Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2226 (starts 6/20/22)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/426988-pe-2226

    This time around we have progressions and regressions through the years, artists sets, and finally, a whole bunch of tunes from 1967 to finish out the week.

Artist:    Animals
Title:    Dimples
Source:    Mono LP: The Best Of The Animals (originally released on LP: The Animals On Tour)
Writer(s):    Hooker/Bracken
Label:    Abkco (original label: M-G-M)
Year:    1965
    Of all the bands to come out of England as part of the British invasion of the mid-1960s, none were bigger fans of US blues and R&B artists than the Animals, from the city of Newcastle uponTyne. The group reportedly spent all of their spare time checking out independent record stores looking for obscure old records while on their first US tour, and upon returning to the UK set about recording their own versions of several of these songs. Among the tracks recorded was Dimples, a John Lee Hooker tune that was included on the Animals second US LP, On Tour. A different recording of Dimples was included on the band's first UK album.

Artist:    Blues Project
Title:    I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes
Source:    CD: The Blues Project Anthology (originally released on LP: Projections)
Writer(s):    Blind Willie Johnson
Label:    Polydor (original label: Verve Folkways)
Year:    1966
    One lasting legacy of the British Invasion was the re-introduction to the US record-buying public to the songs of early Rhythm and Blues artists such as Blind Willie Johnson. This emphasis on classic blues in particular would lead to the formation of electric blues-based US bands such as the Butterfield Blues Band and the Blues Project. Unlike the Butterfields, who made a conscious effort to remain true to their Chicago-style blues roots, the Blues Project was always looking for new ground to cover, which ultimately led to them developing an improvisational style that would be emulated by west coast bands such as the Grateful Dead, and by Project member Al Kooper, who conceived and produced the first successful rock jam LP, Super Session, in 1968. As the opening track to their second (and generally considered best) LP Projections, I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes served notice that this was a new kind of blues, louder and brasher than what had come before, yet tempered with Kooper's melodic vocal style. An added twist was the use during the song's instrumental bridge of an experimental synthesizer known among band members as the "Kooperphone", probably the first use of any type of synthesizer on a blues record.

Artist:    Spencer Davis Group
Title:    I'm A Man
Source:    Mono LP: Progressive Heavies (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, while his brother Steve went on to form the band Traffic. Then Blind Faith. Then Traffic again. And then a successful solo career. Meanwhile, the Spencer Davis Group continued on for several years with a series of replacement vocalists, but were never able to duplicate their earlier successes with the Winwoods.

Artist:    Warm Sounds
Title:    Nite Is A Comin'/Smeta Murgaty
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Gerrard/Younghusband
Label:    Deram
Year:    1968
            Presaging a trend that began to take off in the 1980s (and is even more prevalent today), Warm Sounds was a band that actually consisted of only two people, Britishers Denver Gerrard and Barry Younghusband. They only had one real hit, the 1967 tune Birds And Bees, but continued to make records through the following year, getting more experimental with each subsequent single. Among the most psychedelic of these singles was Nite Is A Comin', which here is segued into its own B side, Smeta Murgaty. Astute listeners will realize that the first portion of Smeta Murgaty is actually the last portion of Nite Is A Comin' played backwards. Experimental indeed!
        
Artist:    Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title:    Miss Attraction
Source:    LP: The Best Of The Strawberry Alarm Clock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Weitz/Pitman/King/Freeman/Gunnels
Label:    Sundazed/Uni
Year:    1969
    The Strawberry Alarm Clock had always had a bit of a fluid lineup, having been formed in the first place by the merger of two local Los Angeles bands, Waterfyrd Traene and Thee Sixpence. Their biggest hit, Incense and Peppermints, featured lead vocals from a member of yet another local band, and one of their main songwriters on the first album (who also played flute on several tracks) was not credited as a band member at all. Such confusion continued to plague the band throughout its existence. In 1968, for instance, their former manager recruited two ex-members to form a second Strawberry Alarm Clock to tour and play the band's songs while the current group was working on their fourth and final LP, Good Morning Starshine. A court injunction stopped the new group from using the name, but by the time it took effect the damage had already been done. Promoters refused to book the band, not knowing who would actually show up. The group's sound had changed a bit by then as well, as can be heard on Miss Attraction, the first single released from Good Morning Starshine. Founding member and co-leader Ed King, the band's lead guitarist, had already been playing many of the bass lines on the group's studio recordings. For Good Morning Starshine he officially switched to bass, although he also provided some of the guitar tracks on the album as well. Following the breakup of the Strawberry Alarm Clock King would take a similar role in his new group, Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Artist:      13th Floor Elevators
Title:     Roller Coaster
Source:      CD:The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators
Writer(s):    Hall/Erickson
Label:    Collectables (original label: International Artists)
Year:     1966
     A favorite trick of dance club bands in the late 60s was to start a song off slow, then slowly build up to a frenzy, all the while sneaking looks at the teenage girls gyrating on the dance floor. As most of the band members were still in their teens themselves, this isn't as creepy as it sounds. A good example of this type of song is Roller Coaster, a tune that Austin's 13th Floor Elevators included on their first LP.

Artist:    Shadows of Knight
Title:    Oh Yeah
Source:    CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:    Elias McDaniel
Label:    Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year:    1966
    The original British blues bands like the Yardbirds made no secret of the fact that they had created their own version of a music that had come from Chicago. The Shadows Of Knight, on the other hand, were a Chicago band that created their own version of the British blues, bringing the whole thing full circle. After taking their version of Van Morrison's Gloria into the top 10 early in 1966, the Shadows (which had added "of Knight" to their name just prior to releasing Gloria) decided to follow it up with an updated version of Bo Diddley's Oh Yeah. Although the song did not have a lot of national top 40 success, it did help establish the Shadows' reputation as one of the premier garage-punk bands.

Artist:    Love
Title:    No. Fourteen
Source:    Mono CD: Love Story (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Arthur Lee
Label:    Raven (original label: Elektra)
Year:    1967
    With a title that is an obvious joke, No. Fourteen is among the most obscure of the original Love's recordings, having appeared on vinyl only as a B side to the 1966 single 7&7 Is and on a 1973 compilation album that was only released in Europe. At less than two minutes long, it would seem that the track's main objective was to make sure that disc jockeys didn't accidentally play the wrong side of the record.

Artist:    Neil Young/Crazy Horse
Title:    Cinnamon Girl
Source:    LP: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1969
    My favorite Neil Young song has always been Cinnamon Girl. I suspect this is because the band I was in the summer after I graduated from high school used an amped-up version of the song as our show opener (imagine Cinnamon Girl played like I Can See For Miles and you get a general idea of how it sounded). If we had ever recorded an album, we probably would have used that arrangement as our first single. I finally got to see Neil Young perform the song live (from the 16th row even) with Booker T. and the MGs as his stage band in the mid-1990s. It was worth the wait.

Artist:     Them
Title:     I'm Your Witch Doctor
Source:     LP: Now and Them
Writer:    John Mayall
Label:     Tower
Year:     1968
     Here's an oddity for you: a pyschedelicized version of a John Mayall song by Van Morrison's old band with a new vocalist (Kenny McDowell). Just to make it even odder we have sound effects at the beginning of the song that were obviously added after the fact by the producer (and not done particularly well at that). But then, what else would you expect from the label that put out an LP by a band that didn't even participate in the recording of half the tracks on the album (Chocolate Watchband's No Way Out), a song about a city that none of the band members had ever been to (the Standells' Dirty Water), and soundtrack albums to teensploitation films like Wild In the Streets, Riot On Sunset Strip and The Love In? Let's hear it for Tower Records!

Artist:    Circus Maximus
Title:    Short-Haired Fathers
Source:    LP: Circus Maximus
Writer(s):    Bob Bruno
Label:    Vanguard
Year:    1967
    Circus Maximus was formed in Greenwich Village by guitarist/keyboardist/vocalist Bob Bruno and guitarist Jerry Jeff Walker in 1967. The group originally wanted to call itself the Lost Sea Dreamers, but changed it after the Vanguard Records expressed reservations about signing a group with the initials LSD. Of the eleven tracks on the band's debut LP, only four were written by Walker, and those were in more of a folk-rock vein. Bruno's seven tracks, on the other hand, are true gems of psychedelia, ranging from the jazz-influenced Wind to the proto-punk rocker Short-Haired Fathers. The group fell apart after only two albums, mostly due to the growing musical differences between Walker and Bruno. Walker, of course, went on to become one of the most successful songwriters of the country-rock genre. As for Bruno, he's still in New York City, concentrating more on the visual arts in recent years.

Artist:    Lovin' Spoonful
Title:    Summer In The City
Source:    LP: Harmony (originally released on LP: Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful)
Writer(s):    Sebastian/Sebastian/Boone
Label:    RCA Special Products (original label: Kama Sutra)
Year:    1966
    The Lovin' Spoonful changed gears completely for what would become their biggest hit of 1966: Summer In The City. Inspired by a poem by John Sebastian's brother, the song was recorded for the album Hums Of The Lovin' Spoonful. That album was an attempt by the band to deliberately record in a variety of styles; in the case of Summer In The City, it was a rare foray into psychedelic rock for the band. Not coincidentally, Summer In The City is also my favorite Lovin' Spoonful song.

Artist:    Standells
Title:    Dirty Water
Source:    Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:    Ed Cobb
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
    Dirty Water has long since been adopted by the city of Boston (and especially its sports teams), yet the band that originally recorded this Ed Cobb tune was purely an L.A. band, having started off playing cover tunes for frat parties in the early 60s. Drummer Dickie Dodd, who sings lead on Dirty Water, was a former Mouseketeer who had played on the surf-rock hit Mr. Moto as a member of the Bel-Airs.

Artist:    Who
Title:    I Can't Explain
Source:    Mono CD: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    MCA (original US label: Decca)
Year:    1964
    Here's a little known fact: The Who's first single, I Can't Explain, came out in the US several weeks before it did in England. As to how this came about, producer Shel Talmy had this to say: "The Who was funny, because I brought them to Decca America, who were a very nice bunch of guys, older men who had no idea what rock'n'roll was. They didn't understand what the hell I was doing, but they said if that's what's supposedly selling, then we'll go out and try to sell it, which of course they did." I Can't Explain was released in the second week of December, 1964 in the US. Since there was a completely separate Decca label in the UK (the two had split prior to WWII), records made for the US Decca label appeared in Britain on the Brunswick label, which was owned by US Decca. I Can't Explain was released in the UK on January 15, 1965, over a month after it had appeared in the US. Subsequent Who releases on Brunswick came out before their American counterparts, however. As an aside, when the Who jumped labels from Brunswick to Reaction in 1966, their contract with US Decca temporarily lapsed, allowing the single version of Substitute (with the line "I look all white but my dad was black" deleted) to come out on the Atco label in the US. Apparently new contracts were signed shortly thereafter that saw subsequent Who singles back on the Decca label in the US from that point on.

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    Richard Cory
Source:    LP: Sounds Of Silence
Writer(s):    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    My ultra-cool 9th-grade English teacher brought in a copy of Simon And Garfunkel's Sounds Of Silence album one day. As a class, we deconstructed the lyrics of two of the songs on that album: A Most Peculiar Man and Richard Cory. Both songs deal with suicide, but under vastly different circumstances. Whereas A Most Peculiar Man is about a lonely man who lives an isolated existence as an anonymous resident of a boarding house, Richard Cory deals with a character who is a pillar of society, known and envied by many. Too bad most high school English classes weren't that interesting.

Artist:    Music Machine
Title:    Double Yellow Line
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Bonniwell Music Machine)
Writer(s):    Sean Bonniwell
Label:    Rhino (original label: Original Sound, stereo LP version released on Warner Brothers)
Year:    1967
    One of the Original Sound singles that also appeared on the Warner Brothers LP Bonniwell Music Machine, Double Yellow Line features lyrics that were literally written by Bonniwell on the way to the recording studio. In fact, his inability to stay in his lane while driving with one hand and writing with the other resulted in a traffic ticket. The ever resourceful Bonniwell wrote the rest of the lyrics on the back of the ticket and even invited the officer in to watch the recording session. The officer declined the invitation.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    Move On Alone
Source:    LP: This Was
Writer(s):    Mick Abrahams
Label:    Chrysalis (original US label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    Original lead guitarist Mick Abrahams was already on his way out of Jethro Tull when the liner notes for the band's debut LP were written by vocalist/flautist Ian Anderson. In fact, it is probable that the album's title itself, This Was, refers to the band having already divested itself of the heavy blues influence that Abrahams had brought to the group. Oddly enough, the one song on the album that was composed entirely by Abrahams, Move On Alone (an appropriate title, as it turns out), has more of a dance hall feel to it, complete with horn section. Abrahams would go on to found Blodwyn Pig, while Jethro Tull became, essentially, a vehicle for Anderson's songwriting.

Artist:    Aerovons
Title:    World Of You
Source:    CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Hartman
Label:    Zonophone (original label: Parlophone)
Year:    1969
    Originally from St. Louis, Mo., the Aerovons were such big fans of the Beatles that they moved to England in hopes of meeting their idols. They had enough talent in their own right to get a contract with EMI, recording an album's worth of material at Abbey Road in 1969. Although only two singles from those sessions were originally released (on Parlophone, the same label that the Beatles' records were on), the Aerovons finally got some recognition many years later when an acetate of their unreleased album was discovered and remastered for release on the RPM label. Perhaps more important for the band members, they got to meet the Beatles while recording at Abbey Road!

Artist:    Mouse
Title:    Promises Promises
Source:    Mono British import CD: The Fraternity Years (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Brians/Payne
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Fraternity)
Year:    1967
    Although they never released any LPs, the Tyler-based Mouse And The Traps were one of the most prolific recording bands in Texas, releasing over a dozen singles on the Fraternity label from 1966 through 1968. Many of these records were regional hits as far east as Nashville, Tennessee, but due to the nature of small label distribution and promotion, they would have already peaked in one locality while just starting to break in another. As a result, despite each one being quite popular overall, they were never able to make the national charts. The band toured extensively, playing bars and small auditoriums all over the southeastern US, returning to the studio to cut a song or two whenever their schedule allowed. Most of their material came from either band members Ronnie "Mouse" Weiss and Knox Henderson or their producer, Robin Hood Brians. It was Brians who co-wrote Promises Promises, a 1967 B side that sounds like a cross between folk-rock and early southern rock.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    3rd Stone From The Sun
Source:    Mono LP: Are You Experienced
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Experience Hendrix/Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    One of the great rock instrumentals, 3rd Stone From The Sun (from the Jimi Hendrix Experience album Are You Experienced) is one of the first tracks to use a recording technique known as backwards masking (where the tape is deliberately put on the machine backwards and new material is added to the reversed recording). In this particular case  the masked material (Hendrix speaking) was added at a faster speed than the original recording, with a lot of reverb added, creating an almost otherworldly effect when played forward at normal speed.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Wait Until Tomorrow
Source:    CD: Axis: Bold As Love
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Experience Hendrix/Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Jimi Hendrix shows his sense of humor on Wait Until Tomorrow, a track from his second Jimi Hendrix Experience LP, Axis: Bold As Love. The song tells a story of a young man standing outside his girlfriend's window trying to convince her to run away from him. He gets continually rebuffed by the girl, who keeps telling him to Wait Until Tomorrow. Ultimately the girl's father resolves the issue by shooting the young man. The entire story is punctuated by outstanding distortion-free guitar work that showcases just how gifted Hendrix was on his chosen instrument.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    All Along The Watchtower
Source:    LP: Electric Ladyland
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1968
    Although there have been countless covers of Bob Dylan songs recorded by a variety of artists, very few of them are considered improvements over Dylan's original versions. Probably the most celebrated of these is the Jimi Hendrix Experience version of All Along The Watchtower on the Electric Ladyland album. Hendrix's arrangement of the song has been adopted by several other musicians over the years, including Neil Young (at the massive Bob Dylan tribute concert) and even Dylan himself.

Artist:     Cream
Title:        White Room
Source:    CD: Wheels Of Fire
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:        1968
        Musically almost a rewriting of Eric Clapton's Tales of Brave Ulysses (from Cream's Disraeli Gears album), White Room, a Jack Bruce/Pete Brown composition from the Wheels Of Fire album, is arguably the most popular song ever to feature the use of a wah-wah pedal prominently.

Artist:    Yardbirds
Title:    Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Page/McCarty
Label:    Epic
Year:    1967
    By 1967 the Yardbirds had moved far away from their blues roots and were on their fourth lead guitarist, studio whiz Jimmy Page. The band had recently picked up a new producer, Mickey Most, known mostly for his work with Herman's Hermits and the original Animals. Most had a tendency to focus on the band's single A sides, leaving Page an opportunity to develop his own songwriting and production skills on songs such as Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, a track that also shows signs of Page's innovative guitar style (including an instrumental break played with a violin bow) that would help define 70s rock.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Eight Miles High
Source:    European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Fifth Dimension)
Writer(s):    Clark/McGuinn/Crosby
Label:    Sony Music (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1966
    Gene Clark's final contribution to the Byrds was his collaboration with David Crosby and Roger McGuinn, Eight Miles High. Despite a newsletter from the influential Gavin Report advising stations not to play this "drug song", Eight Miles High managed to hit the top 20 in 1966. The band members themselves claimed that Eight Miles High was not a drug song at all, but was instead referring to the experience of travelling by air. In fact, it was Gene Clark's fear of flying, especially long intercontinental trips, that in part led to his leaving the Byrds.

Artist:     Jefferson Airplane
Title:     How Do You Feel
Source:     LP: Surrealistic Pillow (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer:     Tom Mastlin
Label:     RCA Victor
Year:     1966
     How Do You Feel was the only song on Surrealistic Pillow not written by a current or former member of Jefferson Airplane, having been given to the band by Tom Maslin, a friend of Paul Kantner's. The song was first released in late 1966 as the B side of My Best Friend.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Chauffeur Blues
Source:    LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer(s):    Lester Melrose (disputed, may have been Lizzie Douglas)
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1966
    The Jefferson Airplane's original female vocalist was Signe Toly Anderson. Unlike Grace Slick, who basically shared lead vocals with founder Marty Balin, Anderson mostly functioned as a backup singer. The only Airplane recording to feature Anderson as a lead vocalist was Chauffeur Blues, a cover of an old Memphis Minnie tune that was included on the 1966 LP Jefferson Airplane Takes Off. The song was credited on the album's label to Lester Melrose, who produced the original Memphis Minnie version of the song. However, the original 1941 78 RPM label gives the songwriting credit to "Lawler", which is thought to be a misspelled reference to Minnie's husband, Ernest "Little Son Joe" Lawlars. It is now believed that Memphis Minnie, whose given name was Lizzie Douglas, was the actual writer of Chaffeur Blues, but that it was easier to get the song published under her husband's name.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Somebody To Love
Source:    LP: Surrealistic Pillow
Writer(s):    Darby Slick
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1967
    Jefferson Airplane's Somebody To Love is, of course, the monster hit that put the San Francisco Bay area on the musical map in early 1967, touching off an exodus of young hippie wannabees from all over the country that converged on the city's Haight-Ashbury district that summer. Interestingly enough, Somebody To Love was not the first single released from the band's Surrealistic Pillow album. That honor goes to My Best Friend, a song written by the band's former drummer Skip Spence.

Artist:    First Edition
Title:    Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released on LP: The First Edition and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Mickey Newbury
Label:    Rhino (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    In 1968, former New Christy Mistrels members Kenny Rogers and Mike Settle decided to form a psychedelic rock band, the First Edition. Although Settle was the official leader on the first album, it was Rogers who would emerge as the star of the band, even to the point of eventually changing the band's name to Kenny Rogers and the First Edition. That change reflected a shift from psychedelic folk-rock to country flavored pop that would eventually propel Rogers to superstar status.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Flying
Source:    CD: Magical Mystery Tour
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starr
Label:    Apple/Parlophone
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, in December of 1967, coincided with the release (again only in the UK and Europe) of a two-disc extended play 45 RPM set featuring the six songs from the special. As EPs were at that time considered a non-starter in the US, Capitol Records decided to release Magical Mystery Tour as a full-length album instead, with the songs from the telefilm on one side of the LP and all of the single sides they had released that year on the other. Among the songs from the film itself is Flying, an instrumental track that, unusually, was credited to the entire band.

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    Rock And Roll Woman
Source:    LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Label:    Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year:    1967
    Buffalo Springfield did not sell huge numbers of records (except for the single For What It's Worth) while they were together. Nor did they pack in the crowds. As a matter of fact, when they played the club across the street from where Love was playing, they barely had any audience at all. Artistically, though, it's a whole 'nother story. During their brief existence Buffalo Springfield launched the careers of no less than four major artists: Richie Furay, Jim Messina, Stephen Stills and Neil Young. They also recorded more than their share of tracks that have held up better than most of what else was being recorded at the time. Case in point: Rock And Roll Woman, a Stephen Stills tune that still sounds fresh well over 50 years after it was recorded.
Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    She's A Rainbow
Source:    Mono CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1967
    The Stones had their own brand of psychedelia, which was showcased on their 1967 album Their Satanic Majesties Request. The album itself, after zooming to the top of the charts, lost its momentum quickly, despite the fact that She's A Rainbow, which was released as a single, was a solid top 40 hit.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    You're Lost Little Girl
Source:    LP: Strange Days
Writer:    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    The Doors second LP, Strange Days, was stylistically similar to the first, and served notice to the world that this band was going to be around for awhile. Songwriting credit for You're Lost Little Girl (a haunting number that's always been a personal favorite of mine) was given to the entire band, a practice that would continue until the release of The Soft Parade in 1969.

Artist:    Traffic
Title:    Smiling Phases
Source:    CD: Smiling Phases (originally released in UK as 45 RPM B side and in US on LP: Heaven Is In Your Mind, aka Mr. Fantasy)
Writer(s):    Capaldi/Wood/Winwood
Label:    Island (original US label: United Artists)
Year:    1967
    The standard practice in the UK during the 60s was to not include songs that had been released as singles on LPs. This left several songs, such as the 1967 B side Smiling Phases, only available on 45 RPM vinyl until the group's first greatest hits anthology was released. In the US the song was more widely circulated, having been included on the American version of Traffic's debut LP. Smiling Phases has since come to be recognized as one of Traffic's most iconic tunes, and has been covered by such bands as Blood, Sweat and Tears.

 

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2226 (starts 6/20/22

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/426986-dc-2226

    Once again we have two short sets bookending a much longer one. In this case the short ones are from specific years, 1972 and 1970, while the longer sets counts down from 1975 to 1968 one year at a time.

Artist:    Graham Nash/David Crosby
Title:    Immigration Man
Source:    45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s):    Graham Nash
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1972
    Graham Nash and David Crosby decided to make an album without Stephen Stills or Neil Young in 1972. The two songwriters' compositions alternated on the album, with the final track, Nash's Immigration Man (based on his own real life experience at customs) being released as a single.

Artist:    Lou Reed
Title:    Wild Child
Source:    European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Lou Reed)
Writer(s):    Lou Reed
Label:    Sony Music (original label: RCA Victor)
Year:    1972
    Lou Reed's first album after leaving the Velvet Underground was made up mostly of new recordings of songs the VU had already recorded but not released, using British session musicians and members of other bands such as Yes. Familiar names on songs such as Wild Child include Steve Howe and Caleb Quaye on guitars and Rick Wakeman on piano.

Artist:    Rare Bird
Title:    Birdman-Part One (Title #1 Again)
Source:    45 RPM promo (stereo side)
Writer(s):    Kaffinetti/Karos/Curtis/Kelly/Gould
Label:    Polydor
Year:    1972
    The appropriately named Rare Bird was never very popular in their native England. None of their albums charted there, and they only had one charted single that went to the #27 spot in 1969. They were much more successful in continental Europe, however. That same single, Sympathy, was an international hit, selling a million copies worldwide and hitting the #1 spot in both France and Italy. By the time the Rare Bird's third LP, Epic Forest, was released, the band had gone through several personnel changes, including the loss of the group's founder, keyboardist Graham Field. In the US the band got some airplay on college radio stations, but was virtually ignored by mainstream US listeners. I did manage to find a copy of Birdman-Part One (Title #1 Again), the single from the Epic Forest album in a thrift store many years ago. It's really quite listenable.
    
Artist:    Return To Forever
Title:    No Mystery
Source:    LP: No Mystery
Writer(s):    Chick Corea
Label:    Polydor
Year:    1975
    When it comes to jazz-rock fusion, generally the first name that comes to mind is Chick Corea, founder of Return To Forever. The band was formed out of Corea's desire to better "communicate" with an audience than was possible with the avant-garde jazz he had been performing with his previous band, Circle. Along with bassist Stanley Clarke, Corea oversaw the evolution of Return To Forever over the years from a Latin-based sound featuring Flora Purim and her husband Airto Moreira into one of the first true jazz-rock fusion bands. By 1975 Corea had become well-versed in the use of synthesizers, as can be heard on the album No Mystery. On the album Corea and Clarke were joined by guitarist Al DiMeola and drummer Lenny White for what is now considered the "classic" Return To Forever lineup. Corea himself wrote the title track, which is probably the best-known tune on the album.

Artist:    John Lennon
Title:    Scared
Source:    CD: Lennon (box set) (originally released on LP: Walls And Bridges)
Writer(s):    John Lennon
Label:    Capitol (original label: Apple)
Year:    1974
    John Lennon was never shy about expresssing his deepest feelings through his music. This is especially true on his 1974 album Walls And Bridges. Made during his eighteen-month long separation from Yoko Ono, the album features many songs relating directly to the separation. Other songs, such as Scared, which closes the LP's first side, center more on Lennon's feelings of isolation. As a singular pop star, there were very few people he could feel comfortable around without suspecting ulterior motives, and at the same time he was aware that he wasn't getting any younger. Walls And Bridges would be Lennon's last album of new original songs until 1980's Double Fantasy collaboration with Yoko Ono.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Dancing With Mr. D.
Source:    LP: Goat's Head Soup
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    Rolling Stones
Year:    1973
    Depending on whose point of view you choose to agree with, Goat's Head Soup marked either the end of the Rolling Stones' golden age or the beginning of their mid-70s decline into rock star decadence. With a track like Dancing With Mr. D. starting off the album, I'd have to go with the former view.

Artist:    Jo Jo Gunne
Title:    I Make Love
Source:    CD: Jo Jo Gunne/Bite Down Hard/Jumpin' The Gun/So…Where's The Show (originally released on LP: Jo Jo Gunne)
Writer(s):    Jay Ferguson
Label:    Rhino/Edsel (original label: Asylum)
Year:    1972
    I Make Love is the last track on side one of the first Jo Jo Gunne LP. Written by Jay Ferguson (formerly of Spirit), the song features a distinct opening guitar rift by Matt Andes. Other than that, it's probably the weakest track on a strong album, which puts it at a disadvantage.

Artist:    Allman Brothers Band
Title:    Statesboro Blues
Source:    LP: At Fillmore East
Writer(s):    Willie McTell
Label:    Mercury (original label: Capricorn)
Year:    1971
    The Allman Brothers Band is generally accepted as the original Southern Rock band. Much of this reputation, however, is based on the group's second phase, following the death of founder Duane Allman. In the beginning, however, the Allman Brothers Band was first and foremost a blues-rock band, perhaps even the best American blues-rock band of its time. This is evidenced by the fact that their breakthrough album, At Fillmore East, starts with their electrifying arrangement of a Blind Willie McTell blues classic, Statesboro Blues. McTell originally recorded the tune in 1928. Forty years later Taj Mahal recorded a blues-rock version that inspired Duane Allman to take up the slide guitar. The Allman Brothers Band At Fillmore East version of Statesboro Blues is ranked #9 on Rolling Stone Magazine's list of all-time greatest guitar songs.    

Artist:    Mountain
Title:    Mississippi Queen
Source:    CD: Electric 70s (originally released on LP: Mountain Climbing)
Writer(s):    West/Laing/Pappalardi/Rea
Label:    Warner Special Products/JCI (original label: Windfall)
Year:    1970
    One of the most overlooked bands of the mid-1960s was the Vagrants. Based on Long Island, the group made a specialty of covering popular R&B and rock songs, often slowing them down and featuring extended solos by guitarist Leslie Weinstein, inspiring fellow Long Islanders Vanilla Fudge to do the same. Although the Vagrants never were able to gain much national attention, Weinstein himself had established quite a reputation by the time the group disbanded. Meanwhile, keyboardist/producer/songwriter Felix Pappalardi had been working with the members of Cream as a producer, but with the demise of that band was looking for a new project to sink his teeth into. That new project turned out to be a solo album by Weinstein, who by then had shortened his last name to West. The album was called Mountain, and soon after its release West and Pappalardi decided to form a band of the same name. The group first got national attention performing at Woodstock, and in 1970 released the album Mountain Climbing, featuring the hit single Mississippi Queen.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    What Is And What Should Never Be
Source:    CD: Led Zeppelin II
Writer(s):    Page/Plant
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1969
    Due to contractual obligations with another label, singer Robert Plant did not received any writing credits for songs on the first Led Zeppelin album. By the time the band's second LP was released, Plant had been able to get out of his previous contract, and his name began appearing as co-writer of songs such as What Is And What Should Never Be. The song itself was based on a true story concerning Plant's attraction to his girlfriend's sister.

Artist:    Cream
Title:    Politician
Source:    LP: Wheels Of Fire
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    RSO (original label: Atco)
Year:    1968
    Although the songwriting team of Jack Bruce and Pete Brown are best known for providing Cream with its more psychedelic songs such as White Room and Swlabr, they did occasionally come up with bluesier numbers such as Politician from the Wheels Of Fire album. The song quickly became a staple of Cream's live performances.

Artist:    Grateful Dead
Title:    Uncle John's Band
Source:    CD: Skeletons From The Closet (originally released on LP: Workingman's Dead)
Writer(s):    Hunter/Garcia
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1970
    For many people who only got their music from commercial radio, Uncle John's Band was the first Grateful Dead song they ever heard. The tune, from the 1970 LP Workingman's Dead, was the first Dead song to crack the top 100, peaking at #69, and got significant airplay on FM rock radio stations as well. The tight harmonies on the track were reportedly inspired by Crosby, Stills and Nash, whose debut album had come out the previous year.

Artist:    Joni Mitchell
Title:    Big Yellow Taxi
Source:    LP: The Big Ball (originally released on LP: Ladies Of The Canyon)
Writer(s):    Joni Mitchell
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1970
    One of Joni Mitchell's best-known tunes, Big Yellow Taxi was originally released on the 1970 album Ladies Of The Canyon. The original studio version of the song hit the top 10 in Australia and the top 20 in the UK and Mitchell's native Canada, but only reached the #67 spot in the US. A later live version of the song, however, cracked the top 30 in the US in 1974. Mitchell says she was inspired to write the song on a visit to Hawaii, where she looked out her hotel window to view a mountain vista in the distance, only to be shocked back to reality when she looked down to see a parking lot "as far as the eye could see".

Artist:    Sugarloaf
Title:    Green-Eyed Lady
Source:    CD: Billboard Top Rock 'N' Roll Hits-1970 (originally released on LP: Sugarloaf and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Corbetta/Phillips/Riordan
Label:    Rhino (original label: Liberty)
Year:    1970
    The unwritten rules of radio, particularly those concerning song length, were in transition in 1970. Take Sugarloaf's Green-Eyed Lady, for example. When first released as a single the 45 was virtually identical to the album version except that it faded out just short of the six-minute mark. This was about twice the allowed length under the old rules and it was soon replaced with an edited version that left out all the instrumental solos, coming in at just under three minutes. The label soon realized, however, that part of the original song's appeal (as heard on FM rock radio) was its organ solo, and a third single edit with that solo restored became the final, and most popular, version of Green-Eyed Lady. The song went into the top 5 nationally (#1 on some charts) and ended up being the band's biggest hit.

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2225 (starts 6/13/22)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/426099-pe-2225

    This week's show includes a rather long Advanced Psych segment made up entirely of tracks from the 21st century. Other than that, it's business as usual, with lots of good stuff from 1966-1970, including a couple of tracks from unusual sources.

Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    Hush
Source:    LP: Purple Passages (originally released on LP: Shades Of Deep Purple)
Writer(s):    Joe South
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Tetragrammaton)
Year:    1968
    British rockers Deep Purple scored a huge US hit in 1968 with their rocked out cover of Hush, a tune written by Joe South that had been an international hit for Billy Joe Royal the previous year. Oddly enough, the song was virtually ignored in their native England. The track was included on the album Tales Of Deep Purple, the first of three LPs to be released in the US on Tetragrammaton Records, a label partially owned by actor/comedian Bill Cosby. When Tetragrammaton folded shortly after the release of the third Deep Purple album the band was left without a US label, and went through some personnel changes, including adding new lead vocalist Ian Gillan (who had sung the part of Jesus on the original Jesus Christ Superstar LP) before signing to Warner Brothers and becoming a major force in 70s rock. Meanwhile, original vocalist Rod Evans hooked up with drummer Bobby Caldwell and two former members of Iron Butterfly to form Captain Beyond, releasing two fine LPs before fading from the public view.

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:    Pink Floyd
Title:    Careful With That Axe, Eugene
Source:    CD: Relics (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Waters/Wright/Mason/Gilmour
Label:    Capitol (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1968
    Despite being originally released only as a B side of a non-charting single (and not being released in the US at all) Be Careful With That Axe, Eugene is one of the most popular Pink Floyd tracks from the 1960s. This is due in part to the inclusion of a live version of the song on the 1969 LP Ummagumma. The original studio version was also included on the 1971 compilation album Relics. It is one of the first songs credited to all four band members following the departure of founder Syd Barrett.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Nowhere Man
Source:    CD: Rubber Soul (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Parlophone (original label: Capitol)
Year:    1965
    The original UK version of Rubber Soul, released in December 1965, had several songs that were left off the shorter US version. In the case of Nowhere Man, it was because Capitol Records decided to hold back the song for release as a single in early 1966. Although Nowhere Man was one of the most popular songs of the year in the US, the song was never released as a single in the UK.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    I'm Not Like Everybody Else
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1966
    One of the most popular songs in the Kinks' catalog, I'm Not Like Everybody Else was originally written for another British band, the Animals. When that group decided not to record the tune, the Kinks did their own version of the song, issuing it as the B side of the 1966 hit Sunny Afternoon. Although written by Ray Davies, it was sung by his brother Dave, who usually handled the lead vocals on only the songs he himself composed. Initially not available on any LPs, the song has in recent years shown up on various collections and as a bonus track on CD reissues of both the Kink Kontroversy and Face To Face albums. Both Davies brothers continue to perform the song in their live appearances.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    Everybody's Been Burned
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    David Crosby
Label:    Columbia/Legacy
Year:    1967
    There is a common misconception that David Crosby's songwriting skills didn't fully develop until he began working with Stephen Stills and Graham Nash. A listen to Everybody's Been Burned from the Byrds' 1967 album Younger Than Yesterday, however, puts the lie to that theory in a hurry. The track has all the hallmarks of a classic Crosby song: a strong melody, intelligent lyrics and an innovative chord structure. It's also my personal favorite tune from what is arguably the Byrds' best LP.

Artist:    Great! Society
Title:    Somebody To Love
Source:    CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: Conspicuous Only In Its Absence)
Writer(s):    Darby Slick
Label:    Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 1968
    One of the iconic songs of the psychedelic era (and of the so-called San Francisco sound) is Somebody To Love, released by Jefferson Airplane in 1967 on their Surrealistic Pillow album. Somebody To Love was written by Darby Slick, guitarist for another San Francisco band, Great! Society. The Society had released the song, featuring Slick's sister-in-law Grace on lead vocals, as a single in early 1966 but was unable to get any local airplay for the record. In June the group played the Matrix, a club managed by Marty Balin, the founder of Jefferson Airplane. The entire gig was recorded (probably by legendary Grateful Dead soundman Owsley Stanley, whose board recordings usually isolated the vocals in one channel and the instruments in the other to provide the band with a tape they could use to critique their own performance) and eventually released on an album called Conspicuous Only In Its Absence two years after Great! Society disbanded. Within a few weeks of this performance Grace Slick would leave the group to join Jefferson Airplane, taking the song with her. This whole set of circumstances can't help but raise the question of whether Balin was using the Society's gig at the Matrix as a kind of sideways audition for Slick.

Artist:    1910 Fruitgum Co.
Title:    Creations Of Simon
Source:    LP: Hard Ride
Writer(s):    Roth/Gomez/Gutkowski
Label:    Buddah
Year:    1969
    Throughout 1968 the top 40 charts were cominated by a series of lyrically lightweight, highly danceable tunes that came to be collectively known as "bubble-gum" music. Most of these came from Kazenetz-Katz Productions and were released on the Buddah label. Perhaps the most infamous of the 'bubble-gum" bands was the 1910 Fruitgum Co., who tried to break out of the mold and go for a more progressive sound with their 1969 album Hard Ride. Some tracks, such as Creations Of Simon, even anticipated the horn-oriented pop of bands of the early 1970s such as Chase and the Ides Of March. The 1910 Fruitgum Co., however, was never to escape its bubble gum image and disbanded the following year.

Artist:    Santana
Title:    Samba Pa Ti
Source:    CD: Abraxas
Writer(s):    Carlos Santana
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1970
    One of the most enduring tracks from Santana's second LP, Abraxas, Samba Pa Ti starts off as a slow instrumental, slowly picking up the pace and adding percussion to give it a decidedly latin flavor. As far as I know, Carlos Santana still includes Samba Pa Ti in his concert repertoire.

Artist:    Spiders
Title:    Don't Blow Your Mind (alternate version)
Source:    Mono EP: The Spiders
Writer(s):    Dunaway/Furnier
Label:    Sundazed
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 1998
    Told by a Phoenix club owner to find a better name than the Earwigs, the band that would ultimately come to be known as Alice Cooper showed up two weeks later calling themselves the Spiders and performing with a huge black spider web as their backdrop. Within a year they were popular enough to cut their first record, a single called Why Don't You Love Me on the local Mascot label. The following year, after graduating high school, the Spiders cut a second single, Don't Blow Your Mind, for another local label. In 1998 Sundazed released a Spiders EP that included an alternate take of Don't Blow Your Mind.

Artist:    Bob Dylan
Title:    Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again
Source:    Mono LP: Blonde On Blonde
Writer(s):    Bob Dylan
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1966
    It took Bob Dylan (and his backup musicians) 20 takes over a period of three hours in the middle of a night full of constant revisions of both music and lyrics to arrive at the final LP version of Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again. It was worth the effort.
    
Artist:     Rising Sons
Title:    Let The Good Times Roll
Source:     CD: The Rising Sons
Writer:     Goodman/Lee
Label:     Columbia/Legacy
Year:     Recorded 1966, released 1996
     Columbia Records did not have a clue what to do with the Rising Sons. Part of the problem was that they were playing the same clubs on Sunset Strip as bands like Love, the Leaves, and the Seeds, yet did not play anywhere near the same type of music as those psychedelic underground garage/punk flower power type bands. Instead, the Rising Sons were big fans of the blues and of 50s R&B artists such as Bobby Blue Bland and Shirley and Lee, with many of the songs in their repertoire being originally recorded by those artists. One example of this is Let The Good Times Roll. The Rising Sons version of the tune follows Shirley and Lee's version closely. Another thing that ultimately led to Columbia's decision not to release the Rising Sons recordings is that fact that the band itself was multi-racial (featuring future stars Taj Mahal and Ry Cooder), and in 1966 nobody but Jan Holtzman's Elektra Records had any idea how to market a multi-racial band (Elektra had both the Butterfield Blues Band and Love on the label). Rather than ask a competitor how to do something (especially an upstart label like Elektra), the decidedly old-school Columbia executives decided to shelve the whole thing until a new generation of executives came along to release the recordings 30 years later. 

Artist:    Mamas And The Papas
Title:    Got A Feelin'
Source:    LP: If You Can Believe Your Eyes And Ears
Writer(s):    Phillips/ Doherty
Label:    Dunhill
Year:    1965
    Got A Feelin' was one of the few collaborations between Mamas & Papas members John Phillips and Denny Doherty. The song features some of the group's smoothest recorded harmonies, as well as lyrics that can be considered somewhat ironic in hindsight, given that Doherty was having an affair with John's wife Michelle at the time.
        
Artist:    Blues Magoos
Title:    (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet
Source:    CD: Psychedelic Pop (originally released on LP: Psychedelic Lollipop)
Writer(s):    Gilbert/Scala/Esposito
Label:    BMG/RCA/Buddah (original 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:    Derek and the Dominos
Title:    Layla
Source:    CD: The Best Of Eric Clapton (originally released on LP: Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs)
Writer:    Clapton/Gordon
Label:    Polydor/Chronicles (original label: Atco)
Year:    1970
    After the breakup of Blind Faith after one album, Eric Clapton set about forming a new band that would be more of a group effort than a collection of stars working together. To this end he found musicians that, although quite talented, were not particularly well-known outside of the British blues community. At first the group deliberately downplayed Clapton's presence in the band in order to stay focused on making music as a collective, although even in the beginning it was clear that Clapton would be the group's lead vocalist. The new group had trouble coming up with a name, however, and (half-jokingly) told one stage MC that their name was Del and the Dynamos. The MC misheard the name and introduced the new band as Derek and the Dominos. The name stuck. Meanwhile, Clapton had recently discovered a new band out of Atlanta, Georgia, calling itself the Allman Brothers band and was so impressed by guitarist Duane Allman that he asked him to join the Dominos. Allman, however, declined Clapton's offer, choosing to stick with the band he had co-founded with brother Gregg. Duane Allman did, however, sit in with Derek and the Dominos in the studio for several tracks on their upcoming double LP. One of the tracks where Allman's distinctive slide guitar stands out is the album's title song, Layla. The first half of the song itself was written by Clapton, while the second part (where the piano comes in) is credited to drummer Jim Gordon, although there is reason to believe it was actually written by Rita Coolidge, who was Gordon's girlfriend at the time.

Artist:    Geiger Von Müller
Title:    Interstellar Resorbtion
Source:    CD: Teddy Zur And The Kwands
Writer(s):    Geiger Von Müller
Label:    GVM
Year:    2018
    Geiger Von Müller is a London-based guitarist who has deconstructed the blues down to one of its most essential elements, slide guitar, and then explored from scratch what can be done with the instrument. The result is tracks like Interstellar Resorbtion, from the album Teddy Zur And The Kwands. The all-instrumental album is accompanied by the beginning of a science fiction story about the Kwands, a powerful race that kidnaps children's stuff toys, including one called Teddy Zur, to work in their factory as slaves. You'll have to find a copy of the CD itself to get a more detailed explanation.

Artist:    Sleep City Devils
Title:    A Twenty Dollar Orchestra
Source:    CD independently released by Ivan Perelli
Writer(s):    Ivan Perilli
Label:    none
Year:    2021
    As a result of our ongoing efforts to find new artists to feature on our occasional Advanced Psych segment, I was contacted by Ivan Perilli, who pointed me to non-compressed versions of several tracks from his latest project, Sleep City Devils. The one that really grabbed me was A Twenty Dollar Orchestra. Billed as "an experimental thing", Sleep City Devils (1 band, 3 imaginary musicians, 4 songs) is the latest in a series of projects that also includes Happy Graveyard Orchestra and Banana Planets. According to Perilli's website, he also "just plays the bass" with Djoolio.
    
Artist:    Claypool Lennon Delirium
Title:    Mr. Wright/Boomerang Baby
Source:    Monolith Of Phobos
Writer(s):    Claypool/Lennon
Label:    ATO
Year:    2016
    In 2015 Les Claypool's band, Primus, decided to take a year off after touring with Ghost Of A Sabre Tooth Tiger. During the tour Claypool had become friends with GOASTT's Sean Lennon, who also had no musical projects planned for the immediate future. The two of them, along with keyboardist/vocalist João Nogueira from Stone Giant and drummer Paulo Baldi of Cake, decided to pursue their mutual interest in " old-school" psychedelic and progressive rock and formed the Claypool Lennon Delirium. Their first album, Monolith Of Phobos, was released the following year. Although Claypool and Lennon share songwriting credits for the entire album, it is likely that Mr. Wright, which was also released as the album's third single, comes mostly from Claypool, while Boomerang Baby, which follows Mr. Wright on the album without a break between songs, has more of a Lennon feel to it. The Claypool Lennon Delirium has since released a four-song EP of late 1960s prog-rock covers and a second album, South Of Reality, that I have yet to score a copy of. Sean or Les, if you're reading this, can you send me one, pretty please, preferably on vinyl?

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    Fakin' It
Source:    CD: Collected Works (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Bookends)
Writer:    Paul Simon
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    Fakin' It, originally released as a single in 1967, was a bit of a departure for Simon And Garfunkel, sounding more like British psychedelic music than American folk-rock. The track starts with an intro that is similar to the false ending to the Beatles Strawberry Fields Forever; midway through the record the tempo changes drastically for a short spoken word section (name-dropping Mr. [Donovan] Leitch) that is slightly reminiscent of the bridge in Traffic's Hole In My Shoe. The song was later included on the 1968 LP Bookends.

Artist:     Traffic
Title:     Giving To You
Source:     CD: Heaven Is In Your Mind
Writer(s):     Winwood/Capaldi/Wood/Mason
Label:     Island (original label: United Artists)
Year:     1967
     Traffic's first LP, Mr. Fantasy, was released in late 1967 under the name Heaven Is In Your Mind by United Artists Records in the US. The reason for this is not entirely clear, although the label may have been expecting the song Heaven Is In Your Mind to be a hit and wanted to capitalize on the title. As it turns out the song didn't do much on the US charts, despite the lead vocals of Steve Winwood, whose voice had already graced two top 10 singles by the Spencer Davis Group (Gimme Some Lovin' and I'm A Man) earlier that year. More recently Island Records, which always had the UK rights to Traffic's material and has had US rights since the early 70s, decided to release CDs under both titles. Mr. Fantasy contains the mono mixes of the songs (plus mono bonus tracks), while Heaven Is In Your Mind has the stereo mixes of the same songs (with some slight differences in bonus tracks). One track that benefits from the stereo mix is Giving To You. Basically an instrumental, the song has a short lounge lizard style vocal introduction, along with some interesting spoken parts and stereo sound effects at the beginning and end of what is otherwise a rather tasty jam session.

Artist:    Amboy Dukes
Title:    Night Time
Source:    German import CD: The Amboy Dukes
Writer(s):    Nugent/Farmer
Label:    Repertoire (original label: Mainstream)
Year:    1967
    Although the Amboy Dukes were officially formed in Chicago in 1964, only founder and bandleader Ted Nugent was still with the group when they relocated to Detroit and recorded their first album for the Chicago-based Mainstream label. By then the lineup consisted of Nugent on lead guitar, John Drake on lead vocals, Steve Farmer on rhythm guitar, Dave Palmer on drums, Rick Lober on keyboards and Bill White on bass, with Nugent, Farmer and White providing backup vocals. Seven of the eleven songs on the first Amboy Dukes album were originals; most of those were written by Nugent and Farmer, including the song Night Time, which expresses a common feeling among young people of any decade.

Artist:     It's A Beautiful Day
Title:     White Bird
Source:     CD: It's A Beautiful Day
Writer:     David and Linda LaFlamme
Label:     San Francisco Sound (original label: Columbia)
Year:     1968
     It's A Beautiful Day is a good illustration of how a band can be a part of a trend without intending to be or even realizing that they are. In their case, they were actually tied to two different trends. The first one was a positive thing: it was now possible for a band to be considered successful without a top 40 hit, as long as their album sales were healthy. The second trend was not such a good thing; as was true for way too many bands, It's A Beautiful Day was sorely mistreated by its own management, in this case one Matthew Katz. Katz already represented both Jefferson Airplane and Moby Grape when he signed up It's A Beautiful Day in 1967. What the members of It's A Beautiful Day did not know at the time was that both of the aforementioned bands were trying to get out of their contracts with Katz. The first thing Katz did after signing It's A Beautiful Day was to ship the band off to Seattle to become house band at a club Katz owned called the San Francisco Sound. Unfortunately for the band, Seattle already had a sound of its own and attendance at their gigs was sparse. Feeling downtrodden and caged (and having no means of transportation to boot) classically-trained 5-string violinist and lead vocalist David LaFlamme and his keyboardist wife Linda LaFlamme translated those feelings into a song that is at once sad and beautiful: the classic White Bird. As an aside, Linda LaFlamme was not the female vocalist heard on White Bird. Credit for those goes to one Pattie Santos, the other female band member. To this day Katz owns the rights to It's A Beautiful Day's recordings, which have been reissued on CD on Katz's own San Francisco Sound label.

Artist:    David Axelrod
Title:    Urizen
Source:    British import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released on LP: Song Of Innocence)
Writer(s):    David Axelrod
Label:    Zonophone (original label: Capitol)
Year:    1968
    One of the more unique talents of the psychedelic era was a man named David Axelrod. Originally known as a jazz producer, working with such artists as Lou Rawls and Cannonball Adderly, Axelrod came to the attention of the rock world when he scored an entire Catholic Mass for a rock band, the Electric Prunes' Mass In F Minor, in 1968. The piece was sung entirely in Latin and featured mostly studio musicians playing the complicated score. The same year, Axelrod released Song Of Innocence, setting the words of poet William Blake to modern music. The opening track of Song Of Innocence is Urizen, named for one of Blake's key characters.

Artist:    Blossom Toes
Title:    What On Earth
Source:    Mono British import CD: Think I'm Going Weird (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Brian Gooding
Label:    Grapefruit (original label: Marmalade)
Year:    1968
    The Ingoes were a mid-60s English mod band that spent most of their time in Paris, returning to London in March of 1967 to find that the mod movement had given way to psychedelia. The band promptly responded by hiring a new drummer and changing their name to Blossom Toes. Their first single, What On Earth, appeared as the long side of a three-song single released in October of 1967. The following month a slightly different version of What On Earth was included on their debut LP, We Are Ever So Clean.

Artist:    Love
Title:    My Little Red Book
Source:    Mono German import CD: Love
Writer(s):    Bacharach/David
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 composer's Burt Bacharach and Hal David had in mind.

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2225 (starts 6/13/22)

 https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/426097-dc-2225

    This week we have one fairly long set bookended by two shorter sets, each with its own characteristics. The first set is all live performances that have never been featured on Rockin' in the Days of Confusion before this week. The second, longer set is on the quieter side...but definitely does not qualify as "soft rock" (which is an oxymoron in my book). The final set is a mixed bag of rock, jazz, and soul, with a couple of genuine hit singles thrown in.

Artist:    Humble Pie
Title:    Four Day Creep
Source:    CD: Performance Rockin' The Fillmore
Writer(s):    Ida Cox
Label:    A&M
Year:    1971
    The opening track on Humble Pie's 1971 live album Performance Rockin' The Fillmore is NOT an Ida Cox song called Four Day Creep, regardless of what it says on the label. I've heard the Ida Cox performance of Four Day Creep, and it is an entirely different song. Different melody. Different chord structure. Different lyrics. The only thing I can figure is that someone in the band really liked Ida Cox and wanted to see her get some royalty money, so they tacked her name and song title onto this track. I hope it worked.

Artist:    John Mayall
Title:    Wish You Were Mine
Source:    European import CD: Blues From Laurel Canyon (bonus track originally released on LP: Primal Solos)
Writer(s):    John Mayall
Label:    Decca (original US label: London)
Year:    Recorded 1968, released 1977
    Following the release of the LP Blues From Laurel Canyon in November 1968, John Mayall took his new band, consisting of himself, guitarist Mick Taylor, bassist Stephen Thompson and drummer Colin Allen on a European tour to promote the album. He took along a reel to reel recorder and taped this performance of Wish You Were Mine in Sweden in December of 1968. This bonus track was a bit of a surprise to me, as I bought the CD to replace a poorly remastered European import LP and was not expecting anything but the original album itself to be on the disc. 

Artist:    MC5
Title:    Kick Out The Jams
Source:    LP: Heavy Metal (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    MC5
Label:    Warner Special Products (original label: Elektra)
Year:    1970
    The MC5's association with Elektra Records was cut short when the band took out a full-page ad in a Detroit newspaper saying: "Stick Alive with the MC5, and F*** Hudson's!", prominently displaying the Elektra logo in the ad itself. Hudson's, the city's largest department store chain, had refused to stock the band's debut LP Kick Out The Jams because of the use of profanity throughout the album, including on the intro to the title track. In response to the ad, Hudson's then pulled ALL of Elektra's records from the shelves. Elektra responded by terminating their contract with the MC5. Before all this happened, however, the band had, at Elektra's insistence, recorded a modified version of the song's intro, with "Kick out the jams, brothers and sisters!" replacing the original wording. This version was released as a single in March of 1969 and appears on some album copies as well.

Artist:    Neil Young
Title:    Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Source:    CD: After The Gold Rush
Writer(s):    Neil Young
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1970
    In the wake of the massive success of the Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young album deja vu, each of the band members were given the opportunity to record solo albums. Neil Young, being the only member to have already released two solo LPs, chose to base his work on a screenplay by Dean Stockwell and Herb Bermann for a proposed film to be called After The Gold Rush. Although the film was never made, Young liked the title, and used it for his 1970 solo album. Two singles were released from the album, the first being Only Love Can Break Your Heart, which was a minor hit, reaching the #33 spot. Stephen Stills contributed backup vocals to the track.

Artist:    David Crosby
Title:    Song With No Words (Tree With No Leaves)
Source:    CD: If Only I Could Remember My Name
Writer(s):    David Crosby
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1971
    In 1971, following the success of the deja vu album, all four members of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young released solo albums. The most successful of these at the time was Neil Young's After The Gold Rush, followed by the album Stephen Stills. David Crosby's album, while somewhat overshadowed by Stills and Young's efforts, was nonetheless a commercial success, selling more than half a million copies and peaking at #12 on the album charts. Having listened to all four albums recently, I would actually rank If Only I Could Remember My Name as the best of the four, as the songs have aged amazingly well. Among the truly timeless tracks on the album is a piece called Song With No Words (Tree With No Leaves), which is basically an instrumental with wordless vocals. Thanks to Crosby's gift for writing compelling melody and harmony lines, it works.

Artist:    Mark Fry
Title:    The Witch
Source:    British Import CD: Love, Poetry And Revolution (originally released in Italy on LP: Dreaming With Alice)
Writer(s):    Mark Fry
Label:    Grapefruit (original label: IT)
Year:    1972
    One of the most obscure albums ever released, Dreaming With Alice is sometimes considered the ultimate example of acid folk. Recorded in 1971 by teenaged British art student Mark Fry and released only in Italy on RCA's IT subsidiary, the album includes a track called The Witch, which is described in the book Galactic Ramble as "one of the creepiest songs you'll ever hear". Personally I don't really find anything creepy about it at all, although the track itself is quite hypnotic and highly listenable.
        
Artist:    Genesis
Title:    After The Ordeal
Source:    CD: Selling England By The Pound
Writer(s):    Hackett/Rutherford
Label:    Rhino/Atlantic (original label: Charisma)
Year:    1973
    As was the case with all the early Genesis albums, all the songs on the 1973 LP Selling England By The Pound are credited to the entire band. More recently, however, the individual members of the band have been given credit for their specific contributions. For example, After The Ordeal, the four-minute long instrumental piece that precedes The Cinema Show, was actually written by guitarist Steve Hackett, with help from bassist Mike Rutherford. The piece almost got left off the album, but Hackett insisted that it be included. The original vinyl release of Selling England By The Pound, which runs in excess of 53 minutes, suffered from the limitations of LP vinyl records, which normally can only contain about 20 minutes per album side before sacrificing overall sound quality.

Artist:    Joni Mitchell
Title:    Shades Of Scarlett Conquering
Source:    LP: The Hissing Of Summer Lawns
Writer(s):    Joni Mitchell
Label:    Asylum
Year:    1975
    Joni Mitchell was always known for sophisticated lyrics, but after making her switch from Reprise to Asylum, her music began to take on a sophistication of its own. While still based in folk-rock, it increasingly incorporated jazz idioms to create a sound that was uniquely Mitchell's. This trend reached its fulfillment with the 1975 album The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, featuring complex songs such as Shades Of Scarlett Conquering. The song is a poetic observation of women who actually look to fictional character Scarlett O'Hara as a role model. If at first that seems a bit absurd, rest assured that I have met such women as recently as the 1990s.

Artist:    Robin Trower
Title:    Little Bit Of Sympathy
Source:    LP: Bridge Of Sighs
Writer(s):    Robin Trower
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1974
    Released in 1974, Bridge Of Sighs was the second solo LP by former Procol Harum guitarist Robin Trower. The album was Trower's commercial breakthrough, staying on the Billboard album charts for 31 weeks, peaking at #7. In addition to Trower, the album features James Dewar on lead vocals and bass, along with Reg Isidore on drums. The album was a staple of mid-1970s progressive rock radio, with several tunes, including album closer Little Bit Of Sympathy, becoming concert favorites.

Artist:    Mahavishnu Orchestra
Title:    Open Country Joy
Source:    45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s):    John McLaughlin
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1973
    John McLaughlin. Billy Cobham. Rick Laird. Jan Hammer. Jerry Goodman. All were destined to become jazz-rock fusion stars by the end of the decade, but in 1971 the term fusion, as applied to music, was not yet in use. Yet fusion was indeed the most appropriate word for the Mahavishnu Orchestra, whose five members came from five different countries: England, Ireland, Panama, Czechoslovakia (as it was then known) and the US, respectively. The members came from a variety of musical backgrounds as well. McLaughlin (who wrote all the group's material) and Cobham had met while working on Miles Davis' Bitches Brew album, while Goodman had recorded two albums with the Chicago-based Flock. The Mahavishnu Orchestra was known for its ability to quickly shift between music styles on such tracks as Open Country Joy, which appeared on the group's second LP, Birds of Fire, as well as being released as a single.The original band disbanded after only two albums, but McLaughlin would later revive the group with a different lineup in the 1980s.

Artist:    Stevie Wonder
Title:    Superstition
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Stevie Wonder
Label:    Tamla
Year:    1972
    Superstition was not originally meant to be a Stevie Wonder hit record. The song was actually written with the intention of giving it to guitarist Jeff Beck, in return for his participation of Wonder's Talking Book album. In fact, it was Beck that came up with the song's opening drum riff, creating, with Wonder, the first demo of the song. The plan was for Beck to release the song first as the lead single from the album Beck, Bogert & Appice. However, that album's release got delayed, and Motown CEO Barry Gordy Jr. insisted that Wonder go ahead and release his own version of the song first, as Barry saw the song as a potential #1 hit. It turned out Gordy was right, and Superstition ended up topping both the pop and soul charts in 1973, doing well in other countries as well. A 1986 live version of the song by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble continues to get a lot of airplay on classic rock radio.

Artist:    Ringo Starr
Title:    It Don't Come Easy
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Richard Starkey
Label:    Apple
Year:    1971
            Ringo Starr's most famous song started off as You Gotta Pay Your Dues, and was recorded in 30 takes in February of 1970. Ringo, however, was not satisfied with the still unfinished recording and decided to scrap the whole thing and start over on March 8th. By this time the song had been retitled It Don't Come Easy, and the song was not finished until October of that year. When the press first got wind of the recording sessions in March Apple Records issued a statement that there were no plans for the record to be released as a single. 13 months later, It Don't Come Easy hit the charts and managed to outperform John Lennon's Power To The People, Paul McCartney's Another Day and George Harrison's Bangla Desh, all of which were released at around the same time. Ringo still performs the song pretty much every time he makes a live appearance.
       

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2224 (starts 6/6/22)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/424931-pe-2224

    A little over a hundred years ago a Japanese department store came up with the idea of packaging a selection of items from the previous year anonymously and selling them at a discount. They called it fukubukuro, and it has since become a New Year's tradition among retailers in Japan and other places. In the 1960s, some US stores decided that this was a good way to get rid of 45 RPM records that had not been sold and could not be returned to the manufacturers. From a consumer's point of view this was a way of getting brand new unplayed records at a fraction of the price one would normally be expected to pay. The drawback, of course, was that you didn't know what you were getting until you had already paid for the "grab bag". Still, there was a good chance of getting at least one genuine hit that the store had simply ordered too many copies of, along with other lesser known tunes (some of which turned out to be pretty good). The point was you just didn't know until you actually opened your grab bag and got to see and hear what was in it. Stuck in the Psychedelic Era is like that, except that you have the option of checking out this blog to look at the playlist before you actually hear the show. So, just for this week, try not to look ahead, and experience the thrill of opening a musical grab bag.

Artist:    Shadows Of Knight
Title:    Hey Joe
Source:    LP: Back Door Men
Writer(s):    Billy Roberts
Label:    Sundazed (original label: Dunwich)
Year:    1966
    Possibly the greatest garage-rock album of all is the second Shadows Of Knight LP, Back Door Men. Released in 1966, the album features virtually the same lineup as their debut LP, Gloria. Unlike many of their contemporaries, the Shadows were capable of varying their style somewhat, going from their trademark Chicago blues-influenced punk to what can only be described as early hard rock with ease. Like many bands of the time, they recorded a fast version of Billy Roberts' Hey Joe (although they credited it to Chet Powers on the label). The Shadows version, however, is a bit longer than the rest, featuring an extended guitar break by Joe Kelley, who had switched from bass to lead guitar midway through the recording of the Gloria album, replacing Warren Rogers, when it was discovered that Kelley was by far the more talented guitarist (Rogers was moved over to bass). Incidentally, despite the album's title and the Shadows' penchant for recording classic blues tunes, the band did not record a version of Howlin' Wolf's Back Door Man. The Blues Project and the Doors, however, did.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    If 6 Was 9
Source:    CD: Easy Rider (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Axis: Bold As Love)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    Prior to 1967 producers and artists devoted most of their mixing time to working on the monoraul masters, with the stereo mixes usually done as a rush job after the "real" mix was finished. Starting with the album Axis: Bold As Love, however, Jimi Hendrix, along with producer Chas Chandler and engineer Eddie Kramer, began using stereo as an artist's tool, creating soundscapes that were designed to utilize the entire area around the listener, as opposed to coming from one specific point. After working late into the night on the mix for If 6 Was 9, Hendrix took the stereo master tape with him, but left it in a taxicab (it was never found). The three of them spent several hours trying to recreate the mix they had done, but were unable to get a final version that they were satisfied with. At that point bassist Noel Redding reminded them that he had taken a rough copy of the original tape home with him a few days earlier. It was this copy that was finally used on the album.

Artist:          Vanilla Fudge
Title:        Come By Day, Come By Night
Source:    Mono CD: The Complete Atco Singles (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Mark Stein
Label:     Atco
Year:        1968
       The Vanilla Fudge version of  the Supremes' You Keep Me Hangin' On was first released as a single in 1967, but tanked before it could hit the top 60. In 1968 the song was re-released with a different B side and made the top 20. That secondB side, Come By Day, Come By Night, was written by keyboardist Mark Stein, and was never released on a Vanilla Fudge album. The song is now available on a CD called The Complete Atco Singles.

Artist:    Thunderclap Newman
Title:    Something In The Air
Source:    Stereo British import 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    John "Speedy" Keen
Label:    Track (original label: Marmalade)
Year:    1969
    Thunderclap Newman was actually the creation of the Who's Pete Townshend, who assembled a bunch of studio musicians to work with drummer (and former Who roadie) John "Speedy" Keen. Keen had written Armenia City In The Sky, the opening track on The Who Sell Out, and Townshend set up the studio project to return the favor. Joining Keen were 15-year-old guitarist Jimmy McCulloch (who would eventually join Paul McCartney's Wings before dying of a heroin overdose in 1979), studio engineer Andy "Thunderclap" Newman (who had worked with Pink Floyd, among others) on piano, and Townshend himself on bass. Following the success of Something In The Air, the group recorded an album, but sales were disappointing and the band members soon went their separate ways.

Artist:    Pretty Things
Title:    Midnight To Six Man
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Taylor/May
Label:    Rhino (original label: Fontana)
Year:    1965
    Once upon a time in London there was a band called Little Boy Blue And The Blue Boys. Well, it wasn't really so much a band as a bunch of schoolkids jamming in guitarist Dick Taylor's parents' garage on a semi-regular basis. In addition to Taylor, the group included classmate Mick Jagger and eventually another guitarist by the name of Keith Richards. When yet another guitarist, Brian Jones, entered the picture, the band, which was still an amateur outfit, began calling itself the Rollin' Stones. Taylor switched from guitar to bass to accomodate Jones, but when the Stones decided to go pro in late 1962, Taylor opted to stay in school. It wasn't long, however, before Taylor, now back on guitar, showed up on the scene with a new band called the Pretty Things. Fronted by vocalist Phil May, the Things were rock and roll bad boys like the Stones, except more so. Their fifth single, Midnight To Six Man, sums up the band's attitude and habits. Unfortunately, the song barely made the British top 50 and was totally ignored by US radio stations.           
        
Artist:    Bee Gees
Title:    I Don't Know Why I Bother With Myself
Source:    Mono LP: Rare Precious And Beautiful (originally released in Australia on LP: Spicks And Specks)
Writer(s):    Robin Gibb
Label:    Atco (original label: Spin)
Year:    1966 (US release: 1968)
    The Bee Gees were formed in 1958 in Redcliffe, Queensland, Australia by brothers Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb, whose family had recently immigrated from Manchester, England. The young boys (Barry was 11 and fraternal twins Robin and Maurice were 8) had already been singing together for about a year when they immigrated, and soon came to the attention of Brisbane disc jockey Bill Gates and dirt track driver/promoter Bill Goode, who had hired them to ride on the back of a flatbed truck and sing between races, collecting money that would be thrown down to them by the crowd. It was Gates (no relation to the Microsoft guy), who, inspired by the fact that he, Goode and Barry Gibb shared the same initials, came up with the name BGs in the first place. By 1960 they were making appearances on local TV shows and in 1963 were signed to Leedon Records, using the spelled out name Bee Gees for the first time. The group released their first LP in late 1965, The Bee Gees Sing and Play 14 Barry Gibb Songs. Only five of the songs on the album were new recordings, with the remainder having been released as singles over the previous three years. The album was not a commercial success, however, and the Bee Gees soon found their contract being transferred to the new independent Spin label. About a year later they released their first hit single, Spicks And Specks, which went to the #4 spot on the Australian charts and led to an album of the same name. Although Barry Gibb continued to be the group's primary songwriter, Spicks And Specks did include I Don't Know Why I Bother With Myself, the first song written by Robin Gibb, who also sang lead vocal on the tune. Early in 1967, the band decided to return to England, where they were signed to a five-year contract with the Polydor label (and Atco in the US) by Robert Stigwood. Their next LP, Bee Gees 1st, was an international success, hitting the top 10 on both the British and American album charts and spawning three top 20 singles.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Ruby Tuesday
Source:    LP: Between The Buttons
Writer(s):    Jagger/Richards
Label:    London
Year:    1967
    One of the most durable songs in the Rolling Stones catalog, Ruby Tuesday was originally intended to be the B side of their 1967 single Let's Spend The Night Together. Many stations, however, balked at the subject matter of the A side and began playing Ruby Tuesday instead, taking it to the #1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Although credited to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, there is evidence that Ruby Tuesday was actually written by Richards with considerable help from Brian Jones.

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

Artist:    Vagrants
Title:    I Can't Make A Friend
Source:    Mono LP: I Can't Make A Friend 1965-1968 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    (Storch/Martin)
Label:    Light In The Attic (original label: Vanguard)
Year:    1966
            The Vagrants were one of several "blue-eyed soul" bands from New York's Long Island area, and were best known for their regular appearances at The Action House in Island Park, one of the late 60's most popular rock clubs on Long Island. The group consisted of Peter Sabatino on vocals, harmonica, and tambourine, Leslie Weinstein on vocals and guitar, his brother Larry on vocals and bass guitar, Jerry Storch (also known as Jay Storch) on organ, and Roger Mansour on drums. They released their first single, Oh Those Eyes, on the Southern Sounds label in 1965, and even performed the song in a beach party film called Disk-o-Tek Holiday. The following year the band signed its first official record contract with Vanguard Records, a respected folk/jazz label not known for issuing what was then called "pop" music. The group released one single for Vanguard,  I Can't Make A Friend, which was co-written by Storch, before switching over to the Atco label for a series of singles over a period of about two years. Following the breakup of the Vagrants, Leslie Weistein changed his name to Leslie West, and along with the band's producer, Felix Pappalardi, formed his own band, Mountain.
        
Artist:    Doors
Title:    Light My Fire
Source:    CD: The Doors
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    Once in a while a song comes along that totally blows you away the very first time you hear it. The Doors' Light My Fire was one of those songs. I liked it so much that I immediately went out and bought the 45 RPM single. Not long after that I heard the full-length version of the song from the first Doors album and was blown away all over again.

Artist:     Blue Cheer
Title:     Out Of Focus
Source:     Dutch import LP: Vincebus Eruptum
Writer:     Dickie Peterson
Label:     Philips
Year:     1968
     With the possible exception of the Grateful Dead (when they were using the Owsley-designed sound system), the loudest band to come out of San Francisco was Blue Cheer. The album Vincebus Eruptum, highlighted by the band's feedback-drenched version of Eddie Cochrane's Summertime Blues, is considered by some to be the first heavy metal album ever recorded. My own favorite track on the album is Out Of Focus, which opens side 2 of the LP and was issued as the B side of Summertime Blues.

Artist:    James Gang
Title:    Wrapcity In English/Fred
Source:    CD: Yer' Album
Writer:    Joe Walsh
Label:    MCA (original label: Bluesway)
Year:    1969
    The only rock record to ever be released on the Bluesway label was Yer' Album, the debut LP by Cleveland's James Gang. Featuring Joe Walsh on Guitar, Tom Criss (who would leave the band after this album) on bass and Dale Peters on drums, the group was one of the first "power trios" of the 70s. Unlike the group's later efforts, Yer' Album included cover tunes written by such diverse composers as Stephen Stills, Jerry Ragavoy and Jeff Beck, as well as a smattering of original compositions. One of those originals was Fred, a Walsh song that was described in the liner notes as "and it's straaaaaaaange." It is preceded by a short fully orchestrated Walsh instrumental called Wrapcity In English that tracks directly into Fred.

Artist:    Nazz (Alice Cooper)
Title:    Lay Down And Die, Goodbye
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Smith/Cooper/Dunaway/Buxton/Bruce
Label:    Very Record
Year:    1967
    Formed as a parody band in Phoenix, Arizona called the Earwigs in 1964, the band that would eventually be known as Alice Cooper underwent several name changes as they evolved into one of the most popular bands of the early 1970s. One of those names was Nazz, inspired no doubt by the Yardbirds track The Nazz Is Blue. They released one single under that name before discovering that there was already a band called Nazz making records in Philadelphia, prompting them to make their final name change. The B side of that single was Lay Down And Die, Goodbye, a song that would be re-recorded for their 1970 LP Easy Action.

Artist:    Immediate Family
Title:    Rubiyat
Source:    Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on CD: What A Way To Come Down)
Writer(s):    Kovacs/Khayyam
Label:    Rhino (original label: Big Beat)
Year:    Recorded 1967, released 1997
    The members of the Immediate Family hailed from the city of Concord, a conservative suburb east of San Francisco bay. They didn't actually make music in their hometown, however. Instead they practiced at the home of organist Kriss Kovacs's mother Judy Davis (the vocal coach to the stars who numbered such diverse talents as Grace Slick, Barbra Streisand and even Frank Sinatra among her pupils). The band was able to get the backing to lay down some tracks at Golden State Recorders (the top studio in the area at the time), but reportedly lost their record deal due to emotional instability on the part of Kovacs. The song Rubiyat is an adaptation of the Rubiyat Of Omar Khayyam. Ambitious to be sure, but done well enough to make one wonder what it could have led to.

Artist:    Aretha Franklin
Title:    Chain Of Fools
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    Don Covay
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1968
    Since pretty much everyone knows who Arethat Franklin was, I'll instead focus on the guy who wrote Chain Of Fools, Donald James Randolph, who was known by the stage name Don Covay. Covay got his start as a member of the Little Richard Revue, working in the dual roles of opening act and chaffeur for Little Richard himself. Pretty much from the start he was more successful as a songwriter than as a singer. For example, his first charted single, Pony Time, only made it as far as the #60 spot on the Billboard pop chart, but later became a #1 hit for Chubby Checker. Another example was Mercy, Mercy, which is now associated with the Rolling Stones, who covered the tune on their 1965 LP Out Of Our Heads. Probably the biggest hit Covay had as a songwriter was Aretha Franklin's Chain Of Fools, which went to the #2 spot on the pop charts and all the way to the top of the R&B charts in 1968. Ironically, Chain Of Fools was one of Covay's earliest compositions, written in 1953 while he was a teenager singing in a gospel group with his brothers and sisters.

Artist:     Who
Title:     Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde
Source:     Mono Canadian import CD: Magic Bus: The Who On Tour (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    John Entwhistle
Label:     MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:     1968
     The Who were blessed with not one, but two top-notch songwriters: Pete Townshend and John Entwhistle. Whereas Townsend's songs ranged from tight pop songs to more serious works such as Tommy, Entwistle's tunes had a slightly twisted outlook, dealing with such topics as crawly critters (Boris the Spider), imaginary friends (Whiskey Man) and even outright perversion (Fiddle About). Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde was originally released in the US as the B side to Call Me Lightning. Both songs were included on the Magic Bus album, which, to my knowledge has never been issued on CD in the US.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Someone's Coming
Source:    Mono CD: The Who Sell Out (bonus track originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    John Entwhistle
Label:    Track (original label: Decca)
Year:    1968
    Some songs just get no respect. First released in 1967 in the UK as the B side of I Can See For Miles, John Alec Entwistle's Someone's Coming got left off the US release entirely. It wasn't until the release of the Magic Bus single (and subsequent LP) in 1968 that the tune appeared on US vinyl, and then, once again as a B side. The Magic Bus album, however, was never issued on CD in the US, although it has been available as a Canadian import for several years. Finally, in 1995 the song found a home on a US CD as a bonus track on The Who Sell Out.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Our Love Was, Is
Source:    Canadian import CD: Magic Bus (originally released on LP: The Who Sell Out)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:    1967
    The Who's late-1967 album, The Who Sell Out, is best known for its faux commercials and actual jingles lifted from the British pirate station Radio London. Hidden among the commercial hype, however, are some of the band's best tunes, including Our Love Was, a song that was one of the few LP tracks to be included on the Who's Magic Bus compilation album.
 
Artist:    Crescent Six
Title:    And Then
Source:    Mono CD: A Heavy Dose Of Lite Psych (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Gregory Ferrera
Label:    Arf! Arf! (original label: Rust)
Year:    1965
    One of the earliest psychedelic tracks was a single called And Then by New Jersey's Crescent Six. Virtually nothing else is known about the record, which was released on New York's Rust Records label.

Artist:    Music Machine
Title:    Masculine Intuition
Source:    45 RPM single B side (promo copy)
Writer:    Sean Bonniwell
Label:    Original Sound
Year:    1966
    If you take out the cover songs that Original Sound Records added to the album without the band's knowledge or approval, Turn On The Music Machine has to be considered one of the best LPs of 1966. Not that the covers were badly done, but they were intended to be used for lip synching on a local TV show and were included without the knowledge or approval of the band, and that's never a good thing. Every one of the Sean Bonniwell originals on the other hand, combines strong musical structure and intelligent lyrics with musicianship far surpassing the average garage band. This is especially true in the case of Masculine Intuition, which was also issued as the B side of the band's second single.

Artist:    Notes From The Underground
Title:    Where Does Love Go
Source:    Mono British import CD: The Berkeley EPs (originally released on EP: Notes From The Underground)
Writer(s):    Mandell/Sokolow/O'Connor
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Changes)
Year:    1967
    After Country Joe And The Fish became too popular in San Francisco to keep performing regularly at Berkeley's Jabberwock a new band called Notes From The Underground stepped in to fill the void. The group, consisting of guitarists Fred Sokolow and Mark Mandel, along with bassist Mike O'Connor, pianist Jim Work and drummer Peter Oswalt soon came to the attention of Chris Strachwich, founder of Arhoolie Records, who invited the group to the local Sierra Sound studios to record seven songs. Four of these, including Where Does Love Go, were released on an EP on Arhoolies subsidiary label Changes in 1967.

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:    Pentangle
Title:    Sally, Go 'Round The Roses
Source:    LP: The Big Ball (originally released on LP: Basket Of Light)
Writer(s):    Sanders/Stevens
Label:    Warner Brothers (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1969
    Although it was a top 5 hit in the US in autumn of 1963, the original Jaynetts version of Sally, Go 'Round The Roses did not make the British charts at all. In fact, several British artists covered the song over the next few years, but it wasn't until 1969, when Pentangle included it on their Basket Of Light LP, that the song became well known in the UK.

Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    A Song For Jeffrey
Source:    LP: This Was
Writer(s):    Ian Anderson
Label:    Chrysalis (original US label: Reprise)
Year:    1968
    Jethro Tull's second single (and first European hit) was A Song For Jeffrey from their debut LP, This Was. The Jeffrey in the song title is Jeffrey Hammond, who, according to the liner notes, was "one of us, though he doesn't play anything". The notes go on to say he "makes bombs and stuff". In fact, Hammond would replace bassist Glen Cornick a few albums later and remain with the group for several years. The song itself proved popular enough that when the band compiled their first Anthology album, Living In The Past, A Song For Jeffrey was chosen to open the album.

Artist:    Dion
Title:    Abraham, Martin And John
Source:    CD: Songs Of Protest (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Dick Holler
Label:    Rhino (original label: Laurie)
Year:    1968
    Although sometimes characterized as a protest song, Dion DiMucci's 1968 hit Abraham, Martin And John is really a tribute to three famous Americans, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy (with a reference to the recently-assassinated Bobby Kennedy included in the final verse of the song). Most people in the business saw Dion, perhaps the most successful doo-wop artist of all time, as being near the end of his career by 1967, although he was one of only two rock musicians included on the cover collage of the Beatles' 1967 LP Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band beside the Beatles themselves (the other being Bob Dylan).  In April of 1968, however, Dion experienced what he later called "a powerful religious experience" which led to him approaching his old label, Laurie Records, for a new contract. The label agreed on the condition that he record Abraham, Martin And John. The song, written by Dick Holler (who also wrote, strangely enough, Snoopy vs. The Red Baron), ended up being one of Dion's biggest hits and led to the revitalization of his career.

Artist:    Pink Floyd
Title:    Remember A Day
Source:    CD: A Saucerful Of Secrets
Writer(s):    Rick Wright
Label:    EMI (original label: Tower)
Year:    1968
    Trivia question: Which Pink Floyd album never made the US album charts? The answer:  A Saucerful Of Secrets, the band's second LP. Like the band's debut LP, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, A Saucerful Of Secrets was released on Capitol's tax-writeoff Tower subsidiary and received virtually no promotion from the label. By 1968 it was becoming increasingly clear that Syd Barrett was going off the deep end due to ongoing mental health issues exacerbated by heavy use of hallucinogenics and it's reasonable to assume the label expected to band to soon dissolve. After one performance where Barrett did nothing but stand and strum a single chord for the entire set the rest of the band made a decision to bring in Barrett's childhood friend David Gilmour as their new guitarist. In all likelihood this decision saved the band itself, as A Saucerful Of Secrets ended up being the only Pink Floyd album to include both Barrett and Gilmour. Meanwhile, other band members were stepping up their own contributions, Rick Wright's Remember A Day being a prime example.

Artist:    Moby Grape
Title:    Miller's Blues
Source:    LP: Wow
Writer(s):    Miller/Mosely
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1968
    Moby Grape's second album, Wow, was musically solid, but suffered from a bad case of over-production, with an abundance of overdubs and studio effects that actually hurt, rather than enhanced, the music itself. One track that managed to, for the most part, avoid the excesses was Miller's Blues, which appeared near the end of side two. As the title impies, the tune is a straight blues number with lots of tasty guitar licks from Jerry Miller. I'm kind of surprised it appeared on Wow itself rather than on the Grape Jam album, which, packaged together with Wow, was sold for one dollar more than the standard LP price.

Artist:    Cream
Title:    I Feel Free
Source:    LP: Fresh Cream
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown
Label:    Atco
Year:    1966
    After an unsuccessful debut single (Wrapping Paper), Cream scored a bona-fide hit in the UK with their follow-up, I Feel Free. As was the case with nearly every British single at the time, the song was not included on Fresh Cream, the band's debut LP. In the US, however, hit singles were commonly given a prominent place on albums, and the US version of Fresh Cream actually opens with I Feel Free. To my knowledge the song, being basically a studio creation, was never performed live by the band.

Artist:         Cream
Title:        Sunshine Of Your Love
Source:      CD: The Best Of 60s Supergroups (originally released on LP: Disraeli Gears)
Writer(s):    Bruce/Brown/Clapton
Label:    Priority (original label: Atco)
Year:        1967
        Although by mid-1967 Cream had already released a handful of singles in the UK, Sunshine Of Your Love, featuring one of the most recognizable guitar rifts in the history of rock, was their first song to make a splash in the US. Although only moderately successful in edited form on AM Top-40 radio, the full-length LP version of the song received extensive airplay on the more progressive FM stations, and turned Disraeli Gears into a perennial best-seller. Clapton and Bruce constantly trade off lead vocal lines throughout the song. The basic compatibility of their voices is such that it is sometimes difficult to tell exactly who is singing what line. Clapton's guitar solo (which was almost entirely edited out of the AM version) set a standard for instrumental breaks in terms of length and style that became a hallmark for what is now known as "classic rock."

Artist:     Cream
Title:     N.S.U.
Source:     LP: Fresh Cream
Writer:     Jack Bruce
Label:     Atco
Year:     1966
     The US version of Fresh Cream starts off the with powerful one-two punch of I Feel Free and N.S.U. Although I Feel Free was a purely studio creation that never got performed live, N.S.U. became a staple of the band's concert performances, and was even performed by various other bands that bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce was a member of over the years.
 

 

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2224 (starts 6/6/22)

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/424930-dc-2224

    This week we allow Quicksilver Messenger Service to answer a music question that dates back to the 1950s, and then progress forward through the year 1974. As a bonus we have the original Hot Chocolate version of the song that made the members of a band called Stories one-hit wonders.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    The WASP (Texas Radio And The Big Beat)
Source:    CD: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released on LP: L.A. Woman)
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra/Rhino
Year:    1971
    Following a downward slide starting in 1968, the Doors ended their original run on a high note in 1971 with the L.A. Woman album. Among the strong blues-based tracks on the album is The WASP (Texas Radio And The Big Beat), an anthemic number that ranks up with other Doors album classics such as Five To One, When The Music's Over and The End. Big Beat indeed.

Artist:    Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title:    Who Do You Love Suite
Source:    LP: Happy Trails
Writer(s):    McDaniel/Duncan/Elmore/Cippolina/Freiberg
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1969
    Quick, what was the last rock album released by Capitol using its iconic "rainbow" label before switching over to that horrid light green one that all the early Grand Funk Railroad albums used? If you answered Quicksilver Messenger Service's Happy Trails album, you'd be wrong...but just barely (actually the answer is Gandalf, which was the very next album released after Happy Trails). Happy Trails is dominated by a 25 minute long rendition of Bo Diddley's Who Do You Love recorded live at either the Fillmore East or Fillmore West, or maybe even a combination of both. The performance is divided into continuous sections, each of which is a variation on the song's basic riff as interpreted by (in order), guitarist Gary Duncan, drummer Greg Elmore, guitarist John Cipollina and bassist David Freibereg, although Elmore's segment is more of an audience participation piece. Quicksilver was one of the most popular live acts during the heyday of the late 1960s San Francisco music scene, and this recording demonstrates why.

Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    Speed King (Dutch single "piano version")
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Blackmore/Gillan/Glover/Lord/Paice
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1970
    The live version of Speed King, a song that originally appeared on the album Deep Purple In Rock, was taken from a 1970 performance on the BBC series In Concert. The album Deep Purple In Concert itself was not released until 1980, but an edited version of Speed King was issued as the B side of the Black Night single in the US in 1970. The song's lyrics, the first written for Deep Purple by vocalist Ian Gillan, reference several Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Elvis Presley songs. The Dutch version of the single heard here differs from other versions in that it has piano overdubs in strategic places.

Artist:    Rory Gallagher
Title:    Can't Believe It's True
Source:    British import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Rory Gallagher)
Writer(s):    Rory Gallagher
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1971
    In addition to his obvious prowess on guitar, Rory Gallagher was an accomplished saxophonist (although he largely abandoned the instrument in the mid-1970s). Excellent examples of both his guitar and saxophone work can be found on Can't Believe It's True, the final and longest track on Gallagher's first solo album, recorded in 1971. Accompanying Gallagher on the album were drummer Wilgar Campbell and bass guitarist Gerry McAvoy. Gallagher had set up practice sessions with Campbell and McAvoy, as well as former Jimi Hendrix Experience members Mitch Mitchell and Noel Redding following the breakup of his original band, Taste, but ultimately decided to form a power trio with the two Belfast natives for his solo debut.
     
Artist:    Little Feat
Title:    Cold, Cold, Cold
Source:    CD: Sailin' Shoes
Writer(s):    Lowell George
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1972
    Little Feat's second album, Sailin' Shoes, continued the band's move toward the unique sound that would blossom with their next LP, Dixie Chicken. Already, original compositions such as Cold, Cold, Cold were an indication of Lowell George's songwriting inclinations.

Artist:    Eagles
Title:    Outlaw Man
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    David Blue
Label:    Asylum
Year:    1973
    Although all the members of the Eagles are known for the songwriting abilities, some of the earliest singles were actually cover songs, including Peaceful Easy Feeling (by Jack Tempchin) and Outlaw Man (by David Blue). Blue was a recent addition to the Asylum roster, making him labelmates with the Eagles, and Outlaw Man was an obvious choice for inclusion on an album meant to have a modernized wild west theme. The song itself is a first person account of the life of an outlaw, with ambiguous enough lyrics to make it applicable to current times as well as the obvious 19th century.

Artist:    Steely Dan
Title:    Monkey In Your Soul
Source:    LP: Pretzel Logic
Writer(s):    Bekcer/Fagen
Label:    MCA (original label: ABC)
Year:    1974
    By the mid-1980s, it was fairly common for a band to consist of a couple of core members supplemented by various support musicians on their albums, often with an entirely different set up backup musicians joining them for live performances. In the early 1970s, however, such a thing was looked at as fakery of tht worst sort, thanks in large part to the Monkees, whose credibity as a band was virtually destroyed when it became known that the instrumental tracks on their first two chart-topping albums had been played entirely by studio musicians. Because of this, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, a pair of songwriters contracted to ABC records whose music was generally considered too complex for their labelmates, decided to form their own band, calling it Steely Dan. Even their earliest albums featured contributions from studio musicians, however, and by the end of 1974 Steely Dan had ceased to be an active touring band altogether. The 1974 LP Pretzel Logic was the last to feature former drummer Jim Hodder (who only provided background vocals on one song) and guitarists Jeff Baxter and Denny Dias, as official members of the band. Songs like Monkey In Your Soul, the final track on Pretzel Logic, featured contributions from over a dozen studio musicians, including drummer Jim Gordon, who had been a member of Derek And The Dominos and had played with Joe Cocker on the Mad Dogs And Englismen tour.

Artist:    Hot Chocolate
Title:    Brother Louie
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Brown/Wilson
Label:    Rak
Year:    1973
    The British soul band Hot Chocolate recorded the original version of the song Brother Louie in early 1973. Co-written and sung by band members Errol Brown and Tony Wilson, the song peaked at #7 on the UK charts. A few months later the song was covered by an American band called Stories, who took Brother Louie to the top of the US charts in the summer of 1973. Personally I prefer the British original.