https://exchange.prx.org/p/545402
This week, rather than a battle of the bands we have a battle of mid-60s songwriting folk singers, one of which brings along a non-writing partner. Also on the bill, a set from the post-Van Morrison version of Them, an excerpt from the seldom heard mono version of The Who Sell Out and of course plenty of tasty singles, B sides and album tracks from the late 1960s, starting with a tune that spent four weeks in 1965 as the number one song in the nation.
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
Source: 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer: Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1965
Singles released in the UK in the 60s tended to stay on the racks much longer than their American counterparts. This is because singles were generally not duplicated on LPs like they were in the US. (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction was a good example. In the US, the song was added to the Out Of Our Heads album, which had a considerably different song lineup than the original UK version. In the UK and Europe the song was unavailable as an LP track until Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass) was released, yet the single remained available until at least late 1967, when I had the opportunity to listen to a copy of it in a German department store. All the store's singles were behind the counter, and you had to ask the store clerk to play the record for you, which you would then listen to on headphones. It was a cool way to check out a record before deciding whether to buy it (and not have to worry about accidentally damaging it).
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: Doors
Title: Strange Days
Source: CD: Strange Days
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra/Rhino
Year: 1967
One of the first rock albums to not picture the band members on the front cover was the Doors' second LP, Strange Days. Instead, the cover featured several circus performers doing various tricks on a city street, with the band's logo appearing on a poster on the wall of a building. The album itself contains some of the Doors' most memorable tracks, including the title song, which also appears on their greatest hits album despite never being released as a single.
Artist: Box Tops
Title: Cry Like A Baby
Source: CD: The Best Of 60s Supergroups (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Penn/Oldham
Label: Priority (original label: Mala)
Year: 1968
The Box Tops' second top 5 single, Cry Like A Baby, was the result of an all-night songwriting session. The band's producer, Dan Penn, was under pressure from the record company to come up with a follow up hit to The Letter, and asked his friend Spooner Oldham for help writing a song. The session, though long, was unproductive, and the two decided to call it a night and have breakfast at a cafe across the street. During the course of the conversation, Oldham expressed his frustration, saying "I could just cry like a baby." Penn decided then and there that Cry Like A Baby would be the title of the song and by the time the left the restaurant they had the first verse written. When Box Tops vocalist Alex Chilton showed up later that morning the two songwriters played him a demo of the new tune that they had come up with and the rest is history.
Artist: Grateful Dead
Title: Dupree's Diamond Blues
Source: LP: Aoxomoxoa
Writer(s): Hunter/Garcia/Lesh
Label: Warner Brothers
Year: 1969
The third Grateful Dead LP, Aoxomoxoa, was one of the first albums to be recorded using state-of-the-art sixteen track equipment, and the band, in the words of guitarist Jerry Garcia, "tended to put too much on everything...A lot of the music was just lost in the mix, a lot of what was really there." Garcia and bassist Phil Lesh would return to the master tapes in 1971, remixing the entire album for the version that has appeared on vinyl and CD ever since then. In 2010, however, Warner Brothers and Rhino released a limited edition pressing of the original mix on vinyl as part of a five album box set and made a standalone version of the LP available a year later. I've also run across claims that the remixed version of Dupree's Diamond Blues uses a different lead vocal track than the one heard here, but have so far been unable to verify that for certain. All of the music on Aoxomoxoa, including Dupree's Diamond Blues (which was also released as a single) is credited to guitarist Jerry Garcia and bassist Phil Lesh, with lyrics by poet Robert Hunter.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: Wild Honey
Source: Mono LP: Wild Honey
Writer(s): Wilson/Love
Label: Capitol
Year: 1967
Wild Honey was the 13th Beach Boys album. Released in 1967, the album was met with indifference by both critics and the record buying public, resulting in it being the poorest-selling Beach Boys album up to that point in time. More recent reviews have put the album in a more positive light, with some critics finding its simplicity charming. The title track, featuring Carl Wilson on lead vocal, was recorded and mixed in a single day (with only a theramin overdub added the following day) at Brian Wilson's home studio and released as a single two months ahead of the album. The song made it into the top 40 on both sides of the Atlantic, peaking at #31 in the US and #29 in the UK.
Artist: Left Banke
Title: She May Call You Up Tonight
Source: LP: Walk Away Renee/Pretty Ballerina
Writer(s): Brown/Martin
Label: Smash/Sundazed
Year: 1967
Unlike their first two singles, Walk Away Renee and Pretty Ballerina, She May Call You Up Tonight failed to chart, possibly due to the release two months earlier of a song called Ivy Ivy, written by keyboardist Michael Brown and marketed as a Left Banke song. The song was in reality performed entirely by session musicians, including lead vocals by Bert Sommer, who would be one of the acoustic acts on the opening afternoon of the Woodstock festival a couple years later. The resulting fued between Brown and the rest of the band left a large number of radio stations gun shy when came to any record with the name Left Banke on the label, and She May Call You Up Tonight tanked, despite being a fine tune in its own right.
Artist: Baker Knight
Title: Hallucinations
Source: Mono British import CD: My Mind Goes High (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Baker Knight
Label: Warner Strategic Marketing (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1967
Although he never became a major star, Baker Knight had a long and productive career, beginning in 1956, when he opened for the likes of Carl Perkins. Knight also achieved success as a songwriter, particularly with the song Lonesome Town, which was a hit for Ricky Nelson. By the mid-1960s Knight was working with producer Jimmy Bowen and writing songs for Dino, Desi and Billy as well as recording songs like Hallucinations with his own band, the Knightmares.
Artist: Donovan
Title: There Is A Mountain
Source: British import CD: Mellow Yellow (bonus track originally released in US as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Donovan Leitch
Label: EMI (original label: Epic)
Year: 1967
1967 was a year that saw Donovan continue to shed the "folk singer" image, forcing the media to look for a new term to describe someone like him. As you may have already guessed, that term was "singer-songwriter." On There Is A Mountain, a hit single from 1967, Donovan applies Eastern philosophy and tonality to pop music, with the result being one of those songs that sticks in your head for days.
Artist: Barbarians
Title: Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Morris/Morris
Label: Rhino (original label: Laurie)
Year: 1965
From Boston we have the Barbarians, best known for having a drummer named Victor "Moulty" Moulton, who wore a hook in place of his left hand (and was probably the inspiration for the hook-handed bass player in the cult film Wild In The Streets a few years later). In addition to Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl, which was their biggest hit, the Barbarians (or rather their record label) released an inspirational tune (inspirational in the 80s self-help sense, not the religious one) called Moulty that got some airplay in 1966 but later was revealed to have been the work of Bob Dylan's stage band, who would eventually be known as The Band, with only Moulty himself appearing on the record as lead vocalist.
Artist: Spencer Davis Group
Title: Gimme Some Lovin'
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Winwood/Winwood/Davis
Label: United Artists
Year: 1966
By mid-1966 the Spencer Davis Group had already racked up an impressive number of British hit singles, but had yet to crack the US top 40. This changed when the band released Gimme Some Lovin', an original composition that had taken the band about an hour to develop in the studio. The single, released on Oct 28, went to the #2 spot on the British charts. Although producer Jimmy Miller knew he had a hit on his hands, he decided to do a complete remix of the song, including a brand new lead vocal track, added backup vocals and percussion and plenty of reverb, for the song's US release. His strategy was successful; Gimme Some Lovin', released in December of 1966, hit the US charts in early 1967, eventually reaching the #7 spot. The US remix has since become the standard version of the song, and has appeared on countless compilations over the years.
Artist: Young Rascals
Title: Lonely Too Long
Source: Mono LP: Collections
Writer(s): Cavaliere/Brigati
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1967
There seems to be a bit of confusion over the official title of the Young Rascals' first single from their 1967 album Collections. The album label and cover clearly show it as Lonely Too Long, but the single itself, released the same day as the album (January 9) just as clearly shows it as I've Been Lonely Too Long. Some sources, apparently trying to come up with a compromise, list it as (I've Been) Lonely Too Long. Since I'm playing this directly from an original mono vinyl copy of Collections, I'm going with the title listed on the album itself.
Artist: Canned Heat
Title: Boogie Music
Source: LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released on LP: Living The Blues and as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): L.T.Tatman III
Label: United Artists (original label: Liberty)
Year: 1968
Canned Heat was formed in 1966 by a group of San Francisco Bay Area blues purists. Although a favorite on the rock scene, the band continued to remain true to the blues throughout its existence, even after relocating to the Laurel Canyon area near Los Angeles in 1968. The band's most popular single was Going Up the Country from the album Living the Blues. The B side of that single was another track from Living The Blues that actually had a longer running time on the single than on the album version. Although the single uses the same basic recording of Boogie Music as the album, it includes a short low-fidelity instrumental tacked onto the end of the song that sounds suspiciously like a 1920s recording of someone playing a melody similar to Going Up The Country on a fiddle. The only time this unique version of the song appeared in true stereo was on a 1969 United Artists compilation called Progressive Heavies that also featured tracks from Johnny Winter, Traffic, the Spencer Davis Group and others.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: The House At Pooniel Corners
Source: LP: Crown Of Creation
Writer(s): Kantner/Balin
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1968
Jefferson Airplane was just starting to get political when they released their Crown Of Creation album in September of 1968. Two months later they, at the suggestion of Swiss-French filmmaker Jean-Luc Goddard, set up their equipment on a Manhattan rooftop without getting a permit and performed their most political song from the album, The House At Pooniel Corners. It should be noted that this guerilla performance happened two months before the more famous Beatles rooftop performance in London that was included in the Let It Be movie. The Airplane filmed the gig, but it was not released for several years. The performance is available on a 2004 DVD called Fly Jefferson Airplane.
Artist: Mad River
Title: Orange Fire
Source: Mono British import CD: The Berkeley EPs (originally released in US on EP: Mad River)
Writer(s): Lawrence Hammond
Label: Big Beat (original label: Wee)
Year: 1967
Mad River was formed in 1965 in Yellow Spings, Ohio, as the Mad River Blues Band. The group (after several personnel changes) relocated to the Berkeley, California in spring of 1967, and soon began appearing at local clubs, often alongside Country Joe And The Fish. Around this time the band came into contact with Lonnie Hewitt, a jazz musician who had started his own R&B-oriented label, Wee. After auditioning for Fantasy Records, the band decided instead to finance their own studio recordings, which were then issued as a three-song EP on Wee. From the start, Mad River's music was pretty far out there, even by Bay Area standards. Orange Fire, for instance, was an attempt by bandleader Lawrence Hammond to portray the horrors of war musically. Interestingly enough, all the tracks on the EP had been written and arranged before the band moved out to the West Coast. The group eventually signed with Capitol, releasing two decidedly non-commercial albums for the label before disbanding in 1969.
Artist: Great! Society
Title: Daydream Nightmare
Source: European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: How It Was)
Writer(s): David Miner
Label: Sony Music (original label: Columbia)
Year: Recorded 1966, released 1968
Before joining Jefferson Airplane, Grace Slick was already making a name for herself in the San Francisco area as a member of the Great! Society. She was not the only talented member of the band, however, as this recording of Daydream Nightmare, recorded in 1966 (probably at Marty Balin's Matrix club) demonstrates.
Artist: Crazy World Of Arthur Brown
Title: Spontaneous Apple Creation
Source: British import CD: Acid Daze (originally released on LP: The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown)
Writer(s): Brown/Crane
Label: Uncut (original US label: Atlantic)
Year: 1968
One of the most revered examples of British psychedelia is the 1968 album The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown. While side one was done as a concept album about Hell, side two was a mixture of original tunes and the most popular cover songs from the band's live repertoire. Among the originals on side two is Spontaneous Apple Creation, possibly the most avant-garde piece on the album. Once you hear it, you'll know exactly what I mean by that.
Artist: Bob Dylan
Title: Like A Rolling Stone
Source: CD: Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Highway 61 Revisited)
Writer: Bob Dylan
Label: Columbia
Year: 1965
Bob Dylan incurred the wrath of folk purists when he decided to use electric instruments for his 1965 LP Highway 61 Revisited. The opening track on the album is the six-minute Like A Rolling Stone, a song that was also selected to be the first single released from the new album. After the single was pressed, the shirts at Columbia Records decided to cancel the release due to its length. An acetate copy of the record, however, made it to a local New York club, where, by audience request, the record was played over and over until it was worn out (acetate copies not being as durable as their vinyl counterparts). When Columbia started getting calls from local radio stations demanding copies of the song the next morning they decided to release the single after all. Like A Rolling Stone ended up going all the way to the number two spot on the US charts, doing quite well in several other countries as well.
Artist: Simon And Garfunkel
Title: Patterns
Source: LP: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Sundazed/Columbia
Year: 1966
Although it was the third Simon And Garfunkel album, 1966s' Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme was actually the first to contain songs written following the duo's shift from pure folk music to a more electric sound. The album was more adventurous overall, containing such sonic experiments as Silent Night juxtaposed with the 7 O'Clock News and Patterns, which opens with a guitar string being detuned (or maybe tuned) and features an African beat throughout. Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme is now generally regarded as Simon's first true classic album.
Artist: Bob Dylan
Title: Pledging My Time
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Bob Dylan
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
The B side of the first single from Bob Dylan's Blonde On Blonde album was Pledging My Time, a blues tune that features Robbie Robertson (who had been touring with Dylan) on guitar. The song was one of three tracks recorded in four takes in Nashville on March 8th of 1966. The single version of the song heard here fades after only two minutes (the album version being considerably longer).
Artist: Simon And Garfunkel
Title: A Poem On The Underground Wall
Source: LP: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Sundazed/Columbia
Year: 1966
The influence of Paul Simon's time spent in London is in evidence in the title A Poem On The Underground Wall (the American translation would be A Poem On The Subway Wall). The song itself tells the story of a would-be poet waiting his chance to use a colored crayon to write a four letter word on an advertising poster, which he does before running off into the darkness.
Artist: Bob Dylan
Title: Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Bob Dylan
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
Some of the best rock and roll songs of 1966 were banned on a number of stations for being about either sex or drugs. Most artists that recorded those songs claimed they were about something else altogether. In the case of Bob Dylan's Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35, "stoned" refers to a rather unpleasant form of execution (at least according to Dylan). On the other hand, Dylan himself was reportedly quite stoned while recording the song, having passed a few doobies around before starting the tape rolling. Sometimes I think ambiguities like this are why English has become the dominant language of commerce on the planet.
Artist: Simon and Garfunkel
Title: A Hazy Shade Of Winter
Source: CD: Collected Works (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Bookends)
Writer: Paul Simon
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966 (first stereo release: 1968)
Originally released as a single in late 1966, A Hazy Shade Of Winter was one of several songs slated to be used in the film The Graduate. The only one of these actually used was Mrs. Robinson. The remaining songs eventually made up side two of the 1968 album Bookends, although several of them were also released as singles throughout 1967. A Hazy Shade Of Winter, being the first of these singles (and the only one released in 1966), was also the highest charting, peaking at # 13 just as the weather was turning cold in most of the country.
Artist: Who
Title: I Can't Reach You/Medac (aka Spotted Henry)/Relax
Source: Mono CD: The Who Sell Out
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: UMC/Polydor
Year: 1967
One day during my freshman year of high school my friend Bill invited a bunch of us over to his place to listen to the new console stereo his family had bought recently. Like most console stereos, this one had a wooden top that could be lifted up to operate the turntable and radio, then closed to make it look more like a piece of furniture. When we arrived there was already music playing on the stereo, and Bill soon had us convinced that this new stereo was somehow picking up the British pirate radio station Radio London. This was pretty amazing since we were in Mainz, Germany, several hundred miles from England or its coastal waters that Radio London broadcast from. Even more amazing was the fact that the broadcast itself seemed to be in stereo, and Radio London was an AM station. Yet there it was, coming in more clearly than the much closer Radio Luxembourg, the powerhouse station that we listened to every evening, when they broadcast in a British top 40 format. Although a couple of us were a bit suspicious about what was going on, even we skeptics were convinced when we heard jingles, stingers, and even commercials for stuff like the Charles Atlas bodybuilding course and Medac acne cream interspersed with songs we had never heard, like I Can't Reach You and Relax. Well, as it turned out, we were indeed being hoaxed by Bill and his older brother, who had put on his brand new copy of The Who Sell Out when he saw us approaching the apartment building they lived in. I eventually picked up a copy of the LP for myself, and still consider it my favorite Who album.
Artist: Them
Title: Time Out For Time In
Source: British import CD: Time Out! Time In For Them
Writer(s): Lane/Pulley
Label: Rev-Ola (original US label:Tower)
Year: 1968
After Van Morrison left Them to embark on a successful solo career, the rest of the band continued to make records. The first effort was an offshoot group made up of former members of the band (who had left while Morrison was still fronting the group) calling themselves the Belfast Gypsys (they had actually called themselves Them until Morrison sued them over it) released one LP in 1967. The current band, meanwhile, had returned to their native Ireland and recruited Kenny McDowell as their new lead vocalist. They soon relocated to the US, recording two LPs for Tower Records in 1968. The second of these was a collaborative effort between Them and the songwriting team of Tom Pulley and Vivian Lane. The opening track of the LP, Time Out For Time In, is a good example of the direction the band was moving in at that time.
Artist: Them
Title: Square Room
Source: Mono LP: Now And Them
Writer(s): Them
Label: Tower
Year: 1968
The first album Them recorded after relocating to the US was called Now and Them. Recorded in late 1967, the LP was released in January of '68. The standout track of the album is the nearly ten minute Square Room, an acid rock piece that showcases the work of guitarist Jim Armstrong. An edit of the track had already appeared as the B side of a single before the album was released.
Artist: Them
Title: But It's Alright
Source: Mono British import CD: Time Out! Time In! For Them (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Jackson/Tubbs
Label: Rev-Ola (original US label: Tower)
Year: 1968
Following the departure of original founding member and front man Van Morrison, the remaining members of Them, with new vocalist Kenny McDowell, decided to relocate to the US and make a go of it there. Unfortunately, rather than to forge a whole new identity of their own, they chose to remain Them, which, as it turned out, was actually more of a hindrance than a help when it came to establishing a consistent sound. Their first LP, Now And Them, while containing some good music, reflects this lack of direction. Before embarking on a second LP the group cut a cover of JJ Jackson's R&B hit But It's Alright, mostly to satisfy their label's demand for a new single. Them's version of the tune used a similar arrangement to Jackson's original, but with fuzz guitar and a more snarling vocal track. Although the record was not a hit, it did give an indication of where the band was headed as they began work on their next studio album, Time Out! Time In For Them.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Eight Miles High
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Fifth Dimension)
Writer(s): Clark/McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1966
Gene Clark's final contribution to the Byrds was his collaboration with David Crosby and Roger McGuinn, Eight Miles High. Despite a newsletter from the influential Gavin Report advising stations not to play this "drug song", Eight Miles High managed to hit the top 20 in 1966. The band members themselves claimed that Eight Miles High was not a drug song at all, but was instead referring to the experience of travelling by air. In fact, it was Gene Clark's fear of flying, especially over an ocean, that in part led to his leaving the Byrds.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Can You See Me
Source: LP: Historic Performances Recorded at the Monterey International Pop Festival
Writer: Jimi Hendrix
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
The first great rock festival was held in Monterey, California, in June of 1967. Headlined by the biggest names in the folk-rock world (the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, the Mamas and the Papas, Simon & Garfunkel), the festival also served to showcase the talent coming out of the nearby San Francisco Bay area and introduced an eager US audience to several up and coming international artists, such as Ravi Shankar, Hugh Masakela, the Who, and Eric Burdon's new Animals lineup. Two acts in particular stole the show: the soulful Otis Redding, who was just starting to cross over from a successful R&B career to the mainstream charts, and the Jimi Hendrix Experience, formed in England in late 1966 by a former member of the US Army and two British natives. The recordings sat on the shelf for three years and were finally released less than a month before Hendrix's untimely death in 1970. Among the songs the Experience performed at Monterey was a Hendrix composition called Can You See Me. The song had appeared on the band's first LP in the UK, but had been left off the US version of Are You Experienced. An early concert favorite, Can You See Me seems to have been permanently dropped from the band's setlist after the Monterey performance.
Artist: Blood, Sweat and Tears
Title: House In The Country
Source: LP: Child Is Father To The Man
Writer: Al Kooper
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
Al Kooper was, by 1968, one of the most respected musicians in New York, having played organ on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited album and then become a member of the seminal jam band the Blues Project. After leaving that group in 1967 he made an appearance at the Monterey International Pop Festival with a pickup band. Later that same year he formed a new band called Blood, Sweat And Tears that included a horn section as part of the band itself. Kooper wrote most of the band's original material for their first album, including House In The Country. Shortly after Child Is Father To The Man was released, Kooper left the group to become a staff producer at Columbia Records. While working in that capacity he came up with the surprise hit album of 1968: the classic Super Session album with Michael Bloomfield and Stephen Stills. Kooper remained active as a producer, guitarist and keyboardist for the remainder of the century, working with an array of talent, including B.B. King, the Rolling Stones, Rita Coolidge and the Who. After moving to Atlanta in 1972 he discovered a local band named Lynyrd Skynyrd and produced their first three albums, as well as the Tubes' debut LP in 1975. Al Kooper has been officially retired since 2001, although he still plays weekend concerts in Boston with his bands the ReKooperators and the Funky Faculty.
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