore gee I think you're swell" and "you're my pride and joy etcetera" and gave production credit to former Turtles bassist Chip Douglas for the "Douglas F. Hatelid Foundation", which was in itself an in-joke referring to the pseudonym Douglas was forced to use as producer for the Monkees in 1967. Then a strange thing happened: the record became a hit. I suspect this was the event that began Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman's eventually metamorphosis into rock parody act Flo and Eddie.
Artist: Temptations
Title: Psychedelic Shack
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer: Whitfield/Strong
Label: Motown Yesteryear
Year: 1970
Starting in 1969 the songwriting/production team of Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong began to carve out their own company within a company at Motown, producing a series of recordings with a far more psychedelic feel than anything else coming out of the Motor City's biggest label. The most blatantly obvious example of this is the Temptations tune Psychedelic Shack, which graced the charts in 1970. Whitfield would eventually form his own company, taking another Motown act, the Undisputed Truth, with him, but would not be able to equal the success of the songs he and Strong produced for the Temptations, such as 1972's Papa Was A Rolling Stone.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: A Whiter Shade Of Pale (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Source: LP: The Best Of Procol Harum
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M (original label: Deram)
Year: 1967
Often credited as the first progressive rock band, Procol Harum drew heavily from classical music sources, such as the Bach inspired theme used by organist Matthew Fisher as the signature rift for A Whiter Shade of Pale. The song itself hold the distinction of being the most-played song on the British airwaves of the past 70 years.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: 2000 Light Years From Home
Source: LP: Their Satanic Majesties Request
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
Nowhere was the ripple effect of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band more noticable than on the Rolling Stones fall 1967 release Their Satanic Majesties Request. The cover featured the band members in various sorcerous regalia in a seven-inch picture on the kind of holographic paper used for "magic rings" found in bubble-gum machines and pasted over regular album-cover stock, which was a simple pattern of faded white circles on a blue background (it kind of looked like dark wallpaper). Musically it was the most psychedelic Stones album ever released. Interesting enough, different songs were released as singles in different countries. In the US the single was She's A Rainbow, while in Germany 2,000 Light Years From Home (the US B side of She's A Rainbow) made the top 40 charts.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Why
Source: CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s): McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Columbia
Year: 1967
One of the earliest collaborations between Byrds songwriters David Crosby and Roger McGuinn was the up-tempo raga rocker Why. The song was first recorded at RCA studios in Los Angeles in late 1965 as an intended B side for Eight Miles High, but due to the fact that the band's label, Columbia, refused to release recordings made at their main rival's studios, the band ended up having to re-record both songs at Columbia's own studios in early 1966. Although the band members felt the newer versions were inferior to the 1965 recordings, they were released as a single in March of 1966. Later that year, for reasons that are still unclear, Crosby insisted the band record a new version of Why, and that version was used for the band's next LP, Younger Than Yesterday.
Artist: Blood, Sweat And Tears
Title: The Modern Adventures Of Diogenes And Freud
Source: LP: Child Is Father To The Man
Writer(s): Al Kooper
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
In the liner notes for the debut Blood, Sweat And Tears album, Child Is Father To The Man, bandleader Al Kooper describes The Modern Adventures Of Diogenes And Freud as being about "the professions of psychiatry and messiahtry." The song is somewhat unusual in that it features none of the standard rock instruments. The recording instead consists entirely of Kooper's vocals and strings arranged by producer John Simon.
Artist: Dave Van Ronk And The Hudson Dusters
Title: New Dreams
Source: LP: Dave Van Ronk And The Hudson Dusters
Writer(s): Dave and Doris Woods
Label: Verve Forecast
Year: 1967
Although not exactly a household name, Dave Van Ronk was, in fact, one of the most important and influential figures on the Greenwich Village scene in the early 60s, serving as mentor to a host of young folk and blue musicians including Bob Dylan, whom he met when the latter first arrived in New York. Van Ronk was not known as a songwriter, preferring to put his unique stamp on songs by other composers such as Reverend Gary Davis, Joni Mitchell and even Dylan himself. Although Van Ronk generally worked as a solo artist, he did record an album in 1967 with an electric band called the Hudson Dusters. Alongside the kinds of songs you might expect from someone like Van Ronk, the Hudson Dusters included tunes such as New Dreams, probably the most psychedelic track Van Ronk ever recorded.
Artist: Blues Magoos
Title: (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet
Source: CD: More Nuggets (originally released on LP: Psychedelic Lollipop)
Writer(s): Gilbert/Scala/Esposito/Thielhelm
Label: Rhino (original label: Mercury)
Year: 1966
The Blues Magoos (original spelling: Bloos) were either the first or second band to use the word psychedelic in an album title. Both they and the 13th Floor Elevators released their debut albums in 1966 and it is unclear which one actually came out first. What's not in dispute is the fact that Psychedelic Lollipop far outsold The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators. One major reason for this was the fact that (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet was a huge national hit in early 1967, which helped album sales considerably. Despite having a unique sound and a look to match (including electric suits), the Magoos were unable to duplicate the success of Nothin' Yet on subsequent releases, partially due to Mercury's pairing of two equally marketable songs on the band's next single without indicating to stations which one they were supposed to be playing.
Artist: Lovin' Spoonful
Title: Nashville Cats
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful)
Writer(s): John B. Sebastian
Label: Cotillion (original label: Kama Sutra)
Year: 1966
After the success of their debut LP, Do You Believe In Magic, The Lovin' Spoonful deliberately set out to make a followup album that sounded like it was recorded by several different bands, as a way of showcasing their versatility. With Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful, released in 1966, they did just that. Songs on the album ranged from the folky Darlin' Be Home Soon to the rockin' psychedelic classic Summer In The City, with a liberal dose of what would come to be called country rock a few years later. The best example of the latter was Nashville Cats, a song that surprisingly went into the top 40 and became a staple of progressive FM radio in the early 70s.
Artist: Leaves
Title: Back On The Avenue
Source: CD: Hey Joe
Writer(s): The Leaves
Label: One Way (original label: Mira)
Year: 1966
The Leaves were a group of college fraternity brothers from Los Angeles who decided to form their own band in the mid-1960s. As folk-rock was currently in vogue, this became the music they were most identified with, although their biggest hit, the fast version of Hey Joe, has long been considered a classic example of garage-rock. The group showed on their 1966 debut LP that they were also able to channel the Rolling Stones reasonably well, as Back On The Avenue, an "answer song" to the Stones' 2120 Michigan Avenue, aptly demonstrates.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: God Only Knows
Source: CD: Pet Sounds
Writer(s): Wilson/Asher
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
Possibly the first time a deity appeared in the title of a pop song was the Beach Boys song God Only Knows on the Pet Sounds album. Both Brian and Carl Wilson were going through a spiritual phase and were in the habit of praying for guidance throughout the making of Pet Sounds. The song was released, along with Wouldn't It Be Nice, as a double A sided single a few weeks after the album came out, and both songs made the top 40, although Wouldn't It Be Nice was the bigger hit in the US. In the UK, where Beatle Paul McCartney was enthusiastic in his support of the tune, God Only Knows went all the way to the # 5 slot, considerably higher than in the US.
Artist: We All Together
Title: It's A Sin To Go Away
Source: CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in Peru on LP: We All Together)
Writer(s): Guerrero/Cornejo/Salom/Samame/Cornejo
Label: Rhino (original label: Mag)
Year: 1970
Although Lima, Peru is probably not the first place one thinks of as a hotbed of the psychedelic music scene, it was home to a group called We All Together that recorded two LPs for the Mag label. The first of these was a self-titled collection of covers of British rock tunes (i.e. Beatles), with a few originals, such as It's A Sin To Go Away, tossed in.
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young
Title: Country Girl
Source: CD: déjà vu
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1970
The second Crosby, Stills and Nash album, déjà vu, was enhanced by the addition of singer/songwriter/guitarist Neil Young, along with drummer Dallas Taylor and bassist Greg Reeves. The LP itself was printed on textured cardboard with gold offset lettering, giving the package a unique look. But it was the music itself that made the album one of the top sellers of 1970, with three singles going into the top 40. One of the non-single tracks was a song that could just as easily have appeared on a Neil Young solo album was Country Girl, which was actually a medley of two or three unfinished Young songs that had not yet been recorded.
Artist: Kinks
Title: Ev'rybody's Gonna Be Happy
Source: LP: Kinda Kinks
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: Reprise
Year: 1965
Ev'rybody's Gonna Be Happy is perhaps recognizable from a TV commercial from a few years back (don't ask me who the ad was for, as I tend to ignore such things). The song was originally the opening track from the 1965 album Kinda Kinks, which, like most British albums of the time, had a different song lineup on its US release than the original UK version. In this case, it also had entirely different cover art, for reasons that are not entirely clear.
Artist: Outsiders
Title: Touch
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in the Netherlands as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Tax/Splinter
Label: Rhino (original label: Relax)
Year: 1966
The Outsiders were formed in Holland in 1964 by vocalist Wally Tax and guitarist Ronald Splinter. Although most of the band members were only 15, they managed to get a four night a week gig at a local club, and by 1966 had become one of the top bands in the country. Touch was the fifth of many hit singles for the band, which split up in 1969.
Artist: Yardbirds
Title: Heart Full Of Soul
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Graham Gouldman
Label: Epic
Year: 1965
Heart Full Of Soul, the Yardbirds' follow-up single to For Your Love was a huge hit, making the top 10 on both sides of the Atlantic in 1965. The song, the first to feature guitarist Jeff Beck prominently, was written by Graham Gouldman, who was then a member of Wayne Fontana's Mindbenders and would later be a founding member of 10cc.
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