Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1534 (starts 8/19/15)

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Take It Back
Source:    LP: Disraeli Gears
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    Atco
Year:    1967
    After seven years of serving in the Air Force liason office at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Aurora, Colorado, my dad got transferred to Weisbaden Air Force Base in Germany. Standard practice at the time was for the married GI to go on ahead of the rest of the family and find a place to live "on the economy." My dad, already having quite a bit of time in the service, was able to instead get a spot in a place called Kastel, which was a group of WWII Panzer barracks that had been adapted for use by American military with families. When the rest of us arrived in August I was happily surprised to find that my dad, in addition to finding us a place to live, had bought a state-of-the-art Akai X-355 Tape Recorder using money he had won at Lotto, along with a pair of Koss headphones. I of course had to go to the Base Exchange to look for pre-recorded tapes. Already having experience with reel to reel machines, I knew that tapes recorded at 3 3/4 ips had more tape hiss than those recorded at 7 1/2 ips, so I was resolved to only buy tapes recorded at the faster speed. Unfortunately several albums I wanted were only available at the slower speed. The problem was resolved a year later when my dad finally got a Dual turntable to hook up to the tape recorded. I immediately went out and bought a reel of blank tape; the first album I made a copy of was Cream's Disraeli Gears. I would often fall asleep listening to that tape, which meant I ended up sleeping through the last songs on the album, including Take It Back. I must have done some kind of sleep learning, though, since to this day I can quote the lyrics of the entire song.

Artist:    Love
Title:    Que Vida!
Source:    CD: Da Capo
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    The first Love album was pretty much garage rock. Their second effort, however, showed off the rapidly maturing songwriting skills of both Arthur Lee and Bryan MacLean. Que Vida! (yes, I know that technically there should be an upside down exclamation point at the beginning of the song title, but my keyboard doesn't speak Spanish) is a good example of Lee moving into territory usually associated with middle-of-the-road singers such as Johnny Mathis. Lee would continue to defy convention throughout his career, leading to a noticable lack of commercial success even as he won the respect of his musical peers.

Artist:    Chocolate Watchband
Title:    Dark Side Of The Mushroom
Source:    CD: No Way Out
Writer(s):    Cooper/Podolor
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Tower)
Year:    1967
    Just who played on Dark Side Of The Mushroom is lost to history. What is certain, however, is that it is not the Chocolate Watchband, despite its inclusion on that band's debut LP. Producer Ed Cobb apparently had his own agenda when it came to the Watchband, which included making them sound much more psychedelic on vinyl than when they performed onstage (in fact it is doubtful that Cobb ever actually attended any of the band's live gigs). To accomplish his goal, Cobb enlisted the help of songwriter/musician Richie Podolor, who would later go on to produce Three Dog Night's records. Podolor put together the group of anonymous studio musicians that recorded Dark Side Of The Mushroom, which, despite its shady history, is a decent slice of instrumental psychedelia.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Long Day's Flight
Source:    CD: Underground
Writer(s):    Weakley/Yorty
Label:    Collector's Choice (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Originally from the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles, California, the Electric Prunes were often mislabeled as a Pacific Northwest band, due to their popularity in the Seattle area. Interestingly enough, the band also enjoyed greater popularity in the UK than many of their L.A. contemporaries (such as the Doors). Long Day's Flight, an anthemic track from the band's second LP, was released as a single in the UK, but not in the US.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    I Don't Live Today
Source:    CD: Are You Experienced?
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Some things stick in your mind for the rest of your life. One of those for me is seeing for the first time a black light poster of Jimi Hendrix playing his guitar with the caption I Don't Live Today. I don't believe Hendrix was being deliberately prophetic when he wrote and recorded this classic track for the Are You Experienced album, but it still spooks me a bit to hear it, even now.

Artist:    P.F. Sloan
Title:    Halloween Mary
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:    P.F. Sloan
Label:    Rhino (original label: Dunhill)
Year:    1965
    If there is any one songwriter associated specifically with folk-rock (as opposed to folk music), it would be the Los Angeles based P.F. Sloan, writer of Barry McGuire's signature song, Eve Of Destruction. Sloan also penned hits for the Turtles in their early days as one of the harder-edged folk-rock bands, including their second hit, Let Me Be. In fact, Sloan had almost 400 songs to his credit by the time he and Steve Barri teamed up to write and produce a series of major hits released by various bands under the name Grass Roots. Sloan himself, however, only released two singles as a singer, although (as can be heard on the second of them, the slightly off-kilter Halloween Mary) he had a voice as powerful as many of the recording stars of the time.

Artist:    Ken And The Fourth Dimension
Title:    See If I Care
Source:    Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:    Ken Johnson
Label:    Rhino (original label: Star-Burst)
Year:    1966
    There was never a band called Ken And The Fourth Dimension in Nashville West, aka Bakersfield, California, aka Buck Owens territory. What Bakersfield did have, however, was the Johnson brothers, whose father was involved with the record business in Los Angeles, about two hours south of Bakersfield. Don Johnson was the bass player for a popular Bakersfield band known as the Trippers. When brother Ken talked Dad into getting his friend Gary Paxton to produce a record for him, he used most of brother Don's band, re-naming them the Fourth Dimension for just this one project. See If I Care was released in 1966 on the Star-Burst label, one of many small labels operating out of L.A. at the time.

Artist:    The Light
Title:    Back Up
Source:    Mono CD: A Lethal Dose Of Hard Psych (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Anglin/Samson
Label:    Arf! Arf! (original label: A&M)
Year:    1967
    The San Bernadino/Riverside area of southern California is probably better known to racing fans than to music afficionados, yet the area did have its share of local bands filling up various venues in the area in the late 60s. Among those bands was the Light, who released one single, Back Up, on the A&M label in 1967.

Artist:     Johnny Winter
Title:     Bad Luck And Trouble
Source:     LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released on LP: The Progressive Blues Experiment)
Writer:     Johnny Winter
Label:     United Artists (original labels: Sonobeat/Imperial)
Year:     1968
     Johnny Winter first started getting attention while playing the Texas blues circuit. His first album, The Progressive Blues Experiment, originally appeared on the regional Sonobeat label and was subsequently reissued nationally on Imperial. Unlike his brother Edgar, who gravitated to rock music, Johnny Winter has remained primarily a blues musician throughout his career.

Artist:     Blind Faith
Title:     Presence of the Lord
Source:     LP: Blind Faith
Writer:     Eric Clapton
Label:     Polydor
Year:     1969
     When the album Blind Faith first came out, several critics questioned why Steve Winwood sang lead on this track instead of songwriter Eric Clapton. Many went so far as to say Clapton should have sung the tune, but after countless subsequent recordings of Clapton singing Presence of the Lord over the years, it's kind of refreshing to go back and hear Winwood's original interpretation.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Up Or Down
Source:    LP: Early Flight
Writer(s):    Peter Kaukonen
Label:    Grunt
Year:    Recorded 1970, released 1974
            Following the release of the Volunteers album in 1969, drummer Spencer Dryden left Jefferson Airplane and was replaced by Joey Covington, who made his debut on the band's live LP, Bless Its Pointed Little Head. Sessions for Bark, the first studio LP to feature Covington, began in 1970. One of the earliest tracks recorded for the album was the six-minute jam piece Up Or Down, which was written by guitarist Jorma Kaukonen's brother Peter. Lead vocalist Marty Balin decided to leave the band before Bark could be completed, and the tracks with his vocals were scrapped in favor of songs that featured the remaining members.
       
Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    For What It's Worth
Source:    LP: Retrospective (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Buffalo Springfield (revised version))
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 turning into a major hit, Atco Records quickly recalled the album and added the song to it (as the opening track). All subsequent pressings of the LP (and later the CD) contain For What It's Worth, making earlier copies of the album somewhat of a rarity and quite collectable.

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    Mr. Soul
Source:    CD: Retrospective (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again)
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Atco
Year:    1967
    Executives at Atco Records originally considered Neil Young's voice "too weird" to be recorded. As a result many of Young's early tunes (including the band's debut single Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing), were sung by Richie Furay. By the time the band's second album, Buffalo Springfield Again, was released, the band had enough clout to make sure Young was allowed to sing his own songs. In fact, the album starts with a Young vocal on the classic Mr. Soul.

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    On The Way Home
Source:    CD: Retrospective (originally released on LP: Last Time Around)
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Atco
Year:    1968
    Things fell apart for Buffalo Springfield following the drug bust and deportation of bassist Bruce Palmer in January of 1968. Neil Young stopped showing up for gigs, forcing Stephen Stills to carry all lead guitar duties for the band. By March, the band was defunct in everything but name. However, the group was still contractually obligated to provide Atco Records with one more album, so Richie Furay, along with replacement bassist Jim Messina, set about compiling a final Buffalo Springfield album from various studio tapes that the band members had made. None of these tapes featured the entire lineup of the band, although Neil Young's On The Way Home, which was chosen to open the album, came close, as it featured  Furay on lead vocals, Stills on guitar and backup vocals, and Palmer on bass as well as Young himself on lead guitar and backup vocals.

Artist:    Firesign Theatre
Title:    Coal
Source:    LP: Dear Friends
Writer(s):    Proctor/Bergman/Austin/Ossman
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1970
    From September of 1970 through February of 1971 the Firesign Theatre did a live one-hour radio show on Los Angeles station KPFK called Dear Friends. These shows were recorded and edited down for syndication across the country. Later, the comedy group compiled the best segments of the show such as Coal and issued them as a double LP called (naturally) Dear Friends.
       
Artist:    Pandamonium
Title:    No Presents For Me
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Ponton/Curtis
Label:    Rhino (original label: CBS)
Year:    1967
    Originally formed in 1964 as the Pandas, Pandamonium released three singles over a period of two years. The second of these was No Presents For Me, released in 1967. The song presents a libertarian message ("there ain't no such thing as a free lunch") against a psychedelic backdrop. The resulting song failed to chart, as did the band's previous single, a cover of Donovan's Season Of The Witch, and after a final failed single in 1968 Pandamonium decided to call it quits.

Artist:    Steven Cerio
Title:    Theme For Counting Events (remix of Overfed)
Source:    CD: The Magnificent Pigtail Shadow
Writer(s):    Cerio/Pier
Label:    Wowcool
Year:    2013
    Steven Cerio is a multimedia artist originally from Liverpool, NY, who is credited with setting the stage for the new-psychedelic revival in New York City. A graduate of Syracuse University, Cerio wrote and directed the indy film The Magnificent Pigtail Shadow in 2012. The following year a soundtrack album for the film, which is narrated by Kristin Hirsch of Throwing Muses. The opening track of The Magnificent Pigtail Shadow is a piece called Theme For Counting Events, which is actually a remix of an earlier work called Overfed.
       
Artist:    Jigsaw Seen
Title:    We Women
Source:    CD: Old Man Reverb
Writer(s):    Dennis Davison
Label:    Vibro-Phonic
Year:    2014
    The Jigsaw Seen is an indy band based in Los Angeles that has been around since the 1980s. Their latest album, Old Man Reverb, covers a lot of ground musically, and at least some of the tracks, such as We Women, are bitingly satirical. The album itself was recorded at the legendary Abbey Road studios in London.
       
Artist:    Byrds
Title:    It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
Source:    CD: Turn! Turn! Turn! (bonus track)
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1965
    In late June of 1965 the Byrds began work on their second album's worth of material. Having already had success with covers of Bob Dylan songs, they naturally decided to record a couple more in the hopes of getting a third single out that summer. Those two songs were The Times They Are A-Changin' (which would get re-recorded a couple months later) and It's All Over Now, Baby Blue, which remained unreleased for many years. Baby Blue, which features Roger McGuinn on lead vocals, is now available as a bonus track on the Turn! Turn! Turn! remastered CD.

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    Scarborough Fair/Canticle
Source:    LP: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1966
    After the reunion of Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel following the surprise success of an electrified remix of The Sound Of Silence, the duo quickly recorded an album to support the hit single. Sounds Of Silence was, for the most part, a reworking of material that Simon had recorded for 1965 UK LP the Paul Simon Songbook. The pressure for a new album thus (temporarily) relieved, the duo got to work on their first album of truly new material since their unsuccessful 1964 effort Wednesday Morning 3AM (which had in fact been re-released and was now doing well on the charts). In October the new album, Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, hit the stands. The title track was a new arrangement of an old English folk ballad, Scarborough Fair, combined with a reworking of a song from the Paul Simon Songbook, The Side Of A Hill, retitled Canticle. The two melodies and sets of lyrics are set in counterpoint to each other, creating one of the most sophisticated folk song arrangements ever recorded. After being featured in the film The Graduate, Scarborough Fair/Canticle was released as a single in early 1968, going on to become one of the duo's most instantly recognizable songs.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Ruby Tuesday
Source:    CD: Flowers (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Bakco (original label: London)
Year:    1967
    One of the most durable songs in the Rolling Stones catalog, Ruby Tuesday was originally intended to be the B side of their 1967 single Let's Spend The Night Together. Many stations, however, balked at the subject matter of the A side and began playing Ruby Tuesday instead, which is somewhat ironic considering the subject matter of the song (a groupie of the band's acquaintance).

Artist:    Lollipop Shoppe (aka The Weeds)
Title:    You Must Be A Witch
Source:    Mono LP: Pebbles Vol. 8 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Fred Cole
Label:    BFD (original label: Uni)
Year:    1968
    The Weeds were formed in Las Vegas in 1965 by vocalist Fred Cole, who at age 16 was already a recording studio veteran. They showed up at the Fillmore to open for the Yardbirds in 1966 only to find out that their manager had lied to them about being on the playbill (in fact Bill Graham had never even heard of them). Disenchanted with their management and fearing the Draft, the entire band decided to head for Canada, but ran out of gas in Portland, Oregon. They soon landed a regular gig at a club called the Folk Singer (where Cole met his future wife Toody) and after relocating to Southern California in 1968 attracted the attention of Seeds' manager Lord Tim, who got them a contract with MCA Records (now Universal). They recorded one album for MCA's Uni label (discovering after the fact that Lord Tim had changed their name to the Lollipop Shoppe) which included the single You Must Be A Witch. Fred Cole has since become an icon of indy rock, co-leading the band Dead Moon (with wife Toody) from 1987-2006. Fred and Toody currently co-lead the band Pierced Arrows.

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

Artist:    Melanie
Title:    What Have They Done To My Song Ma
Source:    LP: Candles In The Rain
Writer(s):    Melanie Safka
Label:    Buddah
Year:    1970
    Melanie Safka was born to Ukrainian and Italian parents in the Astoria nieghborhood of Queens, New York in the late 1940s. While still in high school she performed regularly at the Inkwell, a coffee house in West End, New Jersey. While attending college she began performing in various Greenwich Village folk clubs, signing with first Columbia and then Buddah and releasing her first LP, Born To Be, in 1968. Inspired by a successful performance at Woodstock, Melanie released her third LP, Candles In The Rain, in 1970. The title track was her first top 10 single in the US, with a cover of the Rolling Stones' Ruby Tuesday doing the same in the UK. One of Melanie's strengths as a singer/songwriter was the diversity of her material, as tunes like What Have They Done To My Song Ma (which sounds like it could be written much earlier in the century) demonstrate.
       
Artist:    Glass Prism
Title:    A Dream
Source:    LP: Poe Through A Glass Prism
Writer(s):    Poe/Varano
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1969
    The El Caminos were a successful cover band from eastern Pennsylvania that did well enough to record a few tracks at Bell Sound Studios in New York in the early to mid 1960s. They eventually signed with RCA Victor, changing their name to Glass Prism to better reflect their use of the poetry of Edgar Allen Poe set to music written by band members Tom Varano and Augie Christiano. The band itself was known for its vocal harmonies and for the organ work of Carl Syracuse. The final track on the album, A Dream, gives drummer Rick Richards a chance to shine and was probably the most commercial souding tune on the LP (although the opening line, "In visions of the dark night, I have dreamed of joy departed", probably shot down any chances of the song being played on top 40 radio.

Artist:    Action
Title:    A Saying For Today
Source:    German import CD: Mighty Baby
Writer(s):    Ian Whiteman
Label:    Big Beat
Year:    Recorded 1968, released 1993
    Formed in 1965, the Action was a North London band best known for their dead-on covers of then-current US R&B crossover hits. Producer George Martin signed the band to his own Air Productions, and the band issued five singles on the Parlophone label from 1965-67. The band, which by late 1966 was starting to sound more like a California band, was dropped by the label before releasing a sixth single, and went into hibernation for several months, adding a new member, keyboardist/flautist Ian Whiteman, and developing a more jazz-influenced improvisational style. The group, which at that point also included guitarists Bam King and Martin Stone, bassist Michael Evans and drummer Roger Powell, eventually resurfaced under a new name, Mighty Baby, releasing their first LP in 1969. The band had not been completely inactive in the intervening years, however. Shortly after Whiteman joined, the Action made several studio recordings that acquired legendary status over the years before finally being released on a mini-LP in 1985 with no documentation whatsoever. The recordings were finally reissued in the EU in 1993 as bonus tracks on the CD version of the Mighty Baby album.

Artist:    Moby Grape
Title:    Omaha
Source:    LP: Moby Grape
Writer(s):    Skip Spence
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    As an ill-advised promotional gimmick, Columbia Records released five separate singles concurrently with the first Moby Grape album. Of the five singles, only one, Omaha, actually charted, and it only got to the #86 spot. Meanwhile, the heavy promotion by the label led to Moby Grape getting the reputation of being over-hyped, much to the detriment of the band's career.

Artist:    Downliners Sect
Title:    Glendora
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Ray Stanley
Label:    Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1966
    Although they never had the massive success of the Rolling Stones, Kinks or Animals, the Downliners Sect had a solid run beginning in 1964, with enough staying power to cut three LPs and numerous singles over a period of years. One of their more notable tracks is their 1966 remake of a 1956 Perry Como hit, Glendora, about a department store mannequin. As interpreted by the Sect, the song takes on a cool macabre flavor.

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

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

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.