Artist: Left Banke
Title: Desiree
Source: Mono CD: More Nuggets
Writer(s): Brown/Feher
Label: Rhino (original label: Smash)
Year: 1967
For a while it looked as if the Left Banke would emerge as one of the most important bands of the late 60s. They certainly got off to a good start, with back-to-back top 10 singles Walk Away Renee and Pretty Ballerina. But then bandleader Michael Brown and Smash Records made a serious misstep, issuing a Brown solo effort called Ivy Ivy utilizing studio musicians and trying to pass it off as a Left Banke record. The other band members refused to go along with the charade and sent out letters to their fan club membership denouncing the single. The outraged fans, in turn, threatened to boycott any radio stations that played the single. Brown and the rest of the band, meanwhile, managed to patch things up enough to record a new single, Desiree, and released the song in late 1967. By then, however, radio stations were leery of playing anything with the words Left Banke on the label, and the song failed to chart, despite being an outstanding single. Brown left the Left Banke soon after.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Fixing A Hole
Source: CD: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1967
Until 1967 every Beatle album released in the US had at least one hit single included that was not on the British version of the album (or was never released as a single in the UK). With the release of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, however, the track lineup became universal, making it the first Beatle album released in the US to not have a hit single on it. Nonetheless, the importance (and popularity) of the album was such that virtually every song on it got top 40 airplay at one time or another, although some tracks got more exposure than others. One of the many tracks that falls in between these extremes is Fixing A Hole, a tune by Paul McCartney that features the harpsichord prominently.
Artist: Turtles
Title: The Walking Song
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Kaylan/Nichols
Label: White Whale
Year: 1967
When they weren't recording hit songs by professional songwriters, the Turtles were busy developing their own songwriting talents, albeit in a somewhat satirical direction. One early example is The Walking Song, which contrasts the older generation's obsession with material goods with a "stop and smell the roses" approach favored by the song's protagonist. This tongue-in-cheek style of writing would characterize the later careers of two of the band members, Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan, who, after performing with the Mothers at the Fillmore would become known as the Phlorescent Leech (later Flo) and Eddie.
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 a city known for drawing wannabes from across the world, this local band's members were all native L.A.ins. 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 to record as a single by their producer (Love Minus Zero) and allowed to write their own B side. In this case that B side was Too Many People, written by bassist Jim Pons and guitarist Bill Rhinehart. 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: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Out Of My Mind
Source: CD: Buffalo Springfield
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
There are distinct advantages in having a unique vehicle of your own. Take the case of Neil Young, who had his own hearse. Young had moved to Los Angeles in 1966 in the hope of forming a band with Stephen Stills, whom he had met a few years before in Toronto. Unfortunately, the two were unable to locate each other and Young was on the verge of returning to Canada when Stills and his new bandmates spotted Young's hearse on a busy L.A. boulevard. After hanging a u-turn, the group was able to get Young's attention and Buffalo Springfield was formed. The band recorded its first LP, Buffalo Springfield, that fall, releasing it in time for Christmas. Although Young had made considerable contributions to the album as a songwriter, people at the record company thought his voice was too weird and insisted that Richie Furay provide the lead vocals for the majority of Young's songs. One of the two tracks on the album to actually feature a Young lead vocal is Out Of My Mind, which features backup vocals by both Stills and Furay.
Artist: Seeds
Title: The Wind Blows Her Hair
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Saxon/Bigelow
Label: Rhino (original label: GNP Crescendo)
Year: 1967
The Wind Blows Her Hair is actually one of the Seeds' better tracks. Unfortunately, by the time it was released the whole concept of Flower Power (which the Seeds were intimately tied to) had become yesterday's news and the single went nowhere.
Artist: Steppenwolf
Title: The Pusher
Source: CD: Born To Be Wild / A Retrospective (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf)
Writer(s): Hoyt Axton
Label: MCA (original label: Dunhill)
Year: 1968
While AM radio was all over Born To Be Wild in 1968 (taking the song all the way to the # 2 spot on the top 40 charts), the edgier FM stations were playing heavier tunes from the debut Steppenwolf album. The most controversial (and thus most popular) of these heavier tunes was Hoyt Axton's The Pusher, with it's repeated use of the line "God damn the Pusher." Axton himself did not record the song until 1971, at which point the song was already burned indelibly in the public consciousness as a Steppenwolf tune.
Artist: Eire Apparent
Title: The Clown
Source: CD: Psychedelic Pop (originally released on LP: Sunrise)
Writer: Stewart
Label: BMG/RCA/Buddah (original label: Buddah)
Year: 1969
Eire Apparent was a band from Northern Ireland that got the attention of Chas Chandler, former bassist for the Animals in late 1967. Chandler had been managing Jimi Hendrix since he had discovered him playing in a club in New York a year before, bringing him back to England and introducing him to Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell, who along with Hendrix would become the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Despite Eire Apparent having almost no recording experience, Chandler put them on the bill as the opening act for the touring Experience. This led to Hendrix producing the band's first and only album, Belfast, in 1968, playing on at least three tracks, including The Clown.
Artist: Butterfield Blues Band
Title: Good Morning Little Schoolgirl
Source: Mono LP: What's Shakin'
Writer(s): Sonny Boy Williamson
Label: Sundazed (original label: Elektra)
Year: 1966
In 1965 Elektra Records, then known as a folk and blues label, put out a sampler LP called Folk Song '65. It was an unexpected success, due in large part to the inclusion of a song called Born In Chicago by a new group called the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. The band itself had yet to release any records of its own; in fact they ended up scrapping the sessions that Born In Chicago had come from, electing to first try recording a live set, then a whole new set of studio recordings before releasing their 1966 debut LP. The following year Elektra decided to follow up Folk Song '65 with an album called What's Shakin'. What's Shakin' was an interesting mix of unreleased tracks from the Elektra vaults and new recordings made especially for the LP. Among the vault tracks were five songs from the early Butterfield sessions, including their take on the Sonny Boy Williamson tune Good Morning Little Schoolgirl.
Artist: Otis Redding
Title: I've Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now)
Source: LP: Historic Performances Recorded At The Monterey International Pop Festival
Writer(s): Redding/Butler
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
Although his name had appeared on the lower reaches of the Billboard Hot 100 and R&B charts since 1962, it wasn't until the release of I've Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now) in 1965 that Redding began to get noticed by the public at large. The song hit # 2 on the R&B chart and just barely missed making the top 20 on the mainstream chart. Two years later Redding performed the song as part of his set at the Monterey International Pop Festival, backed by Booker T and the MGs, along with the Bar-Kays horn section. Less than a year later a plane crash would claim the lives of Redding and the Bar-Kays, just as the singer was achieving his greatest success.
Artist: Traffic
Title: Giving To You
Source: Mono CD: Mr. Fantasy (originally released as LP: Heaven Is In Your Mind)
Writer(s): Capaldi/Mason/Winwood/Wood
Label: Island (original label: United Artists)
Year: 1968
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 of the tracks with more noticable differences is Giving To You, which includes a short lounge-lizard style vocal intro on the mono version that is missing entirely from the stereo mix. The mono track also leaves off the scat vocals heard at the end of the stereo version of the tune.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: It's No Secret
Source: LP: Bless Its Pointed Little Head
Writer(s): Marty Balin
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1969
Jefferson's first single, It's No Secret, was sped up considerably for this live performance included on the band's 1969 live LP, Bless It's Pointed Little Head.
Artist: Chocolate Watchband
Title: Sweet Young Thing
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ed Cobb
Label: Rhino (original label: Uptown)
Year: 1967
There is actually very little on vinyl that captures the flavor of how the Chocolate Watchband actually sounded when left to their own devices, as most of their recorded work was heavily influenced by producer Ed Cobb. One of the few recordings that does accurately represent the Watchband sound is Sweet Young Thing, the first single released under the band's real name (Blues Theme, an instrumental Watchband recording credited to the Hoggs, had been released in 1966 by Hanna-Barbera records).
Artist: Pink Floyd
Title: Lucifer Sam
Source: CD: The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn
Writer(s): Syd Barrett
Label: Capitol (original label: Tower)
Year: 1967
Beyond a shadow of a doubt the original driving force behind Pink Floyd was the legendary Syd Barrett. Not only did he front the band during their rise to fame, he also wrote their first two singles, Arnold Layne and See Emily Play, as well as most of their first LP, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn. In fact it could be argued that one of the songs on that album, Lucifer Sam, could have just as easily been issued as a single, as it is stylistically similar to the first two songs. Sadly, Barrett's mental health deteriorated quickly over the next year and his participation in the making of the band's next LP, A Saucerful Of Secrets, was minimal. He soon left the group altogether, never to return (although several of his former bandmates did participate in the making of his 1970 solo album, The Madcap Laughs).
Artist: Byrds
Title: C.T.A.-102
Source: CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s) McGuinn/Hippard
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1967
Roger McGuinn has always exhibited an interest in the subject of extra-terrestrial life. C.T.A.-102, from the Younger Than Yesterday album, addresses this subject from the angle of aliens tuning in to earth broadcasts to learn our language and culture and hearing rock and roll (and apparently liking it).
Artist: Beacon Street Union
Title: Blue Avenue
Source: British import CD: The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union
Writer(s): Wayne Ulaky
Label: See For Miles (original US label: M-G-M)
Year: 1968
Although never issued as a single in the US, Blue Avenue, from The Eyes Of The Beacon Street Union, was the band's most popular song among UK radio listeners. This is due to the fact that the song was played by England's most influential DJ, John Peel, on his "Top Gear" show. One of the many garage bands I was in learned the song and played it at a failed audition for the Ramstein AFB Airman's club, although all five guys in the audience seemed to get a kick out of hearing me strum my guitar's deadened strings on the song's intro.
Artist: Shadows Of Knight
Title: Boom Boom
Source: CD: Gloria
Writer(s): John Lee Hooker
Label: Sundazed (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
A good portion of the first Shadows Of Knight LP, Gloria, was made up of covers of 50s Chicago blues songs originally issued on the Chess label. Unlike the Animals and the Rolling Stones, whose debut efforts included many of the same covers, including John Lee Hooker's Boom Boom, the Shadows had the advantage of actually being from (suburban) Chicago, giving them a bit more intimate perspective than their British counterparts. The results speak for themselves.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Red House
Source: Mono LP: Are You Experienced (UK version)
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Legacy (original UK label: Track)
Year: 1967
One of the first songs recorded by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Red House was omitted from the US version of Are You Experienced because, in the words of one recording company executive: "America does not like blues". At the time the song was recorded, Noel Redding was not yet comfortable using a bass guitar, and would work out his bass parts on a slightly-detuned hollow body six-string guitar with the tone controls on their muddiest setting (I learned to play bass the same way myself). The original recording of Red House that was included on the UK version of Are You Experienced features Redding doing exactly that. A second take of the song, with overdubs, was included on the 1969 Smash Hits album, but the original mono version heard here was not available in the US until the release of the Blues CD in 1994.
Artist: Asylum Choir
Title: Welcome To Hollywood
Source: Import CD: Look Inside The Asylum Choir
Writer(s): Russell/Benno
Label: Rev-Ola (UK) (original US label: Smash)
Year: 1968
Leon Russell and Marc Benno were both well-established as studio musicians in L.A. when they teamed up to create an album called Look Inside The Asylum Choir in 1968. Although the album was not a hot seller (the fact that the cover featured a roll of toilet paper probably didn't help), it did provide the two a chance to indulge their own particular brand of insanity, as heard on the album's opening track, Welcome To Hollywood. Look Inside The Asylum Choir was re-released (with a new cover) three years later in the wake of Russell's emergence as a superstar in his own right.
Artist: Led Zeppelin
Title: How Many More Times
Source: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Led Zeppelin)
Writer(s): Page/Jones/Bonham
Label: Cotillion (original label: Atlantic)
Year: 1969
Like many early Led Zeppelin songs, How Many More Times was originally credited to the band members (except,for contractual reasons, singer Robert Plant). More recent releases of the song, however, list Chester Burnett (Howlin' Wolf) as a co-writer, despite the fact that he and the members of Led Zeppelin had never met. This is because of the similarity, especially in the lyrics, to a 1951 Howlin' Wolf record called How Many More Years. The band tried to fool radio programmers into playing the eight and a half minute song by listing it on the album cover as being three minutes and thirty seconds long. I doubt anyone was fooled.
Artist: Kinks
Title: Till The End Of The Day
Source: Mono CD: 25 Years-The Ultimate Collection (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: PolyTel (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1965
Although the Kinks had, by 1965, largely moved beyond their hard-rocking roots into more melodic territory, there were a few exceptions. The most notable of these was Till The End Of The Day, which was released as a single toward the end of the year. Although it was not as big a hit as, say, You Really Got Me, it did prove that the band could still rock out when it wanted to.
Artist: Spencer Davis Group
Title: Gimme Some Lovin'
Source: Simulated stereo LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Winwood/Winwood/Davis
Label: United Artists
Year: 1966
The movie The Big Chill used Gimme Some Lovin' by the Spencer Davis Group as the backdrop for a touch football game at an informal reunion of former college students from the 60s. From that point on, movie soundtracks became much more than just background music and soundtrack albums started becoming best-sellers. Not entirely coincidentally, 60s-oriented oldies radio stations began to appear in major markets as well. Most of them are now playing 80s oldies, by the way.
Artist: Penny Peeps
Title: Model Village
Source: Mono import CD: Insane Times (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Alexander
Label: Zonophone (UK) (original label: Liberty)
Year: 1967
Although the British psychedelic era was considerably shorter (only about two years long) than its American counterpart, there are a surprisingly large number of British psych-pop singles that were never issued in the US. Among those was a somewhat forgettable song called Little Man With A Stick, released in 1967 by a band called the Penny Peeps. The band took its name from the risque coin-fed viewers at Brighton Beach (apparently London's version of Coney Island). Emulating his American counterparts, producer Les Reed (who wrote Little Man), allowed the band itself to come up with its own B side. The result was Model Village, a track that manages to convey a classic garage-rock energy while remaining uniquely British.
Artist: Vanilla Fudge
Title: Break Song
Source: LP: Near The Beginning
Writer(s): Stein/Bogert/Martell/Appice
Label: Atco
Year: 1969
Vanilla Fudge's Break Song, from their fourth LP, Near The Beginning, is essentially one long (twenty-three and a half minutes) jam session with solos from each band member. Released nearly a year before Led Zeppelin's Moby Dick, Break Song includes what may well be the first heavy metal drum solo on vinyl. (Carmine Appice literally wrote the book on rock drumming. As far as I know that book is still in print.)
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1317 (starts 4/25/13)
This week we catch up on requests, present three Jethro Tull tracks that have never been played on the show before and ask the question: "How can you be in two places at once when you're not anywhere at all?". Plus we manage to fit in over half a dozen more tracks making their Stuck in the Psychedelic Era debut this week (including three artists never heard here before). Not bad for a two-hour show. Our first request for was some Blue Cheer:
Artist: Blue Cheer
Title: Summertime Blues
Source: CD: Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Vincebus Eruptum)
Writer(s): Cochrane/Capehart
Label: Priority (original label: Philips)
Year: 1968
European electronics giant Philips had its own record label in the 1960s. In the US, the label was distributed by Mercury Records, and was known primarily for a long string of hits by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. In 1968 the label surprised everyone by signing the loudest band in San Francisco, Blue Cheer. Their cover of the 50s Eddie Cochrane hit Summertime Blues was all over both the AM and FM airwaves that summer.
Artist: Human Beinz
Title: Nobody But Me
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as a 45 RPM single)
Writer: Ron Isley
Label: LP: Rhino (originally released on Capitol)
Year: 1968
The Human Beingz were a band that had been around since 1964 doing mostly club gigs in the Youngstown, Ohio area as the Premiers. In the late 60s they decided to update their image with a name more in tune with the times and came up with the Human Beingz. Unfortunately someone at Capitol misspelled their name (leaving out the "g") on the label of Nobody But Me, and after the song became a national hit the band was stuck with the new spelling. The band split up in 1969, but after Nobody But Me was featured in the Quentin Tarantino film Kill Bill: Vol.1, original leader Ting Markulin reformed the band with a new lineup that has appeared in the Northeastern US in recent years.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Burning Of The Midnight Lamp
Source: CD: Electric Ladyland
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Legacy (original US label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Burning of the Midnight Lamp was the fourth, and at the time most sophisticated single released by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, coming out in mid-1967 between Are You Experienced and Axis: Bold As Love. By this time, Reprise had changed its policy and ended up releasing the Axis album with the same song lineup as the UK original, which left Midnight Lamp a kind of orphan. Hendrix, though, having put a lot of work into the song, was not content to let the mono single release be the last word on the cut, and created a new stereo mix from the original tapes for inclusion on Electric Ladyland the following year.
Artist: Cyrkle
Title: Big, Little Woman
Source: Red Rubber Ball
Writer(s): Danneman/Dawes
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
The Cyrkle rose to prominence with a pair of hit singles in 1966: Red Rubber Ball and Turn Down Day. Both those tunes were included on their first LP for Columbia, which also included several tunes written by members of the Cyrkle. Among those was Big, Little Woman, a solid example of the light pop the Cyrkle did so well. Unfortunately for the band, the maturing baby boomers that made up the bulk of the top 40 audience in 1966 were starting to look for heavier stuff, and the Cyrkle soon fell out of favor.
Artist: Love
Title: My Little Red Book
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
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 tune originally recorded by Manfred Mann for the What's New Pussycat movie soundtrack. Needless to say, Love's version was not exactly what Burt Bacharach and Hal David had in mind.
Artist: Mothers Of Invention
Title: How Could I Be Such A Fool
Source: LP: Freak Out!
Writer(s): Frank Zappa
Label: Verve
Year: 1966
Historically, rock music and waltzes have been pretty much mutually exclusive. There are exceptions, however, and many of those were written by Frank Zappa. Perhaps the earliest of these was How Could I Be Such A Fool from the Mothers Of Invention's Freak Out album, which in many ways is one of the most conventional compositions Zappa ever came up with. I can almost picture some mid-60s mainstream and/or jazz singer releasing it as a single.
Artist: Blues Project
Title: Back Door Man
Source: LP: Special Disc Jockey Record (originally released on LP: Live At The Cafe-Au-Go-Go
Writer: Dixon/Burnett
Label: Verve Forecast
Year: 1966
Original Blues Project vocalist Tommy Flanders only stayed with the group long enough to record one album. At the release party at the L.A. Hilton for Live At The Cafe-Au-Go-Go, however, in a scene right out of Spinal Tap, Flanders's girl friend had an all-out blowup with the rest of the band members that resulted in her announcing that Flanders was quitting the band to go Hollywood. As a result by the time the album actually became available in record stores Flanders was no longer with the group. The Blues Project's cover of Howlin' Wolf's classic Back Door Man is a good example of Flanders performing in his element.
Artist: Firesign Theatre
Title: How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All?
Source: CD: How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All?
Writer: Proctor/Bergman/Austin/Ossman
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1969
Tonight's longest request (by far) is the entire first side of the second Firesign Theatre album, How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All? The group, consisting of Phil Proctor, Peter Bergman, Phil Austin and David Ossman, pioneered a type of "counter-culture comedy" that would be followed up on by such stars as Cheech and Chong, George Carlin, and the Credibility Gap (with Harry Shearer and Michael McKean), as well as the National Lampoon Radio Hour (featuring Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, Christopher Guest and others).
Artist: Iron Butterfly
Title: Soul Experience
Source: LP: Evolution (originally released on LP: Ball)
Writer(s): Ingle/Bushy/Brann/Dorman
Label: Atco
Year: 1969
Following up on the success of the In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida album, Iron Butterfly released the Ball album in 1969. It was an immediate commercial success, despite none of its tracks getting extensive airplay on either top 40 AM or progressive FM stations. The first single released from the album was Soul Experience, which peaked at the #75 spot on the charts. The song has an unusual rhythm that is strikingly similar to that of the 1983 Hall and Oates hit Say It Isn't So. Hmmm.
Artist: Warlocks
Title: Early Morning Rain
Source: CD: Birth Of The Dead
Writer(s): Gordon Lightfoot
Label: Rhino
Year: 1965
The earliest known recordings by the Grateful Dead were made for Autumn Records in late 1965, but not released until 2001 as part of the twelve-CD box set The Golden Road (1965-1973). Among those early recordings was a cover version of a Gordon Lightfoot tune, Early Morning Rain. Although the band was still calling itself the Warlocks at this point, the tape box itself is labeled The Emergency Crew.
Artist: Kinks
Title: A Well Respected Man
Source: CD: 25 Years-The Ultimate Collection (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: PolyTel (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1966
The Kinks were one of the original British Invasion bands, scoring huge R&B-influenced hits with You Really Got Me and All Day And All Of The Night in 1964. The hits continued in 1965 with more melodic songs like Set Me Free and Tired Of Waiting For You. 1966 saw Ray Davies's songwriting take a satiric turn, as A Well Respected Man amply illustrates. Over the next few years the Kinks would continue to evolve, generally getting decent critical reviews and moderate record sales for their albums. The title of one of those later albums, Muswell Hillbillies, refers to the Davies brothers hometown of Muswell Hill, North London.
Artist: Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title: Incense And Peppermints
Source: Mono CD: Even More Nuggets (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Gilbert/Weitz/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Uni)
Year: 1967
Incense and Peppermints is one of the iconic songs of the psychedelic era, yet when it was originally released to Los Angeles area radio stations it was intended to be the B side of The Birdman of Alkatrash. Somewhere along the line a DJ flipped the record over and started playing Incense And Peppermints instead. The song caught on and Uni Records (short for Universal, which is now the world's largest record company) picked up the Strawberry Alarm Clock's contract and reissued the record nationally with Incense And Peppermints as the A side.
Artist: Flamin' Groovies
Title: I'm Drowning
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: Sneakers)
Writer(s): Roy Loney
Label: Rhino (original label: Snazz)
Year: 1968
An anomoly among San Francisco bands, the Flamin' Groovies were in a sense a throwback to the early days of the local SF music scene, with an emphasis on basic rock and roll rather than extended jamming of psychedelic experimentation. Although they eventually ended up signing a contract with a major label, it was their self-issued 10" mono LP (or maybe EP) Sneakers that captured the essence of the band. I'm Drowning was written by original lead vocalist Roy Loney, who would be gone by the time the band made their major label debut.
Artist: Tommy James And The Shondells
Title: Ball Of Fire
Source: CD: The Best Of Tommy James And The Shondells (originally released on LP: Greatest Hits and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): James/Vale/Sudano/Wilson/Naumann
Label: Rhino (original label: Roulette)
Year: 1969
From a modern perspective it seems obvious that the only thing keeping Roulette Records going in the late 60s was the string of hits on the label by Tommy James and the Shondells. Oddly enough, Tommy James was one of many acts that initially tanked on the label. It was only when a Pittsburgh DJ began playing a two year old copy of Hanky Panky he had rescued from the throwaway pile in 1966 that the band's career took off. By then, however, the original Shondells had long-since disbanded and James found himself suddenly in demand with no band to back him up. He soon found a new group of Shondells and began cranking out an amazing streak of hits, including I Think We're Alone Now, Mony Mony, Crystal Blue Persuasion and Crimson and Clover among others. One of those others was Ball Of Fire, a tune recorded specifically for the band's Greatest Hits album and subsequently released as a single in 1969. It was, at the time, an innovative way to introduce a new song, although the practice would become fairly common in the 1980s.
Artist: Yardbirds
Title: Got Love If You Want It
Source: Australian import CD: Over, Under, Sideways, Down (originally released in UK on LP: Five Live Yardbirds)
Writer(s): James Moore
Label: Raven (original label: Columbia UK)
Year: 1964
The first Yardbirds LP was a live album released only in the UK in 1964 called Five Live Yardbirds. Although some of the tracks on the LP would appear in the US on side two of Having A Rave Up With The Yardbirds, the band's cover of Slim Harpo's Got Love If You Want It was not among them. The song was recorded when Eric Clapton was still the band's guitarist and is a good example of the early Yardbirds live sound.
Artist: Byrds
Title: The World Turns All Around Her
Source: LP: Turn! Turn! Turn!
Writer(s): Gene Clark
Label: Columbia
Year: 1965
In their early days, the Byrds were known more for their reworking of other writers' material, such as Bob Dylan's Mr. Tambourine Man and Pete Seeger's Turn! Turn! Turn! than for the songs they wrote themselves. Eventually, Jim (Roger) McGuinn, David Crosby and Chris Hillman would all develop into outstanding songwriters, but before they did, Gene Clark was considered the band's top composer. The World Turns All Around Her, from their second album, Turn! Turn! Turn!, shows why.
Artist: Oxford Circle
Title: Foolish Woman
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Yoder/Patton
Label: Rhino (original label: World United)
Year: 1966
The Oxford Circle was one of those bands that had a reputation for being the opening band that blew the headliners off the stage, yet never was able to make it big itself. Originally from Sacramento, California, the group appeared frequently in and around San Francisco in 1965 and 1966, but disbanded before the scene started getting national attention, with many of the members moving on to greater fame with other bands. Drummer Paul Whaley was the first to get national attention as a founding member of Blue Cheer. Oxford Circle leader Gary Lee Yoder would eventually join Blue Cheer as well, after a short stint with his own band, Kak. Also of note was bassist Jim Keylor, who was in an early incarnation of Roxy and went on to form BSU studios, where the Dead Kennedys recorded. For all that, the Oxford Circle made only one single, Foolish Woman, which was released on the independent World United label in 1966.
Artist: Sound Sandwich
Title: Apothecary Dream
Source: Mono LP: Ain't It Hard (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Johnny Cole
Label: Sundazed (original label: Viva)
Year: 1967
One of the more successful record producers in mid-60s Los Angeles was Snuff Garrett, whose credits include hits by Gary Lewis and the Playboys, Cher and others. For a while Garrett even had his own record label. Viva Records was only around for a couple of years, but during that time they turned out some of the best-produced psychedelic records ever made. One example is 1967's Apothecary Dream, a tune written by producer Johnny Cole and performed by local L.A. band the Sound Sandwich. The band cut a second single the following January before Viva folded.
Artist: Standells
Title: Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Ed Cobb
Label: Tower
Year: 1966
The Standells were probably the most successful band to record for the Tower label (not counting Pink Floyd, whose first LP was issued, in modified form, on the label after being recorded in England). Besides their big hit Dirty Water, they hit the charts with other tunes such as Why Pick On Me, Try It, and the punk classic Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White. Both Good Guys and Dirty Water were written by producer Ed Cobb, who has to be considered the most prolific punk-rock songwriter of the 60s, having also written songs for the "E" Types and Chocolate Watchband (both of which he also produced).
Artist: Doors
Title: Moonlight Drive
Source: CD: Strange Days
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
Much of the second Doors album consisted of songs that were already in the band's repertoire when they signed with Elektra Records but for various reasons did not record for their debut LP. One of the earliest was Jim Morrison's Moonlight Ride. As was the case with all the Doors songs on their first three albums, the tune was credited to the entire band.
Artist: John Mayall
Title: Long Gone Midnight
Source: LP: Blues From Laurel Canyon
Writer(s): John Mayall
Label: London
Year: 1968
In spring of 1968 John Mayall decided to disband the Bluesbreakers, the band that had brought fame to a variety of British blues musicians, including Eric Clapton, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie and Peter Green. He then embarked on a holiday (vacation in US terms) to southern California, where he hung out with members of Canned Heat and met a famous groupie. He then returned home to England and wrote a series of songs about the trip. Those songs became one of Mayall's strongest albums, Blues From Laurel Canyon. The 1968 LP features guitarist Mick Taylor, who would soon leave the band to replace Brian Jones in the Rolling Stones. Long Gone Midnight in particular showcases Taylor's prowess.
Artist: Kim Fowley
Title: Bubblegum
Source: Import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released on LP: Outrageous)
Writer(s): Cert/Fowley
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Imperial)
Year: 1969
Like a hip Hollywood Forrest Gump, Kim Fowley kept popping up in various capacities throughout the 60s and 70s on records like Alley Oop (co-producer), Nut Rocker (writer, arranger) and the first three Runaways albums (producer and guy who introduced the band members to each other), working with such diverse talents as Gene Vincent, Helen Reddy and Kiss. He has also managed to rack up an impressive catalog as a solo artist, with over two dozen albums to his credit. The most successful of these was his 1968 LP Outrageous, which includes the song Bubblegum (also called Bubble Gum). Despite the title, the track has nothing in common with bands like the 1910 Fruitgum Company. In fact, the song is sometimes cited as one of the first glam-rock recordings.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Living In The Past
Source: CD: Stand Up (bonus track) (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol (original UK label: Island)
Year: 1969
By the end of the 1960s most UK labels had abandoned the British tradition of not including singles on LPs. One notable exception was Island Records, who continued to issue mutually exclusive Jethro Tull albums, singles and EPs into the early 1970s. Among those non-LP tracks was the 1969 single Living In The Past, which would not be included on an LP until 1972, when the song became the title track of a double LP Jethro Tull retrospective. The song then became a hit all over again, including in the US, where the original single had not been issued at all.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Sossity; You're A Woman
Source: CD: Benefit
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol
Year: 1970
The third Jethro Tull album, Benefit, saw the group take a much darker tone than on their previous LPs. One example of this is Sossity; You're A Woman, which closes out side two of both the US and UK versions of the original LP.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Back To The Family
Source: CD: Stand Up
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol
Year: 1969
The second Jethro Tull album, Stand Up, shows a band in transition from its roots in the British blues-rock scene to a group entirely dominated by the musical vision of vocalist/flautist/composer Ian Anderson. Back To The Family is sometimes cited as an early example of the style that the band would be come to known for on later albums such as Thick As A Brick.
Artist: W.C. Fields Memorial Electric String Band
Title: Hippy Elevator Operator
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Caldwell/Zinner
Label: Rhino (original label: HBR)
Year: 1966
Sometime in 1966, Redondo Beach, California band the Bees decided to start calling themselves the W.C. Fields Memorial Electric String Band. The new name was interesting enough to attract the attention of HBR, also known as Hanna-Barbera Records, a company owned by the TV animation studio that was famous for characters like Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear and the Flintstones. Unfortunately for the band, DJs tended to not take records on the label too seriously, and after a short recording career that culminated in a single called Hippy Elevator Operator, the band faded off into obscurity (followed shortly thereafter by HBR itself).
Artist: Blue Cheer
Title: Summertime Blues
Source: CD: Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Vincebus Eruptum)
Writer(s): Cochrane/Capehart
Label: Priority (original label: Philips)
Year: 1968
European electronics giant Philips had its own record label in the 1960s. In the US, the label was distributed by Mercury Records, and was known primarily for a long string of hits by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. In 1968 the label surprised everyone by signing the loudest band in San Francisco, Blue Cheer. Their cover of the 50s Eddie Cochrane hit Summertime Blues was all over both the AM and FM airwaves that summer.
Artist: Human Beinz
Title: Nobody But Me
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released as a 45 RPM single)
Writer: Ron Isley
Label: LP: Rhino (originally released on Capitol)
Year: 1968
The Human Beingz were a band that had been around since 1964 doing mostly club gigs in the Youngstown, Ohio area as the Premiers. In the late 60s they decided to update their image with a name more in tune with the times and came up with the Human Beingz. Unfortunately someone at Capitol misspelled their name (leaving out the "g") on the label of Nobody But Me, and after the song became a national hit the band was stuck with the new spelling. The band split up in 1969, but after Nobody But Me was featured in the Quentin Tarantino film Kill Bill: Vol.1, original leader Ting Markulin reformed the band with a new lineup that has appeared in the Northeastern US in recent years.
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Burning Of The Midnight Lamp
Source: CD: Electric Ladyland
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Legacy (original US label: Reprise)
Year: 1968
Burning of the Midnight Lamp was the fourth, and at the time most sophisticated single released by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, coming out in mid-1967 between Are You Experienced and Axis: Bold As Love. By this time, Reprise had changed its policy and ended up releasing the Axis album with the same song lineup as the UK original, which left Midnight Lamp a kind of orphan. Hendrix, though, having put a lot of work into the song, was not content to let the mono single release be the last word on the cut, and created a new stereo mix from the original tapes for inclusion on Electric Ladyland the following year.
Artist: Cyrkle
Title: Big, Little Woman
Source: Red Rubber Ball
Writer(s): Danneman/Dawes
Label: Columbia
Year: 1966
The Cyrkle rose to prominence with a pair of hit singles in 1966: Red Rubber Ball and Turn Down Day. Both those tunes were included on their first LP for Columbia, which also included several tunes written by members of the Cyrkle. Among those was Big, Little Woman, a solid example of the light pop the Cyrkle did so well. Unfortunately for the band, the maturing baby boomers that made up the bulk of the top 40 audience in 1966 were starting to look for heavier stuff, and the Cyrkle soon fell out of favor.
Artist: Love
Title: My Little Red Book
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
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 tune originally recorded by Manfred Mann for the What's New Pussycat movie soundtrack. Needless to say, Love's version was not exactly what Burt Bacharach and Hal David had in mind.
Artist: Mothers Of Invention
Title: How Could I Be Such A Fool
Source: LP: Freak Out!
Writer(s): Frank Zappa
Label: Verve
Year: 1966
Historically, rock music and waltzes have been pretty much mutually exclusive. There are exceptions, however, and many of those were written by Frank Zappa. Perhaps the earliest of these was How Could I Be Such A Fool from the Mothers Of Invention's Freak Out album, which in many ways is one of the most conventional compositions Zappa ever came up with. I can almost picture some mid-60s mainstream and/or jazz singer releasing it as a single.
Artist: Blues Project
Title: Back Door Man
Source: LP: Special Disc Jockey Record (originally released on LP: Live At The Cafe-Au-Go-Go
Writer: Dixon/Burnett
Label: Verve Forecast
Year: 1966
Original Blues Project vocalist Tommy Flanders only stayed with the group long enough to record one album. At the release party at the L.A. Hilton for Live At The Cafe-Au-Go-Go, however, in a scene right out of Spinal Tap, Flanders's girl friend had an all-out blowup with the rest of the band members that resulted in her announcing that Flanders was quitting the band to go Hollywood. As a result by the time the album actually became available in record stores Flanders was no longer with the group. The Blues Project's cover of Howlin' Wolf's classic Back Door Man is a good example of Flanders performing in his element.
Artist: Firesign Theatre
Title: How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All?
Source: CD: How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All?
Writer: Proctor/Bergman/Austin/Ossman
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1969
Tonight's longest request (by far) is the entire first side of the second Firesign Theatre album, How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All? The group, consisting of Phil Proctor, Peter Bergman, Phil Austin and David Ossman, pioneered a type of "counter-culture comedy" that would be followed up on by such stars as Cheech and Chong, George Carlin, and the Credibility Gap (with Harry Shearer and Michael McKean), as well as the National Lampoon Radio Hour (featuring Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, Christopher Guest and others).
Artist: Iron Butterfly
Title: Soul Experience
Source: LP: Evolution (originally released on LP: Ball)
Writer(s): Ingle/Bushy/Brann/Dorman
Label: Atco
Year: 1969
Following up on the success of the In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida album, Iron Butterfly released the Ball album in 1969. It was an immediate commercial success, despite none of its tracks getting extensive airplay on either top 40 AM or progressive FM stations. The first single released from the album was Soul Experience, which peaked at the #75 spot on the charts. The song has an unusual rhythm that is strikingly similar to that of the 1983 Hall and Oates hit Say It Isn't So. Hmmm.
Artist: Warlocks
Title: Early Morning Rain
Source: CD: Birth Of The Dead
Writer(s): Gordon Lightfoot
Label: Rhino
Year: 1965
The earliest known recordings by the Grateful Dead were made for Autumn Records in late 1965, but not released until 2001 as part of the twelve-CD box set The Golden Road (1965-1973). Among those early recordings was a cover version of a Gordon Lightfoot tune, Early Morning Rain. Although the band was still calling itself the Warlocks at this point, the tape box itself is labeled The Emergency Crew.
Artist: Kinks
Title: A Well Respected Man
Source: CD: 25 Years-The Ultimate Collection (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: PolyTel (original label: Reprise)
Year: 1966
The Kinks were one of the original British Invasion bands, scoring huge R&B-influenced hits with You Really Got Me and All Day And All Of The Night in 1964. The hits continued in 1965 with more melodic songs like Set Me Free and Tired Of Waiting For You. 1966 saw Ray Davies's songwriting take a satiric turn, as A Well Respected Man amply illustrates. Over the next few years the Kinks would continue to evolve, generally getting decent critical reviews and moderate record sales for their albums. The title of one of those later albums, Muswell Hillbillies, refers to the Davies brothers hometown of Muswell Hill, North London.
Artist: Strawberry Alarm Clock
Title: Incense And Peppermints
Source: Mono CD: Even More Nuggets (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Gilbert/Weitz/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Uni)
Year: 1967
Incense and Peppermints is one of the iconic songs of the psychedelic era, yet when it was originally released to Los Angeles area radio stations it was intended to be the B side of The Birdman of Alkatrash. Somewhere along the line a DJ flipped the record over and started playing Incense And Peppermints instead. The song caught on and Uni Records (short for Universal, which is now the world's largest record company) picked up the Strawberry Alarm Clock's contract and reissued the record nationally with Incense And Peppermints as the A side.
Artist: Flamin' Groovies
Title: I'm Drowning
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released on LP: Sneakers)
Writer(s): Roy Loney
Label: Rhino (original label: Snazz)
Year: 1968
An anomoly among San Francisco bands, the Flamin' Groovies were in a sense a throwback to the early days of the local SF music scene, with an emphasis on basic rock and roll rather than extended jamming of psychedelic experimentation. Although they eventually ended up signing a contract with a major label, it was their self-issued 10" mono LP (or maybe EP) Sneakers that captured the essence of the band. I'm Drowning was written by original lead vocalist Roy Loney, who would be gone by the time the band made their major label debut.
Artist: Tommy James And The Shondells
Title: Ball Of Fire
Source: CD: The Best Of Tommy James And The Shondells (originally released on LP: Greatest Hits and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): James/Vale/Sudano/Wilson/Naumann
Label: Rhino (original label: Roulette)
Year: 1969
From a modern perspective it seems obvious that the only thing keeping Roulette Records going in the late 60s was the string of hits on the label by Tommy James and the Shondells. Oddly enough, Tommy James was one of many acts that initially tanked on the label. It was only when a Pittsburgh DJ began playing a two year old copy of Hanky Panky he had rescued from the throwaway pile in 1966 that the band's career took off. By then, however, the original Shondells had long-since disbanded and James found himself suddenly in demand with no band to back him up. He soon found a new group of Shondells and began cranking out an amazing streak of hits, including I Think We're Alone Now, Mony Mony, Crystal Blue Persuasion and Crimson and Clover among others. One of those others was Ball Of Fire, a tune recorded specifically for the band's Greatest Hits album and subsequently released as a single in 1969. It was, at the time, an innovative way to introduce a new song, although the practice would become fairly common in the 1980s.
Artist: Yardbirds
Title: Got Love If You Want It
Source: Australian import CD: Over, Under, Sideways, Down (originally released in UK on LP: Five Live Yardbirds)
Writer(s): James Moore
Label: Raven (original label: Columbia UK)
Year: 1964
The first Yardbirds LP was a live album released only in the UK in 1964 called Five Live Yardbirds. Although some of the tracks on the LP would appear in the US on side two of Having A Rave Up With The Yardbirds, the band's cover of Slim Harpo's Got Love If You Want It was not among them. The song was recorded when Eric Clapton was still the band's guitarist and is a good example of the early Yardbirds live sound.
Artist: Byrds
Title: The World Turns All Around Her
Source: LP: Turn! Turn! Turn!
Writer(s): Gene Clark
Label: Columbia
Year: 1965
In their early days, the Byrds were known more for their reworking of other writers' material, such as Bob Dylan's Mr. Tambourine Man and Pete Seeger's Turn! Turn! Turn! than for the songs they wrote themselves. Eventually, Jim (Roger) McGuinn, David Crosby and Chris Hillman would all develop into outstanding songwriters, but before they did, Gene Clark was considered the band's top composer. The World Turns All Around Her, from their second album, Turn! Turn! Turn!, shows why.
Artist: Oxford Circle
Title: Foolish Woman
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Yoder/Patton
Label: Rhino (original label: World United)
Year: 1966
The Oxford Circle was one of those bands that had a reputation for being the opening band that blew the headliners off the stage, yet never was able to make it big itself. Originally from Sacramento, California, the group appeared frequently in and around San Francisco in 1965 and 1966, but disbanded before the scene started getting national attention, with many of the members moving on to greater fame with other bands. Drummer Paul Whaley was the first to get national attention as a founding member of Blue Cheer. Oxford Circle leader Gary Lee Yoder would eventually join Blue Cheer as well, after a short stint with his own band, Kak. Also of note was bassist Jim Keylor, who was in an early incarnation of Roxy and went on to form BSU studios, where the Dead Kennedys recorded. For all that, the Oxford Circle made only one single, Foolish Woman, which was released on the independent World United label in 1966.
Artist: Sound Sandwich
Title: Apothecary Dream
Source: Mono LP: Ain't It Hard (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Johnny Cole
Label: Sundazed (original label: Viva)
Year: 1967
One of the more successful record producers in mid-60s Los Angeles was Snuff Garrett, whose credits include hits by Gary Lewis and the Playboys, Cher and others. For a while Garrett even had his own record label. Viva Records was only around for a couple of years, but during that time they turned out some of the best-produced psychedelic records ever made. One example is 1967's Apothecary Dream, a tune written by producer Johnny Cole and performed by local L.A. band the Sound Sandwich. The band cut a second single the following January before Viva folded.
Artist: Standells
Title: Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Ed Cobb
Label: Tower
Year: 1966
The Standells were probably the most successful band to record for the Tower label (not counting Pink Floyd, whose first LP was issued, in modified form, on the label after being recorded in England). Besides their big hit Dirty Water, they hit the charts with other tunes such as Why Pick On Me, Try It, and the punk classic Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White. Both Good Guys and Dirty Water were written by producer Ed Cobb, who has to be considered the most prolific punk-rock songwriter of the 60s, having also written songs for the "E" Types and Chocolate Watchband (both of which he also produced).
Artist: Doors
Title: Moonlight Drive
Source: CD: Strange Days
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1967
Much of the second Doors album consisted of songs that were already in the band's repertoire when they signed with Elektra Records but for various reasons did not record for their debut LP. One of the earliest was Jim Morrison's Moonlight Ride. As was the case with all the Doors songs on their first three albums, the tune was credited to the entire band.
Artist: John Mayall
Title: Long Gone Midnight
Source: LP: Blues From Laurel Canyon
Writer(s): John Mayall
Label: London
Year: 1968
In spring of 1968 John Mayall decided to disband the Bluesbreakers, the band that had brought fame to a variety of British blues musicians, including Eric Clapton, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie and Peter Green. He then embarked on a holiday (vacation in US terms) to southern California, where he hung out with members of Canned Heat and met a famous groupie. He then returned home to England and wrote a series of songs about the trip. Those songs became one of Mayall's strongest albums, Blues From Laurel Canyon. The 1968 LP features guitarist Mick Taylor, who would soon leave the band to replace Brian Jones in the Rolling Stones. Long Gone Midnight in particular showcases Taylor's prowess.
Artist: Kim Fowley
Title: Bubblegum
Source: Import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released on LP: Outrageous)
Writer(s): Cert/Fowley
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Imperial)
Year: 1969
Like a hip Hollywood Forrest Gump, Kim Fowley kept popping up in various capacities throughout the 60s and 70s on records like Alley Oop (co-producer), Nut Rocker (writer, arranger) and the first three Runaways albums (producer and guy who introduced the band members to each other), working with such diverse talents as Gene Vincent, Helen Reddy and Kiss. He has also managed to rack up an impressive catalog as a solo artist, with over two dozen albums to his credit. The most successful of these was his 1968 LP Outrageous, which includes the song Bubblegum (also called Bubble Gum). Despite the title, the track has nothing in common with bands like the 1910 Fruitgum Company. In fact, the song is sometimes cited as one of the first glam-rock recordings.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Living In The Past
Source: CD: Stand Up (bonus track) (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol (original UK label: Island)
Year: 1969
By the end of the 1960s most UK labels had abandoned the British tradition of not including singles on LPs. One notable exception was Island Records, who continued to issue mutually exclusive Jethro Tull albums, singles and EPs into the early 1970s. Among those non-LP tracks was the 1969 single Living In The Past, which would not be included on an LP until 1972, when the song became the title track of a double LP Jethro Tull retrospective. The song then became a hit all over again, including in the US, where the original single had not been issued at all.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Sossity; You're A Woman
Source: CD: Benefit
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol
Year: 1970
The third Jethro Tull album, Benefit, saw the group take a much darker tone than on their previous LPs. One example of this is Sossity; You're A Woman, which closes out side two of both the US and UK versions of the original LP.
Artist: Jethro Tull
Title: Back To The Family
Source: CD: Stand Up
Writer(s): Ian Anderson
Label: Chrysalis/Capitol
Year: 1969
The second Jethro Tull album, Stand Up, shows a band in transition from its roots in the British blues-rock scene to a group entirely dominated by the musical vision of vocalist/flautist/composer Ian Anderson. Back To The Family is sometimes cited as an early example of the style that the band would be come to known for on later albums such as Thick As A Brick.
Artist: W.C. Fields Memorial Electric String Band
Title: Hippy Elevator Operator
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Caldwell/Zinner
Label: Rhino (original label: HBR)
Year: 1966
Sometime in 1966, Redondo Beach, California band the Bees decided to start calling themselves the W.C. Fields Memorial Electric String Band. The new name was interesting enough to attract the attention of HBR, also known as Hanna-Barbera Records, a company owned by the TV animation studio that was famous for characters like Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear and the Flintstones. Unfortunately for the band, DJs tended to not take records on the label too seriously, and after a short recording career that culminated in a single called Hippy Elevator Operator, the band faded off into obscurity (followed shortly thereafter by HBR itself).
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1316 (starts 4/18/13)
Artist: Outsiders
Title: You Gotta Look
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Bob Turek
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
The song Help Me Girl was handicapped by having two versions out at the same time; one by the Outsiders and the other by Eric Burdon and the Animals. As a result, neither song made much of a splash on the charts, making the B side of the Outsiders version, You Gotta Look, even more obscure than it should have been. An interesting footnote is that You Gotta Look was arranged and conducted by a 26-year-old Chuck Mangione, then a member of Art Blakey's band and later to become one of the most popular jazz musicians in the world.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: The War Is Over
Source: LP: After Bathing At Baxter's
Writer(s): Paul Kantner
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1967
The songs on the third Jefferson Airplane album, After Bathing At Baxter's, are grouped into suites of two or three songs apiece. Most of the suites mix songs by different songwriters; the sole exception is The War Is Over, which is made up of two Paul Kantner tunes, Martha and Wild Thyme. The War Is Over is also the shortest of the five suites on After Bathing At Baxter's, clocking in at about six and a half minutes.
Artist: Canned Heat
Title: Sandy's Blues
Source: Import CD: Living The Blues
Writer(s): Bob Hite
Label: BGO UK (original US label: Liberty)
Year: 1968
Generally considered the high point of Canned Heat's career, the 1968 double-LP Living The Blues is best known for the inclusion of Refried Boogie, the centerpiece of the band's live performances. In addition to the 41-minute track, that takes up two entire sides of the album, there were several studio tracks as well, such as Sandy's Blues, a melancholy blues progression written by vocalist Robert (the Bear) Hite.
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, 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.
Artist: Beatles
Title: She Said She Said
Source: CD: Revolver
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1966
The last song to be recorded for the Beatles' Revolver album was She Said She Said, a John Lennon song inspired by an acid trip taken by members of the band (with the exception of Paul McCartney) during a break from touring in August of 1965. The band's manager, Brian Epstein, had rented a large house in Beverly Hills, but word had gotten out and the Beatles found it difficult to come and go at will. Instead, they invited several people, including the original Byrds and actor Peter Fonda, to come over and hang out with them. At some point, Fonda brought up the fact that he had nearly died as a child from an accidental gunshot wound, and used the phrase "I know what it's like to be dead." Lennon was creeped out by the things Fonda was saying and told him to "shut up about that stuff. You're making me feel like I've never been born." The song itself took nine hours to record and mix, and is one of the few Beatle tracks that does not have Paul McCartney on it (George Harrison played bass). Ironically, Fonda himself would star in a Roger Corman film called The Trip (written by Jack Nicholson and co-starring Dennis Hopper) the following year.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: That's Not Me
Source: LP: Pet Sounds
Writer(s): Brian Wilson
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
The Beach Boys were about as mainstream as bands like Love and the Music Machine were underground, yet Brian Wilson was turning out music every bit as original as any of the club bands in town. The album Pet Sounds is considered one of the masterpieces of the era, with the majority of songs, including That's Not Me, written by Wilson with lyrics by Tony Asher.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Porpoise Song
Source: CD: Greatest Hits (originally released on LP: Head soundtrack)
Writer(s): Goffin/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year: 1968
In 1968 the Monkees, trying desperately to shed a teeny-bopper image, enlisted Jack Nicholson to co-write a feature film that was a 180-degree departure from their recently-cancelled TV show. This made sense, since the original fans of the show were by then already outgrowing the group. Unfortunately, by 1968 the Monkees brand was irrevocably tainted by the fact that the Monkees had not been allowed to play their own instruments on their first two albums. The movie Head itself was the type of film that was best suited to being shown in theaters that specialized in "art" films, but that audience was among the most hostile to the Monkees and the movie bombed. It is now considered a cult classic. Porpoise Song, a Gerry Goffin/Carole King composition used as the theme for Head, was also a departure in style for the Monkees, yet managed to retain a decidedly Monkees sound due to the distinctive lead vocals of Mickey Dolenz.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: Shine On Brightly
Source: LP: Shine On Brightly
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M
Year: 1968
Although it was never released as a single, the title track of Procol Harum's second album, Shine On Brightly, is probably their most commercially viable song on the album. Opening with power chords from organist Matthew Fischer and augmented by guitarist Robin Trower, the song quickly moves into psychedelic territory with some of Keith Reid's trippiest lyrics ever, including the refrain "my befuddled brain shines on brightly, quite insane." One of their best tracks ever.
Artist: Simon and Garfunkel
Title: Mrs. Robinson
Source: CD :Collected Works (originally released on LP: Bookends)
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
A shortened version of Mrs. Robinson first appeared on the soundtrack for the film The Graduate in 1967, but it wasn't until the Bookends album came out in 1968 that the full four minute version was released.
Artist: Doors
Title: L.A. Woman
Source: CD: The Best Of The Doors (originally released on LP: L.A. Woman)
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1971
Ray Manzarek became justifiably famous as the keyboard player for the Doors. Before joining up with Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger and John Densmore, however, Manzarek was already making a name for himself as an up-and-coming student filmmaker at UCLA. Although he didn't have much of a need to pursue a career in films once the Doors hit it big, he did end up producing and directing an outstanding video for the title track of the 1971 album L.A. Woman years after the band had split up. I only mention this because, really, what else can I say about a song that you've probably heard a million times or so?
Artist: Kinks
Title: Brainwashed
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: Reprise
Year: 1970
Starting in 1966, Ray Davies started taking satirical potshots at a variety of targets, with songs like A Well Respected Man, Dedicated Follower of Fashion and the classic tax-protest song Sunny Afternoon. This trend continued over the next few years, although few new Kinks songs were heard on US radio stations until the band released the international hit Lola in 1970. One single that got some minor airplay in the US was the song Victoria, from the album Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire). The B side of that track was Brainwashed, one of the hardest rocking Kinks tunes since their early 1964 hits like You Really Got Me.
Artist: Kim Fowley
Title: Bubblegum
Source: Import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released on LP: Outrageous)
Writer(s): Cert/Fowley
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Imperial)
Year: 1969
Like a hip Hollywood Forrest Gump, Kim Fowley kept popping up in various capacities throughout the 60s and 70s on records like Alley Oop (co-producer), Nut Rocker (writer, arranger) and the first three Runaways albums (producer and guy who introduced the band members to each other), working with such diverse talents as Gene Vincent, Helen Reddy and Kiss. He has also managed to rack up an impressive catalog as a solo artist, with over two dozen albums to his credit. The most successful of these was his 1968 LP Outrageous, which includes the song Bubblegum (also called Bubble Gum). Despite the title, the track has nothing in common with bands like the 1910 Fruitgum Company. In fact, the song is sometimes cited as one of the first glam-rock recordings.
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young
Title: Sea Of Madness
Source: CD: Woodstock: 40 Years On: Back To Yasgur's Farm (originally released on LP: Woodstock soundtrack)
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Rhino (original label: Cotillion)
Year: 1969
Neil Young joined Crosby, Stills and Nash to perform a few songs at at Woodstock, including one of his own compositions, Sea Of Madness, and would be a full member of the group when their next album, Deja Vu, came out.
Artist: Bob Seger System
Title: Ramblin' Gamblin' Man
Source: 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s): Bob Seger
Label: Starline (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1969
People who are familiar with the 70s and 80s hits of Bob Seger's Silver Bullet Band may be surprised to hear how much raw energy there is on Seger's early recordings with the Bob Seger System. The best known of these early records is Ramblin' Gamblin' Man, released as a single in 1969. The song did pretty well at the time, but it would be several years before Seger would return to the charts.
Artist: Hysterics
Title: Everything's There
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): David Donaghue
Label: Rhino (original label: Bing)
Year: 1965
Much as San Jose, California had its own thriving teen-oriented music scene within the greater San Francisco media market, the San Bernardino/Riverside area of Southern California was home to several local bands that were able to score recording contracts with various small labels in the area. Among those were the Hysterics, who recorded four songs for two seperate labels in 1965. The best of those was Everything's There, which appeared as the B side of the second single issued by the band. At some point, Everything's There was reissued (along with the A side of the first record, That's All She Wrote) on yet a third label, but this time credited to the Love Ins. Such was the state of the indy record business in the late 60s.
Artist: Lovin' Spoonful
Title: Alley Oop
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Dallas Frazier
Label: Sundazed/Kama Sutra
Year: 1965/2011
The Lovin' Spoonful didn't actually release their version of the old Hollywood Argyles song Alley Oop as a single in 1965. In fact, they didn't release the song at all, even though it was recorded during the same sessions that became their debut LP that year. In 2011 the people at Sundazed decided to create a "single that never was", pairing Alley Oop with the full-length version of Night Owl Blues, a song that had been included on the 1965 debut in edited form. The Spoonful version of Alley Oop has an almost garage-band feel about it, and is perhaps the best indication on vinyl of what the band actually sounded like in their early days as a local fixture on the Greenwich Village scene.
Artist: Blues Project
Title: I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes
Source: CD: Projections
Writer(s): Blind Willie Johnson
Label: Sundazed (original label: Verve Forecast)
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 rock jam LP ever, 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 in a blues record.
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: Mother Earth
Title: Stranger In My Own Home Town
Source: LP: Revolution-soundtrack
Writer(s): Percy Mayfield
Label: United Artists
Year: 1968
In early 1968 the producers of a quasi-documentary film called Revolution decided that it would be more economical to use unsigned San Francisco bands for the film's soundtrack than to pay royalties to various record labels. Thus, they chose the three most popular local bands that had not yet signed with a major label: the Steve Miller Band, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Mother Earth. The latter band had been founded by vocalists Tracy Nelson and Powell St. John, and was the most blues-based of the three, particularly on songs sung by St. John such as Stranger In My Own Home Town. Mother Earth would eventually sign with Mercury, recording a series of critically acclaimed albums in the late 60s and early 70s.
Artist: Chocolate Watchband
Title: Let's Talk About Girls
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released on LP: No Way Out)
Writer(s): E. Freiser
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1967
I find it sadly ironic that the first cut on the first album released by San Jose, California's Chocolate Watchband had a vocal track by Don Bennett, a studio vocalist under contract to Tower Records, replacing the original track by Watchband vocalist Dave Aguilar. Aguilar's vocals were also replaced by Bennett's on the Watchband's cover of Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour on the same album. In addition, there are four instrumental tracks on the album that are played entirely by studio musicians. Worse yet, the entire first side of the Watchband's second LP was done by studio musicians and the third Watchband LP featured an entirely different lineup. The final insult was when Lenny Kaye, who assembled the original Nuggets collection in the early 1970s, elected to include this recording, rather than one of the several fine tracks that actually did feature Aguilar on vocals.
Artist: Humane Society
Title: Knock Knock
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer: Minnick/Wheetman
Label: Rhino (original label: Liberty)
Year: 1967
The Humane Society, from Simi Valley, California, formed in 1965 as the Innocents. The band featured singer/guitarist Danny Wheetman, lead guitarist Jim Pettit, rhythm guitarist Woody Minnick, bassist Richard Majewski, and drummer Bill Schnetzler. As was often the case, The A side of the group's first single was chosen by the band's producers, while the band itself provided the B side. In this case that B side was Knock Knock, a classic piece of garage-punk that far outshines the original A side of the record.
Artist: Litter
Title: Action Woman
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Distortions)
Writer(s): Warren Hendrick
Label: Rhino (original labels: Scotty and Warick)
Year: 1967
The Litter was one of many bands to come under the guidance of Warren Kendrick, owner of the Minneapolis-based Warick Records (later Warwick). Their first album, Distortions, was comprised mostly of cover songs of mainly British groups, but did include a pair of songs written by Hendrick himself, including Action Woman, which was also released as the band's first single in January of 1967. The group made two more albums, including one for ABC's Probe label in 1969, before disbanding, reuniting in the late 90s for a pair of CDs on the Arf! Arf! label.
Artist: Vanilla Fudge
Title: You Keep Me Hangin' On
Source: Mono CD: Psychedelic Pop (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Holland/Dozier/Holland
Label: BMG/RCA/Buddah (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
The Vanilla Fudge version of You Keep Me Hangin' On was originally recorded and released in 1967, not too long after the Supremes version of the song finished its own run on the charts. It wasn't until the following year, however, the the Vanilla Fudge recording caught on with AM radio listeners, turning it into the band's only top 40 hit (not that they needed one).
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Stupid Girl
Source: Simulated stereo CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM B side)
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: Abkco (original label: London)
Year: 1966
By 1966 the songwriting team of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards had hit its stride, turning out Rolling Stones classics like Mother's Little Helper and Paint It Black as a matter of course. Even B sides such as Stupid Girl were starting to get airplay, a trend that would continue to grow over the next year or so.
Artist: Spencer Davis Group
Title: Gimme Some Lovin'
Source: Simulated stereo LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Winwood/Winwood/Davis
Label: United Artists
Year: 1966
The movie The Big Chill used Gimme Some Lovin' by the Spencer Davis Group as the backdrop for a touch football game at an informal reunion of former college students from the 60s. From that point on, movie soundtracks became much more than just background music and soundtrack albums started becoming best-sellers. Not entirely coincidentally, 60s-oriented oldies radio stations began to appear in major markets as well. Most of them are now playing 80s oldies, by the way.
Artist: Frantics
Title: Human Monkey
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Miller/Stevenson
Label: Rhino (original label: Action)
Year: 1966
The Frantics were a popular cover band in Tacoma, Washington in the early 60s. Guitarist Jerry Miller, however, had greater ambitions and eventually relocated to San Francisco, taking the band's name and two of its members, keyboardist Chuck "Steaks" Schoning and drummer Don Stevenson, with him. After recruiting bassist Bob Mosely the Frantics cut their only single, an early Motown-style dance number called the Human Monkey, in 1966. The group would soon shed Schoning and pick up two new members, changing their name to Moby Grape in the process.
Artist: Tommy James And The Shondells
Title: Breakaway
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): James/Vail
Label: Roulette
Year: 1969
From a modern perspective it seems obvious that the only thing keeping Roulette Records going in the late 60s was the string of hits on the label by Tommy James and the Shondells. Oddly enough, Tommy James was one of many acts that initially tanked on the label. It was only when a Pittsburgh DJ began playing a two year old copy of Hanky Panky he had rescued from the throwaway pile in 1966 that the band's career took off. By then, however, the original Shondells had long-since disbanded and James found himself suddenly in demand with no band to back him up. He soon found a new group of Shondells and began cranking out an amazing streak of hits, including I Think We're Alone Now, Mony Mony, Crystal Blue Persuasion and Crimson and Clover. By 1969, however, the streak was coming to an end, with Sweet Cherry Wine being one of the group's last top 40 hits. The B side of that record was the decidedly psychedelic Breakaway. James would continue as a solo artist after the Shondells split up, scoring his last hit in 1971 with Draggin' The Line.
Artist: Ipsissimus
Title: Hold On
Source: Mono import CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Haskell/Condor/Lynton
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Parlophone)
Year: 1969
The song Hold On was originally recorded as a B side in 1967 by a band called Les Fleur De Lys, although the label credited the track to Rupert's People, who recorded the song on the A side. Le Fleur De Lys later recorded another version of Hold On with South African-born singer Sharon Tandy. Finally, the heaviest version of the song was cut by an obscure band from Barnet called Ipsissimus. To my knowledge it was their only record.
Artist: Who
Title: Pinball Wizard
Source: CD: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: MCA (original label: Decca)
Year: 1969
Wrapping up this week's show we have a song from the rock opera Tommy that was actually released as a single a few weeks before the album came out. It was a marketing strategy that would become the music industry standard for decades, until internet downloading changed everything.
Title: You Gotta Look
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Bob Turek
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
The song Help Me Girl was handicapped by having two versions out at the same time; one by the Outsiders and the other by Eric Burdon and the Animals. As a result, neither song made much of a splash on the charts, making the B side of the Outsiders version, You Gotta Look, even more obscure than it should have been. An interesting footnote is that You Gotta Look was arranged and conducted by a 26-year-old Chuck Mangione, then a member of Art Blakey's band and later to become one of the most popular jazz musicians in the world.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: The War Is Over
Source: LP: After Bathing At Baxter's
Writer(s): Paul Kantner
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1967
The songs on the third Jefferson Airplane album, After Bathing At Baxter's, are grouped into suites of two or three songs apiece. Most of the suites mix songs by different songwriters; the sole exception is The War Is Over, which is made up of two Paul Kantner tunes, Martha and Wild Thyme. The War Is Over is also the shortest of the five suites on After Bathing At Baxter's, clocking in at about six and a half minutes.
Artist: Canned Heat
Title: Sandy's Blues
Source: Import CD: Living The Blues
Writer(s): Bob Hite
Label: BGO UK (original US label: Liberty)
Year: 1968
Generally considered the high point of Canned Heat's career, the 1968 double-LP Living The Blues is best known for the inclusion of Refried Boogie, the centerpiece of the band's live performances. In addition to the 41-minute track, that takes up two entire sides of the album, there were several studio tracks as well, such as Sandy's Blues, a melancholy blues progression written by vocalist Robert (the Bear) Hite.
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, 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.
Artist: Beatles
Title: She Said She Said
Source: CD: Revolver
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney
Label: Parlophone (original US label: Capitol)
Year: 1966
The last song to be recorded for the Beatles' Revolver album was She Said She Said, a John Lennon song inspired by an acid trip taken by members of the band (with the exception of Paul McCartney) during a break from touring in August of 1965. The band's manager, Brian Epstein, had rented a large house in Beverly Hills, but word had gotten out and the Beatles found it difficult to come and go at will. Instead, they invited several people, including the original Byrds and actor Peter Fonda, to come over and hang out with them. At some point, Fonda brought up the fact that he had nearly died as a child from an accidental gunshot wound, and used the phrase "I know what it's like to be dead." Lennon was creeped out by the things Fonda was saying and told him to "shut up about that stuff. You're making me feel like I've never been born." The song itself took nine hours to record and mix, and is one of the few Beatle tracks that does not have Paul McCartney on it (George Harrison played bass). Ironically, Fonda himself would star in a Roger Corman film called The Trip (written by Jack Nicholson and co-starring Dennis Hopper) the following year.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: That's Not Me
Source: LP: Pet Sounds
Writer(s): Brian Wilson
Label: Capitol
Year: 1966
The Beach Boys were about as mainstream as bands like Love and the Music Machine were underground, yet Brian Wilson was turning out music every bit as original as any of the club bands in town. The album Pet Sounds is considered one of the masterpieces of the era, with the majority of songs, including That's Not Me, written by Wilson with lyrics by Tony Asher.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Porpoise Song
Source: CD: Greatest Hits (originally released on LP: Head soundtrack)
Writer(s): Goffin/King
Label: Rhino (original label: Colgems)
Year: 1968
In 1968 the Monkees, trying desperately to shed a teeny-bopper image, enlisted Jack Nicholson to co-write a feature film that was a 180-degree departure from their recently-cancelled TV show. This made sense, since the original fans of the show were by then already outgrowing the group. Unfortunately, by 1968 the Monkees brand was irrevocably tainted by the fact that the Monkees had not been allowed to play their own instruments on their first two albums. The movie Head itself was the type of film that was best suited to being shown in theaters that specialized in "art" films, but that audience was among the most hostile to the Monkees and the movie bombed. It is now considered a cult classic. Porpoise Song, a Gerry Goffin/Carole King composition used as the theme for Head, was also a departure in style for the Monkees, yet managed to retain a decidedly Monkees sound due to the distinctive lead vocals of Mickey Dolenz.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: Shine On Brightly
Source: LP: Shine On Brightly
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M
Year: 1968
Although it was never released as a single, the title track of Procol Harum's second album, Shine On Brightly, is probably their most commercially viable song on the album. Opening with power chords from organist Matthew Fischer and augmented by guitarist Robin Trower, the song quickly moves into psychedelic territory with some of Keith Reid's trippiest lyrics ever, including the refrain "my befuddled brain shines on brightly, quite insane." One of their best tracks ever.
Artist: Simon and Garfunkel
Title: Mrs. Robinson
Source: CD :Collected Works (originally released on LP: Bookends)
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Columbia
Year: 1968
A shortened version of Mrs. Robinson first appeared on the soundtrack for the film The Graduate in 1967, but it wasn't until the Bookends album came out in 1968 that the full four minute version was released.
Artist: Doors
Title: L.A. Woman
Source: CD: The Best Of The Doors (originally released on LP: L.A. Woman)
Writer(s): The Doors
Label: Elektra
Year: 1971
Ray Manzarek became justifiably famous as the keyboard player for the Doors. Before joining up with Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger and John Densmore, however, Manzarek was already making a name for himself as an up-and-coming student filmmaker at UCLA. Although he didn't have much of a need to pursue a career in films once the Doors hit it big, he did end up producing and directing an outstanding video for the title track of the 1971 album L.A. Woman years after the band had split up. I only mention this because, really, what else can I say about a song that you've probably heard a million times or so?
Artist: Kinks
Title: Brainwashed
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Ray Davies
Label: Reprise
Year: 1970
Starting in 1966, Ray Davies started taking satirical potshots at a variety of targets, with songs like A Well Respected Man, Dedicated Follower of Fashion and the classic tax-protest song Sunny Afternoon. This trend continued over the next few years, although few new Kinks songs were heard on US radio stations until the band released the international hit Lola in 1970. One single that got some minor airplay in the US was the song Victoria, from the album Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire). The B side of that track was Brainwashed, one of the hardest rocking Kinks tunes since their early 1964 hits like You Really Got Me.
Artist: Kim Fowley
Title: Bubblegum
Source: Import CD: Ah Feel Like Ahcid (originally released on LP: Outrageous)
Writer(s): Cert/Fowley
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Imperial)
Year: 1969
Like a hip Hollywood Forrest Gump, Kim Fowley kept popping up in various capacities throughout the 60s and 70s on records like Alley Oop (co-producer), Nut Rocker (writer, arranger) and the first three Runaways albums (producer and guy who introduced the band members to each other), working with such diverse talents as Gene Vincent, Helen Reddy and Kiss. He has also managed to rack up an impressive catalog as a solo artist, with over two dozen albums to his credit. The most successful of these was his 1968 LP Outrageous, which includes the song Bubblegum (also called Bubble Gum). Despite the title, the track has nothing in common with bands like the 1910 Fruitgum Company. In fact, the song is sometimes cited as one of the first glam-rock recordings.
Artist: Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young
Title: Sea Of Madness
Source: CD: Woodstock: 40 Years On: Back To Yasgur's Farm (originally released on LP: Woodstock soundtrack)
Writer(s): Neil Young
Label: Rhino (original label: Cotillion)
Year: 1969
Neil Young joined Crosby, Stills and Nash to perform a few songs at at Woodstock, including one of his own compositions, Sea Of Madness, and would be a full member of the group when their next album, Deja Vu, came out.
Artist: Bob Seger System
Title: Ramblin' Gamblin' Man
Source: 45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s): Bob Seger
Label: Starline (original label: Capitol)
Year: 1969
People who are familiar with the 70s and 80s hits of Bob Seger's Silver Bullet Band may be surprised to hear how much raw energy there is on Seger's early recordings with the Bob Seger System. The best known of these early records is Ramblin' Gamblin' Man, released as a single in 1969. The song did pretty well at the time, but it would be several years before Seger would return to the charts.
Artist: Hysterics
Title: Everything's There
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): David Donaghue
Label: Rhino (original label: Bing)
Year: 1965
Much as San Jose, California had its own thriving teen-oriented music scene within the greater San Francisco media market, the San Bernardino/Riverside area of Southern California was home to several local bands that were able to score recording contracts with various small labels in the area. Among those were the Hysterics, who recorded four songs for two seperate labels in 1965. The best of those was Everything's There, which appeared as the B side of the second single issued by the band. At some point, Everything's There was reissued (along with the A side of the first record, That's All She Wrote) on yet a third label, but this time credited to the Love Ins. Such was the state of the indy record business in the late 60s.
Artist: Lovin' Spoonful
Title: Alley Oop
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Dallas Frazier
Label: Sundazed/Kama Sutra
Year: 1965/2011
The Lovin' Spoonful didn't actually release their version of the old Hollywood Argyles song Alley Oop as a single in 1965. In fact, they didn't release the song at all, even though it was recorded during the same sessions that became their debut LP that year. In 2011 the people at Sundazed decided to create a "single that never was", pairing Alley Oop with the full-length version of Night Owl Blues, a song that had been included on the 1965 debut in edited form. The Spoonful version of Alley Oop has an almost garage-band feel about it, and is perhaps the best indication on vinyl of what the band actually sounded like in their early days as a local fixture on the Greenwich Village scene.
Artist: Blues Project
Title: I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes
Source: CD: Projections
Writer(s): Blind Willie Johnson
Label: Sundazed (original label: Verve Forecast)
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 rock jam LP ever, 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 in a blues record.
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: Mother Earth
Title: Stranger In My Own Home Town
Source: LP: Revolution-soundtrack
Writer(s): Percy Mayfield
Label: United Artists
Year: 1968
In early 1968 the producers of a quasi-documentary film called Revolution decided that it would be more economical to use unsigned San Francisco bands for the film's soundtrack than to pay royalties to various record labels. Thus, they chose the three most popular local bands that had not yet signed with a major label: the Steve Miller Band, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Mother Earth. The latter band had been founded by vocalists Tracy Nelson and Powell St. John, and was the most blues-based of the three, particularly on songs sung by St. John such as Stranger In My Own Home Town. Mother Earth would eventually sign with Mercury, recording a series of critically acclaimed albums in the late 60s and early 70s.
Artist: Chocolate Watchband
Title: Let's Talk About Girls
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released on LP: No Way Out)
Writer(s): E. Freiser
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1967
I find it sadly ironic that the first cut on the first album released by San Jose, California's Chocolate Watchband had a vocal track by Don Bennett, a studio vocalist under contract to Tower Records, replacing the original track by Watchband vocalist Dave Aguilar. Aguilar's vocals were also replaced by Bennett's on the Watchband's cover of Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour on the same album. In addition, there are four instrumental tracks on the album that are played entirely by studio musicians. Worse yet, the entire first side of the Watchband's second LP was done by studio musicians and the third Watchband LP featured an entirely different lineup. The final insult was when Lenny Kaye, who assembled the original Nuggets collection in the early 1970s, elected to include this recording, rather than one of the several fine tracks that actually did feature Aguilar on vocals.
Artist: Humane Society
Title: Knock Knock
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer: Minnick/Wheetman
Label: Rhino (original label: Liberty)
Year: 1967
The Humane Society, from Simi Valley, California, formed in 1965 as the Innocents. The band featured singer/guitarist Danny Wheetman, lead guitarist Jim Pettit, rhythm guitarist Woody Minnick, bassist Richard Majewski, and drummer Bill Schnetzler. As was often the case, The A side of the group's first single was chosen by the band's producers, while the band itself provided the B side. In this case that B side was Knock Knock, a classic piece of garage-punk that far outshines the original A side of the record.
Artist: Litter
Title: Action Woman
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and included on LP: Distortions)
Writer(s): Warren Hendrick
Label: Rhino (original labels: Scotty and Warick)
Year: 1967
The Litter was one of many bands to come under the guidance of Warren Kendrick, owner of the Minneapolis-based Warick Records (later Warwick). Their first album, Distortions, was comprised mostly of cover songs of mainly British groups, but did include a pair of songs written by Hendrick himself, including Action Woman, which was also released as the band's first single in January of 1967. The group made two more albums, including one for ABC's Probe label in 1969, before disbanding, reuniting in the late 90s for a pair of CDs on the Arf! Arf! label.
Artist: Vanilla Fudge
Title: You Keep Me Hangin' On
Source: Mono CD: Psychedelic Pop (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Holland/Dozier/Holland
Label: BMG/RCA/Buddah (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
The Vanilla Fudge version of You Keep Me Hangin' On was originally recorded and released in 1967, not too long after the Supremes version of the song finished its own run on the charts. It wasn't until the following year, however, the the Vanilla Fudge recording caught on with AM radio listeners, turning it into the band's only top 40 hit (not that they needed one).
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Stupid Girl
Source: Simulated stereo CD: Singles Collection-The London Years (originally released as 45 RPM B side)
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: Abkco (original label: London)
Year: 1966
By 1966 the songwriting team of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards had hit its stride, turning out Rolling Stones classics like Mother's Little Helper and Paint It Black as a matter of course. Even B sides such as Stupid Girl were starting to get airplay, a trend that would continue to grow over the next year or so.
Artist: Spencer Davis Group
Title: Gimme Some Lovin'
Source: Simulated stereo LP: Progressive Heavies (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Winwood/Winwood/Davis
Label: United Artists
Year: 1966
The movie The Big Chill used Gimme Some Lovin' by the Spencer Davis Group as the backdrop for a touch football game at an informal reunion of former college students from the 60s. From that point on, movie soundtracks became much more than just background music and soundtrack albums started becoming best-sellers. Not entirely coincidentally, 60s-oriented oldies radio stations began to appear in major markets as well. Most of them are now playing 80s oldies, by the way.
Artist: Frantics
Title: Human Monkey
Source: Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Miller/Stevenson
Label: Rhino (original label: Action)
Year: 1966
The Frantics were a popular cover band in Tacoma, Washington in the early 60s. Guitarist Jerry Miller, however, had greater ambitions and eventually relocated to San Francisco, taking the band's name and two of its members, keyboardist Chuck "Steaks" Schoning and drummer Don Stevenson, with him. After recruiting bassist Bob Mosely the Frantics cut their only single, an early Motown-style dance number called the Human Monkey, in 1966. The group would soon shed Schoning and pick up two new members, changing their name to Moby Grape in the process.
Artist: Tommy James And The Shondells
Title: Breakaway
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): James/Vail
Label: Roulette
Year: 1969
From a modern perspective it seems obvious that the only thing keeping Roulette Records going in the late 60s was the string of hits on the label by Tommy James and the Shondells. Oddly enough, Tommy James was one of many acts that initially tanked on the label. It was only when a Pittsburgh DJ began playing a two year old copy of Hanky Panky he had rescued from the throwaway pile in 1966 that the band's career took off. By then, however, the original Shondells had long-since disbanded and James found himself suddenly in demand with no band to back him up. He soon found a new group of Shondells and began cranking out an amazing streak of hits, including I Think We're Alone Now, Mony Mony, Crystal Blue Persuasion and Crimson and Clover. By 1969, however, the streak was coming to an end, with Sweet Cherry Wine being one of the group's last top 40 hits. The B side of that record was the decidedly psychedelic Breakaway. James would continue as a solo artist after the Shondells split up, scoring his last hit in 1971 with Draggin' The Line.
Artist: Ipsissimus
Title: Hold On
Source: Mono import CD: Insane Times (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Haskell/Condor/Lynton
Label: Zonophone UK (original label: Parlophone)
Year: 1969
The song Hold On was originally recorded as a B side in 1967 by a band called Les Fleur De Lys, although the label credited the track to Rupert's People, who recorded the song on the A side. Le Fleur De Lys later recorded another version of Hold On with South African-born singer Sharon Tandy. Finally, the heaviest version of the song was cut by an obscure band from Barnet called Ipsissimus. To my knowledge it was their only record.
Artist: Who
Title: Pinball Wizard
Source: CD: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy
Writer(s): Pete Townshend
Label: MCA (original label: Decca)
Year: 1969
Wrapping up this week's show we have a song from the rock opera Tommy that was actually released as a single a few weeks before the album came out. It was a marketing strategy that would become the music industry standard for decades, until internet downloading changed everything.
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Embedded Player
I'm trying out an embedded player with this week's show on it, just to see how it works...
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 1315 (starts 4/11/13)
Artist: Rolling Stones
Title: Let's Spend The Night Together
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
I seem to recall some TV show (Ed Sullivan, maybe?) making Mick Jagger change the words to "Let's Spend Some Time Together". I can't imagine anyone doing that to the Stones now.
Artist: Cream
Title: Outside Woman Blues
Source: CD: Disraeli Gears
Writer(s): Arthur Reynolds
Label: Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
Although Cream's second album, Disraeli Gears, is best known for its psychedelic cover art and original songs such as Strange Brew, Sunshine Of Your Love and Tales of Brave Ulysses, the LP did have one notable blues cover on it. Outside Woman Blues was originally recorded by Blind Joe Reynolds in 1929 and has since been covered by a variety of artists including Van Halen, Johnny Winters, Jimi Hendrix and even the Atlanta Rhythm Section.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Plastic Fantastic Lover
Source: CD: Surrealistic Pillow
Writer(s): Marty Balin
Label: RCA
Year: 1967
Jefferson Airplane scored their first top 10 hit with Somebody To Love, the second single released from the Surrealistic Pillow album. Almost immediately, forward-thinking FM stations began playing other tracks from the album. One of those favored album tracks, Plastic Fantastic Lover, ended up being the B side of the band's follow-up single, White Rabbit. When the Airplane reunited in 1989 and issued their two-disc retrospective, 2400 Fulton Street, they issued a special stereo pressing of the single on white vinyl as a way of promoting the collection.
Artist: Leaves
Title: Too Many People
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era
Writer(s): Pons/Rinehart
Label: Rhino (original label: Mira)
Year: 1965
The Leaves are a bit unusual in that in a city known for drawing wannabes from across the world, this local band's members were all native L.A.ins. 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 to record as a single by their producer (Love Minus Zero) and allowed to write their own B side. In this case that B side was Too Many People, written by bassist Jim Pons and guitarist Bill Rhinehart. 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: Grass Roots
Title: You're A Lonely Girl
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Sloan/Barri
Label: Dunhill
Year: 1966
In late 1965 songwriters/producers P.F. Sloan (Eve of Destruction) and Steve Barri decided to create a series of records by a band called the Grass Roots. The problem was that there was no band called the Grass Roots (at least not that they knew of), so Sloan and Barri decided to recruit an existing band and talk them into changing their name. The band they found was the Bedouins, one of the early San Francisco bands. As the rush to sign SF bands was still months away, the Bedouins were more than happy to record the songs Sloan and Barri picked out for them. The first single by the newly-named Grass Roots was a cover of Bob Dylan's Mr. Jones (Ballad Of A Thin Man). The B side was You're A Lonely Girl, a Sloan/Barri composition. The Bedouins would soon grow disenchanted with their role and move back to San Francisco, leaving Sloan and Barri the task of finding a new Grass Roots. Eventually they did, and the rest is history. The Bedouins never recorded again.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Pleasant Valley Sunday
Source: CD: Nuggets-Classics From the Psychedelic 60s (originally released on LP: Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD.)
Writer: Goffin/King
Label: Rhino
Year: 1967
After making it a point to play their own instruments on their third LP, Headquarters, the Monkees decided to once again use studio musicians for their next album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD. The difference was that this time the studio musicians would be recording under the supervision of the Monkees themselves rather than Don Kirschner and the array of producers he had lined up for the first two Monkees LPs. The result was an album that many critics consider the group's best effort. The only single released from the album was Pleasant Valley Sunday, a song penned by the husband and wife team of Gerry Goffin and Carole King, and backed by the band's remake of the Tommy Boyce/Bobby Hart song Words, which had been recorded the previous year by the Leaves. Although both songs ended up making the charts, it was Pleasant Valley Sunday that got the most airplay and is considered by many to be Monkees' greatest achievement.
Artist: Guilloteens
Title: For My Own
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Bruell/Paul/Hutcherson/Davis
Label: Rhino (original label: Hanna-Barbera)
Year: 1965
Sometimes you don't quite end up where you expected to. The Guilloteens were a band from Memphis, Tennessee, who relocated to Los Angeles in the hopes of hitting the big time. At first it looked like things might just work out for the group, especially when Phil Spector himself took an interest in their music. Then their path took a strange turn when their manager instead got them a contract with the new Hanna-Barbera label being started by the successful animation team. As one of the band members put it: "We went from the wall of sound to Huckleberry Hound." The result was the single For My Own, released in 1965.
Artist: Del-Vetts
Title: Last Time Around
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Dennis Dahlquist
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
The Del-Vetts were from Chicago's affluent North Shore. Their gimmick was to show up at a high school dance by driving their matching corvettes onto the gymnasium dance floor. Musically, like most garage/punk bands, they were heavily influenced by the British invasion bands. Unlike most garage/punk bands, who favored the Rolling Stones, the Del-Vetts were more into the Jeff Beck era Yardbirds. They had a few regional hits from 1965-67, the biggest being this single issued on the Dunwich label, home of fellow Chicago suburbanites the Shadows of Knight. This may well be the very first death rock song.
Artist: West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title: Unfree Child
Source: LP: Volume II
Writer(s): Markley/Harris
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
For those who are not familiar with reel-to-reel tape technology, here's a quick primer. As with all tape tech, a recording is created by a magnetic head imprinting patterns onto magnetic tape. This tape travels across the head at a predetermined speed. There were actually several speeds used over the years, all of which were standardized by measuring the length of tape travelling across the head in one second. In addition, each standard speed was exactly one half of the one above it, with the fastest having the highest quality. The fastest known speed was 30 inches per second (only used by computers, as far as I know), with 15 ips being the standard speed for studio recordings. Radio stations generally had machines that ran at either 15 or 7 1/2 ips, while home units ran at either 7 1/2 or 3 3/4. Dictating machines, which were virtually useless for recording music, used 1 7/8 or even 15/16 (which had so much tape hiss you could barely hear the recording itself). The advantage of halving the speed (besides the obvious economic advantage) is that the original key of the music is the same, albeit an octave lower. This made it possible to deliberately record something at the wrong speed, then play that recording back at the regular speed in the same key (but at half or double tempo). As the technology developed it became possible to put multiple tracks onto the same strip of tape, with first two, then three, four, eight and even sixteen tracks running parallel along the tape. This is what made it possible to record overdubs (by putting the original recording on one track and play it back while recording more stuff on another one), and to record in stereo. Unfree Child, which starts off a set of 1967 tracks from L.A. bands, has an intro that was actually recorded at a higher speed then played back at the next one down, giving it a deep growling sound. This type of effect, combined with backwards masking (created by playing the tape back to front and recording something on one of the unused tracks) is what got some heavy metal bands into trouble for putting hidden "Satanic" messages on their records.
Artist: Simon And Garfunkel
Title: Fakin' It
Source: LP: Bookends
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Columbia/Sundazed
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 that makes a reference to a "Mr. Leitch" (the last name of the Scottish folksinger turned psychedelic pioneer Donovan). The stereo mix of Fakin' It was first released on the 1968 LP Bookends.
Artist: Cyrkle
Title: Red Chair Fade Away
Source: CD: Red Rubber Ball (A Collection)
Writer(s): Barry and Robin Gibb
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1968
The story of the Cyrkle is very much a story of quick success followed by a slow, arduous decline. Their first single, Red Rubber Ball, nearly topped the charts. The follow-up, Turn Down Day, did almost (but not quite) as well, and both are heard regularly on oldies radio stations. Their next single did a bit worse, as did the one after that and the one after that. In fact, each and every single the band released did slightly worse than its predecessor. Making things worse was the death of their manager, Brian Epstein, in mid-1967. One bright spot for the band was when co-founder Tom Dawes got wind that the 7-UP soft drink company was looking for a jingle for their new "un-cola" ad campaign. The band spent about half a day recording the jingle and Dawes took home a check for $10,000, pretty big money in 1967. Not long after, Dawes left the Cyrkle for good for a career in the advertising industry, turning out such memorable tunes as Plop Plop Fizz Fizz (Oh, What A Relief It Is). The final Cyrkle record was a single, Where Are You Going, released in January of 1968, with a cover of a Bee Gees LP track, Red Chair Fade Away, on the B side.
Artist: Max Frost And The Troopers
Title: Shape Of Things To Come
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Wild In The Streets (soundtrack))
Writer(s): Mann/Weill
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1968
Max Frost was a politically savvy rock star who rode the youth movement all the way to the White House, first through getting the support of a hip young Senator, then getting the age requirements for holding high political office lowered to 21, and finally lowering the voting age to 14. Everyone over 30 was locked away in internment camps, similar to those used during WWII by various governments to hold those of questionable loyalty to the current regime. What? You don't remember any of that? You say it sounds like the plot of a cheapie late 60s teen exploitation flick? Right on all counts. "Wild in the Streets" starred Christopher Jones as the rock star, Hal Holbrook as the hip young senator, and a Poseidon Adventure-sized Shelly Winter as the rock star's interred mom. Richard Pryor, in his film debut, played the band's drummer/political activist Stanley X. Imagine that.
Artist: Byrds
Title: What's Happening?!?!
Source: CD: Fifth Dimension
Writer(s): David Crosby
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1966
David Crosby was just beginning to emerge as a songwriter on the third Byrds album, 5D. Most of his contributions on the album were collaborations with Jim (Roger) McGuinn; What's Happening!?!, on the other hand, was Crosby's first solo composition to be recorded by the group.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Eight Miles High
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Fifth Dimension)
Writer(s): Clark/McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1966
Gene Clark's final contribution to the Byrds was his collaboration with David Crosby and Roger McGuinn, Eight Miles High. Despite a newsletter from the most powerful man in top 40 radio, Bill Drake, advising stations not to play this "drug song", the song 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 that led to his leaving the Byrds.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Why
Source: CD: Fifth Dimension (bonus track)
Writer(s): McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1965
One of the highlights of the Byrds' Younger Than Yesterday album, released in early 1967, was a song co-written by David Crosby and Jim (Roger) McGuinn called Why. Many of the band's fans already knew that a different version of the song had already been released as the B side of Eight Miles High the previous year. What was not as well-known, however, was that both songs had been first recorded at the RCA Studios in Burbank in December of 1965, but rejected by Columbia due to their being produced at studios owned by a hated competitor. Crosby has since said that he prefers the RCA recordings to the later ones made at Columbia's own studios, calling it "stronger...with a lot more flow to it".
Artist: Seeds
Title: Girl I Want You
Source: LP: The Seeds
Writer(s): Sky Saxon
Label: GNP Crescendo
Year: 1966
Considering what else was available on vinyl in 1966, a listen to Girl I Want You, from the first Seeds LP, makes it easy to understand why some people in Los Angeles were convinced that the Seeds were actually visitors from another planet.
Artist: Butterfield Blues Band
Title: Get Out Of My Life Woman
Source: CD: East-West
Writer(s): Alan Toussaint
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
The second Butterfield Blues Band album, East-West, released in 1966, is best known for the outstanding guitar work of Mike Bloomfield and Elvin Bishop. One often overlooked member of the group was keyboardist Mark Naftalin, who, along with Butterfield and Bishop, was a founding member of the band. Naftalin's keyboard work is the highlight of the band's cover of Alan Toussaint's Get Out Of My Life Woman, which was a hit for Lee Dorsey the same year.
Artist: Motorcycle Abileen
Title: (You Used To) Ride So High
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released on CD: Warren Zevon: The First Sessions)
Writer(s): Warren Zevon
Label: Rhino (original label: Varese Sarabande)
Year: Recorded 1966, released 2003
One of the ripple effects of the British Invasion was the near-disappearance of the solo artist from the top 40 charts for several years. There were exceptions, of course. Folk singers such as Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, pop singers such as Jackie DeShannon and Dionne Warwick and more adult-oriented vocalists such as Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin all did reasonably well, but if you wanted to be a rock and roll star you had to have a band. Producers took to creating band names for pieces that were in fact entirely performed by studio musicians, and in a few cases a solo artist would use a band name for his own recordings. One such case is the Motorcycle Abilene, which was in reality producer Bones Howe on various percussion devices working with singer/songwriter Warren Zevon, who sings and plays all non-percussion instruments on (You Used To) Ride So High, a song he wrote shortly after disbanding Lyme And Cybelle (he was Lyme).
Artist: Country Joe And The Fish
Title: Super Bird
Source: CD: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s): Joe McDonald
Label: Vanguard
Year: 1967
Country Joe and the Fish, from Berkeley, California, were one of the first rock bands to incorporate political satire into their music. Their I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-To-Die Rag is one of the most famous protest songs ever written. Superbird is even heavier on the satire than the Rag. The song, from the band's debut LP, puts president Lyndon Johnson, whose wife was known as "Ladybird", in the role of a comic book superhero.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Bluebird
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again)
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
When it comes right down to it Buffalo Springfield has one of the highest ratios of songs recorded to songs played on the radio of any band in history, especially if you only count the two albums worth of material that was released while the band was still active. This is probably because Buffalo Springfield had more raw songwriting talent than just about any two other bands. Although Neil Young was just starting to hit his stride as a songwriter, bandmate Stephen Stills was already at an early peak, as songs like Bluebird clearly demonstrate.
Artist: Eric Burdon And The Animals
Title: Sky Pilot
Source: CD: The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals (originally released on LP: The Twain Shall Meet)
Writer(s): Burdon/Briggs/Weider/Jenkins/McCulloch
Label: Polydor (original label: M-G-M)
Year: 1968
After the original Animals lineup disbanded in late 1966, lead vocalist Eric Burdon quickly set out to form a "New Animals" group that would come to be called Eric Burdon and the Animals. Their biggest hit was 1968's Sky Pilot, a song that was so long it had to be split across two sides of a 45 RPM record. The uninterrupted version of the song was included on the group's second album, The Twain Shall Meet.
Artist: Fever Tree
Title: San Francisco Girls (Return of the Native)
Source: LP: Fever Tree
Writer(s): Hlotzman/Holtzman/Michaels
Label: Uni
Year: 1968
A minor trend in 1968 was for producer/songwriters to find a band to record their material exclusively. A prime example is Houston's Fever Tree, which featured the music of husband and wife team Scott and Vivian Holtzman. San Francisco Girls (Return of the Native) was the single from that album, peaking in the lower reaches of the Hot 100 charts.
Artist: October Country
Title: My Girlfriend Is A Witch
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Michael Lloyd
Label: Rhino (original label: Epic)
Year: 1968
By 1968 the L.A. under-age club scene was winding down, and several now out of work bands were making last (and sometimes only) attempts at garnering hits in the studio. One such band was October Country, whose first release had gotten a fair amount of local airplay, but who had become bogged down trying to come up with lyrics for a follow-up single. Enter Michael Lloyd, recently split from the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band and looking to become a record producer. Lloyd not only produced and wrote the lyrics for My Girlfriend Is A Witch, he also ended up playing drums on the record as well.
Artist: Sugarloaf
Title: Gold And The Blues
Source: LP: Sugarloaf
Writer(s): Corbetta/Pollock/Raymond/Webber
Label: Liberty
Year: 1970
There don't seem to be very many tracks highlighting instrumental work in rock radio these days, and virtually none in what passes for top 40. Perhaps that's just a natural consequence of the emergence of a "front" person as the center of attention in the 70s. There was a time, however, that every member of a band played an instrument, and many albums included at least one instrumental track. Gold And The Blues, from the debut Sugarloaf album, is basically a blues jam that shows that Jerry Corbetta was far more than just the guy who sang Green-Eyed Lady and Don't Call Us, We'll Call You; he was quite possibly the best rock organist ever. Bob Webber's guitar work on the tune ain't half bad, either.
Artist: Fleetwood Mac
Title: My Dream
Source: LP: Then Play On (first US version)
Writer(s): Danny Kirwan
Label: Reprise
Year: 1969
Danny Kirwan was only 17 and fronting his own band, Boilerhouse, when he came to the attention of Fleetwood Mac founder Peter Green. Green invited the band to play a few opening gigs for Fleetwood Mac and before long the two guitarists were participating in after hours jams together. Drummer Mick Fleetwood invited Kirwan to join the band, and Kirwan became the group's fifth official member (Christine McVie still having guest artist status at that point). After making his debut sharing lead guitar duties with Green on an instrumental single, Albatross, Kirwan settled in as a songwriting member of the band in time for their 1969 LP Then Play On, contributing as many songs to the album as Green himself (although the US version left two of those songs off the LP). Shortly after Then Play On's release, the group had a huge international hit with Oh, Well (part one), which led to the band's US label, Reprise, recalling the album and reissuing it with Oh Well (parts one and two) added to it. To make way for the nearly nine-minute track, two more of Kirwan's songs were deleted from the lineup. One of those two songs was the instrumental My Dream, which has been reinserted into the lineup on recent CD releases.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: Skip Softly (My Moonbeams)
Source: CD: Shine On Brightly
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M
Year: 1968
Procol Harum is not generally thought of as a novelty act. The closest they ever came was this track from the Shine On Brightly album that steals shamelessly from a classical piece I really should know the name of but don't. Even then, Skip Softly (My Moonbeams) ends up being as much a showcase for a then-young Robin Trower's guitar work as anything else.
...and speaking of guitar work:
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Voodoo Childs (Slight Return)
Source: Import LP: The Singles Album (originally released on LP: Electric Ladyland) `
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Polydor (UK)
Year: 1968
Although never released as a single in the US, Voodoo Child (Slight Return), has become a staple of classic rock radio over the years and is often cited as one of the greatest guitar songs ever recorded. The song was originally an outgrowth of a jam session (spelled Voodoo Chile) at New York's Record Plant, which itself takes up most of side one of the Electric Ladyland LP. A more refined studio version of the song was created when the band had to do multiple takes for a film crew and Hendrix decided to make something more productive out of the sessions. Voodoo Child (Slight Return) closes side four of the LP, and was released on a three-song EP in Europe shortly after Hendrix's death in 1970.
Artist: Grateful Dead
Title: China Cat Sunflower
Source: CD: Aoxomoxoa
Writer(s): Hunter/Garcia/Lesh
Label: Warner Brothers
Year: 1969
The third Grateful Dead album, Aoxomoxoa, was an experimental mixture of live audio and studio enhancements, much in the same vein as their previous effort, Anthem Of The Sun. One track on the album, China Cat Sunflower, is almost entirely a studio creation, and as such has a cleaner sound than the rest of the LP.
Artist: Sly And The Family Stone
Title: I Want To Take You Higher
Source: CD: The Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Stand and as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Sly Stone
Label: Priority (original label: Epic)
Year: 1969
Sylvester Stewart was a major presence on the San Francisco music scene for several years, both as a producer for Autumn Records and as a popular local disc jockey. In 1967 he decided to take it to the next level, using his studio connections to put together Sly And The Family Stone. The band featured a solid lineup of musicians, including Larry Graham, whose growling bass line figures prominently in their 1969 recording of I Want To Take You Higher. The song was originally released as a B side, but after the group blew away the crowd at Woodstock the recording was re-released as a single the following year.
Title: Let's Spend The Night Together
Source: 45 RPM single (stereo reissue)
Writer(s): Jagger/Richards
Label: London
Year: 1967
I seem to recall some TV show (Ed Sullivan, maybe?) making Mick Jagger change the words to "Let's Spend Some Time Together". I can't imagine anyone doing that to the Stones now.
Artist: Cream
Title: Outside Woman Blues
Source: CD: Disraeli Gears
Writer(s): Arthur Reynolds
Label: Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
Although Cream's second album, Disraeli Gears, is best known for its psychedelic cover art and original songs such as Strange Brew, Sunshine Of Your Love and Tales of Brave Ulysses, the LP did have one notable blues cover on it. Outside Woman Blues was originally recorded by Blind Joe Reynolds in 1929 and has since been covered by a variety of artists including Van Halen, Johnny Winters, Jimi Hendrix and even the Atlanta Rhythm Section.
Artist: Jefferson Airplane
Title: Plastic Fantastic Lover
Source: CD: Surrealistic Pillow
Writer(s): Marty Balin
Label: RCA
Year: 1967
Jefferson Airplane scored their first top 10 hit with Somebody To Love, the second single released from the Surrealistic Pillow album. Almost immediately, forward-thinking FM stations began playing other tracks from the album. One of those favored album tracks, Plastic Fantastic Lover, ended up being the B side of the band's follow-up single, White Rabbit. When the Airplane reunited in 1989 and issued their two-disc retrospective, 2400 Fulton Street, they issued a special stereo pressing of the single on white vinyl as a way of promoting the collection.
Artist: Leaves
Title: Too Many People
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era
Writer(s): Pons/Rinehart
Label: Rhino (original label: Mira)
Year: 1965
The Leaves are a bit unusual in that in a city known for drawing wannabes from across the world, this local band's members were all native L.A.ins. 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 to record as a single by their producer (Love Minus Zero) and allowed to write their own B side. In this case that B side was Too Many People, written by bassist Jim Pons and guitarist Bill Rhinehart. 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: Grass Roots
Title: You're A Lonely Girl
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Sloan/Barri
Label: Dunhill
Year: 1966
In late 1965 songwriters/producers P.F. Sloan (Eve of Destruction) and Steve Barri decided to create a series of records by a band called the Grass Roots. The problem was that there was no band called the Grass Roots (at least not that they knew of), so Sloan and Barri decided to recruit an existing band and talk them into changing their name. The band they found was the Bedouins, one of the early San Francisco bands. As the rush to sign SF bands was still months away, the Bedouins were more than happy to record the songs Sloan and Barri picked out for them. The first single by the newly-named Grass Roots was a cover of Bob Dylan's Mr. Jones (Ballad Of A Thin Man). The B side was You're A Lonely Girl, a Sloan/Barri composition. The Bedouins would soon grow disenchanted with their role and move back to San Francisco, leaving Sloan and Barri the task of finding a new Grass Roots. Eventually they did, and the rest is history. The Bedouins never recorded again.
Artist: Monkees
Title: Pleasant Valley Sunday
Source: CD: Nuggets-Classics From the Psychedelic 60s (originally released on LP: Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD.)
Writer: Goffin/King
Label: Rhino
Year: 1967
After making it a point to play their own instruments on their third LP, Headquarters, the Monkees decided to once again use studio musicians for their next album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD. The difference was that this time the studio musicians would be recording under the supervision of the Monkees themselves rather than Don Kirschner and the array of producers he had lined up for the first two Monkees LPs. The result was an album that many critics consider the group's best effort. The only single released from the album was Pleasant Valley Sunday, a song penned by the husband and wife team of Gerry Goffin and Carole King, and backed by the band's remake of the Tommy Boyce/Bobby Hart song Words, which had been recorded the previous year by the Leaves. Although both songs ended up making the charts, it was Pleasant Valley Sunday that got the most airplay and is considered by many to be Monkees' greatest achievement.
Artist: Guilloteens
Title: For My Own
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Bruell/Paul/Hutcherson/Davis
Label: Rhino (original label: Hanna-Barbera)
Year: 1965
Sometimes you don't quite end up where you expected to. The Guilloteens were a band from Memphis, Tennessee, who relocated to Los Angeles in the hopes of hitting the big time. At first it looked like things might just work out for the group, especially when Phil Spector himself took an interest in their music. Then their path took a strange turn when their manager instead got them a contract with the new Hanna-Barbera label being started by the successful animation team. As one of the band members put it: "We went from the wall of sound to Huckleberry Hound." The result was the single For My Own, released in 1965.
Artist: Del-Vetts
Title: Last Time Around
Source: Mono LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Dennis Dahlquist
Label: Rhino (original label: Dunwich)
Year: 1966
The Del-Vetts were from Chicago's affluent North Shore. Their gimmick was to show up at a high school dance by driving their matching corvettes onto the gymnasium dance floor. Musically, like most garage/punk bands, they were heavily influenced by the British invasion bands. Unlike most garage/punk bands, who favored the Rolling Stones, the Del-Vetts were more into the Jeff Beck era Yardbirds. They had a few regional hits from 1965-67, the biggest being this single issued on the Dunwich label, home of fellow Chicago suburbanites the Shadows of Knight. This may well be the very first death rock song.
Artist: West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band
Title: Unfree Child
Source: LP: Volume II
Writer(s): Markley/Harris
Label: Reprise
Year: 1967
For those who are not familiar with reel-to-reel tape technology, here's a quick primer. As with all tape tech, a recording is created by a magnetic head imprinting patterns onto magnetic tape. This tape travels across the head at a predetermined speed. There were actually several speeds used over the years, all of which were standardized by measuring the length of tape travelling across the head in one second. In addition, each standard speed was exactly one half of the one above it, with the fastest having the highest quality. The fastest known speed was 30 inches per second (only used by computers, as far as I know), with 15 ips being the standard speed for studio recordings. Radio stations generally had machines that ran at either 15 or 7 1/2 ips, while home units ran at either 7 1/2 or 3 3/4. Dictating machines, which were virtually useless for recording music, used 1 7/8 or even 15/16 (which had so much tape hiss you could barely hear the recording itself). The advantage of halving the speed (besides the obvious economic advantage) is that the original key of the music is the same, albeit an octave lower. This made it possible to deliberately record something at the wrong speed, then play that recording back at the regular speed in the same key (but at half or double tempo). As the technology developed it became possible to put multiple tracks onto the same strip of tape, with first two, then three, four, eight and even sixteen tracks running parallel along the tape. This is what made it possible to record overdubs (by putting the original recording on one track and play it back while recording more stuff on another one), and to record in stereo. Unfree Child, which starts off a set of 1967 tracks from L.A. bands, has an intro that was actually recorded at a higher speed then played back at the next one down, giving it a deep growling sound. This type of effect, combined with backwards masking (created by playing the tape back to front and recording something on one of the unused tracks) is what got some heavy metal bands into trouble for putting hidden "Satanic" messages on their records.
Artist: Simon And Garfunkel
Title: Fakin' It
Source: LP: Bookends
Writer(s): Paul Simon
Label: Columbia/Sundazed
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 that makes a reference to a "Mr. Leitch" (the last name of the Scottish folksinger turned psychedelic pioneer Donovan). The stereo mix of Fakin' It was first released on the 1968 LP Bookends.
Artist: Cyrkle
Title: Red Chair Fade Away
Source: CD: Red Rubber Ball (A Collection)
Writer(s): Barry and Robin Gibb
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1968
The story of the Cyrkle is very much a story of quick success followed by a slow, arduous decline. Their first single, Red Rubber Ball, nearly topped the charts. The follow-up, Turn Down Day, did almost (but not quite) as well, and both are heard regularly on oldies radio stations. Their next single did a bit worse, as did the one after that and the one after that. In fact, each and every single the band released did slightly worse than its predecessor. Making things worse was the death of their manager, Brian Epstein, in mid-1967. One bright spot for the band was when co-founder Tom Dawes got wind that the 7-UP soft drink company was looking for a jingle for their new "un-cola" ad campaign. The band spent about half a day recording the jingle and Dawes took home a check for $10,000, pretty big money in 1967. Not long after, Dawes left the Cyrkle for good for a career in the advertising industry, turning out such memorable tunes as Plop Plop Fizz Fizz (Oh, What A Relief It Is). The final Cyrkle record was a single, Where Are You Going, released in January of 1968, with a cover of a Bee Gees LP track, Red Chair Fade Away, on the B side.
Artist: Max Frost And The Troopers
Title: Shape Of Things To Come
Source: Mono CD: Nuggets-Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Wild In The Streets (soundtrack))
Writer(s): Mann/Weill
Label: Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year: 1968
Max Frost was a politically savvy rock star who rode the youth movement all the way to the White House, first through getting the support of a hip young Senator, then getting the age requirements for holding high political office lowered to 21, and finally lowering the voting age to 14. Everyone over 30 was locked away in internment camps, similar to those used during WWII by various governments to hold those of questionable loyalty to the current regime. What? You don't remember any of that? You say it sounds like the plot of a cheapie late 60s teen exploitation flick? Right on all counts. "Wild in the Streets" starred Christopher Jones as the rock star, Hal Holbrook as the hip young senator, and a Poseidon Adventure-sized Shelly Winter as the rock star's interred mom. Richard Pryor, in his film debut, played the band's drummer/political activist Stanley X. Imagine that.
Artist: Byrds
Title: What's Happening?!?!
Source: CD: Fifth Dimension
Writer(s): David Crosby
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1966
David Crosby was just beginning to emerge as a songwriter on the third Byrds album, 5D. Most of his contributions on the album were collaborations with Jim (Roger) McGuinn; What's Happening!?!, on the other hand, was Crosby's first solo composition to be recorded by the group.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Eight Miles High
Source: LP: Nuggets Vol. 9-Acid Rock (originally released as 45 RPM single and on LP: Fifth Dimension)
Writer(s): Clark/McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Rhino (original label: Columbia)
Year: 1966
Gene Clark's final contribution to the Byrds was his collaboration with David Crosby and Roger McGuinn, Eight Miles High. Despite a newsletter from the most powerful man in top 40 radio, Bill Drake, advising stations not to play this "drug song", the song 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 that led to his leaving the Byrds.
Artist: Byrds
Title: Why
Source: CD: Fifth Dimension (bonus track)
Writer(s): McGuinn/Crosby
Label: Columbia/Legacy
Year: 1965
One of the highlights of the Byrds' Younger Than Yesterday album, released in early 1967, was a song co-written by David Crosby and Jim (Roger) McGuinn called Why. Many of the band's fans already knew that a different version of the song had already been released as the B side of Eight Miles High the previous year. What was not as well-known, however, was that both songs had been first recorded at the RCA Studios in Burbank in December of 1965, but rejected by Columbia due to their being produced at studios owned by a hated competitor. Crosby has since said that he prefers the RCA recordings to the later ones made at Columbia's own studios, calling it "stronger...with a lot more flow to it".
Artist: Seeds
Title: Girl I Want You
Source: LP: The Seeds
Writer(s): Sky Saxon
Label: GNP Crescendo
Year: 1966
Considering what else was available on vinyl in 1966, a listen to Girl I Want You, from the first Seeds LP, makes it easy to understand why some people in Los Angeles were convinced that the Seeds were actually visitors from another planet.
Artist: Butterfield Blues Band
Title: Get Out Of My Life Woman
Source: CD: East-West
Writer(s): Alan Toussaint
Label: Elektra
Year: 1966
The second Butterfield Blues Band album, East-West, released in 1966, is best known for the outstanding guitar work of Mike Bloomfield and Elvin Bishop. One often overlooked member of the group was keyboardist Mark Naftalin, who, along with Butterfield and Bishop, was a founding member of the band. Naftalin's keyboard work is the highlight of the band's cover of Alan Toussaint's Get Out Of My Life Woman, which was a hit for Lee Dorsey the same year.
Artist: Motorcycle Abileen
Title: (You Used To) Ride So High
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released on CD: Warren Zevon: The First Sessions)
Writer(s): Warren Zevon
Label: Rhino (original label: Varese Sarabande)
Year: Recorded 1966, released 2003
One of the ripple effects of the British Invasion was the near-disappearance of the solo artist from the top 40 charts for several years. There were exceptions, of course. Folk singers such as Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, pop singers such as Jackie DeShannon and Dionne Warwick and more adult-oriented vocalists such as Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin all did reasonably well, but if you wanted to be a rock and roll star you had to have a band. Producers took to creating band names for pieces that were in fact entirely performed by studio musicians, and in a few cases a solo artist would use a band name for his own recordings. One such case is the Motorcycle Abilene, which was in reality producer Bones Howe on various percussion devices working with singer/songwriter Warren Zevon, who sings and plays all non-percussion instruments on (You Used To) Ride So High, a song he wrote shortly after disbanding Lyme And Cybelle (he was Lyme).
Artist: Country Joe And The Fish
Title: Super Bird
Source: CD: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s): Joe McDonald
Label: Vanguard
Year: 1967
Country Joe and the Fish, from Berkeley, California, were one of the first rock bands to incorporate political satire into their music. Their I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-To-Die Rag is one of the most famous protest songs ever written. Superbird is even heavier on the satire than the Rag. The song, from the band's debut LP, puts president Lyndon Johnson, whose wife was known as "Ladybird", in the role of a comic book superhero.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Title: Bluebird
Source: LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released on LP: Buffalo Springfield Again)
Writer(s): Stephen Stills
Label: Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year: 1967
When it comes right down to it Buffalo Springfield has one of the highest ratios of songs recorded to songs played on the radio of any band in history, especially if you only count the two albums worth of material that was released while the band was still active. This is probably because Buffalo Springfield had more raw songwriting talent than just about any two other bands. Although Neil Young was just starting to hit his stride as a songwriter, bandmate Stephen Stills was already at an early peak, as songs like Bluebird clearly demonstrate.
Artist: Eric Burdon And The Animals
Title: Sky Pilot
Source: CD: The Best Of Eric Burdon And The Animals (originally released on LP: The Twain Shall Meet)
Writer(s): Burdon/Briggs/Weider/Jenkins/McCulloch
Label: Polydor (original label: M-G-M)
Year: 1968
After the original Animals lineup disbanded in late 1966, lead vocalist Eric Burdon quickly set out to form a "New Animals" group that would come to be called Eric Burdon and the Animals. Their biggest hit was 1968's Sky Pilot, a song that was so long it had to be split across two sides of a 45 RPM record. The uninterrupted version of the song was included on the group's second album, The Twain Shall Meet.
Artist: Fever Tree
Title: San Francisco Girls (Return of the Native)
Source: LP: Fever Tree
Writer(s): Hlotzman/Holtzman/Michaels
Label: Uni
Year: 1968
A minor trend in 1968 was for producer/songwriters to find a band to record their material exclusively. A prime example is Houston's Fever Tree, which featured the music of husband and wife team Scott and Vivian Holtzman. San Francisco Girls (Return of the Native) was the single from that album, peaking in the lower reaches of the Hot 100 charts.
Artist: October Country
Title: My Girlfriend Is A Witch
Source: Mono CD: Where The Action Is: L.A. Nuggets 1965-68 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Michael Lloyd
Label: Rhino (original label: Epic)
Year: 1968
By 1968 the L.A. under-age club scene was winding down, and several now out of work bands were making last (and sometimes only) attempts at garnering hits in the studio. One such band was October Country, whose first release had gotten a fair amount of local airplay, but who had become bogged down trying to come up with lyrics for a follow-up single. Enter Michael Lloyd, recently split from the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band and looking to become a record producer. Lloyd not only produced and wrote the lyrics for My Girlfriend Is A Witch, he also ended up playing drums on the record as well.
Artist: Sugarloaf
Title: Gold And The Blues
Source: LP: Sugarloaf
Writer(s): Corbetta/Pollock/Raymond/Webber
Label: Liberty
Year: 1970
There don't seem to be very many tracks highlighting instrumental work in rock radio these days, and virtually none in what passes for top 40. Perhaps that's just a natural consequence of the emergence of a "front" person as the center of attention in the 70s. There was a time, however, that every member of a band played an instrument, and many albums included at least one instrumental track. Gold And The Blues, from the debut Sugarloaf album, is basically a blues jam that shows that Jerry Corbetta was far more than just the guy who sang Green-Eyed Lady and Don't Call Us, We'll Call You; he was quite possibly the best rock organist ever. Bob Webber's guitar work on the tune ain't half bad, either.
Artist: Fleetwood Mac
Title: My Dream
Source: LP: Then Play On (first US version)
Writer(s): Danny Kirwan
Label: Reprise
Year: 1969
Danny Kirwan was only 17 and fronting his own band, Boilerhouse, when he came to the attention of Fleetwood Mac founder Peter Green. Green invited the band to play a few opening gigs for Fleetwood Mac and before long the two guitarists were participating in after hours jams together. Drummer Mick Fleetwood invited Kirwan to join the band, and Kirwan became the group's fifth official member (Christine McVie still having guest artist status at that point). After making his debut sharing lead guitar duties with Green on an instrumental single, Albatross, Kirwan settled in as a songwriting member of the band in time for their 1969 LP Then Play On, contributing as many songs to the album as Green himself (although the US version left two of those songs off the LP). Shortly after Then Play On's release, the group had a huge international hit with Oh, Well (part one), which led to the band's US label, Reprise, recalling the album and reissuing it with Oh Well (parts one and two) added to it. To make way for the nearly nine-minute track, two more of Kirwan's songs were deleted from the lineup. One of those two songs was the instrumental My Dream, which has been reinserted into the lineup on recent CD releases.
Artist: Procol Harum
Title: Skip Softly (My Moonbeams)
Source: CD: Shine On Brightly
Writer(s): Brooker/Reid
Label: A&M
Year: 1968
Procol Harum is not generally thought of as a novelty act. The closest they ever came was this track from the Shine On Brightly album that steals shamelessly from a classical piece I really should know the name of but don't. Even then, Skip Softly (My Moonbeams) ends up being as much a showcase for a then-young Robin Trower's guitar work as anything else.
...and speaking of guitar work:
Artist: Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title: Voodoo Childs (Slight Return)
Source: Import LP: The Singles Album (originally released on LP: Electric Ladyland) `
Writer(s): Jimi Hendrix
Label: Polydor (UK)
Year: 1968
Although never released as a single in the US, Voodoo Child (Slight Return), has become a staple of classic rock radio over the years and is often cited as one of the greatest guitar songs ever recorded. The song was originally an outgrowth of a jam session (spelled Voodoo Chile) at New York's Record Plant, which itself takes up most of side one of the Electric Ladyland LP. A more refined studio version of the song was created when the band had to do multiple takes for a film crew and Hendrix decided to make something more productive out of the sessions. Voodoo Child (Slight Return) closes side four of the LP, and was released on a three-song EP in Europe shortly after Hendrix's death in 1970.
Artist: Grateful Dead
Title: China Cat Sunflower
Source: CD: Aoxomoxoa
Writer(s): Hunter/Garcia/Lesh
Label: Warner Brothers
Year: 1969
The third Grateful Dead album, Aoxomoxoa, was an experimental mixture of live audio and studio enhancements, much in the same vein as their previous effort, Anthem Of The Sun. One track on the album, China Cat Sunflower, is almost entirely a studio creation, and as such has a cleaner sound than the rest of the LP.
Artist: Sly And The Family Stone
Title: I Want To Take You Higher
Source: CD: The Best Of 60s Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Stand and as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Sly Stone
Label: Priority (original label: Epic)
Year: 1969
Sylvester Stewart was a major presence on the San Francisco music scene for several years, both as a producer for Autumn Records and as a popular local disc jockey. In 1967 he decided to take it to the next level, using his studio connections to put together Sly And The Family Stone. The band featured a solid lineup of musicians, including Larry Graham, whose growling bass line figures prominently in their 1969 recording of I Want To Take You Higher. The song was originally released as a B side, but after the group blew away the crowd at Woodstock the recording was re-released as a single the following year.
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