Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2043 (starts 10/19/20)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/343223-dc-2043 

    This week's show starts on an almost classical note, with a tune that features vocals accompanied by acoustic guitar and string quartet followed by some early Genesis, but soon finds itself gravitating to solid blues from Johnny Winter, Mother Earth and the Butterfield Blues Band. But rather than staying there, the show goes off in several different directions before finishing up with a song it's almost impossible not to sing along with from the Allman Brothers Band.

Artist:    Gentle Giant
Title:    Dog's Life
Source:    CD: Octopus
Writer(s):    Minnear/Shulman/Shulman/Shulman
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1972
    Although not a major commercial success, Gentle Giant's fourth album, Octopus, is generally considered to be the beginning of the band's peak period, and according to band member Ray Shulman, their best album overall. One of my favorite tracks on the album is Dog's Life, which is a somewhat whimsical look at a day in the life of man's best friend, the song's musical arrangement is unique in that it combines acoustic guitar, string quartet and vocals in a way seldom heard in rock music.

Artist:    Genesis
Title:    The Fountain Of Salmacis
Source:    Canadian import CD: Nursery Cryme
Writer(s):    Banks/Collins/Gabriel/Hackett/Rutherford
Label:    Atlantic (original label: Charisma)
Year:    1971
    Genesis' original guitarist, Anthony Phillips, left the group following their second LP, Trespass, in 1970. This almost caused the band to break up, but ultimately resulted in a revised lineup consisting of Peter Gabriel (vocals), Tony Banks (keyboards), and Mike Rutherford (bass), along with new members Steve Hackett (guitar) and Phil Collins (drums). Early in 1971 the five got to work on a new album, which eventually came to be called Nursery Cryme. Although the album was not a huge seller in their native England, it found enough of a following in European nations such as Belgium to allow the band to continue on. The Fountain Of Salmacis, the album's closing track, was inspired by the story of a water nymph who becomes a hermaphodite after bathing in cursed water (hey, blame the ancient Greeks for that story).

Artist:    Jan Hammer Group
Title:    Don't You Know
Source:    45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s):    Hammer/Reich
Label:    Nemperor
Year:    1977
    Jan Hammer is best known for composing the music used on the early 80s hit TV show, Miami Vice, including the show's main theme, which won him two Grammy awards in 1986. Born into a musical family (his mother was a popular singer in Czechoslovakia while his father, a doctor, worked his way through medical school playing vibraphone and bass guitar), Hammer first started playing piano at age four, and began to receive formal instruction on the instrument two years later. At age 14 he was performing throughout Eastern Europe (then part of the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact) with his own jazz trio, and after high school began attending the Prague Academy of Musical Arts. His formal education was cut short by the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, and Hammer soon emigrated to the US, where he attended Boston's Berklee School of Music. He continued to play jazz, touring with Sarah Vaughan and did some session work for Elvin Jones before moving to Manhattan, where he became an original member of the Mahavishnu Orchestra. He was one of the first jazz keyboardists to embrace synthesizer technology, and after doing more session work following the breakup of the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Hammer formed his own jazz-rock fusion group in 1976. Don't You Know, on which Hammer plays almost all of the instruments as well as backup vocals, features Fernando Saunders on lead vocals. The song was the only single taken from the Jan Hammer Group's second LP, Melodies, which was released in 1977. Hammer has continued to record over the years, both as a solo artist and as a collaborator with such notables as Neal Schon, Jeff Beck and Mick Jagger. His latest album, Seasons-Part 1, was released in 2018.

Artist:    Johnny Winter
Title:    Rock And Roll Hoochie Coo
Source:    European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Johnny Winter And)
Writer(s):    Rick Derringer
Label:    Sony Music (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1970
    Athough best known as a solo Rick Derringer hit, Rock And Roll Hoochie Coo was originally recorded in 1970 by Johnny Winter for the album Johnny Winter And when Derringer was a member of Winter's band (also known as Johnny Winter And at that time). As can be heard here the arrangement on the earlier version is nearly identical to the hit version, the main differences being Winter's lead vocals and the presence of two lead guitarists in the band.

Artist:    Mother Earth
Title:    My Love Will Never Die
Source:    LP: Living With The Animals
Writer(s):    Willie Dixon
Label:    Mercury
Year:    1968
    Mother Earth was formed in San Francisco in 1967 by recent arrivals Tracy Nelson (from Madison, Wisconsin) and Powell St. John (from Austin, Texas). In its original incarnation the lead vocals were split between Nelson and St. John, but after the band's second LP was released Nelson announced her intention to relocate the band to Nashville, a move that St. John refused to go along with. St. John's vocals can be heard on My Love Will Never Die, a Willie Dixon tune included on Mother Earth's debut LP, Living With The Animals.

Artist:    Butterfield Blues Band
Title:    Everything's Gonna Be Alright
Source:    CD: Woodstock 2
Writer(s):    Walter Jacobs
Label:    Atlantic (original label: Cotillion)
Year:    1969
    The Butterfield Blues Band had already gone through several personnel changes by the time they played the Woodstock festival in August of 1969. They had also evolved stylistically, adding a horn section and, for the most part, moving away from the long improvisational jams that had characterized their landmark 1966 LP East-West. Those elements were not entirely gone, however, as their nearly nine minute long performance of Walter Jacobs' Everything's Gonna Be Alright amply demontrates. In addition to a Butterfield harmonica solo to start things off, the piece showcases the talents of new guitarist Buzzy Feiten.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Roadhouse Blues
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Jim Morrison
Label:    Elektra
Year:    Recorded 1970, released 1978
    Roadhouse Blues is one of the most instantly recognizable songs in the entire Doors catalog. Indeed, most people can identify it from the first guitar riff, long before Jim Morrison's vocals come in. The original studio version of the song was released on the album Morrison Hotel in 1970, and was also issued as the B side of one of the band's lesser-known singles. That same year the Doors undertook what became known as their Roadhouse Blues tour; many of the performances from that tour were recorded, but not released at the time. In 1978 the three remaining members of the band, Robby Krieger, Ray Manzarek and John Densmore, decided to put music to some recordings of Morrison reciting his own poetry made before his death in 1971. The resulting album, An American Prayer, also included a live version of Roadhouse Blues made from two separate concert tapes from their 1970 tour. An edited version of the album track was released as a 1978 single as well.

Artist:    Curtis Mayfield
Title:    Freddie's Dead
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Curtis Mayfield
Label:    Curtom
Year:    1972
    The 1971 movie Shaft launched an entire genre of films sometimes known as "blacksploitation" movies. One of the most successful of these was the 1972 film Super Fly. The soundtrack music for Super Fly was provided by former Impressions frontman Curtis Mayfield, and released on his own Curtom label. The single Freddie's Dead, adding vocals to the film's instrumental theme, was released ahead of the film and went into the top 5 on both the Hot 100 and Billboard R&B charts. It was also nominated for a Grammy award, but lost out to the Norman Whitfield/Barrett Strong piece Papa Was A Rolling Stone, sung by the Temptations.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Naked Eye
Source:    British import CD (Spirit Of Joy) (originally released on LP: Odds And Sods)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Polydor (original US label: Decca)
Year:    1974
    While touring to promote the Tommy album, the Who began developing several new songs as part of their live act. Many of these appeared, at least in part, on the Live At Leeds album in 1970. One of those songs, Naked Eye, was partially recorded in the studio around the same time, but remained unfinished when the 1971 album Who's Next was released. Over the next couple of years several bootlegs of the Who's live performances were in circulation, prompting bassist John Entwhistle to compile a new album of outtakes and unreleased tracks in 1974. The album Odds And Sods, included the completed version of Naked Eye.

Artist:     Neil Young
Title:     Heart Of Gold
Source:     CD: Decade (originally released on LP: Harvest)
Writer:     Neil Young
Label:     Reprise
Year:     1972
     In the liner notes of his 1977 compilation album Decade, Neil Young had this to say about his hit single Heart Of Gold from the 1972 LP Harvest: "This song put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore so I headed for the ditch. A rougher ride but I saw more interesting people there." As a longtime resident of the ditch myself, I say thankya, Neil.

Artist:    Ten Years After
Title:    Gonna Run
Source:    CD: Watt
Writer(s):    Alvin Lee
Label:    Chrysalis (original label: Deram)
Year:    1970
    The fifth Ten Years After album, Watt, was somewhat unfairly criticized by the rock press for being "more of the same" from the British blues-rock band. When "the same" refers to an album of the calibur of Cricklewood Green, however, that is not necessarily a bad thing. Indeed, some tracks, such as Gonna Run, are at least the equal of any song on the previous album, and show a growing awareness on the part of the band of how to use the recording studio creatively.

Artist:    Allman Brothers Band
Title:    Revival
Source:    CD: Beginnings (originally released on LP: Idlewild South0
Writer(s):    Dicky Betts
Label:    Polydor (original label: Capricorn)
Year:    1970
    The second Allman Brothers band was the first to include songs written by guitarist Dicky Betts. One of those songs, Revival, was also issued as the first single from the album. Originally written as an instrumental, Revival is one of the most easily recognizable songs in the Allman Brothers' catalog, and was the band's first single to hit the Billboard Hot 100 chart, spending three weeks there.

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2042 (starts 10/12/20)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/342405-pe-2042

    This week the spotlight is constantly on the move, lingering momentarily on Arlo Guthrie, Brian Wilson, Peter Tork and the Rolling Stones, among others.

Artist:    Lovin' Spoonful
Title:    Do You Believe In Magic
Source:    CD: Battle Of The Bands (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Do You Believe In Magic)
Writer(s):    John Sebastian
Label:    Era (original label: Kama Sutra)
Year:    1965
    Do You Believe In Magic, the debut single by the Lovin' Spoonful, was instrumental in establishing not only the band itself, but the Kama Sutra label as well. Over the next couple of years, the Spoonful would crank out a string of hits, pretty much single-handedly keeping Kama Sutra in business. In 1967 the band's lead vocalist and primary songwriter John Sebastian departed the group for a solo career, and Kama Sutra itself soon morphed into a company called Buddah Records. Buddah (the misspelling being discovered too late to be fixed) soon came to dominate the "bubble gum" genre of top 40 music throughout 1968 and well into 1969, but eventually proved in its own way to be as much a one-trick pony as its predecessor.

Artist:    Simon And Garfunkel
Title:    Somewhere They Can't Find Me
Source:    LP: Sounds Of Silence
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    The first Simon And Garfunkel album, Wednesday Morning 3AM, was a fairly traditional type of folk LP. The album was originally released in late 1964, but due to lackluster sales was soon deleted from the Columbia catalog. In 1965 Paul Simon relocated to London, releasing a solo LP called the Paul Simon Songbook there. Before leaving the country, however, he and Art Garfunkel recorded two new songs in a more upbeat style that remained unreleased until 1966, when the duo reunited for a new album, Sounds of Silence. One of those two new songs was Somewhere They Can't Find Me. The song was, lyrically, a reworking of the title track of Wednesday Morning 3AM, but with entirely new music inspired by a Bert Jansch tune called Anji. As a tribute Simon included his own recording of Anji on the album immediately following Somewhere They Can't Find Me.

Artist:    West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title:    In The Arena
Source:    LP: Volume II
Writer(s):    Markley/Harris
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1967
    In The Arena is the quintessential West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band song: an ambitious piece that uses spoken word sections and opposing Apollonian and Dionysian musical themes (the latter featuring some of Ron Morgan's best guitar work) to imply that the things we watch on the nightly television newscast serve the same function in our culture that gladiator fights and the like served in ancient Roman times. The track opens side one of the second West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band album, appropriately called Volume II.

Artist:    Arlo Guthrie
Title:    Motorcycle Song (Significance Of The Pickle)
Source:    The Best Of Arlo Guthrie
Writer(s):    Arlo Guthrie
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1968
    To be honest, I am not sure when this particular recording was made. Arlo Guthrie originally recorded the Motorcycle Song for his 1967 debut album, Alice's Restaurant. The first live recording of the song was released the following year on the LP Arlo. However, his reference to having been performing the song for twelve years makes me think this is a mid-seventies performance. It's even possible that the greatest hits album, issued in 1977, was the first time this particular performance was released.

Artist:    Johnny Winter
Title:    I'm Yours And I'm Hers
Source:    Mono European import CD: Johnny Winter
Writer(s):    Johnny Winter
Label:    Repertoire (original US label: Columbia)
Year:    1969
    1969 was a big year for Johnny Winter. An article the previous year in Rolling Stone magazine referring to the "albino guitarist with long white hair causing a stir in the Southwest" had led to his album The Progressive Blues Experiment being picked up by Imperial Records for national distribution, which in turn led to Winters signing with Columbia, one of the world's largest and most influential record labels. His first album for Columbia, titled simply Johnny Winter, was a critical and commercial success, instantly putting him in the top tier of both blues and rock guitarists. The opening track of the LP was I'm Your And I'm Hers, a Johnny Winter original that utilized the talents of future Double Trouble bassist Tommy Shannon and drummer "Uncle" John Turner, both members of Johnny's band Winter at the time. This same lineup would record a second album for Columbia with Johnny's brother Edgar on keyboards and saxophone before being disbanded in favor of the larger group that would come to be known as Johnny Winter And. 

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Spoonful
Source:    LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released in UK on LP: Fresh Cream)
Writer(s):    Willie Dixon
Label:    Cotillion (original label: Reaction)
Year:    1966
    When the album Fresh Cream was released by Atco in the US it was missing one track that was on the original UK version of the album: the band's original studio version of Willie Dixon's Spoonful. A live version of Spoonful was included on the LP Wheels of Fire, but it wasn't until the 1970 soundtrack album for the movie Homer that the studio version was finally released in the US. Unfortunately the compilers of that album left out the last 15 seconds or so from the original recording.

Artist:    Blues Project
Title:    Parchman Farm
Source:    CD: The Blues Project Anthology
Writer(s):    Mose Allison
Label:    Polydor
Year:    Recorded 1965, released 1997
    Autumn of 1965 was a busy, and quite productive, time for the Greenwich Village based Blues Project. The band had added keyboardist Al Kooper in mid-October. At around that same time they signed with MGM's Verve Forecast label and got a steady gig at Howard Solomon's Cafe Au Go Go, on Bleeker Street in the Village. By early November they were playing to a full house every night, prompting Solomon to organize a Thanksgiving weekend bash to be called the Blues Bag. In addition to the Blues Project, the playbill included John Lee Hooker, Son House, Bukka White, Geoff Muldaur, Eric Anderson and several electric bands, including Buzzy Linhart's Seventh Sons. Solomon managed to get Verve Folkways to not only record the Blues Project's portion of the show, but to finance the entire weekend gig. The tracks recorded at the Blues Bag were to be used for the Blues Project's debut LP, but in January a huge problem caused everyone involved to rethink their plans. Lead vocalist Tommy Flanders had a girlfriend who convinced him that he was the band's big star and as such, should get special treatment from pretty much everyone. When the rest of the band took exception to this idea Flanders walked out, never to return. For obvious reasons, nobody wanted to release an album featuring a lead vocalist who was no longer a member of the band; the solution was to set up another live recording session, again at the Cafe Au Go Go. Ultimately, some of the tracks with Flanders were used on the album, with the remaining tracks remaining unreleased until 1997, when  the Blues Project Anthology was released. Among those unreleased tracks was the band's take on the old Mose Allison tune, Parchman Farm.

Artist:    Shadows Of Knight
Title:    Peepin' And Hidin'
Source:    LP: Back Door Men
Writer(s):    Jimmy Reed
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Dunwich)
Year:    1966
    When the Shadows Of Knight first entered the recording studio to work on their debut LP, Gloria, the band featured Warren Rogers on lead guitar and Joe Kelley on bass. It soon became evident, however, the Kelley had a lot more talent as an instrumentalist than anyone had realized, and by the time the album was completed Kelley and Rogers had traded instruments. The band's second LP, Back Door Men, saw Kelley taking even a bigger role on tracks like Jimmy Reed's Peepin' And Hidin', which features Kelley on lead vocals, as well as his usual lead guitar and blues harp.

Artist:    Wildflower
Title:    Wind Dream
Source:    Mono British import CD: With Love-A Pot Of Flowers (originally released in US as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Stephen Ehret
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Mainstream)
Year:    1966
    The Wildflower was one of four bands chosen to represent Mainstream Records on the 1967 compilation album With Love-A Pot Of Flowers. Unlike the other three bands, the Wildflower was part of the emerging San Francisco underground music scene, playing the same places as Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service and the Grateful Dead. Following an audition at Gene Estribou's loft studio in Haight-Ashbury, the Wildflower, along with Big Brother And The Holding Company, were signed by Mainstream's owner, Bob Shad, who quickly flew the band down to Los Angeles to cut a single, a song written by guitarist Stephen Ehret and poet Michael McClure called Baby Dear. The B side of that single was an Ehret composition called Wind Dream. Although the record did not sell well, the band did a tour of the East Coast, and even generated major label interest, but by the time they were able to free themselves of their Mainstream contract, the group had broken up.

Artist:    Blues Magoos
Title:    (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet
Source:    LP: Psychedelic Lollipop
Writer(s):    Esposito/Gilbert/Scala
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:    Turtles
Title:    Come Back
Source:    Mono CD: All The Singles (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Howard Kaylan
Label:    Manifesto (original label: White Whale)
Year:    1966
    Turtles vocalist Howard Kaylan had yet to turn 18 when the band was signed to the newly-formed White Whale record label. Despite his young age, he had already written several songs, three of which appeared on the group's debut LP, It Ain't Me Babe, with three more on the band's second album, Let It Be. Another early Kaylan song was Come Back, which appeared as the B side of the non-album single Grim Reaper Of Love. The song would not be available on an LP until after the Turtles had stopped recording, when White Whale included it on an album of B sides and outtakes called Wooden Head.

Artist:    Hollies
Title:    King Midas In Reverse
Source:    British import CD: Acid Daze (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Clarke/Hicks/Nash
Label:    Uncut (original label: Parlophone)
Year:    1967
    One of the last Hollies singles to include original member Graham Nash, King Midas In Reverse combines pop and psychedelia in a purely British way. The problem was that, with the exception of Nash, the Hollies had no desire to embrace psychedelia, and Nash soon found himself banding with David Crosby and Stephen Stills instead.

Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    The Shield
Source:    LP: Purple Passages (originally released on LP: The Book Of Taliesyn
Writer(s):    Blackmore/Evans/Lord
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Tetragrammaton)
Year:    1968
    The story of the original Deep Purple lineup is, in a way, two entirely different stories. At home the band was virtually ignored by audiences and press alike, and struggled to even get their records released. In the US, however, they were overnight sensations, thanks in large part to the success of the single Hush in the spring of 1968. A North American tour was set up, scheduled to begin in October of that year, but their American label, Tetragrammaton, wanted a second album from the band to be on the racks before the tour opened. This meant that the group was in the studio only two months after releasing Shades of Deep Purple, working on what would become The Book Of Taleisyn, despite the fact that Shades of Deep Purple had not even been released yet in the UK. The first song recorded for the new LP was The Shield, an imaginative piece incorporating unusual drum patterns from Ian Paice and appropriately mystical lyrics from Rod Evans, along with some nice guitar and organ work from Ritchie Blackmore and Jon Lord. Although The Book Of Taleisyn was not as big a seller in the US as Shades Of Deep Purple, the tour itself was a huge success. Still, the band still was not getting any respect at home. In fact, The Book Of Taleisyn did not even come out in the UK until mid-1969, by which time Evans and bassist Nicky Simper were no longer members of Deep Purple.

Artist:     Pleasure (featuring Billy Elder)
Title:     Poor Old Organ Grinder
Source:     CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Tandyn Almer
Label:     Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:     1969
     Tandyn Almer had one of the most innovative minds in late 60s L.A., both in and out of the recording studio (he was the inventor of the dual-chamber bong, for instance). Poor Old Organ Grinder was a song originally intended for Tommy Flanders, the original lead vocalist for the Blues Project. Flanders, however, was not able to hit the high notes. As Almers was about to cancel the entire project one of the recording engineers, Billy Elder, convinced Almer to let him take a shot at the song, and the result is the recording heard here.

Artist:    Beach Boys
Title:    This Whole World
Source:    LP: The Big Ball (also released on LP: Sunflower)
Writer(s):    Brian Wilson
Label:    Warner Brothers (Sunflower released on Reprise label)
Year:    1970
    In 1969 Warner Brothers Records released the first of a series of budget priced sampler albums they called "loss leaders". These double-LP sets were only available by mail order from the label itself. Each set cost two dollars, with no extra charge for shipping and handling. The ads for these albums appeared mainly on the inner sleeves of LPs released on the WB and Reprise labels, although there were a few ads in Rolling Stone magazine as well. Even the ad copy was unconventional; The Big Ball, released in early 1970, was described thusly: "Loss Leaders are compiled from new stuff, NOT old tracks dredged out of our Dead Dogs files. No selections are used on more than one album…Warner/Reprise is not 100% benevolent. It’s our fervent hope that–after hearing one of the Loss Leaders–you’ll be encouraged to pick up more of what you hear on these special albums, at regular retail prices. That’s where the profit lies. We think." In a few cases, tracks on albums like The Big Ball came out before the LPs they were lifted from. For example, This Whole World, a new Beach Boys song written by Brian Wilson, was credited in the liner notes as being from an album called Add Some Music. However, when the album itself (the first to be released on the band's own Brother Records label) came out later that year, the title had been changed to Sunflower.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    12-Bar Original
Source:    Anthology 2
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey
Label:    Capitol/Apple
Year:    Recorded 1965, released 1996
    Apparently nobody at EMI studios was familiar with the term "blues jam", so they called this Rubber Soul outtake 12-Bar Original. The Beatles actually recorded two takes of this; the second of these ran about six and a half minutes in length. That second take was edited down to about three minutes for inclusion on the second Anthology album in 1996.

Artist:    Brian Wilson
Title:    I'm In Great Shape/I Wanna Be Around/Workshop/Vega-Tables
Source:    CD: Brian Wilson Presents Smile
Writer(s):    Wilson/Parks/Mercer/Vimmerstedt
Label:    Nonesuch
Year:    2004
    One of the unique features of Brian Wilson's Smile is the inclusion of snippets of songs that were popular with a previous generation. One of these is I Wanna Be Around, a Johnny Mercer tune from the 1950s that was first recorded by Tony Bennett. In Brian Wilson Presents Smile, the tune is part of a medley that includes Wilson's own I'm In Great Shape and Workshop, which segues into Vega-Tables. I'm In Great Shape was originally one of the many short pieces that were slated to make up Smile's showpiece, the lengthy Heroes And Villains, but had eventually been designated as a separate piece. Workshop is basically a collage of sound effects created during the original Smile sessions that was re-recorded in stereo for the 2004 album. The original tapes were worked into the song Do It Again on the 1969 album 20/20. A stripped-down version of Vega-Tables appeared on the 1967 Smiley Smile, which was essentially a stripped-down version of Smile itself.

Artist:    Squires Of The Subterrain
Title:    Feel The Sun
Source:    CD: Feel The Sun
Writer(s):    Christopher Zajkowski
Label:    Rocket Racket
Year:    2008
    Based in Rochester, NY, the Squires Of The Subterrain are (is?) the work of Christopher Earl of Rochester, NY, who has been releasing independent recordings on his own Rocket Racket label for the better part of 20 years. The 2008 album Feel The Sun has elements of both Brian Wilson's Smile period and the Beatles at their most psychedelic. The title track of Feel The Sun leans more in the Wilson direction, with several seemingly unrelated segments put together in such a way as to create a coherent whole.

Artist:    Strawberry Zots
Title:    Cold
Source:    LP: Cars, Flowers, Telephones
Writer(s):    Mark Andrews
Label:    StreetSound
Year:    1989
    Albuquerque's Strawberry Zots were led by Mark Andrews, who either wrote or co-wrote all of the band's original material, including the song Cold. Their only LP, Cars, Flowers, Telephones, was released on vinyl locally on the StreetSound label and reissued on CD the following year by RCA records.

Artist:    Blossom Toes
Title:    When The Alarm Clock Rings
Source:    CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in UK on LP: We Are Ever So Clean)
Writer(s):    Jim Cregan
Label:    Rhino (original label: Marmalade)
Year:    1968
    Originally known as the Ingoes, Blossom Toes were discovered playing in Paris (where they had released an EP) by Giorgio Gomelsky, manager of the Yardbirds, who signed them to his own label, Marmalade, in 1967. Everyone on the British music scene was talking about (and listening to) the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, trying to figure out how to apply the album's advanced production techniques to their own material, including Gomelsky and Blossom Toes. The result was an album called We Are Ever So Clean, one of the first post-Sgt. Pepper albums to be released in the UK. When The Alarm Clock Rings shows just how strong the Sgt. Pepper's influence was in late 1967.

Artist:    Monkees
Title:    Pull/Long Title: Do I Have To Do This All Over Now
Source:    LP: Head
Writer(s):    Peter Tork
Label:    Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year:    1968
    Perhaps the greatest tragedy of the Monkees was the fact that Peter Tork was never taken seriously as a musician, despite being, according to Mike Nesmith, the best instrumentalist in the band, and for that matter a much better vocalist than anyone realized. Born Peter Halsten Thorkelson on Feb 13, 1942, Tork was part of New York's Greenwich Village folk music community, where he became friends with Stephen Stills. By 1966, both Stills and Tork had relocated to Los Angeles, and after Stills auditioned unsuccessfully for the Monkees, he recommended Tork, who got the part. It was a mixed blessing, however, as Tork, more than any of the others, wanted the Monkees to be a real band, but was constantly frustrated in his efforts to make it so. Tork was proficient on several instruments, including banjo, acoustic and electric bass, guitar and harpsichord. Tork had few opportunities to sing lead vocals with the Monkees, the most famous being the comical Your Auntie Grizelda on the album More Of The Monkees. He finally did get to show his true talent on Long Title: Do I Have To Do This All Over Now, a song that he wrote and sang lead on from the LP Head, the soundtrack album from the movie of the same name. The album itself, a major departure from the light pop the Monkees were known for, was a commercial failure, and Tork soon left the group for a solo career.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Share A Little Joke
Source:    CD: Crown Of Creation
Writer(s):    Marty Balin
Label:    BMG/RCA
Year:    1968
    Jeffeerson Airplane's fourth LP, Crown Of Creation, is generally considered to be the pinnacle of the group's psychedelic period. The album's songs deal with a variety of subjects, including politics, hippy sociology, and even a touch of science fiction. Founder Marty Balin, who had written much of the material on the band's first two albums, only contributed one solo effort to the album, the whimsical Share A Little Joke.

Artist:     Rolling Stones
Title:     Sing This All Together (See What Happens)
Source:     LP: Their Satanic Majesties Request
Writer:     Jagger/Richards
Label:     London
Year:     1967
     Following the critical and commercial success of the Beatles Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the Stones responded with their most psychedelic album ever, Their Satanic Majesties Request, with its own cover parodying the Sgt. Pepper cover. As an added touch, the Stones album featured cover art done on special holographic paper (the same material used for holo rings purchased from bubble gum machines) to simulate a 3D effect. The first side wrapped up with the nearly eight-minute Sing This All Together (See What Happens), a sort of psychedelic jam track featuring an unusual array of instruments and effects.

Artist:     Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:     Purple Haze
Source:     Dutch import LP: The Singles (originally released in the UK as a 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Jimi Hendrix
Label:     Polydor (original label:Track)
Year:     1967
     Purple Haze has one of the most convoluted release histories of any song ever recorded. Originally issued in the UK on the Track label and in Europe on the Polydor label as a single, it scored high on the British charts. When Reprise got the rights to release the first Hendrix album, Are You Experienced, in the US, 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. Purple Haze next appeared on the Smash Hits album, which was released pretty much everywhere. The song's next appearance was on a European double LP release on Polydor called The Singles, which collected all the tracks that had previously appeared on 7" vinyl anywhere, including posthumous releases. This was the way things stayed until the early 1990s, when MCA 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 the song has now been released by all three currently existing major record conglomerates.

Artist:    Lemon Drops
Title:    I Live In The Springtime
Source:    Mono LP: Pebbles Vol. 8 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
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 with drums, which is far superior to the drumless mix.

Artist:    Love
Title:    Alone Again Or
Source:    45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
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:    Vagrants
Title:    Respect
Source:    Mono LP: I Can't Make A Friend 1965-1968 (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Otis Redding
Label:    Light In The Attic (original label: Atco)
Year:    1967
    Sounding a lot like the Rascals, the Vagrants were a popular Long Island band led by singer Peter Sabatino and best remembered for being the group that had guitarist Leslie Weinstein in it. Weinstein would change his last name to West and record a solo album called Mountain before forming the band of the same name. This version of Respect is fairly faithful to the original Otis Redding version. Unfortunately for the Vagrants, Aretha Franklin would release her radically rearranged version of the song just a few weeks after the Vagrants, relegating their version of the tune (and the Vagrants themselves) to footnote status.
        
Artist:     Moby Grape
Title:     Ain't No Use
Source:     LP: Moby Grape
Writer:     Miller/Stevenson
Label:     Columbia
Year:     1967
    Moby Grape's 1967 debut LP is considered by many critics to be the very best album by any artist to come from the late-1960s San Francisco music scene. The thirteen songs on the LP covered a wide range of genres, including folk-rock, acid rock, blues-rock and even country-rock, and the album is considered by some to be a progenitor of such movements as glam and punk, among others. Unfortunately, someone at Columbia Records thought it would be a good idea to issue ten of those thirteen songs simultaneously as singles on June 6. Rather than to get into a discussion of the merits of such a move, I am this week presenting one of the three songs that were not picked for this bit of hyperbole. Ain't No Use, and one minute and thirty-seven seconds, is one of the shortest tracks on the album, surpassed only by Naked, If I Want To, which runs less than a minute. Ain't No Use is also an early example of country-rock, a genre that had not yet been defined when the album came out. Thus, Ain't No Use was perceived as something of a novelty song, and was thus ignored by virtually everyone.

Artist:    Traffic
Title:    (Roamin' Thro' The Gloamin' With) 40,000 Headmen
Source:    LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released as 45 RPM B side and on LP: Traffic)
Writer(s):    Capaldi/Winwood
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1968
    The second Traffic album saw the band taking in a broader set of influences, including traditional English folk music. (Roamin' Through The Gloamin' With) 40,000 Headmen, originally released as the B side to the Dave Mason tune No Face, No Name, No Number, combines those influences with the Steve Winwood brand of British R&B to create a timeless classic.

Artist:    Music Machine
Title:    Affirmative No
Source:    Mono CD: Beyond The Garage (originally released on LP: Bonniwell Music Machine)
Writer(s):    Sean Bonniwell
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year:    1968
    Unlike many of their fellow L.A. bands, who preferred to stay close to home, the Music Machine toured extensively after scoring their big national hit Talk Talk. While on the road the band worked on new material for a second album, booking studio time wherever they happened to be. One of those places was Muscle Shoals, Alabama, which had emerged as a rival to Memphis's Stax Studios as a hotbed of southern soul music. The Machine recorded two tracks there in early 1967, including Affirmative No, a song that manages to have a southern soul vibe without sacrificing any of the Music Machine's trademark garage/punk sound. Although the original group disbanded shortly after the songs were recorded, both tunes were included on the 1968 LP Bonniwell Music Machine, joining a couple of previously released Original Sound singles and several tracks recorded later in the year by a new Music Machine lineup.

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2042 (starts 10/12/20)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/342404-dc-2041

 
    We start this week in 1969, with tunes from Crosby, Stills and Nash, Jethro Tull, Janis Joplin and King Crimson and the begin slowly working our way up to the mid-1970s. As a bonus, we have a hint of what we can expect in just a couple weeks from Steeleye Span.

Artist:    Crosby, Stills and Nash
Title:    Suite: Judy Blue Eyes
Source:    LP: Crosby, Stills and Nash
Writer:    Stephen Stills
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1969
    After the demise of Buffalo Springfield, Stephen Stills headed for New York, where he worked with Al Kooper on the Super Session album and recorded several demo tapes of his own, including a new song called Suite: Judy Blue Eyes (reportedly written for his then-girlfriend Judy Collins). After his stint in New York he returned to California, where he started hanging out in the Laurel Canyon home of David Crosby, who had been fired from the Byrds in 1967. Crosby's house at that time was generally filled with a variety of people coming and going, and Crosby and Stills soon found themselves doing improvised harmonies on each other's material in front of a friendly, if somewhat stoned, audience. It was not long before they invited Graham Nash, whom they heard had been having problems of his own with his bandmates in the Hollies, to come join them in Laurel Canyon. The three soon began recording together, and in 1969 released the album Crosby, Stills and Nash. Suite: Judy Blue Eyes was chosen as the opening track for the new album and was later released (in severely edited form) as a single.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    We Used To Know
Source:    CD: Stand Up
Writer(s):    Ian Anderson
Label:    Chrysalis/Capitol (original US label: Reprise)
Year:    1969
    The first of many personnel changes for Jethro Tull came with the departure of guitarist Mick Abrahams in late 1968. His replacement was Tony Iommi from the band Earth, who joined just in time to make an appearance miming the guitar parts to A Song For Jeffrey on the Rolling Stones' Rock And Roll Circus, a TV special slated for a December airing on British TV, but pulled from the schedule at the last minute by the Stones themselves, who were not satisfied with their own performances on the show. The following month Iommi went back to Earth (who eventually changed their name to Black Sabbath) and Jethro Tull found a new guitarist, Martin Barre, in time to begin work on their second LP, Stand Up. Barre's guitar work is featured prominently on several tracks on Stand Up, including We Used To Know, a song that starts quietly and slowly builds to a wah-wah pedal dominated instrumental finale.

Artist:    Janis Joplin
Title:    One Good Man
Source:    CD: I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama
Writer(s):    Janis Joplin
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1969
    Janis Joplin's first solo album, I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama, got a lukewarm reception, both from the rock press and from fans of the singer who had been listening to her since her days with Big Brother And The Holding Company. The main problem seems to be that, while musically more proficient than the members of Big Brother, Joplin's new group (sometimes called the Kozmic Blues Band) never seemed to gel as a group. The fact that all but two of the tracks on the LP were cover songs didn't help matters, either. The two Joplin originals, however, are among the album's best tracks. I suspect that a few more tracks like One Good Man (featuring some nice guitar work by Big Brother's Sam Andrew) would have helped the album immensely.

Artist:    King Crimson
Title:    I Talk To The Wind/Epitaph
Source:    CD: In The Court Of The Crimson King
Writer(s):    Fripp/McDonald/Lake/Giles/Sinfield
Label:    Discipline Mobile Global (original label: Atlantic)
Year:    1969
    During my years in Albuquerque, New Mexico I had a friend named Dave Meaden. It was Dave who first introduced me to King Crimson's first album, In The Court Of The Crimson King, featuring lyrics by poet Peter Sinfield. Dave was such a big fan of Sinfield's work that he had actually handwritten the entire lyrics to Epitaph on a flag that he had hanging in his living room. I usually don't pay all that much attention to lyrics, being more of an instrumentalist, but for this particular piece I have to make an exception. In fact, I'm posting the entire text of Epitaph right here:

The wall on which the prophets wrote is cracking at the seams.
 Upon the instruments of death the sunlight brightly gleams.
 When every man is torn apart with nightmares and with dreams,
 Will no one lay the laurel wreath as silence drowns the screams?
 Between the iron gates of fate, the seeds of time were sown,
 And watered by the deeds of those who know and who are known;
 Knowledge is a deadly friend when no-one sets the rules.
 The fate of all mankind, I see, is in the hands of fools.
 Confusion will be my epitaph,
 As I crawl a cracked and broken path.
 If we make it we can all sit back and laugh.
 But I fear tomorrow I'll be crying,
 Yes I fear tomorrow I'll be crying.

Epitaph is preceded on the album by a Greg Lake composition called I Talk To The Wind, with lyrics by Sinfield. The song is a quiet, reflective piece, highlighted by classically-oriented flute solos by Ian McDonald. The two tracks are cross-faded on the original LP, and really need to be heard as one continuous piece to be fully appreciated.

Artist:    Firesign Theatre
Title:    Mark Time!
Source:    LP: Dear Friends
Writer(s):    Proctor/Bergman/Austin/Ossman
Label:    Columbia
Year:    Originally broadcast: 1970, LP released 1972
    Dear Friends was the name of the Firesign Theatre's weekly live radio show that ran on Los Angeles station KPFK from September 16, 1970 through Feb 17. 1971. Later in 1971 the shows were edited into hour-long shows that were distributed to radio stations across the country. The group then compiled a two-LP collection of the show's best bits and released it in January of 1972 as (what else?) Dear Friends. Many of the bits are essentially improv pieces, but there were a few more heavily-rehearsed pieces included on the album as well. One of my own favorites is Mark Time, a parody of the kind of  action/adventure/science fiction radio serials that were a staple of network radio in the days before television.
    
Artist:    John Sebastian
Title:    Red-Eye Express
Source:    LP: The Big Ball (originally released on LP: John B. Sebastian)
Writer(s):    John Sebastian
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1970
    John Sebastian's first solo album is one of those cases where the story behind the album is more interesting than the album itself. Sebastian had been the lead vocalist and primary songwriter for the Lovin' Spoonful during their period of greatest success (1965-67), but had left the group in early 1968 to pursue a solo career. The band tried to carry on without him, but after a string of commercial failures disbanded in early 1969. Meanwhile, Sebastian had been putting together tracks like Red-Eye Express for his debut solo album with the help of many of his old friends from his pre-Spoonful days as a struggling folk singer in New York's Greenwich Village, including (among others) David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, several months before they began recording together as a group. By early 1969 the album was ready to be released, but a series of unexpected problems delayed the album for over a year. The most pertinent of these problems was the fact that MGM records felt that the Lovin' Spoonful still owed them one more album under their previous contract with Kama Sutra Records, which had been distributed by MGM. Since the Spoonful no longer existed, MGM wanted to release Sebastian's album in its place, despite the fact that Sebastian had left the band the previous year. Sebastian and his manager, Bob Cavallo, felt differently, and made a deal with producer Paul Rothchild to get the album released on the Reprise label. Reprise head Mo Ostin bought out Sebastian's Kama Sutra contract and prepared to release the album, John B. Sebastian, in spring of 1969. MGM fought the move, however, and the album's release was delayed until 1970, when the album actually appeared on both labels at the same time (albeit with different cover art). Eventually Reprise ended up with the exclusive rights to the album, and the MGM version was withdrawn. During all this legal wrangling Sebastian made an unscheduled appearance at Woodstock (he was there as an audience member, but got drafted to fill time on the second day of the festival following a major rainstorm that left the stage covered in water, making it impossible for electric instruments to be used until it could be cleaned up), which enhanced his reputation and generated interest in the upcoming album, which eventually peaked at the #20 spot on the Billboard album charts.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    Misty Mountain Hop
Source:    CD: Led Zeppelin IV
Writer(s):    Page/Plant/Jones
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1971
    Led Zeppelin's Misty Mountain Hop, which opens side two of their fourth LP (and was also issued as the B side of Rock 'N' Roll) is either about a mountain range in J.R.R. Tolkein's Middle Earth or a pro-marijuana demonstration in London's Hyde Park in 1968, at which several people were arrested for possession. Your choice.

Artist:     Jo Jo Gunne
Title:     Run Run Run
Source:     45 RPM single (stereo promo)
Writer:     Ferguson/Andes
Label:     Asylum
Year:     1972
     After Spirit called it quits following the disappointing sales of the Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus, lead vocalist Jay Ferguson and bassist Mark Andes hooked up with Andes's brother Matt and William "Curly" Smith to form Jo Jo Gunne. Their best known song was Run Run Run, which hit the British top 10 and the US top 30 in 1972, receiving considerable amount of airplay on progressive rock stations as well.

Artist:    Steely Dan
Title:    Razor Boy
Source:    LP: Countdown To Ecstasy
Writer(s):    Becker/Fagen
Label:    ABC
Year:    1973
    Countdown To Ecstasy is the second Steely Dan album and the first to feature Donald Fagen as the group's sole lead vocalist. It is also the first of a trilogy of albums by the band that expose the seamy underside of Southern California culture in the 1970s. Razor Boy, for instance, targets the twin vices of materialism and complacency, asking the question: "Will you still have a song to sing when the razor boy comes and takes your fancy things away?" The album was not initially a major commercial success, but proved durable enough to attain gold status over a period of years. 

Artist:    Black Sheep
Title:    Cruisin' (For Your Love)
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Grammatico/Turgon
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1974
    Before he shortened his stage name to Lou Gramm and became famous as Foreigner's front man, Louis Grammatico was a member of the Rochester, NY band Black Sheep, which released two LPs on the Capitol label in 1975. What a lot of his fans don't know, however, is that those two albums were not Black Sheep's only major label releases. In 1974, before signing to Capitol, Black Sheep released a single on the Chrysalis label. The B side of that single was Cruisin' (For Your Love), which was written by Graham and bassist Bruce Turgon, who would play on Gramm's solo albums in the late 1980s and eventually become a member of Foreigner itself in 1992.

Artist:    Steeleye Span
Title:    The Twelve Witches
Source:    LP: Rocket Cottage
Writer(s):    Trad. lyrics, music by Steeleye Span
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1976
    Between the released of All Around My Hat in 1975 and Rocket Cottage in 1976, something happened that would have a profound effect on Steeleye Span's career as a band. That something was punk rock, and its emergence immediately branded folk-rock bands like Steeleye Span and Fairport Convention (along with prog-rock bands like Yes and Emerson, Lake & Palmer) as dinosaurs in the eyes of British record buyers. The album failed to crack the British top 40 album charts, and resulted in two of the band's six members leaving after it was released. Despite all this, fans of Steeleye Span consider Rocket Cottage to be one of the band's finest efforts. Songs like The Twelve Witches, which combines traditional lyrics with new music written by the band, actually rock out harder than any of the group's previous work.

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2041 (starts 10/5/20)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/341431-pe-2041 

    The time has come to play the album version of Time Has Come Today in its entirety, something that hasn't been done on the show since 2017. We also have artists' sets from Love and the Rolling Stones, along with an Advanced Psych segments made entirely of songs that have never been heard on Stuck in the Psychedelic Era before.

Artist:    Gerry And The Pacemakers
Title:    It's Gonna Be Alright
Source:    LP: Ferry Across The Mersey
Writer(s):    Gerry Marsden
Label:    Laurie
Year:    1964
    The Beatles are, of course, the most popular band to emerge from the Liverpool music scene. But who was second? The answer is Gerry And The Pacemakers, who became the first (and for 20 years only) artist to score consecutive #1 hits on the British charts with their first three releases. Formed in 1959 by Gerry Marsdon, his brother Fred, Les Chadwick, and Arthur McMahon, the band was originally known as Gerry Marsdon and the Mars Bars, but had to change their name when the candy company objected. They were the second band to sign with Brian Epstein, and released their first single, How Do You Do It, in 1963. In 1964, Marsden began writing most of the band's material, including It's Gonna Be Alright, which was released in September of 1964 in the UK as a single and then as the title track of an EP around Christmastime. The song was released in the US the following June, becoming their seventh US top 40 hit.

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 studio musicians, with only Moulty himself appearing on the record.

Artist:    Clefs Of Lavender Hill
Title:    Stop-Get A Ticket
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Travis & Coventry Fairchild
Label:    Rhino (original label: Thames)
Year:    1966
    The Clefs Of Lavender Hill were a band from North Miami that featured not one, but two sets of siblings: the brother and sister team of Travis and Coventry Fairchild (both of which sang and played guitar) and the Moss brothers, Bill (bass) and Fred (drums). The first single from the band was a song called First Tell Me Why, but it was the B side of the record, a Beatlesque tune called Stop-Get A Ticket that became a hit on Miami radio stations. The song was picked up by Date Records and peaked nationally at # 80. Subsequent releases by the Clefs failed to crack the Hot 100 and the group (after several personnel changes) finally called it quits in 1968.

Artist:    Spencer Davis Group
Title:    I'm A Man
Source:    Mono British import CD: The Best Of The Spencer Davis Group (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Winwood/Miller
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1967
    The Spencer Davis Group, featuring Steve and Muff Winwood, was one of the UK's most successful white R&B bands of the sixties, cranking out a steady stream of hit singles. Two of them, the iconic Gimme Some Lovin' and I'm A Man, were also major hits in the US, the latter being the last song to feature the Winwood brothers. Muff Winwood became a successful record producer. The group itself continued on for several years, but were never able to duplicate their earlier successes. As for Steve Winwood, he quickly faded off into obscurity, never to be heard from again. Except as the leader of Traffic. And a member of Blind Faith. And Traffic again. And some critically-acclaimed collaborations in the early 1980s with Asian musicians. Oh yeah, and a few major solo hits (Back In The High Life, Roll With It...that kinda thing) in the mid-to-late 1980s. Other than that, nothing.

Artist:    Max Frost And The Troopers
Title:    Shape Of Things To Come
Source:    CD: Shape Of Things To Come (originally released on LP: Wild In The Streets soundtrack)
Writer(s):    Mann/Weil
Label:    Captain High (original label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    Max Frost was a politically savvy rock star who rode the youth movement all the way to the White House, first through getting the support of a hip young Senator, then getting the age requirements for holding high political office lowered to 21, and finally lowering the voting age to 14. Everyone over 30 was locked away in internment camps, similar to those used during WWII by various governments to hold those of questionable loyalty to the current regime. What? You don't remember any of that? You say it sounds like the plot of a cheapie late 60s teen exploitation flick? Right on all counts except for the "cheapie" part. Wild in the Streets starred Christopher Jones as the rock star, Hal Holbrook as the hip young senator, and a Poseidon Adventure-sized Shelly Winter as the rock star's interred mom. Richard Pryor, in his film debut, played the band's drummer/political activist Stanley X. The most prominent song from the film was Shape Of Things To Come, writen by the Brill Building husband and wife team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, who had written several hit songs over the years, including Kicks and Hungry for Paul Revere And The Raiders. Shape Of Things To Come ended up being a hit as well, leading to an entire album being released by the fictional Max Frost And The Troopers. Although who the musicians who actually played on the song is not known for sure, most people who know anything about it believe it to be the work of the 13th Power, who had recently signed with Tower Records, the label that issued both the movie soundtrack album and the Shape Of Things To Come LP.

Artist:    Love
Title:    The Daily Planet
Source:    CD: Forever Changes
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1967
    The closest Love ever got to a stable lineup was in early 1967, when the group consisted of multi-instrumentalist and band leader Arthur Lee, lead guitarist Johnny Echols, rhythm guitarist Bryan MacLean, bassist Ken Forssi and drummer Michael Stuart. This group, along with "Snoopy" Pfisterer on keyboards and Tjay Cantrelli on flute and saxophone, had completed the De Capo album in late 1966 and were firmly entrenched as the top-drawing band on the Sunset Strip. There were drawbacks, however. Then, as now, Los Angeles was the party capitol of the world, and the members of Love, as kings of the Strip, had easy access to every vice they could imagine. This became a serious problem when it was time to begin working on the band's third LP, Forever Changes. Both Lee and MacLean had new material ready to be recorded, but getting the other band members into the studio was proving to be impossible, so their producer took matters into his own hands and brought in some of L.A.'s top studio musicians to begin work on the album. The move turned out to be a wake up call for the rest of the band, who were able to get their act together in time to finish the album themselves. Lee and MacLean, however, chose to keep the two tracks that they had completed using studio musicians. One of those was a Lee composition, The Daily Planet. Ken Forssi later claimed that bassist Carol Kaye was having problems with the song and Forssi himself ended up playing on the track, but there is no way now to verify Forssi's claim.

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 a 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:    Love
Title:    The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This
Source:    CD: Forever Changes
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1967
    There is avant garde and there is avant garde. Whereas most of the groups that have the label applied to them (Velvet Underground, United States of America, Fifty Foot Hose) sometimes were about as pleasant to listen to a nails on a blackboard, Love's Arthur Lee took an entirely different approach. Even though tracks like The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This (from Forever Changes) are full of time, key and phrasing surprises throughout, he manages to make it all sound pretty on perhaps his most avant garde recording ever.

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:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Let's Spend The Night Together
Source:    CD: Flowers (originally released on LP: Between The Buttons)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1967
    The Rolling Stones second LP of 1967 was Flowers, one of a series of US-only albums made up of songs that had been released in various forms in the UK but not in the US. In the case of Flowers, though, there were a couple songs that had already been released in the US-but not in true stereo. One of those was Let's Spend The Night Together, a song intended to be the A side of a single, but that was soon banned on a majority of US radio stations because of its suggestive lyrics. Those stations instead flipped the record over and began playing the B side. That B side, a song called Ruby Tuesday, ended up in the top 5, while Let's Spend The Night Together barely cracked the top 40. The Stones did get to perform the tune on the Ed Sullivan Show, but only after promising to change the lyrics to "let's spend some time together." Later  the same year the Doors made a similar promise to the Sullivan show to modify the lyrics of Light My Fire, but when it came time to actually perform the song Jim Morrison defiantly sang the lyrics as written. The Doors were subsequently banned from making any more appearances on the Sullivan show.
 
 Artist:    Rolling Stones (also released as Bill Wyman)
Title:    In Another Land
Source:    CD: Their Satanic Majesties Request
Writer(s):    Bill Wyman
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1967
    In Another Land was the first Rolling Stones song written and sung by bassist Bill Wyman, and was even released in the US as a Wyman single. The song originally appeared on the Stones' most psychedelic album, Their Satanic Majesties Request, in late 1967.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    The Singer Not The Song
Source:    Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Abkco (original label: Decca)
Year:    1965
            Several Rolling Stones singles, especially in the early years, were issued with different B sides in the US than in their native England. Sometimes it was because of topical references that only made sense in one country (The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man, for instance). Other times it was because a song had already appeared in one country on an album, but not in the other one. Sometimes there didn't seem to be any apparent reason at all. Such is the case with Get Off My Cloud, a hit single in both countries. The US B side was a tune called I'm Free, while in the UK Decca issued The Singer Not The Song. Both tracks were from September 1965 sessions at RCA studios in Hollywood, making the choices even more of a mystery.
        
Artist:    Crow
Title:    Busy Day
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Larry Weigand
Label:    Amaret
Year:    1969
    Crow started off as a Minneapolis band called South 40, a name they used until they began releasing records nationally in 1969. Their first LP, Crow Music, was released in 1969 and did fairly well on the charts, thanks in large part to the success of the song Evil Woman (Don't Play Your Games With Me), which made the top 20. The follow-up single, Cottage Cheese, was released in advance of their second album, Crow By Crow, in 1970. As no other tracks from that LP were available for the B side, a tune from Crow Music, Busy Day, was included instead. The song was written by bassist Larry Weigand, who had been listed as co-writer on both A sides.

Artist:    Moby Grape
Title:    Murder In My Heart For The Judge
Source:    LP: Wow
Writer(s):     Don Stevenson
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1968
    Moby Grape was one of those bands that probably should have been more successful than they were, but were thrown off-track by a series of bad decisions by their own support personnel. First, Columbia damaged their reputation by simultaneously releasing five singles from their debut LP in 1967, leading to accusations that the band was nothing but hype. Then their producer, David Rubinson, decided to add horns and strings to many of the tracks on their second album, Wow, alienating much of the band's core audience in the process. Still, Wow did have its share of fine tunes, including drummer Don Stevenson's Murder In My Heart For The Judge, probably the most popular song on the album. The song proved popular enough to warrant cover versions by such diverse talents as Lee Michaels, Chrissy Hynde and Three Dog Night.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Can You See Me
Source:    British simulated stereo LP: Smash Hits (originally released in UK and Europe on LP: Are You Experienced)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Polydor (original British label: Track)
Year:    1967
    Can You See Me was originally slated to be released as the B side of the third Jimi Hendrix Experience single, The Wind Cries Mary, but instead ended up on the album Are You Experienced, released in early 1967. The album was the first LP ever issued on the Track label, with European copies appearing under the Polydor imprint. The LP was issued monoraully, with later stereo copies bearing the disclaimer "Enhanced for stereo from original mono recordings" on the album cover. Later that same year Reprise released their own US version of Are You Experienced, using true stereo mixes created by their own engineers from the original 4-track master tapes. Three songs from the original UK release, including Can You See Me, were left off the US version of the album to make room for the three British singles that were not on the album itself. Those songs were never mixed in true stereo, however, and when Track and Polydor compiled the 1968 album Smash Hits, the "Enhanced for stereo from original mono recordings" were used for all the songs on the LP.

Artist:     Troggs
Title:     Wild Thing
Source:     Simulated stereo LP: Golden Days Of British Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Chip Taylor
Label:     Sire (original label: Fontana)
Year:     1966
    I have a DVD copy of a music video (although back then they were called promotional films) for the Troggs' Wild Thing in which the members of the band are lip-synching the song as they walk through what looks like a train station while being mobbed by girls at every turn. Every time I watch it I imagine singer Reg Presley saying giggity-giggity as he bobs his head.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Eight Miles High (RCA Studios version)
Source:    45 RPM single (originally released on LP: Never Before)
Writer(s):    McGuinn/Crosby/Clark
Label:    Columbia/Sundazed (original label: Re-Flyte)
Year:    Recorded 1965, released 1987
    In December of 1965, while Turn! Turn! Turn! was the number one song in the nation, the Byrds booked time at RCA Studios in Los Angeles to record a pair of songs, Eight Miles High and Why, which were intended to the be the band's next single. Columbia Records, however, had a policy prohibiting the use of a rival's studios (especially RCA's) and insisted that the Byrds re-record both songs, which were then issued as a single and included on the album Fifth Dimension. Meanwhile, the original recorded version of Eight Miles High remained unreleased until 1987, when it was included on an album of early unreleased Byrds recordings on the Re-Flyte label called Never Before. Both David Crosby and Roger McGuinn have said that they actually prefer the earlier version to the well-known Columbia recording.   

Artist:    Monkees
Title:    For Pete's Sake
Source:    CD: Headquarters
Writer(s):    Tork/Richards
Label:    Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year:    1967
    It didn't come as a surprise to anyone who knew him that first member of the Monkees to depart the band was Peter Tork. Of all the members of the "pre-fab four" Tork was the most serious about making the group into a real band, and was the most frustrated when things didn't work out that way. A talented multi-instrumentalist, Tork had been a part of the Greenwich Village scene since the early 60s, where he became close friends with Stephen Stills. Both Tork and Stills had relocated to the west coast when Stills auditioned for the Monkees and was asked if he had a "better looking" musician friend that might be interested in the part. Although Tork was, by all accounts, the best guitarist in the Monkees, he found himself cast as the "lovable dummy" bass player on the TV show and had a difficult time being taken seriously as a musician because of that. During the brief period in 1967 when the members of the band did play their own instruments on their recordings, Tork could be heard on guitar, bass, banjo, harpsichord and other keyboard instruments. He also co-wrote For Pete's Sake, a song on the Headquarters album that became the closing theme for the TV show during its second and final season. Until his passing in February of 2019 Tork was involved with a variety of projects, including an occasional Monkees reunion.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Flying
Source:    British import 45 RPM EP: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year:    1967
    1967 was an odd year for the Beatles. They started it with one of their most successful double-sided singles, Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane, and followed it up with the iconic Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album. From there, they embarked on a new film project. Unlike their previous movies, the Magical Mystery Tour was not made to be shown in theaters. Rather, the film was aired as a television special shown exclusively in the UK. The airing of the film coincided with the release (in the UK and Europe) of a two-disc extended play 45 RPM set featuring the six songs from the special. In the US, however, where EPs were considered to be virtually extinct, the songs became one side of an album that collected all the non-LP single sides they had released that year on the other. Among the songs from the film is Flying, a rare instrumental track that was credited to the entire band.

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    I Want You
Source:    Mono LP: Blonde On Blonde
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    I Want You, Bob Dylan's first single of 1966, was released in advance of his Blonde On Blonde album and was immediately picked by the rock press to be a hit. It was.
 
Artist:    Stranglers
Title:    Don't Bring Harry
Source:    British import 33 1/3 RPM 7" EP
Writer(s):    The Stranglers
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1979
    Formed in the mid-1970s in Guildford, Surry, England, the Stranglers cited L.A. bands like the Doors and the Music Machine as early influences. They soon became associated with London's punk-rock scene, but were far more diverse in style than their contemporaries. This reputation for going "outside the box" gave them the freedom to record songs like Don't Bring Harry, a veiled reference to heroin use that was released on a 1979 EP. With relatively few personnel changes over the years, the Stranglers have continued to both perform and record new material, although the COVID-19 related death of founding keyboardist Dave Greenfield in May of 2020 has put the future of the band in doubt.

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    Tidal Wave
Source:    CD: California
Writer(s):    Lowe/Tulin
Label:    PruneTwang
Year:    2004
    After successfully reestablishing themselves as one of the world's premier psychedelic rock bands with the album Artifact in 2001, the Psychedelic Prunes got to work on their first self-generated concept album (Mass In F Minor having been imposed on them by their then-producer Dave Hassinger). That album, California, centers on the band's own impressions of the Summer of Love and the years beyond, and is an excellent showcase of the songwriting talents of lead vocalist James Lowe and bassist Mark Tulin, on songs like Tidal Wave. 

Artist:    King Crimson
Title:    Nuages (That Which Passes, Passes Like Clouds)
Source:    LP: Three Of A Perfect Pair
Writer(s):    Belew/Bruford/Fripp/Levin
Label:    Warner Brothers/EG
Year:    1984
    The third and final LP of the 1980s version of King Crimson was not as well-received as its predecessors. Three Of A Perfect Pair featured a "left side" made up mostly of relatively commercial songs with lyrics by Adrian Belew and music composed by the entire band. The "right" side of the LP featured more free-form improvisation on tracks like Nuages (That Which Passes, Passes Like Clouds), which closes the album. Robert Fripp, in a radio interview, described the LP's "left" side as "accessible" and its "right" side as "excessive", which seems as good a description of Three Of A Perfect Pair as any other.

Artist:    Bee Gees
Title:    Kilburn Towers
Source:    LP: Idea
Writer(s):    Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb
Label:    Atco
Year:    1968
    Kilburn Towers are a pair of circular apartment buildings in Sydney, Australia, designed by architect William E. Beck and opened in 1960. Kilburn Towers is also a song by the Bee Gees from the 1968 album Idea that was also issued as the B side of the hit single I Started A Joke. And yes, the song was indeed inspired by the apartment complex, known for its uninterrupted view of Sydney Harbour.

Artist:    Donovan
Title:    Jennifer Juniper
Source:    British import CD: The Hurdy Gurdy Man
Writer(s):    Donovan Leitch
Label:    EMI (original label: Epic)
Year:    1968
    Donovan's British label, Pye, chose not to release 1967's Wear Your Love Like Heaven as a single. As a result, Donovan had no current tunes on the British charts in January of 1968, when he recorded Jennifer Juniper. The song was an instant British hit when released the following month, going to the #5 spot on the charts. The song did not do as well when it was released a month later in the US, however, stalling out at #35. The song was later included on the 1968 LP The Hurdy Gurdy Man.

Artist:    Procol Harum
Title:    Skip Softly (My Moonbeams)
Source:    CD: Shine On Brightly
Writer(s):    Brooker/Reid
Label:    A&M
Year:    1968
    Procol Harum is not generally thought of as a novelty act. The closest they ever came was this track from the Shine On Brightly album that steals shamelessly from a classical piece I really should know the name of but don't. Even then, Skip Softly (My Moonbeams) ends up being as much a showcase for a then-young Robin Trower's guitar work as anything else.

Artist:    Spirit
Title:    Space Child/When I Touch You
Source:    CD: Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus
Writer(s):    Locke/Ferguson
Label:    Epic/Legacy
Year:    1970
    Spirit keyboardist John Locke used a combination of piano, organ and synthesizers (then a still-new technology) to set the mood for the entire Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus recording sessions with his instrumental piece Space Child. The tune starts with a rolling piano riff that gives bassist Mark Andes a rare opportunity to carry the melody line before switching to a jazzier tempo that manages to seamlessly transition from a waltz tempo to straight time without anyone noticing. After a short reprise of the tune's opening riff the track segues into Jay Ferguson's When I Touch You, a song that manages to be light and heavy at the same time.

Artist:    Who
Title:    The Acid Queen
Source:    CD: Tommy
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:    1969
    Pete Townshend, the primary composer of the Who's rock opera Tommy, takes the lead vocals on The Acid Queen, a song that, while integral to the Tommy storyline, also stands as one of Townshend's strongest standalone compositions. The song is sung from the first person viewpoint of a gypsy who promises to cure Tommy's condition (blind, deaf and dumb) by using a combination of sex and drugs. Although her efforts are unsuccessful, the attempt itself has a profound effect on the youngster, who explores his inner self under the influence of LSD. Townshend himself has said that the song is "not just about acid: it's the whole drug thing, the drink thing, the sex thing wrapped into one big ball." In a reference to peer pressure, he adds that "society – people – force it on you. She represents this force." The song later became a hit single for, not surprisingly, Tina Turner, who played the part of the Acid Queen in the hit movie version of Tommy.

Artist:      Blue Cheer
Title:     Summertime Blues
Source:      Mono LP: Vincebus Eruptum
Writer(s):    Cochrane/Capehart
Label:    Philips
Year:     1968
     European electronics giant Philips had its own record label in the 1960s. In the US, the label was distributed by Mercury Records, and was known primarily for a long string of hits by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. In 1968 the label surprised everyone by signing the loudest band in San Francisco, Blue Cheer. Their cover of the 50s Eddie Cochrane hit Summertime Blues was all over both the AM and FM airwaves that summer.

Artist:    Chambers Brothers
Title:    CD: Time Has Come Today
Source:    The Time Has Come
Writer(s):    Joe and Willie Chambers
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1967
    The Chambers Brothers were an eclectic band with a gospel music background that dated back to the mid-50s, when oldest brother George finished his tour of duty with the US Army and settled down in the L.A. area. His three brothers soon followed him out to the coast from their native Mississippi, and began playing the Southern California gospel circuit before going after a more secular audience in the early 60s. Their best-known recording was Time Has Come Today, considered to be one of the defining tracks of the psychedelic era. The song, written by brothers Joe and Willie Chambers, was originally recorded in 1966 and released as a single, but went largely unnoticed by radio and the record-buying public. In 1967 the band recorded a new, eleven-minute version of Time Has Come Today for their album The Time Has Come. This version got considerable airplay on the handful of so-called "underground" FM stations that were starting to pop up across the US in college towns and major metropolitan areas, but was considered way too long for commercial radio. The following year two edited versions of the track were released. The second, longer edit ended up getting enough airplay to make the top 40; as a result the full-length version has become somewhat of a rarity on the radio, especially since the shorter version was made available in stereo in the mid-1980s. This week Stuck in the Psychedelic Era presents, for your enjoyment, the full-length album version of Time Has Come Today.

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2041 (starts 10/5/20)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/341426-dc-2041

    This week's show begins and ends with live performances, from Humble Pie and the Doors respectively. In between we have a 1973 set featuring (among others) Pink Floyd and Procol Harum, and a kind of free association set that takes us from the Guess Who to Frank Zappa.

Artist:    Humble Pie
Title:    I Don't Need No Doctor
Source:    CD: Performance-Rockin' The Fillmore
Writer(s):    Ashford/Simpson/Armstead
Label:    A&M
Year:    1971
    Humble Pie, one of the first rock supergroups, was already beginning to fall apart when their double-LP live album Performance-Rockin' The Fillmore was recorded. In fact, guitarist Peter Frampton had already left the group by the time the album was released in 1971, mainly due to clashes with lead vocalist/guitarist Steve Marriott. Regardless, the album was a hit, going to #21 on the US album chart and hitting the top 40 in Britain as well. An edited version of the band's cover of the Ray Charles hit I Don't Need No Doctor was released as a single, becoming the album's best-known track.

Artist:    Grand Funk
Title:    Black Licorice
Source:    CD: We're An American Band
Writer(s):    Farner/Brewer
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1973
    By 1973 Grand Funk Railroad, the first true arena-rock band, was sounding a bit fatigued. The band had released six studio LPs, as well as a double disc live album, over a period of just four years, with guitarist Mark Farner writing virtually all the group's original material, as well as handling all the lead vocals. Having parted company with their original manager/producer, Terry Knight, just prior to recording their self-produced Phoenix album in 1972, the band was seeing a dropoff in sales as well. To get things back on track they brought in a new producer, Todd Rundgren, for their seventh LP, We're An American Band, as well as shortening the band's name to Grand Funk (temporarily, as it turned out). The most noticable change, however, was the rise to prominence of drummer Don Brewer, both as a songwriter and a vocalist. In fact, Brewer took over lead vocal duties on fully half the album's songs, writing or co-writing several of them, including Black Licorice. The album was a huge success, changing the direction of Grand Funk's music forever.

Artist:    Procol Harum
Title:    Bringing Home The Bacon
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM promo single
Writer:    Brooker/Reid
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1973
    After the departure of original lead guitarist Robin Trower, the remaining members of Procol Harum continued to record quality albums such as Grand Hotel, although their airplay was limited to sporadic plays on progressive FM stations. One song that probably should have gotten more attention than it did was Bringing Home The Bacon, from the aforementioned Grand Hotel album. The group would experience a brief return to top 40 radio the following year with the release of their live version of Conquistador, a track that originally appeared on the band's 1967 debut LP.

Artist:    Aerosmith
Title:    Dream Om
Source:    CD: Aerosmith
Writer(s):    Steven Tyler
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1973
    My former bandmate and roomate, the late Jeff "Quincy" Adams, was an Air Force brat like me, although my dad was an enlisted man and his father was a full bird colonel. One of the many places Quincy lived was the Boston area. Quincy once told me about this band that had a practice room down the street from where he lived. As an aspiring guitarist himself he would try to check out this band whenever possible, but as a young teenager he was of course too shy to actually approach any of the band members. Quincy, looking back on those times fifteen years later, swore that one of the songs that band was playing was Dream On, a song that was not recorded until 1973, when it came out on the first Aerosmith album. So was that jam band down the street indeed Aerosmith? Could be.

Artist:    Pink Floyd
Title:    Time/The Great Gig In The Sky
Source:    The Dark Side Of The Moon
Writer(s):    Mason/Waters/Gilmour/Wright/Torry
Label:    Capitol (original label: Harvest)
Year:    1973
    There are very few albums in rock history that have achieved the iconic status of Pink Floyd's Dark side Of The Moon. Listening to the last two tracks on side one, it's easy to see why this album makes the grade. In case you're wondering, the "Torry" in the songwriting credits is Clare Torry, who does all that wordless vocalizing throughout The Great Gig In The Sky. Her name did not originally appear in the credits, but then lawyers got involved...
    
Artist:     Guess Who
Title:     American Woman
Source:     European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: American Woman)
Writer:     Bachman/Cummings/Peterson/Kale
Label:     Sony Music (original label: RCA Victor)
Year:     1970
     American Woman is undoubtably the most political song ever recorded by the Guess Who, a generally non-political Canadian band. My family was living on Ramstein AFB, which was and is a huge base in Germany with enough Canadian personnel stationed there to justify their own on-base school. I found myself hanging out with the Canadian kids most of the time and I gotta tell you, they absolutely loved this song. They also loved to throw it in my face as often as possible. I guess that's what I got for being the "token American" member of my peer group.
 
Artist:    Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers
Title:    American Girl
Source:    CD: Greatest Hits (originally released on LP: Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers)
Writer(s):    Tom Petty
Label:    MCA (original label: Shelter)
Year:    1976
    American Girl was not a hit when it was originally released as a single, but has since become known as one of Tom Petty's signature songs and is a staple of classic rock radio. It was also the last song ever played live by Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers, as the encore to their tour-ending performance at the Hollywood Bowl on Sept. 25, 2017. Petty claimed the lyrics to the song were inspired by listening to cars on the freeway from his apartment in Encino, California, but the line "she could hear the cars roll by out on 441" was actually a reference to US Highway 441, which was the main highway through Gainesville, Florida, where he grew up, before I-75, which bypasses the city, was constructed in 1964.

Artist:    Rush
Title:    Cinderella Man
Source:    LP: A Farewell To Kings
Writer(s):    Lee/Lifeson
Label:    Mercury
Year:    1977
    Although most of Rush's lyrics were written by drummer Neal Peart, there were exceptions. One of those was Cinderella Man, which was based on bassist/vocalist Geddy Lee's impressions of one of his favorite films, the 1936 classic Mr Deeds Goes To Town. Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson wrote the music for the song.

Artist:    Frank Zappa
Title:    Black Napkins
Source:    LP: Zoot Allures
Writer(s):    Frank Zappa
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1976
    Most of Frank Zappa's recorded work from the mid-1970s until his death in 1993 mixes live and studio performances so seamlessly it's difficult to tell them apart. Black Napkins, from the 1976 LP Zoot Allures, sounds like a studio piece, with clean separation of instruments not often heard on live recordings of the time.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Break On Thru #2
Source:    LP: Absolutely Live
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1970
    The first live Doors album had a close relationship to controversy without itself being particularly controversial. The double LP was made up of performances from the Absolutely Live tour between July of 1969 and June of 1970. At the time the album was released, producer Paul Rothchild claimed that he had to make "over 1000" edits to get acceptable takes of the songs, including splicing part of one performance into part of another. In recent years, however, this claim has been disproven by the Bright Midnight record company, which has issued uncut masters of all of the performances in question over a total of 22 CDs. Audio proofs made by comparing these uncut masters with the original album tracks show there there were fewer than five major edits on the entire album, none of them on the songs themselves. A more personal controversy erupted at the time the album was released over the cover art, which was modified by the record label to include a picture of singer Jim Morrison that did not reflect his 1970 look. None of the band members approved the change from the original artwork, which was a single image of the band in concert against a blue background. Of course, that particular period in time was somewhat controversial for the band itself, as they were experiencing the aftermath of Morrison's arrest for onstage obscenity in Miami, Florida. As a result, the album did not do all that well in record stores, selling only about half as many copies as their most recent studio LP, Morrison Hotel. The CD reissue of the album breaks down the individual tracks differently than the original LPs; Break On Thru #2, for instance, is divided into two tracks: Dead Cats, Dead Rats and Break On Through (To The Other Side). The two pieces were actually one continuous performance recorded in Detroit in 1970.

 

Some ramblings about American pride

I usually don't get into current real world politics on this page, preferring to concentrate on the music. However, in this particular case I've decided to make an exception.

In a recent discussion on Facebook, the original poster put to me the following question: "Are you no longer proud 2bn American?" (His spelling). As my reply was buried rather deeply among a large number of comments from a lot of different people, I decided to post it here as well.

 

 "Are you no longer proud 2bn American?" Sorry it took so long to reply, but I wanted to make sure I didn't say something that would be taken out of context and used by the next Joe McCarthy type to come along. So, first off, let me tell you about the America I was raised in. This America had a whole lot of great things going for it. It had the world's most advanced health care facilities. It had an education system that was the envy of the world, and was home to the leading scientists in nearly every major field of study. It had the highest standard of living on the planet. Its cities were full of excitement and purpose. Its small towns were vibrant and healthy. Individuals could speak their mind freely on just about any subject without fear of government retaliation, and often did, even if nobody was listening. Yes, America had a lot going for it, and at the core of it all was the unshakeable belief that all these things were the birthright of every human being on the planet, not just those of us lucky enough to have been born in the USA. It was that belief and the efforts of so many Americans to bring that kind of freedom and prosperity to the rest of the world that I was proud of. 

Sadly, that America no longer exists. Maybe it never did for some people, but at least in my mind when I was growing up it was the accepted reality. Now, not so much. We have fallen behind much of the world in our education system. Science is scorned. Our profit-driven health care system drives tens of thousands (probably a conservative estimate) of American families into bankruptcy every year. There is too much "me and mine" and "America first" going around, and virtually no talk of what kind of example we are setting for the rest of the world to follow. I'm not talking about imposing our system of doing things on the rest of the world; I'm talking about showing the world how good life can be and offering to help the rest of the world achieve that good life. That is something to be proud of, not this "America first" garbage. So am I "no longer proud 2bn American?" I guess that depends entirely on America itself and the direction it chooses to take from here. 

Make me proud.