Rockin' in the Days Of Confusion # 2012 (starts 3/16/20)

    This week, Rockin' in the Days of Confusion is back in (free)-form, as we abandon all semblance of structure in favor of letting the songs flow into each other. How well that works is a matter of perception: Yours.

Artist:    Free
Title:    Wishing Well
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM promo single (from LP: Heartbreaker)
Writer(s):    Rodgers/Kirke/Yamauchi/Bundrick/Kossoff
Label:    Island
Year:    1972
    The final album from Free featured a somewhat altered lineup from their previous albums. Bassist (and one of the band's primary songwriters) Andy Fraser had already left the band, while guitarist/keyboardist Paul Kossoff was often incapacitated due to his Quaalude addiction. As a result, several guest musicians, as well as a couple of more permanent replacement members, make an appearance on Heartbreaker. With Fraser gone, lead vocalist Paul Rodgers took on the bulk of the band's songwriting duties, although the official writing credit on several tracks, including the single Wishing Well, went to the entire band membership. Following a US tour (without Kossoff), the band finally called it quits, with Rodgers and drummer Simon Kirke remaining together to form a new band, Bad Company.

Artist:    Grand Funk Railroad
Title:    Winter And My Soul
Source:    CD: Grand Funk
Writer(s):    Mark Farner
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1969
     It was 1969, and there were only three bands in the entire world recording the kind of music that would come to be called heavy metal. Two of those groups, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, were British. The third was Grand Funk Railroad. Hailing from Flint, Michigan, GFR had evolved out of popular local band Terry Knight And The Pack. Unlike the Pack, Grand Funk Railroad was built around the song ideas of guitarist/vocalist Mark Farner and, to a lesser degree in the early days, drummer Don Brewer. The power trio was completed by bassist Mel Shacher, the only member of the group that had not been a member of the Pack (although he, being younger than Farner and Brewer, had been an enthusiastic fan of the earlier band). Terry Knight himself was the band's producer, and together they made rock history, almost single-handedly creating the arena-rock phenomenon. Grand Funk (aka the Red Album) the group's second LP in six months, was recorded in a week, with all of the songs well rehearsed before the band even entered the studio. Winter In My Soul, which opens the LP's second side, is an excellent example of this. The song starts with a strong guitar riff which is quickly taken up by bass and drums before giving way to the tune's first vocal section, in which Mark Farner sings a somewhat bluesy riff in harmony with his guitar (no mean feat, considering it was done "live in the studio"). From there the song goes through several tempo and time signature changes before ending up rocking out hard and fast.
   
Artist:    Humble Pie
Title:    Shine On
Source:    CD: Rock On
Writer(s):    Peter Frampton
Label:    A&M
Year:    1971
    Humble Pie's fourth album, Rock On, was the last to feature guitarist/vocalist Peter Frampton, who wrote the album's lead single, Shine On. The song later became a staple of Frampton's live performances and was included on his most popular solo album, Frampton Comes Alive.

Artist:    Traffic
Title:    Dear Mr. Fantasy
Source:    CD: Smiling Phases (originally released on LP: Heaven Is In Your Mind, aka Mr. Fantasy)
Writer(s):    Winwood/Capaldi/Wood
Label:    Island (original label: United Artists)
Year:    1967
            Steve Winwood is one of those artists that has multiple signature songs, having a career that has spanned decades (so far). Still, if there is any one song that is most  closely associated with the guitarist/keyboardist/vocalist, it's Dear Mr. Fantasy from Traffic's 1967 debut LP Mr. Fantasy. The album was originally released in a modified version in the US in early 1968 under the title Heaven Is In Your Mind, but later editions of the LP, while retaining the US track order and running time, were renamed to match the original British title.

Artist:    Canned Heat
Title:    Human Condition
Source:    CD: The Very Best Of Canned Heat (originally released on CD: Uncanned)
Writer(s):    Canned Heat
Label:    Capitol (original label: EMI)
Year:    Recorded 1970, released 1994
    Human Condition was the name of Canned Heat's 1978 LP for the Takoma label. By that point only Robert Hite and Fito De La Parra were left from the band's classic lineup, and the album itself went largely unnoticed. This was not the first time that the band had recorded the title track itself, however. In 1994, a 1970 recording of Human Condition surfaced on the band's greatest hits collection Uncanned! The Best Of Canned Heat. Although it's not clear whether Henry Vestine or Harvey Mandel plays guitar on the recording, most of the members of the original band, including Robert Hite and Al Wilson, were present.

Artist:    Frank Zappa
Title:    Stink-Foot
Source:    CD: Apostrophe (')
Writer(s):    Frank Zappa
Label:    Zappa (original label: Discreet)
Year:    1974
    Recorded at the same time as the Mothers' Over-Nite Sensation, Apostrophe (') is one of the most popular albums in the Frank Zappa catalog. Much of this popularity is attributable to a combination of Zappa's prodigious guitar work, along with his unique sense of humor, both of which are in abundance on the final track of the album, Stink-Foot.

Artist:    Miles Davis
Title:    John McLaughlin
Source:    European import CD: Pure...Psychedelic Rock (originally released on LP: Bitches Brew)
Writer(s):    Miles Davis
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1970
    Miles Davis broke just about every rule in the jazz world with his 1970 album Bitches Brew. One of the stranger examples of this is the fact that he doesn't actually play on John McLaughlin, the final track on side three of the double-LP. The track, written by Davis, includes several musicians who would become some of the biggest stars of the jazz fusion movement, including Joe Zawinul, Chick Corea, Jack DeJohnette, Billy Cobham and, of course, John McLaughlin himself.
   
Artist:    Rare Earth
Title:    No. 1 Man
Source:    LP: Ecology
Writer(s):    Tom Baird
Label:    Motown (original label: Rare Earth)
Year:    1971
    Although not as well known as Norman Whitfield, Barret Strong or the Holland brothers, Tom Baird was one of the most prolific staff songwriter/producers at Motown from about 1969 on, which coincided with the rise in popularity of the band Rare Earth. In fact, Baird wrote much of the band's material, including No. 1 Son, from the 1970 LP Ecology. Baird would continue with the label throughout the 1970s, writing hit songs for many of Motown's most popular artists.

Artist:    Santana
Title:    No One To Depend On
Source:    LP: Santana (III)
Writer(s):    Carabella/Escobida/Rolie
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1971
    Santana's third LP (which like their debut LP was called simply Santana), was the last by the band's original lineup. Among the better-known tracks on the LP was No One To Depend On, featuring a guitar solo by teen phenom Neal Schon (who would go on to co-found Journey).

Artist:    James Gang
Title:    Funk #48
Source:    LP: The Best Of The James Gang (originally released on LP: Yer' Album)
Writer(s):    Walsh/Fox/Kriss
Label:    ABC (original label: Bluesway)
Year:    1969
    Cleveland's James Gang was one of the original power trios of the seventies. Although generally known as the starting place of Joe Walsh, the band was actually led by Jim Fox, one of the most underrated drummers in the history of rock. Fox, who was the only member to stay with the group through its many personnel changes over the years, sings lead on Funk # 48 from the band's debut album on ABC's Bluesway label. Yer Album, incidentally, was the only rock LP ever issued on Bluesway, a label better known for recordings by B.B. King such as Lucille and The Thrill Is Gone.

Artist:    Genesis
Title:    The Return Of The Giant Hogweed
Source:    CD: Nursery Crymes
Writer(s):    Banks/Collins/Gabriel/Hackett/Rutherford
Label:    Atlantic (original label: Charisma)
Year:    1971
    The Return Of The Giant Hogweed, from the 1971 Genesis album Nursery Cryme, is actually based on a true story about an invasive organism brought to England from Russia in the 1800s. Genesis, thanks in large part to the sense of whimsy brought to the band by their new drummer, Phil Collins, deliberately exaggerated the story, making the Giant Hogweed a threat to civilization as we know it. Nursery Crymes itself, although officially the third Genesis album, was in fact the debut of the band's classic lineup of Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Peter Gabriel, Mike Rutherford and new guitarist Steve Hackett, who joined a few months after founding member Anthony Phillips left the group following the release of the Trespass album. This lineup would remain intact until the departure of Gabriel in 1975.

   

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2011 (starts 3/9/20)

    This week's show is just a little bit different. For one thing, there are no artists' sets. For another, there are no Beatles songs. In fact, ten of this week's 32 tracks have never been played on Stuck in the Psychedelic Era before now. Read on...

Artist:     Who
Title:     The Kids Are Alright
Source:     Mono CD: Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy (originally released on LP: The Who Sings My Generation)
Writer:     Pete Townshend
Label:     MCA (original label: Decca)
Year:     1965
     In 1966, after releasing one album on the British Brunswick label, the Who's manager, Kit Lambert, had a falling out with their producer Shel Talby, which resulted in the Who switching to the new Reaction label. Talby retaliated by releasing A Legal Matter, taken from the 1965 album My Generation, as a single within a week of the debut of the Who's first Reaction single, Subsitute. Substitute, being a brand new song, did considerably better than A Legal Matter, but that did not stop Talmy from trying again a few months later by releasing another My Generation track, The Kids Are Alright, two weeks before Reaction released I'm A Boy. The legal battles between Talmy and the band continued for several years, preventing the CD release of the My Generation album until 2002, when the matter was finally settled. All of the songs referred to so far, however, appeared on the 1968 collection Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy, which is where most Americans heard them for the first time.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Set Me Free
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1965
    After scoring international success with a series of R&B influenced rockers in 1964, the Kinks started to mellow a bit in 1965, releasing more melodic songs such as Set Me Free. The band would continue to evolve throughout the decade, eventually becoming one of the first groups to release a concept album, Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire), in 1969.

Artist:    Rolling Stones
Title:    Mercy, Mercy
Source:    Mono CD: Out Of Our Heads (manufactured in England for US distribution)
Writer(s):    Covay/Miller
Label:    Abkco (original label: London)
Year:    1965
    One of Jimi Hendrix's first recordings as an R&B sideman was on Don Covay's 1964 recording of his song Mercy, Mercy (sometimes known as Have Mercy). The song was Covay's first breakthrough hit, going to the top of the R&B charts and crossing over into the top 40 charts as well. Possibly more importantly, the song was covered the following year by the Rolling Stones on their Out Of Our Heads album, bringing the song to a much wider worldwide audience. The Stones version of the song follows Covay's arrangement fairly closely, but, in the words of rock critic Richie Unterberger, "really upped the guitar wattage" from the original version. That's right. Keith Richards actually "out-louded" Jimi Hendrix on a recording of the same song. Granted, Hendrix, as a sideman in 1964, was under strict instructions to play it the way he was told to without any embellishments of his own, but still...

Artist:    Glass Family
Title:    Baby's Gone
Source:    Mono LP: Electric Band
Writer(s):    The Glass Family
Label:    Maplewood
Year:    Recorded 1967, released 2015
    Known as the "perpetual opening band" for such acts as the Byrds, the Doors and the Grateful Dead, the Glass Family was an important, if somewhat overlooked, piece of the California rock scene in the late 1960s. Formed earlier in the decade in West Los Angeles, the trio of Ralph Parrett (guitar), David Capilouto (keyboards/bass) and Gary Green (drums), performed under several different names before settling on the Glass Family around 1966 or so. By 1967 they had secured a contract with Warner Brothers Records, but their original recordings, produced by Richard Podolor, were rejected by the label. Undaunted, Podolor and the band returned to the studio and came up with another LP's worth of material, this time in a more commercial vein and more slickly produced. It was this second set of tunes that was released in February of 1969 as an album called Electric Band. Meanwhile, the original set of tapes sat in storage for nearly 50 years before being restored to a usable state and included as a second LP on the reissue of Electric Band in 2015. Baby's Gone is one of those long-lost tracks, and is a good example of how the band itself wanted to be presented.

Artist:    Moby Grape
Title:    Mr. Blues
Source:    Mono LP: Moby Grape
Writer(s):    Bob Mosley
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    Bassist Bob Mosley wrote and sang on Mr. Blues, one of ten songs released simultaneously on 45 RPM vinyl from the first Moby Grape album. It was a marketing disaster that forever tarnished a talented band.
   
Artist:    Doors
Title:    Horse Latitudes/Moonlight Drive
Source:    LP: 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, which he wrote even before the band was formed. As was the case with all the Doors songs on their first three albums, the tune was credited to the entire band. Horse Latitudes, which leads into Moonlight Ride, was also an obvious Morrison composition, as it is essentially a piece of Morrison poetry with a soundtrack provided by the rest of the band.

Artist:    Stone Poneys featuring Linda Ronstadt
Title:    Different Drum
Source:    LP: Evergreen, Vol. 2
Writer(s):    Michael Nesmith
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1967
    Although released as a single and album track by the Stone Poneys, the hit version of Different Drum is essentially a Linda Ronstadt solo effort, backed by studio musicians. As originally recorded by the Greenbriar Boys in 1966 the song was a slower-paced acoustic ballad written by Michael Nesmith, who performed his own version of the song on an episode of the Monkees TV show that aired in December of that year. In 1967 the Stone Poneys recorded their own version of the song for their second LP, Evergreen Vol. 3, using the same arrangement as the Greenbriar Boys had used, but producer Nick Venet, sensing a potential hit, decided to try a different, more rock-oriented, arrangement using studio musicians, leaving Ronstadt as the only band member actually participating in the final recording. Venet's instincts turned out to be spot on, and Different Drum became the first in a long string of hit singles for Ronstadt, who soon left the Stone Poneys for a successful solo career.
   
Artist:    Janis Ian
Title:    Society's Child (Baby I've Been Thinking)
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    Janis Ian
Label:    Polydor (original label: Verve Forecast)
Year:    1966
    Janis Ian began writing Society's Child, using the title Baby I've Been Thinking, when she was 13 years old, finishing it shortly after her 14th birthday. She shopped it around to several record labels before finally finding one (Now Sounds) willing to take a chance on the controversial song about interracial dating. The record got picked up and re-issued in 1966 by M-G-M's experimental label Verve Forecast, a label whose roster included Dave Van Ronk, Laura Nyro and the Blues Project, among others. Despite being banned on several radio stations the song became a major hit when re-released yet another time in early 1967. Ian had problems maintaining a balance between her performing career and being a student which ultimately led to her dropping out of high school. She would eventually get her career back on track in the mid-70s, scoring another major hit with At Seventeen, and becoming somewhat of a heroine to the feminist movement.

Artist:     Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:     One Rainy Wish
Source:     CD: Axis: Bold As Love
Writer:     Jimi Hendrix
Label:     Legacy (original label: Reprise)
Year:     1967
     In the summer of 1967 my dad (who was an Air Force NCO), got transferred to Lindsay Air Station in Weisbaden, Germany. The housing situation there being what it was, it was several weeks before the rest of us could join him, and during that time he went out and bought an Akai X-355 reel to reel tape recorder that a fellow GI had picked up in Japan. The Akai had small speakers built into it, but the best way to listen to it was through headphones. It would be another year before he would pick up a turntable, so I started buying pre-recorded reel to reel tapes. Two of the first three tapes I bought were Are You Experienced and Axis: Bold As Love, both by the Jimi Hendrix Experience. As I was forced to share a bedroom with my little brother I made it a habit to sleep on the couch instead, usually with the headphones on listening to Axis: Bold As Love. I was blown away by the stereo effects on the album, which I attributed (somewhat correctly) to Hendrix, although I would find out years later that much of the credit belongs to engineer Eddie Kramer as well. One Rainy Wish, for example, starts off with all the instruments in the center channel (essentially a mono mix). After a few seconds of slow spacy intro the song gets into gear with vocals isolated all the way over to the left, with a guitar overdub on the opposite side to balance it out. As the song continues, things move back and forth from side to side, fading in and out at the same time. It was a hell of a way to drift off to sleep every night.

Artist:     Yardbirds
Title:     Jeff's Boogie
Source:     45 RPM single B side
Writer:     Dreja/Relf/Samwell-Smith/McCarty/Beck
Label:     Epic
Year:     1966
     Jeff's Boogie is an instrumental track from the Yardbirds that originally appeared on the album Over Under Sideways Down in the US. That LP, with a different track lineup and cover, was issued in the UK under the name Yardbirds, although it has since come to be known as Roger The Engineer due to its cover art. The song was also chosen to be the B side of the Over Under Sideways Down single, released in 1966. Although credited to the entire band, the tune is actually based on Chuck Berry's guitar boogie, and features some outstanding guitar work by Jeff Beck.

Artist:    Byrds
Title:    So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star
Source:    CD: Younger Than Yesterday
Writer(s):    Hillman/McGuinn
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1967
    By early 1967 there was a building resentment among musicians and rock press alike concerning the instant (and in many eyes unearned) success of the Monkees. One notable expression of this resentment was the Byrds' So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star, which takes a somewhat sarcastic look at what it takes to succeed in the music business. Unfortunately, much of what they talk about in the song continues to apply today (although the guitar has been somewhat supplanted by the computer as the instrument of choice).
   
Artist:    Quicksilver Messenger Service
Title:    Pride Of Man
Source:    CD: Quicksilver Messenger Service
Writer(s):    Hamilton Camp
Label:    Rock Beat (original label: Capitol)
Year:    1968
    Although many major record labels were participating in a signing frenzy in 1967 San Francisco, one of the most popular bands, Quicksilver Messenger Service, held out for the best possible deal. As a result their debut album did not appear on the record racks until May of 1968. By then the excitement surrounding the Bay Area music scene was already starting to die down, and the band never achieved the commercial success of some of their contemporaries. Nonetheless, the album itself was a strong one, starting with its opening track, a cover of folk artist Hamilton Camp's most well-known song, Pride Of Man. Quicksilver's version of the song manages to combine Camp's powerful lyrics with an equally powerful instrumental arrangement.

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.

Artist:    Canned Heat
Title:    Let's Work Together
Source:    CD: The Very Best Of Canned Heat (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Wilbert Harrison
Label:    Capitol (original label: Liberty)
Year:    1970
    By a rather odd twist of fate Wilbert Harrison, known primarily for his 50s hit Kansas City, decided to reissue one of his lesser-known tunes, Let's Work Together, just a few weeks before a new Canned Heat version of the song was released in 1970. As it turns out, neither version became a major hit, although the Canned Heat version did get some airplay and managed to crack the Billboard Hot 100 that year.

Artist:    Spencer Davis Group
Title:    Gimme Some Lovin'
Source:    45 RPM single
Writer(s):    Steve Winwood
Label:    United Artists
Year:    1966
    Although it sometimes seemed like being British was the only way to get a hit single on the American charts in the mid-1960s, there were actually plenty of bands that were successful in the UK, but struggled to be heard in the US. One of these was the Spencer Davis Group, which was signed to Chris Blackwood's Island label. Island was, at the time, a small independent company specializing in bringing Jamaican recordings to a British audience, but was looking to expand into popular music. Since Island's distribution was limited, the Spencer Davis Group recordings were released on the much larger Fontana label. Fontana released only one Spencer Davis Group single, I Can't Stand It, in the US, in late 1964. A year later Island worked out a deal with Ahmet Ertegun's Atco label to release the band's version of Keep On Running in the US, but neither it nor its followup, Somebody Help Me, made a dent on the Billboard charts, despite the fact that both songs had gone all the way to the number one spot in the UK. Finally, in December of 1966, producer Jimmy Miller did an extensive remix of their current British hit, Gimme Some Lovin', adding piano, background vocals and tons of reverb to the original recording, as well as using an entirely different lead vocal track with slightly different lyrics. That version appeared on the United Artists label, becoming the group's first US hit in early 1967. The Miller mix is now accepted as the standard version of the song.

Artist:    Seeds
Title:    It's A Hard Life
Source:    LP: The Seeds
Writer(s):    Sky Saxon
Label:    GNP Crescendo
Year:    1966
    If there was any real weakness in the first Seeds album, it was a certain sameness among the songs on the LP. There were exeptions, however, such as It's A Hard Life, which manages to stay true to the Seeds' style without sounding too much like Pushin' Too Hard.

Artist:    Fleur De Lys
Title:    Circles
Source:    Mono CD: Nuggets II-Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969 (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Rhino (original label: Immediate)
Year:    1966
    Circles was a song by the Who that was originally slated to be released in the UK on the Brunswick label as a follow-up to the highly successful My Generation. A dispute between the band and the label and their producer, Shel Talmy, led to the Who switching labels and releasing another song, Substitute, in its place, with Circles (retitled Instant Party) on the B side of the record. When Talmy slapped the band with a legal injunction, the single was withdrawn, and another band, the Fleur De Lys, took advantage of the situation, recording their own version of Circles and releasing it on the Immediate label. Just to make things more confusing Brunswick issued the Who's version of Circles as the B side of A Legal Matter later the same month.

Artist:    Supremes
Title:    You Can't Hurry Love
Source:    CD: Billboard Top Rock 'N' Roll Hits-1966 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Holland/Dozier/Holland
Label:    Rhino (original label: Motown)
Year:    1966
    I've maintained for years that top 40 radio hit its peak in late summer of 1966, when the charts were topped by Donovan's Sunshine Superman and the Lovin' Spoonful's Summer In The City. Another song in the top five that week was the Supremes' You Can't Hurry Love, which was  already at #4 in only its fourth week in the top 100. The song, written by Motown's Holland/Dozier/Holland songwriting team, ended up being one of the label's signature songs and is instantly recognizable to multiple generations.

Artist:    Dada
Title:    Dorina
Source:    CD: Puzzle
Writer(s):    Calio/Gurney
Label:    IRS
Year:    1992
    In the early 1990s I found myself within listening range of a Virginia Beach radio station that called itself The Coast. Unlike other radio stations in the area, each of which had a tight playlist determined by extensive audience research, The Coast was a relatively free-form station that played an eclectic mix of classic, modern and alternative rock. Among the bands that got airplay on The Coast was a new three-piece band from California called Dada. Consisting of guitarist Michael Gurley and bassist Joie Calio (who shared lead vocals) along with drummer Phil Leavitt, Dada made their recording debut with the 1992 album Puzzle. The first single released from the album, Dizz-Knee Land, got a lot of airplay on more mainstream rock stations, but it was the album's opening track, Dorina, that really grabbed my attention when I heard it on The Coast.

Artist:    Claypool/Lennon Delerium
Title:    Oxycontin Girl
Source:    LP: Monolith Of Phobos
Writer(s):    Claypool/Lennon
Label:    Ato
Year:    2016
    Fans of alternative rock are no doubt familiar with a band called Primus, led by bassist Les Claypool. One of the more colorful characters on the modern music scene, Claypool was once rejected by Metallica as being "too good" for them. Claypool himself has said that he thought James Hetfield was just being nice when he told him that, but the fact is that Claypool is indeed one of the most talented bass players (if not the best) in rock history. Sean Lennon is, of course, the son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono. Unlike his half-borther Julian, Sean has never had to prove anything to anyone, and, thanks in large part to his mother's influence (and let's be honest here, money), has always felt free to pursue his own artistic path without having to bow to commercial pressures. The two of them met when their respective bands were on tour and they immediately recognized that they had a musical connection. That connection manifested itself in the album Monolith Of Phobos (a title inspired by Arthur Clarke's works), released in 2016. Oxycontin Girl begins with a bass solo that seems impossible to actually play (but of course, Claypool regularly does that) and then hits us with the lyric "She's an Oxycontin girl in a heroin world". It gets even better from there.

Artist:    George Harrison
Title:    When We Was Fab
Source:    CD: Cloud Nine
Writer(s):    George Harrison
Label:    Dark Horse
Year:    1987
    George Harrison recorded two different songs referencing his years as a member of the world's most popular rock band. The first, All Those Years Ago, was done in Harrison's own early 80s style, and was released not long after the death of former bandmate John Lennon. The second, When We Was Fab, was stylistically a throwback to the Beatles' most psychedelic period, with a strong resemblance to Lennon's I Am The Walrus from Magical Mystery Tour. The song appeared on Harrison's Cloud Nine album, which was recorded around the same time as the first Traveling Wilburys album, and features guest appearances from some of the other members of that group, including Beatles fans Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty.

Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Rugs Of Wood And Flowers
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Kaylan/Nichols
Label:    White Whale
Year:    1967
    The Turtles were best known for their big hit records like Happy Together and She'd Rather Be With Me, both of which came from outside songwriters. The band had a weird side, however, that usually showed up on their self-penned B sides and an occasional album track. One example is Rugs Of Wood And Flowers, which appeared as the B side of You Know What I Mean in 1967. The song, written by vocalist Howard Kaylan and guitarist Al Nichol,  features Kaylan using a semi-operatic style that he would revive for his legendary performances with the Mothers at the Fillmore East in 1971.

Artist:    Peanut Butter Conspiracy
Title:    Ecstasy
Source:    CD: The Peanut Butter Conspiracy Is Spreading/The Great Conspiracy (original LP: The Great Conspiracy)
Writer(s):    John Merrill
Label:    Collectables (original label: Columbia)
Year:    1967
    For their second Columbia LP, The Great Conspiracy, the members of L.A.'s Peanut Butter Conspiracy were given greater artistic freedom by producer Gary Usher, who was already working on his own Millennium project at this point. The biggest change was the fact that there were no studio musicians used on the album, which resulted in a record much more in sync with the band's live sound. The album is full of strong tracks such as Ecstasy, which, like about half the songs on the LP, was written by lead guitarist John Merrill. Although the PBC would end up recording a third LP a couple years later, they would do it without Merrill, who left shortly after The Great Conspiracy was released.

Artist:    Simon and Garfunkel
Title:    Scarborough Fair/Canticle
Source:    LP: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme
Writer(s):    Trad., arr. Simon/Garfunkel
Label:    Sundazed/Columbia
Year:    1966
    After the reunion of Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel following the surprise success of an electrified remix of The Sound Of Silence, the duo quickly recorded an album to support the hit single. Sounds Of Silence was, for the most part, a reworking of material that Simon had recorded for 1965 UK LP the Paul Simon Songbook. The pressure for a new album thus (temporarily) relieved, the duo got to work on their first album of truly new material since their unsuccessful 1964 effort Wednesday Morning 3AM (which had in fact been re-released and was now doing well on the charts). In October the new album, Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, hit the stands. The title track was a new arrangement of an old English folk ballad, Scarborough Fair, combined with a reworking of a song from the Paul Simon Songbook, The Side Of A Hill, retitled Canticle. The two melodies and sets of lyrics are set in counterpoint to each other, creating one of the most sophisticated folk song arrangements ever recorded. After being featured in the film The Graduate, Scarborough Fair/Canticle was released as a single in early 1968, going on to become one of the duo's most instantly recognizable songs.

Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    Today
Source:    LP: The Worst Of Jefferson Airplane (originally released on LP: Surrealistic Pillow)
Writer(s):    Balin/Kantner
Label:    Victor
Year:    1967
    Uncredited guest guitarist Jerry Garcia adds a simple, but memorable recurring fill riff to Today, an early collaboration between rhythm guitarist Paul Kantner and bandleader Marty Balin on Jefferson Airplane's second LP, Surrealistic Pillow.
       
Artist:    Millennium
Title:    I Just Want To Be Your Friend
Source:    LP: Begin
Writer(s):    Curt Boettcher
Label:    Columbia/Sundazed
Year:    1968
    The Millennium's 1968 album Begin can best be described as a cooperative effort by some of L.A.'s most talented studio musicians that ended up being a victim of its own bad timing. Conceived by Curt Boettcher (Sagittarius, the Ballroom) and Keith Olsen (Music Machine), the Millennium also included guitarist Doug Rhodes and drummer Ron Edgar (both from the Music Machine), as well as several other Ballroom and Sagittarius veterans, including guitarist/vocalists Lee Mallory, Joey Stec, Mike Fennelly and Sandy Salisbury. Most of the participants shared songwriting credits, with no one songwriter appearing on more than six of the album's fourteen tracks. Boettcher had three solo writing credits, including I Just Want To Be Your Friend, a tune that sounds like it could easily have appeared on the first Association LP (which Boettcher had produced). The album itself was widely praised by music critics as one of the best sunshine pop albums ever produced. Unfortunately, by July of 1968, when Begin hit the stands, sunshine pop had essentially been replaced by bubblegum rock on top 40 radio, while most of the new FM stations were playing a harder rocking sound favored by the counter-culture, leaving the album in a kind of commercial limbo.
   
Artist:    Tyrannosaurus Rex
Title:    Once Upon The Seas Of Abyssinia
Source:    British import CD: Acid Days
Writer(s):    Marc Bolan
Label:    Uncut
Year:    Recorded 1969, released 2002
    Despite the similarity in names (not to mention the presence of Marc Bolan) Tyrannosaurus Rex and T-Rex were really entirely different groups. The original Tyrannosaurus Rex, formed in 1967. was a psychedelic-folk duo consisting of guitarist/vocalist Bolan and percussionist
Steve Peregrine Took, that released three albums before the two had a falling out. Following the departure of Took a fourth Tyrannosaurus Rex album was released, with Mickey Finn handling percussion duties, in 1969. Sometime that year, probably following the release of the original duo's third LP, they recorded Once Upon The Seas Of Abyssinia, a track that didn't get released until 2002, when it appeared on the Marc Bolan box set 20th Century Superstar.
   
Artist:    American Dream
Title:    Good News
Source:    LP: The American Dream
Writer(s):    Van Winkle/Bowers
Label:    Ampex
Year:    1970
    Following his departure from his band Nazz in 1969 Todd Rundgren went to work for Albert Grossman as a staff producer for the new Ampex label, a joint venture being launched by Grossman (who was a well-known manager of folk artists) and the Ampex tape company. Rundgren's first project for Grossman was producing a band of fellow Philadelphian's known as The American Dream. The album was the first to be released on the Ampex label. The album opens with a recorded phone conversation between (presumably) one of the band members and his grandmother, telling her excitedly that he is in New York. The leads into a song called Good News, a solid rocker that was also issued as the b side of the album's only single. The American Dream was never heard from again after that first album, but Rundgren's career is legendary.

Artist:     Five Americans
Title:     Western Union
Source:     45 RPM single
Writer:     Rabon/Ezell/Durrell
Label:     Abnak
Year:     1967
     One of the biggest hits of 1967 came from a band from Southeastern State College in Durant Oklahoma, although they probably played at least as many gigs in neighboring Texas as in their home state. The Five Americans, having already scored a minor hit with I See The Light the previous year, hit the #5 spot on the national charts with Western Union, featuring a distinctive opening organ riff designed to evoke the sound of a telegraph receiver picking up Morse code.

Artist:    Small Faces
Title:    Lazy Sunday
Source:    British import CD: Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake
Writer(s):    Marriott/Lane
Label:    Charly (original label: Immediate)
Year:    1968
    Following up on the creative freedom that came with their switch to Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label in 1967 (and their subsequent international hit Itchycoo Park), the Small Faces immediately (sorry) got to work on what would end up being their final full-length LP, Ogden's Nut Gone Flake. Before the album was released in the spring of 1968, however, Immediate issued Lazy Sunday, the last track on side one of the LP, as a single, against the wishes of the band. As it turned out the song, inspired by frontman Steve Marriott's ongoing feud with his neighbors, ended up being an even bigger hit than Itchycoo Park in their native Britain, as well as in Germany and the Netherlands. Marriott, however, was frustrated with the band's inability to shed their pop music image and left the group later that year to form Humble Pie.
   
Artist:    Jethro Tull
Title:    Driving Song
Source:    Lebanese import 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Ian Anderson
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1969
    By 1969 the presence of "underground" FM radio stations in most major US cities playing what would come to be called album rock was making it possible for an artist to be considered successful without having the benefit of a top 40 hit record. This was not the case in the UK, where top 40 itself had been, until July of 1967, considered an underground format heard on illegal AM pirate stations broadcasting from offshore transmitters. Momentum being what it is, British bands such as Jethro Tull continued to put out singles and EPs that were successful in their native England but difficult to find in the US well into the 1970s. For example, Driving Song was originally released as the B side of Living In the Past in 1969. As was the case with every other early Jethro Tull single, the record, although released in the US failed to make a dent in the charts, and was not heard by most Americans until the Living In the Past LP was released in 1973. Living In The Past/Driving Song also has the distinction of being the only Jethro Tull single ever issued in Lebanon.

Artist:     Edwin Starr
Title:     War
Source:     CD: Songs Of Protest (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer:     Whitfield/Strong
Label:     Rhino (original label: Gordy)
Year:     1970
     It was 1970, and Motown Records staff producer Norman Whitfield was facing a bit of a dilemma. A track that he and co-producer Barrett Strong had included on the Temptations' LP Psychedelic Shack was starting to get a lot of airplay, and radio programmers were asking for the song to be released as a single. The problem was the song itself. War, co-written by Whitfield and Strong, had a powerful message that resonated with the anti-Vietnam War movement. This, of course, did not sit well with some of the more conservative radio station owners, a fact that Motown president Berry Gordy, Jr. was well aware of. At that particular moment in space and time, the Temptations were Motown's #1 cash cow (Diana Ross having left the Supremes earlier that year), and Berry did not want to take any chances with his top money makers. Eventually a compromise was reached. Whitfield re-recorded the track with second-string artist Edwin Starr, amping up the energy level of the song in the process, and ended up with one of the biggest hit singles of the year (and certainly the biggest of Starr's career).

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2011 (starts 3/9/20)

    This time around we manage to squeeze in 13 tunes, including one that runs over 11 minutes in length. I'm still not sure how that happened.

Artist:    Steve Miller Band
Title:    Good Morning
Source:    CD: Number 5
Writer(s):    Bobby Winkleman
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1970
    In 1970 bassist Lonnie Turner, who had been with the Steve Miller Band since its founding in 1966 (and would return in 1973), left the band for reasons unknown. His replacement, Bobby Winkleman, immediately made his presence felt by penning the opening track of the band's next LP, a tune called Good Morning that was based on a children's song. Winkleman had been a member of the legendary San Francisco East Bay band Frumious Bandersnatch, and several of his former bandmates would appear on the following album, Rock Love. Winkleman himself has remained active in the music business, producing (among other things) a CD called Nuggets From The Golden State: The Berkeley EPs, A British anthology album on the Big Beat label that collected rare recordings from legendary Bay Area bands such as Country Joe and the Fish, Mad River and of course Frumious Bandersnatch.

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

Artist:    Derek And The Dominos
Title:    Anyday
Source:    CD: Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs
Writer(s):    Clapton/Whitlock
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1970
    Derek And The Dominos was originally an attempt by Eric Clapton to remove himself from the solo spotlight and work in a larger group setting than he had with his previous bands, Cream and Blind Faith. Such was Clapton's stature, however, that even among talents like Jim Gordon, Carl Radle and Bobby Whitlock, Clapton was still the star. However, there was one unofficial member of the group whose own star was in ascendancy. Duane Allman, who had chosen to stick with his own group the Allman Brothers Band, nonetheless played on eleven of the fourteen tracks on Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs. His slide guitar work is especially noticeable on the title track and on the song Anyday, which remains one of the most popular songs on the album.

Artist:    Elton John
Title:    Honey Roll
Source:    Mono 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    John/Taupin
Label:    Uni
Year:    1971
    Shortly after the release of Tumbleweed Connection, Elton John and Bernie Taupin worked on a soundtrack album for a film called Friends. The film itself was a bomb. Despite this, the album became John's third gold record of 1971, despite being released on the Paramount label rather than through MCA/Universal. Still, despite Universal now having the rights to all of Paramount's catalog, the Friends soundtrack has never been released as a standalone CD, although all of the songs were included on the Rare Masters set released in 1992. The only single from the album was the title track, with Honey Roll, a tune fairly typical of John and Taupin's work during that period, appearing on the B side.
   
Artist:    J.J. Cale
Title:    After Midnight
Source:    CD: Naturally
Writer(s):    J.J. Cale
Label:    Mercury/Polygram (original label: Shelter)
Year:    1972
    J.J. Cale is one of the most highly-respected, yet unknown to the general public, names in the history of rock music. He is credited as the creator of the Tulsa Sound adopted by Eric Clapton in the early 1970s. In fact, several of Clapton's best known songs were written by Cale, including After Midnight, originally released by Cale as a single in 1966 and re-recorded in 1972 for Cale's Naturally LP after Clapton's 1970 version of the song had become a hit. Cale's version is more laid back than Clapton's, and is itself a classic example of the Tulsa Sound.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Who Scared You
Source:    CD: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1969
    The Doors only released two non-album tracks while Jim Morrison was alive. The first of these was Who Scared You, which appeared as the B side of Wishful Sinful, a minor hit from the 1969 album The Soft Parade. Unlike the songs on The Soft Parade itself, Who Scared You is credited to the entire band, rather than one or more of its individual members. The song made its album debut in 1972, when it was included in the double-LP compilation Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine.

Artist:    Free
Title:    Mr. Big
Source:    British import CD: All Right Now-The Collection (originally released on LP: Fire And Water)
Writer(s):    Kossoff/Fraser/Kirke/Rodgers
Label:    Spectrum (original US label: A&M)
Year:    1970
    After two albums that failed to make the charts, Free became overnight stars with the release of the song All Right Now in 1970. The international sucess of the single propelled the band's third LP, Fire And Water, to the upper reaches of both the US and UK album charts, peaking at #2 and #17 respectively. One of the album's highlights was Mr Big, the only track credited to the entire band, which led off the LP's second side.
   
Artist:    Flower Travellin' Band
Title:    Satori-Part IV
Source:    CD: Satori
Writer(s):    Satori
Label:    Phoenix
Year:    1971
    Possibly the first Japanese heavy metal band and almost certainly the first Japanese psychedelic group, the Flower Travelin' Band was created as a side project of Yuyu Yuchida, a friend of John Lennon's who, having heard Jimi Hendrix and Cream on a trip to England, wanted to introduce Japanese audiences to this new kind of music. After returning to Japan he gathered a group of musicians together and recorded the first Flowerin' Travellin' Band LP in 1969. The album was made up entirely of covers of bands like Cream and Led Zeppelin. It wasn't until 1971 (and several personnel changes) that the FTB recorded their first LP made up entirely of original material. The album was called Satori, as were all five tracks on the album. It was worth the wait.

Artist:    Procol Harum
Title:    Pandora's Box
Source:    LP: Procol's Ninth
Writer(s):    Brooker/Reid
Label:    Chrysalis
Year:    1975
    By 1975 Procol Harum had pretty much run out of steam. The proof of this was the album Procol Harum's Ninth. The only song to draw any attention at all was the album's opening track, Pandora's Box, which had been written (and partially recorded) by the band several years earlier. That said, Pandora's Box is actually one of Procol Harum's best songs. Too bad the rest of the album falls flat by comparison.
   
Artist:    Triumvirat
Title:    Million Dollars
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Frtiz/Bathelt
Label:    Harvest
Year:    1974
    Triumvirat was formed in 1969 in Cologne, Germany. Originally a cover band specializing in prog-rock they soon began writing and performing their own material. Thanks to the flamboyant virtuosity of keyboardist Jürgen Fritz, they were often compared to Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Most of the band's lyrics were written by percussionist Hans Bathelt, including Million Dollars, part of a suite called Mister Ten Percent that appeared as the second side of their second LP, Illusions On A Double Dimple. At around the same time that the LP was released, Triumvirat toured the US as the opening act for Fleetwood Mac, performing the album in its entirety at each show. This helped establish Triumvirat as one of the most visible krautrock bands of the 1970s. Bathelt left the group in 1977, and Triumvirat finally disbanded in 1980 following a final album that was essentially Fritz backed up by several guest musicians.
   
Artist:    Beatles
Title:    Something
Source:    LP: Abbey Road
Writer(s):    George Harrison
Label:    Apple
Year:    1969
    For years, the Beatles' George Harrison had felt that he was not getting the respect he deserved from his bandmates for his songwriting ability. That all changed in 1969 when he introduced them to his latest tune for inclusion on the Abbey Road album. Something impressed everyone who heard it, including John Lennon (who said it was the best song on the album), Paul McCartney (who called it Harrison's best song ever) and even producer George Martin, who made sure the song was released as the A side of the only single from Abbey Road. Commercially, Something was a major success as well, going to the top of the US charts and placing in the top 5 in the UK. Perhaps more tellingly, Something is the second most covered song in the entire Beatles catalog (behind Paul McCartney's Yesterday), with over 150 artists recording the tune over the years, including Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley and even James Brown.

Artist:    Stealer's Wheel
Title:    Star
Source:    45 RPM single (promo)
Writer(s):    Joe Egan
Label:    A&M
Year:    1973
    Formed in 1972 in Paisley, Scotland by Gerry Rafferty and Joe Egan, Stealer's Wheel scored a huge international hit with Stuck in the Middle With You that same year. Their followup album, 1973's Ferguslie Park, did not have any hits to match Stuck's success, although two of the songs from the album made the top 40 charts on both sides of the Atlantic. The second of these was Star, a Joe Egan composition that hit the top 30 in 1974. After the duo split Rafferty went on to international fame for his 1978 hit Baker Street.

Artist:     Uriah Heep
Title:     Blind Eye
Source:     British import CD: The Magician's Birthday
Writer:     Ken Hensley
Label:     Sanctuary (original US label: Mercury)
Year:     1972
     This week's closing number is from Uriah Heep. The single Easy Livin' from the album Demons and Wizards was a top 40 hit, giving the band some momentum for their follow up album, The Magician's Birthday. Both albums were certified gold. Blind Eye, the second single from The Magician's Birthday, barely made a dent in the charts, but by 1972 album sales were considered a more important measure of success anyway. Both albums were notable for their cover art by Roger Dean, who also did cover art for Yes during their most popular period.

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2010 (starts 3/2/20)

    Although the show begins and ends with British acts, it's a pair of California bands that draw the most attention this time around. As was the case last week as well, our second hour features an artists' set from the Doors, albeit a considerably shorter one this time out. Then, in our last half hour, it's once again time for the full version of Iron Butterfly's 1968 classic In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. As an added bonus we have a track from legendary Memphis guitarist Steve Cropper's first and only solo LP for Stax, the company he helped make famous in the late 1960s.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    I'm Looking Through You
Source:    CD: Rubber Soul
Writer(s):    Lennon/McCartney
Label:    Capitol/EMI
Year:    1965
    If you were an American Beatles fan in the 1970s and early 1980s you probably had a copy of the 1965 album Rubber Soul in your collection, and whether it was on vinyl, cassette, 8-track cartridge or even reel-to-reel tape it was almost certainly a stereo copy. All of these US releases included a version of I'm Looking Through You that was not available anywhere else. In addition to the extreme separation between vocal and instrumental tracks (if your left speaker wasn't working, you wouldn't hear any vocals at all), this version of the song included a pair of short acoustic guitar chords there tacked onto the beginning of the track, probably by mistake. Many of us got so used to hearing the song that way that it still feels a bit unnatural to hear the song without them. So, for all you nostalgic ones, here is the version we all remember.

Artist:    Count Five
Title:    The Morning After
Source:    Mono LP: Psychotic Reaction
Writer(s):    John Byrne
Label:    Bicycle/Concord (original label: Double Shot)
Year:    1966
    Following the success of the single Psychotic Reaction, San Jose, Calfornia's Count Five headed for Los Angeles to record an entire album's worth of material. With the exception of two Who covers, all the songs on the album (also called Psychotic Reaction) were written or co-written by John Byrne, the Irish-born rhythm guitarist and lead vocalist for the band. They were also quite short. The Morning After, for instance, runs less than two minutes total.

Artist:    Turtles
Title:    Happy Together
Source:    CD: Billboard Top Rock 'N' Roll Hits-1967 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Bonner/Gordon
Label:    Rhino (original label: White Whale)
Year:    1967
    The Turtles got off to a strong start with their cover of Bob Dylan's It Ain't Me Babe, which hit the top 20 in 1965. By early 1967, however, the band had fallen on hard times and was looking for a way to return to the charts. They found that way with Happy Together, a song written by Gary Bonner and Mark Gordon, both members of an east coast band called the Magicians. Happy Together was the Turtles' first international hit, going all the way to the top of the charts in several countries and becoming one of the most recognizable songs in popular music history.

Artist:    Mandala
Title:    Come On Home
Source:    CD: Soul Crusade
Writer(s):    Dominic Troiano
Label:    Wounded Bird (original label: Atlantic)
Year:    1968
    Mandala was formed in late 1966, when Toronto's Five Rogues decided to update their image, presenting themselves as a channel for audience members to release its emotions as part of the band's "Soul Crusade". They were an immediate success, and in early 1967 found themselves playing high-profile gigs in the US, including a four-night stand at L.A.'s Whisky-A-Go-Go and a month-long extended engagement at The Scene in New York City. They also participated in Murray the K's Easter Rock Extravaganza, sharing the bill with the Blues Project, Cream, the Who, Wilson Pickett and others. Internal conflicts, however, led to lineup changes later in the year, and a new lineup consisting of guitarist Dominic Troiano, bassist Don Elliot, keyboardist Hugh Sullivan, drummer Whitey Glan and new lead vocalist Roy Kenner made its debut in Ottawa on October 8, 1967. The earlier lineup had cut a couple singles for the Decca label, and in early 1968 Atlantic's Ahmet Ertegun bought out the band's contract. The band's only album, Soul Crusade, was released in June of 1968. Although the group was primarily a blue-eyed soul band, one of the songs on the LP, Dominic Troiano's Come On Home, was pure blues. Sales of the album and it's singles were a commercial disappointment, however, and Mandala disbanded a year later, with Troiano, Kenner, Glan, Sullivan and new bassist Prakish John continuing on under the name Bush. After one album Bush also fell apart, with Kenner and Troiano replacing Joe Walsh as a member of the James Gang in early 1972. Troiano eventually moved on to the Guess Who when Randy Bachman left that band to form Bachman-Turner Overdrive.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix
Title:    Red House
Source:    CD: Live At Woodstock
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    Legacy
Year:    1969
    Just about every time Jimi Hendrix made a live appearance he played his signature blues song, Red House. This is the version performed at Woodstock, using the band he was calling Gypsy, Sun And Rainbows at the time, although he also was heard to say "We're just a Band Of Gypsys" during his set. In addition to Hendrix himself, the band featured Mitch Mitchell on drums, Billy Cox on bass, Larry Lee on rhythm guitar and percussionists Jerry Velez and Juma Sultan, although only Hendrix, Cox and Mitchell are audible on the recording.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    That's The Way
Source:    German import LP: Led Zeppelin III
Writer(s):    Page/Plant
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1970
    I read somewhere that Jimmy Page came up with The Rain Song (from the album Houses Of The Holy) in response to someone asking him why Led Zeppelin hadn't recorded any ballads. Apparently that person had never heard That's The Way, from the album Led Zeppelin III. If this ain't a ballad, I don't know what is.

Artist:    Trashmen
Title:    Surfin' Bird
Source:    Mono CD: Surfin' Hits (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Frazier/White/Harris/Wilson
Label:    Rhino (original label: Garrett)
Year:    1963
    The Trashmen were a group from Minneapolis that came up with the idea of taking two Rivingtons hits from the 1950s, Papa Oom Mow Mow and Bird Is The Word, and combining them, speeding up the tempo to insane levels in the process. The result was a huge hit in 1963. The original label lists bandleader Steve Wahrer as the songwriter, but more recent releases credit the song to the members of the Rivingtons.

Artist:    Them
Title:    Just A Little Bit
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: Backtrackin' (originally released in UK on LP: The Angry Young Them)
Writer(s):    Thornton/Washington/Bass/Brown
Label:    London (original label: Decca)
Year:    1965
    Like many mid-60s albums, the debut effort from Belfast's Them had a slightly different track lineup on either side of the Atlantic, with a few of the songs from the British version left off the American album. One of the songs from The Angry Young Them that was left off its US counterpart (titled simply Them) was a remake of a 1959 Roscoe Gordon tune called Just A Little Bit. The song finally appeared in the US on an album called Backtrackin' in 1974. By then, however, LPs were being pressed only in stereo, whereas the original recordings used were all mixed monoraully. Rather than use the mono mixes, London Records chose to create "fake stereo" mixes of the songs on the LP. Although there are no production credits given on the album cover or label, I suspect Allan Klein was somehow involved in putting this album together.

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:    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:    Ultimate Spinach
Title:    Baroque # 1
Source:    Mono LP: Ultimate Spinach (promo copy)
Writer(s):    Ian Bruce-Douglas
Label:    M-G-M
Year:    1967
    Of the six major US record labels of the time, only two, Decca and M-G-M, failed to sign any San Francisco bands in the late 1960s. Decca, which had been bought by MCA in the early 60s, was fast fading as a major force in the industry (ironic considering that Universal, the direct descendant of MCA, is now the world's largest record company). M-G-M, on the other hand, had a strong presence on the Greenwich Village scene thanks to Jerry Schoenbaum at the Verve Forecast label, who had signed such critically-acclaimed artists as Dave Van Ronk, Tim Hardin and the Blues Project. Taking this as an inspiration, the parent label decided to create interest in the Boston music scene, aggressively promoting (some would say hyping) the "Boss-Town Sound". One of the bands signed was Ultimate Spinach, which was led by keyboardist Ian Bruce-Douglas, who wrote all the band's material, including the instrumental Baroque # 1.

Artist:    Allman Brothers Band
Title:    Trouble No More
Source:    CD: Beginnings (originally released on LP: The Allman Brothers Band)
Writer(s):    McKinley Morganfield
Label:    Polydor (original label: Atco)
Year:    1969
    The Allman Brothers band grew out of massive jam sessions organized by Duane Allman and drummer Jai Johnny Johanson in early 1969. The two had recently relocated from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, where Allman had been doing session work for artists such as Aretha Franklin and Wilson Pickett (it's Duane's guitar that can be heard on Pickett's version of Hey Jude). One of the musicians Allman invited to the sessions was bassist Berry Oakley, who in turn recruited Dickey Betts as the as-yet unnamed band's second guitarist. Duane Allman's concept of the new band was to have two guitarists and two drummers, and it wasn't long before Butch Trucks, whom Allman and his brother Gregg had cut a demo with the previous year, was added to the mix. The final piece came into play on March 26, 1969, when Gregg Allman accepted his brother's invitation to sit in with the group as lead vocalist. The band was rehearsing an old Muddy Waters tune, Trouble No More, which became the first song Gregg Allman ever performed with the group. The addition of Gregg as vocalist and keyboardist gave the band its name as well. It wasn't long before the Allman Brothers Band recorded their first album for Phil Walden's new Capricorn label (since Capricorn at that point did not yet have its own logo, the LP was actually released on the Atco label, thanks to a deal between Walden, Jerry Wexler of Atlantic Records and the band itself). Although not a huge commercial success when first released, the album's sales picked up considerably after the band released a live album recorded at the Fillmore East in 1971.
   
Artist:    Jefferson Airplane
Title:    It's No Secret
Source:    LP: Jefferson Airplane Takes Off
Writer:    Marty Balin
Label:    RCA Victor
Year:    1966
    The first Jefferson Airplane song to get played on the radio was not Somebody To Love. Rather, it was It's No Secret, from the album Jefferson Airplane Takes Off, that got extensive airplay, albeit only in the San Francisco Bay area. Still, the song was featured on a 1966 Bell Telephone Hour special on Haight Ashbury that introduced a national TV audience to what was happening out on the coast and may have just touched off the exodus to San Francisco the following year.

Artist:    Chocolate Watch Band
Title:    Psychedelic Trip
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer(s):    Loomis/Flores/Tolby/Aguilar/Andrijasevich
Label:    Sundazed
Year:    Recorded 1966, released 2012
    Psychedelic Trip is essentially an early instrumental version of what would eventually become the title track for the Chocolate Watch Band's debut album, No Way Out. Although Psychedelic Trip was a creation of the entire band, producer/manager Ed Cobb (the Ed Wood of psychedelic music) took sole writing credit for the song No Way Out.

Artist:    Standells
Title:    Mr. Nobody
Source:    Mono CD: The Best Of The Standells (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Larry Tamblyn
Label:    Rhino (original label: Tower)
Year:    1966
    The third Standells single of 1966, Why Pick On Me, was probably also their weakest, but it did sport a decent B side. Mr. Nobody, written by Larry Tamblyn (brother of Russ, I believe), is yet another example of why the Standells are sometimes considered the first punk rock band (though not by those with any real knowledge of the band's history).

Artist:    ? And The Mysterians
Title:    96 Tears
Source:    45 RPM single (reissue)
Writer(s):    The Mysterians
Label:    Abkco (original label: Cameo)
Year:    1966
    Although his birth certificate gives the name Rudy Martinez, the leader of the Mysterians had his name legally changed to "?" several years ago. He asserts that he is actually from the planet Mars and has lived among dinosaurs in a past life. Sometimes I feel like I'm living among dinosaurs in this life, so I guess I can relate a little. The band's only major hit, 96 Tears, has the distinction of being the last top 10 single on the Cameo label before Cameo-Parkway got into trouble with the SEC and went bankrupt. The label's assets were bought by Allen Klein, who now operates the company as Abkco.

Artist:    Steve Cropper
Title:    Land Of 1000 Dances
Source:    LP: With A Little Help From My Friends
Writer(s):    Kenner/Domino
Label:    Volt
Year:    1969
    Despite being one of the most respected (and imitated) guitarists in the world as well as one of the principal architects (as a member of the MGs) of what came to be known as  "Memphis Soul", Steve Cropper only released one solo album for Stax, the label he helped make famous. That album, With A Little Help From My Friends, released in 1969, featured instrumental versions of some of the most popular R&B songs of the decade, including a few, such as Land Of 1000 Dances, that he had never before recorded. Within a year of the album's release, Cropper would leave Stax to form his own production company.

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

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Love Her Madly
Source:    Stereo 45 RPM single
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1971   
    Released as a single in advance of the 1971 Doors album L.A. Woman, Love Her Madly was a major success, peaking just outside the top 10 in the US, and going all the way to the #3 spot in Canada. The album itself was a return to a more blues-based sound by the Doors, a change that did not sit well with producer Paul Rothchild, who left the project early on, leaving engineer Bruce Botnik to assume production duties. Rothchild's opinion aside, it was exactly what the Doors needed to end their run (in their original four man incarnation) on a positive note.

Artist:        Doors
Title:        End Of The Night
Source:    CD: Weird Scenes Inside The Goldmine (originally released on LP: The Doors)
Writer:        The Doors
Label:        Elektra
Year:        1967
        Sometimes you run across a song that seems to encapsulate what a band is all about. End Of The Night, from the first Doors album, is one of those songs. Apparently the band members felt the same way, as it was included on the anthology album Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine, despite never being released as a single.

Artist:     Blues Project
Title:     Caress Me Baby
Source:     Mono CD: Projections
Writer:     Jimmy Reed
Label:     Sundazed/Verve Folkways
Year:     1966
     After deliberately truncating their extended jams for their first LP, Live At The Cafe Au-Go-Go, the Blues Project recorded a second album that was a much more accurate representation of what the band was all about. Mixed in with the group's original material was this outstanding cover of an old Jimmy Reed tune, sung by lead guitarist and Blues Project founder Danny Kalb, running over seven minutes long. Andy Kuhlberg's memorable walking bass line would be lifted a few year later by Blood, Sweat and Tears bassist Jim Fielder for the track Blues, Part II.

Artist:    Buffalo Springfield
Title:    For What It's Worth (Stop, Hey What's That Sound)
Source:    LP: Homer (soundtrack) (originally released as 45 RPM single and added to LP: Buffalo Springfield)
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Label:    Cotillion (original label: Atco)
Year:    1966
    Most people associate the name Buffalo Springfield with the song For What It's Worth (Stop, Hey What's That Sound). And for good reason. The song is one of the greatest protest songs ever recorded, and to this day is in regular rotation on both oldies and classic rock radio stations. The song was written and recorded in November of 1966 and released in December. By then the first Buffalo Springfield LP was already on the racks, but until that point had not sold particularly well. When it became clear that For What It's Worth was becoming a breakout hit, Atco Records quickly recalled the album and added the song to it (as the opening track). All subsequent pressings of the LP (and later the CD) contain For What It's Worth, making earlier copies of the album somewhat of a rarity and quite collectable. According to the  song's composer, Stephen Stills, the piece got its rather unusual title when he told Atlantic/Atco chief Ahmet Ertegun "I have this song here, for what it's worth, if you want it."

Artist:    Love
Title:    My Little Red Book
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 2-Punk (originally released on LP: Love)
Writer(s):    Bacharach/David
Label:    Rhino (original label: Elektra)
Year:    1966
    The first rock record ever released by Elektra Records was a single by Love called My Little Red Book. The track itself (which also opens Love's debut LP), is a punked out version of a tune originally recorded by Manfred Mann for the What's New Pussycat movie soundtrack. Needless to say, Love's version was not exactly what Burt Bacharach and Hal David had in mind.

Artist:    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 influential Gavin Report advising stations not to play this "drug song", Eight Miles High managed to hit the top 20 in 1966. The band members themselves claimed that Eight Miles High was not a drug song at all, but was instead referring to the experience of travelling by air. In fact, it was Gene Clark's fear of flying, especially long intercontinental trips, that in part led to his leaving the Byrds.

Artist:    Monkees
Title:     The Door Into Summer
Source:     LP: Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, LTD.
Writer:     Douglas/Martin
Label:     Colgems
Year:     1967
     After playing nearly all the instrumental tracks on their third album themselves, the Monkees came to the painful conclusion that they would not be able to repeat the effort and still have time to tape a weekly TV show. As a result, the fourth Monkees LP, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones LTD., used studio musicians extensively, albeit under the creative supervision of the Monkees themselves. The group also had the final say over what songs ended up on the album, including The Door Into Summer, a tune by Bill Martin, a friend of band leader Michael Nesmith. For reasons that are too complicated to get into here (and probably wouldn't make much sense anyway), co-credit was given to the band's producer, Chip Douglas.

Artist:    Iron Butterfly
Title:    In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida
Source:    LP: In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida
Writer(s):    Doug Ingle
Label:    Atco
Year:    1968
    One of the ironies of 1969 is that the top selling album of the year was actually released in June of 1968. The full version of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, clocking in at slightly over seventeen minutes, was long the go-to record for DJs needing to take a nature break and for many people is the embodiment of the psychedelic era itself. According to legend, the song's unusual title came from mispronouncing "In The Garden Of Eden" while extremely drunk.

Artist:    Information
Title:    Oh Strange Man
Source:    British import CD: Love, Poetry And Revolution (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Moir/Stewart
Label:    Grapefruit (original label: Beacon)
Year:    1969
    One of the most obscure recordings of 1969 was Oh Strange Man, released as a B side by a band calling itself Information. The group, led by vocalist David Moir and guitarist Albie Harrup only released two singles (on two different labels) before changing their name to Scarecrow and releasing an equally obscure album in 1978.

Rockin' in the Days of Confusion # 2010 (starts 3/2/20)

    Sometimes it seems that no matter how hard you rock out, you still end up with the blues. This week we do both.

Artist:    Jimi Hendrix Experience
Title:    Foxy Lady
Source:    CD: The Ultimate Experience (originally released on LP: Are You Experienced)
Writer(s):    Jimi Hendrix
Label:    MCA (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1967
    The first track on the original UK release of Are You Experienced was Foxy Lady. The British custom of the time was to not include any songs on albums that had been previously released as singles. When Reprise Records got the rights to release the album in the US, it was decided to include three songs that had all been top 40 hits in the UK. One of those songs, Purple Haze, took over the opening spot on the album, and Foxy Lady was moved to the middle of side 2.

Artist:     Stephen Stills
Title:     Love the One You're With
Source:     45 RPM single (stereo promo pressing)
Writer(s):    Stephen Stills
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1971
     Depending on your point of view Crosby, Stills and Nash (and sometimes Young) have either split up several times over the years or have never actually split up at all. It was during one of these maybe split-ups that Stills recorded Love the One You're With, one of his most popular tunes. Presumably he and singer Judy Collins were no longer an item at that point.

Artist:    ZZ Top
Title:    Asleep In The Desert
Source:    LP: Tejas
Writer(s):    Billy Gibbons
Label:    London
Year:    1976
    Guitarist Billy Gibbons takes center stage for the final track on ZZ Top's 1976 LP Tejas, a low-key instrumental called Asleep In The Desert. Warning: this one will stick in your head.

Artist:    David Bromberg
Title:    Sweet Home Chicago
Source:    LP: How Late'll Ya Play Till
Writer(s):    Robert Johnson
Label:    Fantasy
Year:    1976
    Sweet Home Chicago is considered by many to be the blues standard by which all other blues standards are measured. First recorded by Robert Johnson in 1936, the song has been subsequently modified by several notable artists over the years, including Junior Parker, who took the song to the #13 spot of the Billboard R&B chart in 1958. David Bromberg used a fairly standard arrangement of the tune for his live performance included on his 1976 LP How Late'll You Play Till.

Artist:    Led Zeppelin
Title:    You Shook Me/Dazed And Confused
Source:    CD: Led Zeppelin
Writer:    Dixon/Page
Label:    Atlantic
Year:    1969
    I've heard it said that Willie Dixon sued Led Zeppelin over the use of You Shook Me, which is puzzling to me since Dixon is clearly credited as the songwriter on the label. Still, I don't know enough about copyright laws to say for sure whether this could have happened or not. Dazed & Confused, on the other hand, is a Jimmy Page composition that was performed by the Yardbirds (with slightly different lyrics) as early as 1966.
   
Artist:    Cheech And Chong
Title:    The Bust
Source:    LP: Big Bambu
Writer(s):    Marin/Chong
Label:    Ode
Year:    1971
    The Bust, from the 1971 Cheech And Chong LP Big Bambu, may just have the greatest punchline in the annals of stoner comedy.
   
Artist:    Eric Burdon & War
Title:    Sun-Moon
Source:    CD: The Black Man's Burdon
Writer(s):    War
Label:    UMe (original label: M-G-M)
Year:    1970
    The second album by Eric Burdon & War was The Black Man's Burdon, a double-LP set full of long, extended pieces that laid the groundwork for War's rise to star status in the 1970s. One of the best of these extended jams was Sun-Moon, a ten-minute long slow blues number that showcases the various band members' talents.

Artist:    Johnny Winter
Title:    I Hate Everybody/Fast Life Rider
Source:    LP: Second Winter
Writer(s):    Johnny Winter
Label:    Columbia
Year:    1968
    The shortest track on Johnny Winter's Second Winter album, I Hate Everybody is a 50s-styled blues boogie that features Johnny's younger brother Edgar prominently on both organ and saxophone, supported by the rhythm section of Tommy Shannon on bass and Uncle John Turner on drums. It's followed on the album immediately by the longest track on the album, the seven-minute Fast Life Rider, which features a long middle section of Winter jamming away against a military-type beat provided by Turner. The other band members provide hoots, hums and hollers, making the whole thing feel a bit like a chain gang recording from the 1930s.

Artist:    Deep Purple
Title:    The Mule
Source:    LP: Fireball
Writer(s):    Blackmore/Gillan/Glover/Lord/Paice
Label:    Warner Brothers
Year:    1971
    The Mule is a mostly-instrumental piece by Deep Purple that is best known as the track that features the Ian Paice drum solo on the album Made In Japan. The studio version of the song, inspired by Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, originally appeared in 1971 on the band's Fireball LP.

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

   
   

Stuck in the Psychedelic Era # 2009 (starts 2/24/20)

    This week we have a long set of Doors tunes, a short set of Kinks tunes and, to close out the show, a "full band composition" set. We also have both long and short trips through the years, and, to start off the show, a 1966 set...

Artist:    Electric Prunes
Title:    I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)
Source:    LP: Nuggets Vol. 1-The Hits (originally released on LP: The Electric Prunes and as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Tucker/Mantz
Label:    Rhino (original label: Reprise)
Year:    1966
    The Electric Prunes biggest hit was I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night), released in November of 1966. The record, initially released without much promotion from their record label, was championed by Seattle DJ Pat O'Day of KJR radio, and was already popular in that area when it hit the national charts (thus explaining why so many people assumed the band was from Seattle). I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night) has come to be one of the defining songs of the psychedelic era and was the opening track on the original Lenny Kaye Nuggets compilation (and the second track on Rhino's first Nuggets LP).

Artist:    Misunderstood
Title:    Who Do You Love
Source:     British import CD: Before The Dream Faded (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Elias McDaniel
Label:    Cherry Red (original label: Fontana)
Year:    1966
    Although not as well-known as Beatlemania or Carnaby Street, London had a thriving underground rock scene from around 1966 on. One of the first bands on that scene was an American group called the Misunderstood. Formed in Riverside, California, in 1965, the Misunderstood soon caught the eye and ear of local disc jockey John Ravencroft, a Britisher who had established himself as one of the most distinctive radio voices in the Inland Empire doing the morning show on San Bernardino's KMEN. Ravencroft convinced the band to relocate to London, where his brother Alan helped the band get a contract with the Fontana label. The B side of their first single was a version of Bo Diddly's Who Do You Love that is even more psychedelic (albeit considerably shorter) than the later Quicksilver Messenger Service version of the tune. Although no recordings of the Misunderstood's live performances at the Marquee Club exist, they were reported attended by members of Pink Floyd and the Move, whose own recording careers were still in the near future. Unfortunately, a series of events completely unrelated to music (visa problems, the Draft) led to the band falling apart before they could truly get established, and the Misunderstood soon became the stuff of legends.

Artist:    Johnny Thompson Quintet
Title:    Color Me Columbuth
Source:    Mono CD: A Deadly Dose Of Wild Psych (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Johnny Thompson Quintet
Label:    Arf! Arf! (original label: Guitarsville)
Year:    1966
    Not much is known about Monterey Park, California's Johnny Thompson Quintet. The group apparently only released two singles, the first of which was the punkish Color Me Columbus. Rather than come up with another song for the B side, one of the band members recorded a new vocal track doing what sounds like a Daffy Duck impersonation over the original instrumental track, titling it Color Me Columbuth. Strange stuff.

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Nothin' In This World Can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout That Girl
Source:    Mono LP: Kinda Kinks
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1965
    The Kinks can never be accused of resting on their laurels. Despite virtually inventing hard rock with their 1964 singles You Really Got Me and All Day And All Of The Night, the band, led by Ray Davies, virtually abandoned their own style the following year, moving into more melodic territory with singles like Set Me Free and Tired Of Waiting For You, as well as folky material such as Nothin' In This World Can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout That Girl, on their LP Kinda Kinks.

Artist:    Dave Davies
Title:    Suzannah's Still Alive
Source:    Mono Canadian CD: Kinks-25 Years-The Ultimate Collection (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Dave Davies
Label:    Polygram/PolyTel (original label: Pye)
Year:    1967
    Although Ray Davies was the leader and primary songwriter for the Kinks, it was brother Dave who first recorded as a solo artist, with Death of a Clown (which received extensive airplay on the 100,000 watt English language semi-pirate station Radio Luxembourg in late 1967), followed by Suzannah's Still Alive in early 1968, both of which were backed by the other members of the band. After the next two singles flopped, however, Dave returned to the fold, finally releasing his first LP as a solo artist (and playing all of the instruments himself) in 1980, on the album Dave Davies (AFL1-3603).

Artist:    Kinks
Title:    Set Me Free
Source:    Mono LP: Kinda Kinks
Writer(s):    Ray Davies
Label:    Reprise
Year:    1965
    After scoring international success with a series of R&B influenced rockers in 1964, the Kinks started to mellow a bit in 1965, releasing more melodic songs such as Set Me Free. The band would continue to evolve throughout the decade, eventually becoming known for their increasingly innovative concept albums such as The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society, Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire), and Lola Versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One.

Artist:    Beatles
Title:    I Want To Tell You
Source:    CD: Revolver
Writer(s):    George Harrison
Label:    Capitol/EMI
Year:    1966
    The first pre-recorded reel-to-reel tape I ever bought was the Capitol version of the Beatles' Revolver album, which I picked up about a year after the LP was released. Although my Dad's tape recorder had small built-in speakers, his Koss headphones had far superior sound, which led to me sleeping on the couch in the living room with the headphones on. Hearing songs like I Want To Tell You on factory-recorded reel-to-reel tape through a decent pair of headphones gave me an appreciation for just how well-engineered Revolver was, and also inspired me to (eventually) learn my own way around a recording studio. The song itself, by the way, is one of three George Harrison songs on Revolver; the most on any Beatle LP up to that point, and one of the many reasons that, when pressed, I usually end up citing Revolver as my favorite Beatles album.

Artist:    Country Joe And The Fish
Title:    Death Sound Blues
Source:    CD: Electric Music For The Mind And Body
Writer(s):    Joe McDonald
Label:    Vanguard
Year:    1967
    I generally use the term "psychedelic" to describe a musical attitude that existed during a particular period of time rather than a specific style of music. On the other hand, the term "acid rock" is better suited for describing music that was composed and/or performed under the influence of certain mind-expanding substances. That said, the first album by Country Joe and the Fish is a classic example of acid rock. I mean, really, is there any other way to describe Death Sound Blues than "the blues on acid"?

Artist:    Steppenwolf
Title:    Born To Be Wild
Source:    CD: Billboard Top Rock 'N' Roll Hits-1968 (originally released on LP: Steppenwolf)
Writer(s):    Mars Bonfire
Label:    Rhino (original label: Dunhill)
Year:    1968
    Born To Be Wild's status as a counter-cultural anthem was cemented when it was chosen for the soundtrack of the movie Easy Rider. The popularity of both the song and the movie resulted in Steppenwolf becoming the all-time favorite band of bikers all over the world.

Artist:    Beach Boys
Title:    California Girls
Source:    Simulated stereo LP: California Girls (originally titled Summer Days (And Summer Nights))
Writer(s):    Brian Wilson
Label:    Capitol
Year:    1965   
    The Beach Boys are virtually synonymous with the fun-in-the-sun-partying-on-the-beach lifestyle that many people associate with Southern California, despite the fact that only drummer Dennis Wilson ever really participated in that lifestyle. This can be attributed mainly to the genius of Brian Wilson, who wrote nearly all the group's material, such as the iconic California Girls, which was all over the radio dial coast to coast in the summer of 1965. The song was featured on an album called Summer Days (And Summer Nights), which in addition to the original mono mix was also available on Capitol's Duophonic "electronically rechannelled for stereo" vinyl for a dollar more. In the 1980s, riding a wave of renewed popularity for the band, Capitol released abridged versions many of the group's albums at a budget price, often under new titles such as California Girls. Rather than use the mono mixes Capitol chose to go with the Duophonic mixes for these reissues This was the last time these "fake stereo" mixes were released, as the Beach Boys now insist that only the original mono mixes be used for the band's 1960s recordings on CD (with the exception of a handful of songs that were mixed in true stereo).

Artist:    Mojo Men
Title:    She's My Baby
Source:    Mono CD: Love Is The Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965-70 (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Stewart/Alaimo/Curcio
Label:    Rhino (original labels: Autumn/Reprise)
Year:    1965/1966
    Although generally considered to be one of the early San Francisco bands, the Mojo Men actually originated in Rochester, NY. After spending most of the early 60s in Florida playing to fraternities, the band moved out the West Coast in 1965, soon falling in with Autumn Records producer Sylvester Stewart (Sly Stone), for a time becoming his backup band. Stewart produced several singles for the Mojo Men, including She's My Baby, a song that had originally been recorded in 1962 as a song to do the mashed potato (an early 60s dance) to by Steve Alaimo, brother of Mojo Men bassist/lead vocalist Jim Alaimo and co-host (with Paul Revere and the Raiders) of the nationally distributed dance show Where The Action Is. The Mojo Men version of She's My Baby has more of a blues/garage-rock sound than the Steve Alaimo original, prompting its inclusion on several compilation albums over the past forty years. The original single, released in 1965 on the Autumn label, had different vocals than the 1966 Reprise reissue heard here, although both use the same instrumental backing track.

Artist:    Mad River
Title:    Wind Chimes
Source:    Mono British import CD: The Berkeley EPs (originally released as 7" 33 1/3 RPM Extended Play mini-album)
Writer(s):    Mad River
Label:    Big Beat (original label: Wee)
Year:    1967
    Unlike most San Francisco Bay Area bands of the mid to late 1960s, Mad River was already a functioning band when they arrived on the scene from their native Ohio in 1967. The group, consisting of Lawrence Hammond (vocals, bass), David Robinson (guitar), Rick Bockner (guitar) and Greg Dewey (drums, vocals), had been formed in 1965 as the Mad River Blues Band in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where all of the members were attending college. By the time they relocated to Berkeley in early 1967 they had developed a unique style of their own. Once in Berkeley, the band quickly established themselves as one of the most "underground" bands in the area, often appearing on the bill with Country Joe And The Fish. In fact, it was the latter band that inspired Mad River to record an EP later that year. Following an unsuccessful audition for Fantasy Records, Mad River cut a three-song EP for the small Wee label. The entire second side of the disc was a six and a half minute long piece called Wind Chimes. The band later recut the track for their first full-length album the following year.

Artist:    Fairport Convention
Title:    Sun Shade/The Lobster
Source:    British import CD: Fairport Convention
Writer(s):    Ghosh/Horvitz/Painter/Hutchings/Thompson
Label:    Polydor
Year:    1968
    The recording history of the premier English folk-rock band, Fairport Convention, can be more than a little confusing. A large part of the problem was caused by A&M Records, who had the rights to release the band's material in the US, starting with the band's second LP. Rather than go with the original album title, What We Did On Our Holidays, A&M retitled the album Fairport Convention, releasing it in 1970. The problem is that the band's first album, released in the UK on Polydor in 1968, was also titled Fairport Convention. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the lineup on the 1968 Polydor LP differs from that of every other Fairport album, most notably in the absence of the band's most visible member, vocalist Sandy Denny. Fairport Convention (the band) was formed in 1967, and was consciously following in the footsteps of Jefferson Airplane, albeit from a British perspective. Like the Airplane, the original Fairport lineup had a wealth of talent, including Martin Lamble on violin, Simon Nicol on guitars, Judy Dyble on autoharp, recorder and piano, Richard Thompson on guitar and mandolin, Ashley Hutchings (then known as Tyger Hutchings) on bass and Ian MacDonald (who later changed his name to Ian Matthews), who shared lead vocals with Dyble. Musically the band was far more rock-oriented than on later LPs, even dabbling with jazz and progressive rock on tracks like Sun Shade & The Lobster, respectively. This can be attributed, at least in part, to a general disdain among the youth of Britain for the traditional English folk music that was taught to every schoolchild in the country (whether they wanted it or not). Later albums would find Fairport Convention doing more and more traditional folk, eventually becoming the world's most popular practicioners of the art, although they never entirely abandoned rock.

Artist:    Who
Title:    Amazing Journey
Source:    British Import CD: Spirit Of Joy (originally released on LP: Tommy)
Writer(s):    Pete Townshend
Label:    Polydor UK (original US label: Decca)
Year:    1969
    After achieving major success in their native England with a series of hit singles in 1965-67, the Who began to concentrate more on their albums from 1968 on. The first of these concept albums was The Who Sell Out, released in December of 1967. The Who Sell Out was a collection of songs connected by faux radio spots and actual jingles from England's last remaining pirate radio station, Radio London. After releasing a few more singles in 1968, the Who began work on their most ambitious project yet: the world's first rock opera. Tommy, released in 1969, was a double LP telling the story of a boy who, after being tramautized into becoming a blind deaf-mute, eventually emerges as a kind of messiah, only to have his followers ultimately abandon him. One of the early tracks on the album is Amazing Journey, describing Tommy's voyage into the recesses of his own mind in response to the traumatic event that results in his blind, deaf and dumb condition.

Artist:    Sugarloaf
Title:    Mother Nature's Wine
Source:    LP: Spaceship Earth
Writer:    Corbetta/Phillips/Reardon
Label:    Liberty
Year:    1971
    Despite being a better album overall than Sugarloaf's first LP, Spaceship Earth did not sell particularly well, only making it to the #111 spot on the Billboard albums chart. This is probably due to the lack of a hit single on a par with Green-Eyed Lady. Of the two singles that were released from Spaceship Earth, the one more similar in style to Green-Eyed Lady was Mother Nature's Wine. The song stalled out in the # 88 spot however, and Sugarloaf did not have another charted single until 1974, when Don't Call Us, We'll Call You made the top 10.

Artist:    Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Title:    Knife-Edge
Source:    CD: Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Writer(s):    Janácek, arr. Emerson/Lake/Palmer
Label:    Rhino (original label: Cotillion)
Year:    1970
    Starting with the release of their first self-titled LP, Emerson, Lake & Palmer were known for incorporating classical music into rock compositions. One of the earliest examples of this is Knife-Edge, an adaptation of  the first movement of Leoš Janácek's Sinfonietta that incorporates a section of Johann Sebastian Bach's first French Suite in D minor as well. All this on a piece that rocks out as hard, if not harder, than anything else released in 1970.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    Light My Fire
Source:    CD: The Doors
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    Once in a while a song comes along that totally blows you away the very first time you hear it. The Doors' Light My Fire was one of those songs. I liked it so much that I immediately went out and bought the 45 RPM single. Not long after that I heard the full-length version of the song from the first Doors album and was blown away all over again.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    The Crystal Ship
Source:    45 RPM single B side
Writer:    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    Ever feel like you've discovered something really special that nobody else (among your circle of friends at any rate) knows about? At first you kind of want to keep it to yourself, but soon you find yourself compelled to share it with everyone you know. Such was the case when, in the early summer of 1967, I used my weekly allowance to buy copies of a couple of songs I had heard on the American Forces Network (AFN). As usual, it wasn't long before I was flipping the records over to hear what was on the B sides. I liked the first one well enough (a song by Buffalo Springfield called Do I Have To Come Right Out And Say It, the B side of For What It's Worth), but it was the second one, the B side of the Doors' Light My Fire, that really got to me. To this day I consider The Crystal Ship to be one of the finest slow rock songs ever recorded.

Artist:    Doors
Title:    When The Music's Over
Source:    LP: Strange Days
Writer(s):    The Doors
Label:    Elektra
Year:    1967
    I remember the first time I heard When The Music's Over. My girlfriend's older brother had a copy of the Strange Days album on the stereo in his room and told us to get real close to the speakers so we could hear the sound of a butterfly while he turned the volume way up. What we got, of course, was a blast of "...we want the world and we want it now." Good times.

Artist:    Traffic
Title:    Paper Sun
Source:    Mono CD: Mr. Fantasy (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s):    Winwood/Capaldi
Label:    Silver Spotlight (original label: United Artists)
Year:    1967
    Paper Sun was the first single released by Traffic in mid-1967 in both the US and UK. Despite its length (4:10), the song made the top 5 on both the British and Canadian charts. United Artists Records, however, in deference to the tendency of American top 40 stations to not play any records more than three and a half minutes long, released a shortened version of the track, created by simply fading the song out 50 seconds early. That version only managed to hit the #80 spot on the US charts, however, despite Steve Winwood's name being displayed prominently on the label. The full-length original mono mix of the song is now available as a bonus track on the CD version of the Mr. Fantasy album.

Artist:     Left Banke
Title:     Pretty Ballerina
Source:     45 RPM single
Writer:     Michael Brown
Label:     Smash
Year:     1967
     The Left Banke, taking advantage of bandleader Michael Brown's industry connections (his father owned a New York recording studio), ushered in what was considered to be the "next big thing" in popular music in early 1967: baroque pop. After their debut single, Walk Away Renee, became a huge bestseller, the band followed it up with Pretty Ballerina, which easily made the top 20 as well. Subsequent releases were sabotaged by a series of bad decisions by Brown and the other band members that left radio stations leery of playing any record with the words "Left Banke" on the label.

Artist:     Rolling Stones
Title:     She's A Rainbow
Source:     CD: Their Satanic Majesties Request
Writer:     Jagger/Richards
Label:     Abkco (original label: London)
Year:     1967
     The only song from Their Satanic Majesties Request to get significant airplay in the US was She's A Rainbow, released as a single in the fall of 1967. Another song from the album, In Another Land, was released as the first Bill Wyman solo single (with the Stones credited as the artists on the B side). 2,000 Light Years From Home, the B side to She's A Rainbow, did get some international airplay as well.

Artist:     Turtles
Title:     The Last Thing I Remember, The First Thing I Knew
Source:     12" 45 RPM Picture Disc: Turtles 1968
Writer:     The Turtles
Label:     Rhino
Year:     Recorded 1968, released 1978
     In 1968 the Turtles rebelled against their record company, White Whale. They did not attempt to break the contract or go on strike, though. Instead, they simply went into the studio and produced four songs that they themselves wrote and chose to record. White Whale, in turn, elected not to issue any of the band's self-produced recordings (although one, Surfer Dan, did end up on their Battle of the Bands album a few months later). Finally, in the late 1970s a small independent label known for issuing oddball recordings by the likes of Barnes and Barnes (Fish Heads) and professional wrestler Fred Blassie (Pencil-Neck Geek) put out a 12-inch picture disc featuring the four tunes. That label also began reissuing old Turtles albums, starting it on a path that has since become their stock in trade. The name of that label: Rhino Records.

Artist:    Them
Title:    Just One Conception
Source:    LP: Time Out! Time In! For Them
Writer(s):    Them
Label:    Tower
Year:    1968
    Most of the songs on Them's second album without founder Van Morrison, Time Out! Time In! For Them, were written for the band by the wife and husband team of Sharon Pulley and Tom Lane. There were, however, a couple of exceptions, including Just One Conception, which was credited to the band itself. The track, which opens with massive sitar, shows just how deep into the psychedelic pool the original Irish punk band had dived by 1968.

Artist:    Pink Floyd
Title:    Careful With That Axe, Eugene
Source:    CD: Relics (originally released in UK as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s):    Waters/Wright/Mason/Gilmour
Label:    Capitol (original UK label: Columbia)
Year:    1968
    Originally released in the UK as the B side of Point Me At The Sky, Careful With That Axe Eugene went on to become one of Pink Floyd's best known early recordings, thanks in large part to a live performance of the piece being included on the 1969 LP Ummagumma. The original studio version of the tune was included on the 1971 compilation album Relics, which is still in print.

Artist:    Canned Heat
Title:    Amphetamine Annie
Source:    LP: Boogie With Canned Heat
Writer(s):    Canned Heat
Label:    United Artists (original label: Liberty)
Year:    1968
    By the end of 1967 the Haight-Ashbury scene had taken a definite turn for the worse. Most veterans of the street (i.e. those who had been there before the Summer of Love) placed the blame firmly on the influx of naive runaways that had flooded the area in the wake of calls to "go to San Francisco" earlier in the year, and on the drug dealers who preyed upon them. Methamphetamine (aka speed) was the drug usually singled out as the most destructive force at play. Back then it was the pill form of speed, such as white crosses, that was prevalent among users; the powdered crystal meth that has become a concern in modern rural America would not be used widely until the 1970s. As one of the original Bay Area bands, Canned Heat decided to take a stand against the drug, declaring in the song Amphetamine Annie that "speed kills", a phrase that would show up as graffiti on various walls in the city as well.