https://exchange.prx.org/p/642081
We have two long sets this week. The first features several singles from the early '70s, including a couple of fairly obscure B sides, while the second is focused more on album tracks from 1968 and 1969, including the showcase track from the Electric Flag's 1968 LP A Long Time Comin'.
Artist: Lou Reed
Title: Rock 'n' Roll
Source: CD: Rock 'n' Roll Animal
Writer(s): Lou Reed
Label: RCA/BMG
Year: 1974
Lou Reed's career did not exactly take off following his departure from Velvet Underground in 1970. According to Paul Nelson of Rolling Stone magazine, Reed's first live appearance as a solo artist (with a pickup band) was, "tragic in every sense of the word". As a result, it came as a bit of a surprise when his appearance on December 21, 1973, at Howard Stein's Academy of Music in New York City, was a major success, thanks in large part to his new, well-rehearsed band consisting of Pentti Glan (drums), Prakash John (bass), Ray Colcord (keyboards), and Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter on guitars (all of which would eventually become the second incarnation of the Alice Cooper band). The performance was recorded and released on two albums, the first of which was Rock 'n' Roll Animal, released in 1973. The final track on the album is an extended version of the song Rock 'n' Roll that first appeared on the Velvet Underground's Loaded LP.
Artist: Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Title: Stonegates
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): C.F. Turner
Label: Mercury
Year: 1973
After touring relentlessly to promote their first album, Bachman-Turner Overdrive released their second LP in December of 1973. The album did well, and produced two hit singles, Let It Ride and Takin' Care Of Business, which went on to become the band's most popular song. The B side of Takin' Care Of Business was a tune called Stonegates, written and sung by bassist C.F. Turner. Stonegates is actually a better example of the band's sound at that point in time.
Artist: Steely Dan
Title: Reeling In The Years
Source: CD: Can't Buy A Thrill
Writer(s): Becker/Fagen
Label: MCA (original label: ABC)
Year: 1972
My first radio gig (sort of), was volunteering at the Voice Of Holloman, a closed-circuit station that served a handful of locations on Holloman AFB, about 10 miles from Alamogordo, NM. I had been taking broadcasting courses through a community college program that was taught by Sgt. Tim Daniels, who was the NCO in charge of the base Information Office, which ran the station, as well as a free weekly newspaper that was distributed on base. After completing the classes, Tim gave me the opportunity to do a daily two-hour show on the VOH, using records that had been sent to the station by various record labels. We got excellent singles service from some labels (Warner Brothers and Capitol in particular), but virtually nothing from others, such as ABC. This was unfortunate, as one of the best songs out at the time was Steely Dan's Reeling In The Years, from their 1972 Can't Buy A Thrill album. Tim, whose previous gig was with the Armed Forces Vietnam Network, was a big rock fan, however, and went out and bought his own copy of the album, making a copy of Reeling In The Years on reel to reel tape, which we then played extensively until the song had run its course on the charts. Thus the Voice Of Holloman, with its audience consisting mostly of guys working out at the base gym, was playing the longer album version of a song that was also getting airplay on Alamogordo's daytime-only top 40 AM station, KINN, in its edited single form. It was just about the nearest the Voice Of Holloman ever got to being an underground rock station (although I did manage to sneak in some Procol Harum, Jethro Tull and Deep Purple from time to time from the aformentioned Warner Brothers promos).
Artist: Climax Blues Band
Title: Reap What I've Sowed
Source: 45 RPM promo
Writer(s): Climax Blues Band
Label: Sire
Year: 1970
The Climax Chicago Blues Band was a band steeped in confusion pretty much from the start. Formed in Stafford, England in 1967, the group originally consisted of vocalist/harmonica player Colin Cooper, guitarist/vocalist Pete Haycock , guitarist Derek Holt, bassist/keyboardist Richard Jones, drummer George Newsome, and keyboardist Arthur Wood. Originally part of the British blues-rock scene of the late 1960s, the band found itself continually adapting to a changing musical landscape throughout its existence, racking up a total of 17 albums over the years. After releasing two LPs on EMI's Parlophone label, the band switched over to EMI's progressive rock oriented label, Harvest, releasing their third album, A Lot Of Bottle, in 1970. By this time there was more than a little confusion over the band's name, which, on the British release of A Lot Of Bottle, was still the Climax Chicago Blues Band. In the US, however, the name of the album itself was The Climax Blues Band. To make things even more confusing, the band's next two studio albums were credited to the Climax Blues Band in North America, but appeared under the name Climax Chicago in the rest of the world. This confusion over the band's name may be part of the reason they were never a major success, although they did manage a couple hit singles over the years (Couldn't Get It Right in 1977 and I Love You in 1981). The band's first US single, 1971's Reap What I've Sowed, was only issued to radio stations, with the notation that it was from the "forthcoming" album, The Climax Blues Band, which had actually been released the previous year in the UK. As I said, steeped in confusion.
Artist: Neil Young/Graham Nash
Title: War Song
Source: Mono 45 RPM single (promo)
Writer: Neil Young
Label: Reprise
Year: 1972
Around the same time that Neil Young was working on his Harvest LP he recorded War Song with Graham Nash and the Stray Gators. It was never released on an LP, although it did appear on CD many years later on one of the various anthologies that have been issued over the decades since the song was originally released.
Artist: Uriah Heep
Title: Sunshine
Source: CD: Sweet Freedom (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Thain/Box
Label: Sequel (original US label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1973
Stealin' was the first single released from Sweet Freedom, the first Uriah Heep album to appear on the Warner Brothers label in the US. For the B side, the band chose to include Sunshine, a song recorded during the sessions for Sweet Freedom but not included on the album itself. As a result, the song soon became a hard to find collector's item, at least until the compact disc era, when it appeared in 1991 on a CD called Rarities From The Bronze Age.
Artist: Electric Flag
Title: Another Country
Source: LP: A Long Time Comin'
Writer(s): Polte/Bloomfield
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
In 1967, after leaving the Butterfield Blue Band, guitarist Michael Bloomfield decided to form what he called "An American Music Band." The band would incorporate all of Bloomfield's favorite musical genres, including jazz, rock, soul, and of course blues. Like his friend Al Kooper, Bloomfield wanted to work in a horn section as well. The result was the Electric Flag. After one soundtrack album for a Peter Fonda cult film that was mostly a Bloomfield solo effort (although credited to the band), the Electric Flag made its official debut with the 1968 LP A Long Time Comin'. Perhaps the track that came closest to incorporating all the elements that Bloomfield wanted into a single piece was Another Country, which, along with a short Bloomfield instrumental that served as a coda, takes up the last nine and a half minutes of A Long Time Comin'. Bloomfield would leave the group following the release of the LP, although the remaining members, including Barry Goldberg, Nick Gravenites and Buddy Miles, would record a follow-up without him.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Sweet Dream
Source: CD: Stand Up (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1969
Jethro Tull released several singles from 1968 through 1970 that were not originally available on any LPs. Among the best of these was Sweet Dream, a tune that made the top 10 in the UK and top 20 in Ireland and Germany but failed to make the charts in North America. The song was included on the 1972 double LP Living In The Past, and is currently available as a bonus track on the Stand Up CD.
Artist: Savoy Brown
Title: Stay With Me Baby
Source: LP: Getting To The Point
Writer(s): Youlden/Simmonds
Label: Parrot
Year: 1968
Savoy Brown's second LP, Getting To The Point, was the first to feature lead vocalist Chris Youlden. It was also the first Savoy Brown album to have more original material than cover songs on it. These new originals included Stay With Me Baby, written by Youlden, with help from bandleader/guitarist Kim Simmonds. Youlden would be gone by 1970, one of many to leave Savoy Brown over the years. In fact, Simmonds is the only member to appear on every Savoy Brown album.
Artist: James Gang
Title: Funk # 48
Source: CD: Yer Album
Writer: Walsh/Fox/Kriss
Label: MCA (original label: Bluesway)
Year: 1969
Cleveland's James Gang was one of the original power trios of the seventies. Although generally known as the starting place of guitarist/vocalist Joe Walsh, the band was actually led by Jim Fox, one of the most underrated drummers in the history of rock. Fox, who was the only member to stay with the group through its many personnel changes over the years, shares lead vocals with Walsh on Funk # 48 from the band's debut album on ABC's Bluesway label (they moved over to the parent label for subsequent releases). Yer Album was in fact the only rock LP ever issued on the Bluesway label.
Artist: Spirit
Title: Prelude-Nothing To Hide
Source: CD: Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus
Writer(s): Randy California
Label: Epic/Legacy
Year: 1970
Spirit's first few albums had generated good reviews but poor sales. Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus was considered at the time to be their last chance to reach a larger audience. The pseudo-polygamous lyrics of the album's opening track, Prelude-Nothing To Hide, are actually about the band members' commitment to their music, a commitment that is apparent throughout this classic album. Unfortunately even that level of commitment did not translate to commercial success, leading vocalist Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes to split from Spirit to form Jo Jo Gunne soon thereafter.
Artist: Ringo Starr
Title: Early 1970
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Richard Starkey
Label: Apple
Year: 1971
The first gold record by an ex-Beatle did not come from John Lennon or Paul McCartney, as one would expect. Rather it was drummer Ringo Starr, who topped the charts in 1971 with It Don't Come Easy (co-written by an uncredited George Harrison). The B side of that single, Early 1970, is a thinly disguised message to Ringo's former bandmates describing where things stood just after the breakup of the Beatles became public knowledge and expressing the hope that they could still play together from time to time.
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