https://exchange.prx.org/p/626408
After spending the first twenty minutes of the show in the year 1970, we jump up a few years, ending in 1977.
Artist: Spirit
Title: Nature's Way
Source: CD: Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus)
Writer: Randy California
Label: Epic/Legacy
Year: 1970
Nature's Way is one of the best-known and best-loved songs in the Spirit catalog. Originally released on the 1970 LP Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus, the song was finally issued as a single in 1973, long after lead vocalist Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes had left Spirit to form Jo Jo Gunne.
Artist: Guess Who
Title: Bus Rider
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Kurt Winter
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1970
When Randy Bachman suddenly quit the band he had co-founded ten years before, the Guess Who frantically searched for a replacement guitarist. They ended up with two, Kurt Winter and Greg Leskiw. Both had been members of the Winnipeg-based Gettysburg Address, and Winter had recently formed a power trio named Brother that was considered to be Winnipeg's first supergroup. Winter brought a couple of Brother's songs along with him when he joined the Guess Who, one of which, Bus Rider, was issued as a B side in September of 1970 and included as the opening track on the band's Share The Land album the following month. The song also appeared on The Best Of The Guess Who, released in 1971.
Artist: Blues Image
Title: Fugue U/Parchman Farm/Wrath Of Daisey
Source: CD: Open
Writer(s): Blues Image/Allison
Label: Sundazed (original label: Atco)
Year: 1970
Despite drawing decent crowds in Florida (and, later, Los Angeles) and getting rave reviews from the rock press, as well as their fellow musicians, Blues Image was never able to sell a lot of albums. This is a shame, as almost all of their material was as good or better than anything else being recorded in 1969-70. A classic example is the medley of Fugue U (emulating J.S. Bach), a jazz-rock arrangement of Mose Allison's Parchman Farm and the latin-rock instrumental Wrath Of Daisey. Guitarist Mike Pinera went on to replace Eric Brann in Iron Butterfly the following year.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix/Band Of Gypsys
Title: Power Of Soul
Source: CD: South Saturn Delta
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: MCA
Year: Recorded 1970, released 1997
1969 was a strange year for Jimi Hendrix. For one thing, he did not release any new recordings that year, yet he remained the top money maker in rock music. One reason for the lack of new material was an ongoing dispute with Capitol Records over a contract he had signed as a backup musician in 1965. By the end of the year an agreement was reached for Hendrix to provide Capitol with one album's worth of new material. At this point Hendrix had not released any live albums, so it was decided to tape his New Year's performances at the Fillmore East with his new Band Of Gypsys (with drummer Buddy Miles and bassist Billy Cox), playing songs that had never been released in studio form. As it turns out, however, studio versions of many of the songs on that album do indeed exist, but were not issued until after Hendrix's death, when producer Alan Douglas put out a pair of LPs (Crash Landing and Midnight Lightning), that had some of the original drum and bass tracks (and even some guitar tracks) re-recorded by musicians that had never actually worked with Hendrix. One of those songs is Power Of Soul, which has finally been released in its original Band Of Gypsys studio version (recorded about a month after the group's live performance of the song) with background vocals provided by Cox and Miles.
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
Title: Carry On
Source: CD: Déjà Vu
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1970
Carry On, the opening track from the Crosby, Still, Nash & Young album Déjà Vu, is a Stephen Stills song that incorporates lyrics from an earlier piece, Questions, which appeared on the third Buffalo Springfield album, Last Time Around. The song was the fourth single released from Déjà Vu, but failed to make the top 40 (which only reinforces my belief that top 40 radio had outlived its usefulness by 1970).
Artist: Bruce Springsteen
Title: Wild Billy's Circus Story
Source: LP: The Wild, The Innocent And The E Street Shuffle
Writer(s): Bruce Springsteen
Label: Columbia
Year: 1973
Originally titled Circus Song, Wild Billy's Circus Story is the oldest song on Bruce Springsteen's second LP, The Wild, The Innocent And The E Street Shuffle. Written in mid-1972, the song was part of the E Street Band's stage repertoire through early 1973, when it was reworked to become the first song recorded for the LP in May. The original composition was basically a description of the everyday lives of circus people; for its recorded version passages were added about a clown running away from the circus and a young boy becoming enamored of, and eventually joining the circus itself.
Artist: Stealer's Wheel
Title: Star
Source: Stereo 45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s): Joe Egan
Label: A&M
Year: 1973
Formed in 1972 in Paisley, Scotland by Gerry Rafferty and Joe Egan, Stealer's Wheel scored a huge international hit with Stuck in the Middle With You that same year. Their followup album, 1973's Ferguslie Park, did not have any hits to match Stuck's success, although two of the songs from the album made the top 40 charts on both sides of the Atlantic. The second of these was Star, a Joe Egan composition that hit the top 30 in 1974. After the duo split Rafferty went on to international fame for his 1978 hit Baker Street.
Artist: Graham Nash
Title: Prison Song
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Graham Nash
Label: Atlantic
Year: 1973
Graham Nash's Prison Song is one of those songs that by all rights should have been a huge hit. It was by a name artist. It had a catchy opening harmonica riff and a haunting melody. I can only surmise that once again Bill Gavin (whose Gavin Report was considered by many in the industry to be the top 40 "bible") decided that the lyrics were too subversive for AM radio and had the song blacklisted, much as he had done with the Byrds Eight Miles High a few years earlier. Those lyrics center on a subject that is unfortunately still relevant today: the utter absurdity of drug laws and the disproportionate sentences for violation of those laws in various part of the United States.
Artist: Barclay James Harvest
Title: The Great 1974 Mining Disaster
Source: British import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Everyone Is Everybody Else)
Writer(s): John Lees
Label: Polydor
Year: 1974
Although they were never as big as other prog-rock bands such as Yes or Emerson, Lake And Palmer, England's Barclay James Harvest nonetheless had a long and productive career. Their 1974 album Everyone Is Everybody Else is generally considered to be their artistic and commercial peak, and was especially successful in continental Europe, as were the band's subsequent LPs. One of the more notable tracks on Everyone Is Everybody Else is The Great 1974 Mining Disaster, a tribute to the Bee Gees first international hit single, New York Mining Disaster 1941, with a healthy number of David Bowie references thrown in.
Artist: Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM)
Title: Out Of The Roundabout
Source: LP: Chocolate Kings
Writer(s): PFM
Label: Asylum
Year: 1975
Premiata Forneria Marconi (English translation: The Award Winning Marconi Bakery) was the first Italian rock band to place albums on the British and American charts. Part of the reason for this is the fact that, beginning in 1973, they began to reissue their original albums with new English lyrics overdubbed over the original Italian. This made their material more accessible to English-speaking audiences, although their appeal was mainly due to their complex progressive rock arrangements (and the fact that they were proficient enough on their instruments to play those arrangements). In 1975 they attempted to take it a step further by adding a new lead vocalist, Bernardo Lanzetti, and actually writing the original lyrics for their album Chocolate Kings in English (as opposed to using translations of the original Italian lyrics). In some cases, such as Out Of The Roundabout, the change was for the better, although overall the group was still perceived as being weak in the vocals department.
Artist: Joni Mitchell
Title: Coyote
Source: LP: Hejira
Writer(s): Joni Mitchell
Label: Asylum
Year: 1976
Joni Mitchell is not one to rest on past accomplishments. Having had her greatest commercial success with the albums Court And Spark and its followup, The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, Mitchell expressed a desire to work with jazz musicians who could play subtleties that the rock studio musicians she had previously worked with were not familiar with. One of the first jazz musicians she connected with musically was bassist Jaco Pastorius, who used a fretless bass that freed him up to play "notes between the notes". Mitchell and Pastorius are joined by percussionist Bobbye Hall on Coyote, the lead track from the 1976 album Hejira. The song, like almost Mitchell's compositions, is based on her own life experiences, in this particular case a one-night stand with a notorious womanizer. In addition to opening the album itself, Coyote was released as the lead single from Hejira, but did not chart at all in the US and peaked at #79 on the Canadian charts.
Artist: Genesis
Title: It's Yourself
Source: British import 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Collins/Rutherford/Banks/Hackett
Label: Charisma
Year: 1977
One of the rarest Genesis tracks, Its Yourself was originally slated to be included on the 1976 album A Trick Of The Tail, but time limitations forced the band to instead hold the song back and release it as the B side of Your Own Special Way the following year. That single was never released in the US, however, and the song has not been included on CD versions of any regular Genesis albums, even as a bonus track. Why that should be is a bit of a mystery to me, since It's Yourself is an outstanding track worthy of much greater exposure.
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