THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,171) One in a Million* — “Fredereek Hernando”

The Scottish band’s ’67 Christmastime 45 (with “Double Sight” as the B-side) is truly one in a million: “one of the very greatest obscure British psychedelic singles” (Richie Unterberger, https://www.allmusic.com/album/double-sight-mw0001743746), “one of the jewels of British psychedelia — a superb double-sided disc with psychedelic guitar work out of the top drawer” (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited), “what just might be the most cataclysmic single to escape from the primordial mushroom soup of the British psychedelic underground” with “the void-embracing ‘Fredereek Hernando’ [an] astonishing, skull-busting example[] of the crash-and-burn end of the British psychedelic spectrum, marrying acid-ravaged lyrics and a psychotropic lead vocal to a blitzkrieg sonic assault led by Jimmy McColloch”. (David Wells, Record Collector 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era)

23 Daves opines:

Much talked about but seldom actually made sense of, “Fredereek Hernando” was listed in Record Collector magazine’s list of the greatest British psychedelic singles of all time . . . . Now, whilst I wouldn’t quite go that far in my praise for this single . . . there’s no question that [it] is a bit sodding strange. It’s not just the lyrics that confuse and bamboozle, seemingly being about some infamous but eccentrically named figure being publicly hung, it’s the salad of sinister echoing backing vocals, the screeching tape-rewinding effects, and the squawking guitar. In an interview many years later, lead vocalist Alan Young commented: “It was too way-out for mainstream exposure”, and so it proved. . . . [B]y Young’s own confession they were probably trying to sound like [the Who] at their most cataclysmic rather than a hippy freak-out act. Still, whilst the gritted teeth vocals are decidedly not part of the peace and love plan, the surrealist lyrics and odd noises ensured that this single would inevitably come out of other side whiffing of incense, much as the ‘Orrible ‘Oo’s “I Can See For Miles” is forever referenced in a psychedelic context. . . . One of the more astonishing things about this single is the fact that the guitar lines were delivered by the 14 year old Jimmy McCulloch. Pete Townshend obviously wasn’t blind to his prodigious talent, and ended up match-making him into the band Thunderclap Newman who subsequently had a massive number one hit with “Something In The Air”.

https://left-and-to-the-back.blogspot.com/2010/05/one-in-million-fredereek-hernando.html

As to OM, David Wells notes that they were “[i]nitially known as The Jaygars, Alan Young (rhythm guitar, lead vocals), William Scenters (bass) and brothers Jimmy and Jack McColloch (lead guitar and drums respectively) [and] regrouped as One in a Million when they moved down from Scotland to London in 1966.” (Record Collector 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era) Richie Unterberger adds:

Featuring young teenage prodigy Jimmy McCulloch (later of Thunderclap Newman, Stone the Crows, and Wings) on guitar . . . . Double Sight” was simply one of the greatest Who circa-1966-1967 soundalike songs ever, and while “Fredereek Hernando” went in a somewhat different direction with its monkish harmonies and crunching freakbeat, it was almost as good. While it’s something of a cliché for pet collector bands like these to be unable to match their one capture of lightning in a bottle in the rest of their repertoire, that is, alas, true of One in a Million. Though taken altogether th[eir] material could have comprised an actual LP back in the late ’60s, it just doesn’t sound like the band was ready for that honor. The remainder of the group’s output was pretty average mod rock with occasional psychedelic spice, and sometimes quite derivative of the Who . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/album/double-sight-mw0001743746

Well, as Alan Young freely admits, “We were always very influenced by the Who, really — we used to cover a lot of their songs . . . That was the sound we were aiming for.” (Record Collector 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era)

* Alan Young recalls:

[The band’s name] was inspired by Jimmy, who was still only 13 and was considered by us to be one in a million. . . [W]e had to have private tutor during the day to make sure that he didn’t miss out on his education. I guess he probably shouldn’t have been playing in the clubs either, but everyone turned a blind eye.”

Record Collector 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era

Here they are live (starting at 53:30):

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,170) Giles, Giles & Fripp — “One in a Million”

This ’68 A-side, representing King Crimson in the womb, sounds a lot like the offspring of Syd Barrett and Monty Python — “very English music hall psych … the sort of track done not just by Floyd, but by the Beatles and The Kinks as well” (Trotsky, https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464), with a “generous helping[] of goonish humour”. (Lin Bensley, https://www.loudersound.com/features/giles-giles-fripp-cheerful-insanity) “I’m quite sure that I won’t be able to get the melod[y] . . . out of my head for quite a while.” (tarkus1980, (https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464)

The song comes from an album — The Cheerful Insanity of Giles, Giles & Fripp — that is “very charming, intellectual, tongue-in-cheek pop album of the sixties” (Matti, https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464), “decidedly weird” (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited), “an aural oddity of incurable nonchalance” (Lin Bensley, https://www.loudersound.com/features/giles-giles-fripp-cheerful-insanity), with “a strange mixture of light jazz, psychedelia, droll humor, Goon Show/Monty Python-style comedy, and very offbeat balladry”. (Bruce Eder, https://www.allmusic.com/artist/giles-giles-fripp-mn0000657298#biography)

In Trotsky’s view, one “probably ha[s] to be a fan of ‘silly’ psych albums like The Small Faces’ Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake and Pink Floyd’s Piper At The Gates Of Dawn to appreciate this album on its own terms”, with songs that “are generally a tamer (but not necessarily poor) version of the sort of stuff that early Floyd was doing”. (https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464)

In Lindsay Planer’s, “Musically, Giles, Giles & Fripp are wholly unlike anything before or since. Drawing upon folk, classical, pop, and even sacred music, each track brings a fresh listening experience. . . . lighthearted and decidedly folksy English tales.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-cheerful-insanity-of-giles-giles-fripp-mw0000100997#trackListing)

In Dobermensch’s, “[a]dmirers of Syd Barrett and the more pastoral side of early Floyd will like this. Unfortunately it’s not as strange or acid drenched but retains a certain British quirkiness throughout. The songs are sursprisingly catchy and remind me of Bowie’s first album from ’67.” (https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464)

In Evolver’s: “A friend of mine once said that the one common aspect of all of the early music from the great proggers of the seventies is silliness. This is true of The Nice, early Pink Floyd, and even band’s like Tomorrow (Steve Howe’s pre-Yes group). But few were as silly as Giles, Giles & Fripp.” (https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=8464)

In Lin Bensley’s, “[t]here is an air of lost innocence (or should that be intelligence?) that permeates the whole album, brimming with words and music that owe less to psychedelia than the village hall or Vaudeville”. (https://www.loudersound.com/features/giles-giles-fripp-cheerful-insanity)

Bensley tells us that:

The album was completed in May, and in the same month a first single was released: One In A Million b/w Newly-weds. It was accompanied by a satirical press release penned by Peter Giles:

“This is just another single from one of the countless groups who have come to London in the vain hope of making good. Later this year an LP of their compositions will be tentatively released to take its tentative place in a thick catalogue of other LPs on current release.” . . .

Perhaps Peter [Giles] should have the final say. “The Cheerful Insanity… album WAS WHAT IT WAS in 1968, and IS WHAT IT IS now. It has a musical ingenuousness. That’s what I liked about it then, and that’s what I like about it today.”

https://www.loudersound.com/features/giles-giles-fripp-cheerful-insanity

Unfortunately, “the punters just didn’t seem interested”. (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited) The song and the LP are certainly not everybody’s cup of tea, certainly not rushomancy’s:

The album takes a dramatic turn for the worse with “One in a Million”, the first Mike Giles composition. The liner notes indicate this as having been written in 1965, and it sounds like it. The orchestrations . . . sound completely chintzy here accompanying this piece of sub-Herman’s Hermits garbage. . . . If you’re into wildly uneven fringe ’60s music, though, [the LP] might just be up your alley.

https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/giles-giles-and-fripp/the-cheerful-insanity-of-giles-giles-and-fripp/

Lindsay Planer writes:

This pre-King Crimson aggregate involves the talents of Michael Giles (drums/vocals), Peter Giles (bass/vocals), and Robert Fripp (guitar/vocals) accompanied by a plethora of studio musicians — most notably keyboardist Nicky Hopkins and backing vocalists the Breakaways. By any standards The Cheerful Insanity of Giles, Giles & Fripp is one of the more eclectic albums to have been issued during the psychedelic rock movement of the late ’60s. The album was initially issued in September of 1968 on the Decca Records subsidiary Deram — whose releases were aimed specifically at the alternative or progressive rock market. . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-cheerful-insanity-of-giles-giles-fripp-mw0000100997#trackListing

And Bruce Eder adds:

Giles, Giles & Fripp only existed for a little more than 15 months. They never got to play a single live performance under their own name, never charted a single anywhere in the world, and were so obscure in their own time and their own country that the one album that they recorded . . . sold fewer than 1000 copies. But out of that trio grew the band that became King Crimson. Drummer Michael Giles and his bassist brother Perer Giles were veterans of the rock scene in Bournemouth . . . between January of 1960 and May of 1967. . . . In late August of 1967, they hooked up with Robert Fripp, an ex-member of groups such as the League of Gentlemen, who was then playing guitar in a hotel orchestra. . . . [They] found some interest in their music at Decca Records . . . and passed an audition to get signed to the company’s progressive-oriented Deram Records imprint. The result was an album . . . cut during the winter and early spring of 1968 and a pair of singles. It never sold, despite a surprisingly enthusiastic publicity push by Decca. . . . Peter Giles crossed paths with ex-Fairport Convention vocalist Julie Dyble, who was advertising for a band and working with Ian McDonald, a multi-instrumentalist who also wrote songs. For a time, [they all] worked together, recording a handful of tracks, and McDonald ended up staying after Dyble departed. . . . and soon a non-performing fifth member with the addition of McDonald’s friend and one-time bandmate, lyricist Peter Sinfield. In late 1968, Peter Giles quit the group and decided to leave professional music behind, and Fripp brought in Greg Lake, an old friend who took over on bass and who would also serve as lead singer. . . . [T]he new quintet with a new sound selected the name King Crimson.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/giles-giles-fripp-mn0000657298#biography

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,169) Caleb Quaye — “A Woman of Distinction”

I played the A-side (see #807) — here’s the B-side, “just as good . . . though certainly not as mind numbingly lysergic!” (AnorakThing, https://anorakthing.blogspot.com/2010/10/second-greatest-british-60s-psychedelic.html?m=1) The songs together make a “magnificent 45” (liner notes to the Chocolate Soup for Diabetics Volumes 1-5 CD comp), in fact the ultimate 60’s Brit psych double A-side, or it would have been had 1) anyone bought it at the time, and 2) the Beatles not prematurely released “Strawberry Fields Forever”/“Penny Lane” as a double A-side when under pressure for “product” while everyone waited for Sgt. Pepper’s. As to the first point, I should note that the original vinyl single has made the list of the 100 most valuable vinyl records, going for $3,000 — leading the compiler to comment that “[c]ompiling this list has made me realise something; old psychedelic rockers have way too much money”! (Andrewtk, https://meemix.com/top-100-most-valuable-vinyl-records/) Well, someof them!

As to the second point, David Wells rhapsodizes:

[W]hat a record it is. If Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane is rightly regarded by the proverbial man in the street as the classic double-sided British studio psych pop record, then Baby Your Phrasing Is Bad/Woman of Distinction is, as far as the cognoscenti are concerned, its nearest subterranean equivalent. Distant disembodied vocals, fried lyrics, lashings of phasing, reverb, distortion and backwards tapes — what’s more, Caleb even remembered to write a couple of pretty good songs as well. Possibly he never issued another solo single because this one was impossible to top; then again, maybe it was just that nobody was interested (with the notable and curious exception of pirate station Radio Scotland, apparently). . . .

Record Collector: 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era

Of Caleb, Mojo tells us that:

Born in London, but of Ghanaian descent, Caleb Quaye enjoyed a long and successful career as a backing musician and session player (Nilsson, Lou Reed, The Who, Elton John) for the best part of two decades. . . . [Elton John] is rumoured to have played keyboards [on “Baby”] . . . . He and Quaye . . . in 1969 would together record a (still unreleased) album under the name of The Bread and Beer Band [see #175].

liner notes to Mojo Presents Acid Drops, Spacedust & Flying Saucers: Psychedelic Confectionery from the UK Underground 1965-1969

Wells adds that:

Back in the second half of the 1960s . . . he was employed as resident guitar-prodigy-cum-teenage-studio-whizzkid-producer for Beatles publisher Dick James’s company . . . . Quaye . . . would play on pretty much every recording made by . . . Elton John, from such heavily psychedelic late 60s demos as Regimental Sergeant Zippo to million-selling releases like the 1976 double album Blue Moves. . . . When he found religion in the early 1980s . . . Caleb sold what, according to drummer Roger Pope, was the biggest private record collection in the country to Elton . . . .

Record Collector: 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era

“In 1968, Quaye played guitar in Elton’s touring band, a position he occupied on and off for the next decade, as well as forming Hookfoot.” (liner notes to the Chocolate Soup for Diabetics Volumes 1-5 CD comp)

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,168) Harry Nilsson — “Love Story”

A sweet story, told by a man in love pondering a life of happily ever after . . . all the way to the end: “We’ll play checkers all day / ’til we pass away”. WTF? Is this supposed to be tragedy, farce, or simply acceptance? Well, it’s a Randy Newman song, so I guess all three!

In 1970, Harry Nilsson introduced Newman to the world through a stunning album of interpretations of his songs (with Newman himself playing piano!), including this touching but “bizarre chronicle of a couple who have a dull relationship and who morbidly look forward to passing away in an old people’s home”. (Elusive Disc, https://elusivedisc.com/harry-nilsson-nilsson-sings-newman-180g-lp-1/) “Newman’s most challenging songs mix levity and pathos, and Nilsson never gives a false note on songs like Love Story . . . and stays true to the characters and the cycle-of-life theme.” (Angel Aguilar, https://www.noripcord.com/features/overlooked-albums-32-harry-nilsson-nilsson-sings-newman)

Ezra Furman emphasizes the depressing aspects:

[The song] tries to disguise itself as something utterly average, but if you pay attention you are smacked in the face with absurdity, tragedy, dramatic irony—all the good stuff of depressing art. . . . A meaningless and banal slow death disguised as a happy ending.

https://loveletterstorocknroll.com/2016/02/26/to-misters-harry-nilsson-and-randy-newman/

But, as Bill Leebens understands:

Where Newman’s versions of the same songs often seemed throw-away and sardonic to the point of bitterness, Nilsson’s versions were contemplative and tempered the edge of the lyrics with sweetness and restraint. Rather than lessening the effect of Newman’s lyrics and often-mournful melodies, Nilsson’s careful, balanced handling emphasized their inherent  humanity, which Newman often seemed determined to deny.

https://www.psaudio.com/blogs/copper/nilsson-sings-newman

As to the album, Stephen Thomas Erlewine writes:

[G]enerally regarded as the album that introduced Randy Newman the songwriter to a wide audience, Nilsson Sings Newman has gained a reputation of being an minor masterwork. . . . It’s deliberately an album of subtle pleasures, crafted, as the liner notes state, line by line in the studio. As such, the preponderance of quiet piano-and-voice tracks . . . means the record can slip away upon the first few listens, especially for anyone expecting an undeniable masterpiece. Yet, a masterpiece is what this is, albeit a subtle, graceful masterpiece where the pleasure is in the grace notes, small gestures, and in-jokes. Not to say that this is devoid of emotion; it’s just that the emotion is subdued, [such as] on . . . a tongue-in-cheek tale like “Love Story.” For an album that introduced a songwriter as idiosyncratic as Newman, it’s only appropriate that Nilsson’s interpretations are every bit as original as the songs. His clear intonation and sweet, high voice are more palatable than Randy’s slurred, bluesy growl . . . . He’s created gentle, intricate arrangements of tuneful yet clever songs, and as such, the album may be as much an acquired taste as Newman. Once you’ve acquired that taste, this is as sweet as honey.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/nilsson-sings-newman-mw0001961763

As to Nilsson’s early years, Richie Unterberger writes:

Although he synthesized disparate elements of both rock and pop traditions, singer/songwriter Harry Nilsson[‘s] . . . allegiance belonged to neither. He’s best-known for his versions of other people’s songs but he was a skilled composer . . . . Nilsson had been struggling to make inroads into the music business for . . . years . . . . He made demos, sang commercial jingles, and shopped songs, all the while keeping his job at a Los Angeles area bank. In the mid-’60s, he wrote a few songs with Phil Spector that were recorded by the Ronettes . . . . The Monkees recorded his “Cuddly Toy,” and the Yardbirds did “Ten Little Indians” . . . . But Nilsson didn’t quit his bank job until after the release of Pandemonium Shadow Show [in ‘67, which] caught the attention of the Beatles. . . . John Lennon and Paul McCartney named him as their favorite American singer at a press conference, an extraordinary accolade for an unknown. . . . Three Dog Night took his “One” into the Top Ten in 1969, and Nilsson’s second LP, Aerial Ballet, continued the ambitious pop/rock direction of his debut, marrying his slightly eccentric, bouncy (if sometimes precious) tunes to Baroque orchestral production. When one of its songs, “Everybody’s Talkin’,” was used as the theme for the Midnight Cowboy film, Nilsson had his first Top Ten hit. . . . It was another cover (of . . . Badfinger . . . ) that gave him . . . the number one smash “Without You.” . . . [H]e never performed in concert . . . preferring to craft his artistry in the studio.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/harry-nilsson-mn0000560208#biography

Here is Randy Newman’s version:

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,167) The Daughters of Eve — “Help Me Boy”

This song twice charted in ‘66 — Cleveland’s Outsiders reached #37 and Eric Burdon’s Animals reached #29 (#14 in the UK), both in October. But the best version was issued a year later (with the genders reversed) as a B-side by Chicago’s all-girl Daughters of Eve.

Lookhere65 writes:

Chicago group Daughters Of Eve actually played their own instruments instead of drafting in session players – a rarity at the time. ‘Help Me Boy’ is the kind of haunted, evocative time-warp golf that Quentin Tarantino would dry-hump halfway into soundtrack notoriety given half the chance.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=26ZiD6OTk34&pp=ygUgVGhlIGRhdWdodGVycyBvZiB3dmUgaGVscCBtZSBib3k%3D

Bess Korey adds:

[T]heir breathtaking cover of the Animals’ “Help Me Girl”, . . was gender-bended and re-titled, “Help Me Boy”[.] The dreamy, otherworldly sound of the music, and the enchanting vocals, entices the listener, and makes their version stand out dramatically from the original Animals’ track.

https://spectropop.com/DaughtersOfEve/index.htm?page_id=1335

As to the Daughters, Jason Ankeny tells us:

Chicago garage band the Daughters of Eve was formed in late 1965 by manager Carl Bonafede — already the mastermind behind local favorites the Buckinghams . . . , Bonafede now looked to assemble an all-girl group, first recruiting singer/guitarists Judy Johnson and Marsha Tomal. Bassist Andee Levin and drummer Debi Pomeroy rounded out the original lineup, which recorded its debut single, “Hey Lover,” for the USA label in 1966. Bassist Marilou Davison replaced Levin in time for the 1967 follow-up, “Symphony of My Soul,” and was herself replaced by Lori Wax on “Don’t Waste My Time,” the Daughters of Eve’s third single and their first for the Spectra Sound label. The group signed to Cadet for 1968’s “Social Tragedy,” but dissolved later that year when both Johnson and Tomal wed.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/daughters-of-eve-mn0001989762#biography

And L. Wechsler tells us:

[T]he first ever all-girl rock-and-roll band in the Midwest[, t]heir ages ranged from 14 to 16 . . . . [T]hey played local high school dances and . . . . [then] one-nighters in clubs around the Midwest . . . . Their sound was a fabric of youthful energy, clear sweet vocals and teenage innocence . . . .

https://sometimeworld.com/the-daughters-of-eve/

Here are the Outsiders:

Here are the Animals:

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,166) Damon — “Poor Poor Genie”

A Lounge Lizard becomes Lizard King and gives us a mystical and almost mythical LP that “just oozes lysergia” (Tymeshifter, https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5DDDE08017204B40), consisting of “tranced out gypsy Arabian acid fuzz crooner psych with deep mysterious vocals, a captivating soundscape . . . and excellent, succinct songwriting”, a “great and special experience in my ears”. (Patrick Lundborg, The Acid Archives, 2nd Ed. (edited by Patrick Lundborg)) Thanks, Patrick, that is the single greatest dead-on (and deadpan) description of an album that I have ever come across. And from that album comes a song “about a real girl who had nowhere to run, so she ran with us”. (Damon, https://www.psychedelicbabymag.com/2013/12/david-damon-del-conte-talks-about-song.html)

Eothen Alapatt talks about the LP:

It seemed that this homespun, funky psychedelic monument borrowed from nothing and sprung from nowhere. . . . Damon’s album leapt from the tortured mind of its curious creator at the perfect time. Damon’s unique, introspective songwriting and nuanced voice, the interplay between he and lead guitarist Charlie Carey and an atmosphere that so perfectly captured the last bloom of the flower power era as it decayed into the dark haze of the ’70s underground could only have arisen from a spark of auspicious genius.

http://rockasteria.blogspot.com/2015/07/damon-song-of-gypsy-1959-68-us-gorgeous.html?m=1

Richie Unterberger adds:

Singer/songwriter Damon [David
Carlton Del Conte] . . . put out an extremely obscure, folk-tinged psychedelic album in 1969, Song of a Gypsy . . . . Such is its rarity that mint copies have gone for as much as $1000 or more. There’s a droning, slightly raga-modalish flavor to the melodies and guitar lines, with a gypsy touch in the percussion and questing, spiritual lyrics. The gypsy element . . . is not just an extrapolation from the title, but a deliberate action on Damon’s part, who came to think of himself as a gypsy while wandering around California in the late ’60s. After one 45 . . . the LP was recorded by Damon and other musicians in Los Angeles, its existence barely even suspected by most psychedelic collectors for years.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/damon-mn0000951479#biography

As does Klemen Breznikar:

[The LP] is a true monster of U.S. psychedelic music. . . . contains very laid-back, stoned vocals with nice fuzz guitar and even a sitar and it’s truly among the pillars of rare psych albums. . . . the last bloom of the flower power movement before it decayed into the haze of the 70s underground. It traces a pop hopeful descending into chaos, and becoming the tortured soul who would create an LP to file alongside works by other lost greats of the late ‘60s . . . .

https://www.psychedelicbabymag.com/2013/12/david-damon-del-conte-talks-about-song.html

As to Damon, Alaoatt writes:

When Damon was eight, his parents . . . . moved to Alhambra, California. It was the beginning of what he now regards as his “predestined life as a gypsy,” as his parents moved constantly within Los Angeles city limits . . . . Theirs was a tight knit Italian American family . . . . In 1960 his high school sweetheart Katy told him she was pregnant. She was sixteen, he was nineteen. They married, and their union bore him his three girls. Beginning in the seventh grade . . . he had dreamt of becoming a musician. . . . He was an avid surfer so, in late 1960, newlywed . . . he wrote and recorded “The Lonely Surfer” (groovy, if standard surf rock) and cut to wax his first stab at “Don’t Cry” (blue-eyed doo-wop). . . . He then moved on to the even more obscure Harmony Records for the “Twisf’-inspired “Bowling Alley Jane” and his second version of “Don’t Cry,” this time called “Don’t Cry Davy.” After a detour with Associated Artists – “Little Things Mean a Lot /The Glory of Love” feature only his backing vocals, but were inexplicably released under his name – he founded his own Del Con label and issued promotional and commercial versions of “A Face In A Crowd” and “I Lie,” the latter establishing his preference for garage-rocking soul.

http://rockasteria.blogspot.com/2015/07/damon-song-of-gypsy-1959-68-us-gorgeous.html?m=1

Damon himself tells us of the album:

The songs were about my life as it was at the time. . . . My concept was to write what I was living. Song after song just came into my head. . . . Drugs, life, love, pain, pleasure passion – all had a role in my music. . . . The black [version of the LP] was expensive, but I felt the music was worth it. I pressed 500 Black Gatefold albums and 500 White ones because of the cost.

https://www.psychedelicbabymag.com/2013/12/david-damon-del-conte-talks-about-song.html

And he tells us of his life:

I began singing in a rock band. I soon moved in to top 40. Eventually I became a jazz singer. I then moved on to become a lounge singer. I actually enjoyed that. I could do show tunes, songs in other languages, ballads, and light rock.  It was fun.  Pretty soon I realized that I had to be more ME, and then became a folk singer. . . . I sang mostly in Southern California until around 1967 when I began traveling as a gypsy folk singer. . . . I enjoyed being a lounge singer . . . . But I saw no future in it. Singing other people songs left me a bit empty. I needed to do my own music. . . . [I]n time I realized that I was becoming a “Lounge Lizard” and I didn’t want to end up that way in my “later years”. . . . That’s what brought me to “Gypsy Rock” music.  It was mine. . . . . [S]omewhere in the 1960s I had become a junkie. Strung out on Heroin, used LSD often, and was bailed out of jail a lot. In 1979 I gave my life to Jesus.

https://www.psychedelicbabymag.com/2013/12/david-damon-del-conte-talks-about-song.html

Live — a decade ago:

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,165) Ambrose Slade/Slade– “Pity the Mother”

The first song to be written by Slade’s future songwriting team of Noddy Holder and Jim Lea., this “hauntingly folky” (Dave Thompson, https://www.allmusic.com/album/beginnings-mw0000849687) “SAD song [is] about a pitiful lonely single mum, featuring stunningly heart-rending violin by Jim Lea.” (ReverendWerewolf13, https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/ambrose-slade/beginnings.p/) “Pity” is “Truly exceptional. The interplay of guitar, drums, violin and vocals is sublime.” andrewdolinskiatcarpathian, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3vmmeiXfhs) Joe Viglione asks us to “l]isten to how musical the Holder/Lee original “Pity the Mother” is to hear how inspired and truly underrated these artists were and still are.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/ballzy-mw0000840164)

About Slade, Vernon Joynson writes:

The roots of Slade go back to a 1964 Wolverhampton-based band The Vendors who included Dave Hill and Don Powell and cut a four-song demo EP. By 1965 The Vendors had evolved into The In-Be-Tweens. The same year Noddy Holder was guitarist and backing vocalist in another Wolverhampton-based band, Steve Brett and the Mavericks. During 1966 The In-Be-Tweens split into two with only Hill and Powell remaining. They were then joined by Noddy Holder and another Wolverhampton lad Jimmy Lea. In early 1969 the foursome, who were now known as Ambrose Slade and playing Motown, Beatles and ska covers, moved down to London. They were spotted playing at Rasputin’s Club by ex-Animal Chas Chandler who became their manager/producer, got them a record deal with Fontana and fashioned them in boots, braces and close-cut hair to cash-in on the skinhead movement. By the end of the year, he’d also persuaded them to shorten their name to Slade.

The Tapestry of Delights Revisited

Chas Chandler recalled:

I was going to take time out to take stock of things. Then John Gunnell told me about this group in the Philips studio… I went to Rasputins to see them. They were like a breath of fresh eayer… Mon. . . . There was a certain amount of amateurism about them but the main fault was that they didn’t play any of their own material. I liked the arrangements they did of other people’s material and I thought that if they could do that, they must be able to write as well. I made up my mind to manage them that night.

https://sladestory.blogspot.com/1971/02/ambrose-slade.html?m=1

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,164) Q’65 — “I Despise You” 

The dutch punks’ nasty ‘66 A-side reached #19 in the Netherlands. High Times calls the ‘65* (see #108, 557, 913) ugly, slobs, and less intelligible than a New York cab driver, and it means that as a compliment! —

Dutch punks from the ’60s [were] an entire generation of long-haired, kicks-crazed maniacs who invented “punk” . . . . One listen to [Q’65’s] lead vocalist is as good as a thousand when you’re talkin’ about comprehending Wim Bieler’s “command” of the English language. If articulation is your bag, you’d be better off hanging out with a New York cab driver! . . . [T]hese guys are damn ugly. . . . [and] are worshipped on a cult level worldwide largely due to their wild looks and pre-punk approach to playing R&B. In their heyday, they were in direct confrontation with the Outsiders [and there were] fist fights between their opposing fans at shows . . . . Q’65 were total slobs in their aggression; unintelligible forerunners of the Stooges. . . .

https://hightimes.com/culture/dutch-punk-in-the-1960s/amp/

Bruce Eder gives us some history:

The Dutch quintet could have held their own with [the Pretty Things or the Yardbirds] or the Animals without breaking a sweat . . . . Q 65 have remained one of Europe’s best-kept star-caliber musical secrets for more than 30 years. . . . [They] first got together in 1965, in the Hague . . . “the Liverpool of the Netherlands,” with a music scene that had been thriving since the end of the ’50s. . . . The group’s professed influences were American soul acts . . . yet somehow, when they performed, what they played came out closer in form and spirit to the likes of the Pretty Things . . . and the Yardbirds than it did to any of those soul acts, at least at first. . . . With two successful singles under their belt, the group’s debut album, Revolution, followed in 1966.  [It] was a powerful blues-rock album . . . . The album sold 3,500 copies, a respectable number in the Netherlands, and established the group sufficiently to rate a spot playing with the Small Faces, the Spencer Davis Group, the Kinks, and the Pretty Things when they toured Holland. During 1967, they didn’t release any LPs, but did get a solid extended-play single out called Q Blues, which did well at home. Their music during this period reached what was arguably its peak . . . . The group continued trying to make it as a blues-rock band for most of 1967. Their sound began to change late in the year, just as music was turning psychedelic, and around the time just before Wim Bieler was drafted into the army. His exit heralded the end of the Q 65’s classic period. [The band, with some new members, formed] a new, more psychedelic-oriented outfit, which eventually evolved into a group called Circus, which lasted, in varying lineups, for the year of 1968. . . . In 1969, a second Q 65 album was released, entitled Revival and made up of singles and latter-day tracks. The music was still powerful and very intense — perhaps too much so — if not as accessible. Had the lineup stayed intact, the group might even have found an audience. . . . [T]he Q 65 split up at just about this point.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/q-65-mn0000379341

* “Apparently, it was [guitarist Joop] Roelofs who came up with the catchy band name Q65, based on two Stones classics: Susie Q and Route 66. However, Q66 did not sound appealing enough, so it was changed into Q65.” (https://urbanaspirines.blogspot.com/2023/07/q65-discography-1966-2002.html)

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,163) Earth Island — “Doomsday Afternoon”

Another helping of stellar sunshine pop from Earth Island’s sole album (see #448, 653). Ecologically-aware, but from when sunshine was still a good thing! The album is a “Sunshine Psychedelic gem”. (https://psychedelic-rocknroll.blogspot.com/2009/02/earth-island-we-must-survive.html)

By all accounts, Curt Boettcher must have been sunlighting. Dr. Schluss says:

We Must Surivive . . . . seems to date a little past the expiry date of the genre, but the sounds are definitely the real deal and recall the better moments of Curt Boettcher’s and/or Gary Usher’s love fest freak outs. . . . I can’t help but note the strong environmental awareness aspect that crops up here the very same year as the first Earth Day (I think). . . . Forsaking straight up lead vocals, most of the songs rely on a weave of harmonies that compare favorably with just about anyone else. . . . Earth Island manages that tinge of melancholy that really takes the music to a higher level. 

http://psychedelicobscurities.blogspot.com/2008/07/earth-island-1970-we-must-survive.html

Superbillie1 calls the album “[v]ery good Psych-lite with tinges of Pop and prog. [The] music [is] on the same wavelength as The Millennium; light ‘airy’ sort of super-produced pop with (often) positive messages. For a few tracks I could’ve sworn the lead singer was Curt Boettcher . . . .” (http://poprunners.blogspot.com/2019/02/psychedelic-pop-earth-island-we-must.html)

And, finally, Adamus67:

Originally issued in June 1970 . . . at a time when rock music was beginning to embrace ecological themes, [the Earth Island’s] sole album was produced by Kim Fowley [see #89, 449]. Touching on rock, psychedelia and sunshine pop, it boasts fine vocal harmonies throughout . . . clearly bring to mind the best moments of creative collaboration such classics as Curt Boettcher psychedelia . . . and Gary Usher. 

http://rockasteria.blogspot.com/2013/10/earth-island-we-must-survive-1970.html?m=1

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,162) Bob Dylan and the Band — “Kickin’ My Dog Around”

Recorded in Big Pink’s doghouse, this is the song that fetched the Pulitzer for Dylan. Dalriadajohannsen says that “My dad used to sing this when he was drunk.” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odybt2tHOB4) That also seems to be state that Dylan and the Band were in when they recorded it.

Here area some excerpts from Scott Bunn’s fascinating history of the song:

[While recording the Basement Tapes there] were many instances of goofing off and playing around with either a new song of Dylan’s or a riff on an old, traditional song. “Kickin’ My Dog Around” is perfect example of the latter[.] . . . [Dylan and the Band] all launch into the song to create a wild and hilarious call-and-response tune. . . .

BOB DYLAN: Every time I go to town,
The boys keep kickin’ my dog around.
THE BAND: Why, why, why…
BOB DYLAN: Don’t know why — I’m goin’ to town, I don’t know why they kick my dog aroun’. . . .

. . . . The Band is trying to sabotage the song and make Dylan crack up by changing up their singing parts. . . . It’s a delightful peek into these guys goofing off and having fun in the basement. . . . This performance of “Kickin’ My Dog Around” is both ridiculous and compelling. . . . One source says that the song was written by the legendary songwriter and performer James Bland, perhaps best known for writing “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny[.]”. . . According to Russel Nye in his book The Unembarassed Muse: The Popular Arts in America, Bland was

“born of free Negro parents in New York, musically well educated, a brilliant graduate of Howard University. He joined a Negro minstrel show company (of which there were not many) and wrote more than seven hundred songs for minstrel use, copyrighting only a few. Equaled perhaps only by Foster in his gift for melody, Bland turned out good songs by the score, many published under others’ names.”

Nye goes on to say that “‘They Gotta Quit Kickin’ My Dog Aroun’ was a comedy favorite [of Bland’s] for years.” The Roots of Bob Dylan says that inspiration for Dylan’s version was a song called “The Hound Dawg Song” as documented by folklorist and song collector Alan Lomax . . . . Lomax writes about the song:

“Some say ‘The Hound Dawg Song,’ a favourite Ozark mountain song, originated before the Civil War, when a country boy named Zeke Parish had a tussle with a townie, who had kicked his dog. . . . The tune is the old fiddler’s favourite, ‘Sandy Land’ or ‘Sally Anne.’”

. . . . The song was subsequently recorded by Byron G. Harlan in 1912 as “They Gotta Quit Kickin’ My Dog Around”. . . . Gid Tanner and his Skillet Lickers scored a hit with the song in 1926 as “Ya Gotta Quit Kickin’ My Dog Aroun’” . . . . Both versions of this song are quite fun, especially the Skillet Lickers’ cut as the boys in the band are yipping and baying in the background like dogs. Despite that silliness, neither quite sound like The Basement Tapes version. The key to Dylan’s specific arrangement of the song emerged when he was DJing a radio show in 2006 . . . . The theme for [this episode] was “Dogs,” and he played a track by Rufus Thomas. . . . Dylan introduces the song by Thomas this way:

. . . . Rufus Thomas recorded a number of dog songs, perhaps the most famous was ‘Walkin’ the Dog,’ . . . But I’ve always liked this one. . . . It’s called ‘Stop Kickin’ My Dog Around.’”

. . . . Hearing Thomas’s version, it’s plain to hear that this cut was Dylan’s inspiration . . . more than the Skillet Lickers or anyone else. We can hear the call-and-response between Thomas and his background singers. . . . [It] is a silly song, a ditty, a throwaway. Except that different generations of performers – black and white, urban and rural – keep finding something in it. The adventure embedded in this song reflects the peculiarities and joy that is American music.

https://reclinernotes.com/2021/10/03/kickin-my-dog-around/

As to Byron Harlan, Eugene Chadbourne writes:

Despite an action-packed solo career that resulted in 130 sides on the Edison label alone, the singer was even better known as half of Collins & Harlan, a pairing of over-sized physical and vocal talent often known as “the Half-Ton Duo.” Harlan took delight in ridiculing his own size . . . . He was so confident of his talents that when required to submit a demo to the new Edison outfit, Harlan attempted to create the most ridiculous vocal performance of all time, a long-lost prank from the early recording business that nonetheless convinced label A&R guys that this was a great talent . . . . On his own, Harlan specialized in sentimental ballads such as “Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie” as well as well-loved cornpone, including the classics “They Gotta Quit Kickin’ My Dawg Aroun'” and “How ‘Ya Gonna Keep “Em Down on the Farm.” Collins & Harlan were both minstrel show veterans by the time the first recording technology was invented.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/byron-harlan-mn0000628749#biography

As to Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers, Stephen Thomas Erlewine writes:

The Skillet Lickers were one of the most important and influential string bands of the ’20s and ’30s. Led by fiddler Gid Tanner, the band combined old-timey country music with a wacky sense of humor and showmanship . . . . From 1926 to 1931, the Skillet Lickers were the most popular country band in the country. . . . [T]he group wasn’t relaunched until 1934, when Tanner formed a new lineup that recorded one final session that yielded their biggest hit, “Down Yonder.” . . . Tanner had worked his way up through the conventional circuit of festivals and traveling shows that fiddlers frequented. His first great success arrived in the middle of the 1910s, when he began to regularly win fiddling conventions in Atlanta. In addition to playing, Tanner was also an accomplished comedian, which meant he was an all-around entertainer, capable of winning audiences easily. . . . [T]he band recorded and released their first singles in 1926. [They] were an immediate hit . . . . With their third single, the Skillet Lickers released their first comedy record with “A Corn Licker Still in Georgia,” which alternated music with a comic dialogue about backwoods moonshiners. The record was their biggest single yet . . . . The name was officially reclaimed by Tanner in 1934, when he signed to Victor’s Bluebird label. Tanner assembled a new group of Skillet Lickers . . . and recorded over 30 songs in San Antonio. It was the final time Tanner ever entered a studio. The sessions produced “Down Yonder,” which became Tanner and the Skillet Lickers’ last big hit. Following the 1934 session, the Skillet Licker name was retired . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/gid-tanner-mn0000659368#biography

Here’s Rufus Thomas:

Here’s Byron Harlan:

Here are Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers:

Here are the New Christy Minstrels:

Here is Buffy Saint Marie:

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

Just click on the first blue block for a month to month subscription or the second blue block for a yearly subscription.

THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,161) Aretha Franklin — “Won’t Be Long”

Released on December 23, 1960, this A-side was Aretha’s first charting song (#76 and #7 R&B) and the first track on her first album. It displayed “wanton exuberance in the (broken) mold of Ray Charles’ ‘I Got a Woman’” (Raoul Hernandez, https://www.austinchronicle.com/music/2011-07-29/aretha-franklin-take-a-look-aretha-franklin-complete-on-columbia/), with Aretha “locked into pianist and bandleader Bryant’s easygoing groove while pushing her voice beyond its borders”. (Keith Phipps, https://www.gq.com/story/aretha-franklin-30-underrated-songs) This song — by an 18 year old Aretha! — all by itself dispatches the received wisdom that Aretha’s Columbia work didn’t reach the heights of what she produced in her Atlantic years. And it is one of the all-time great railroad songs and songs of romantic longing.

“Baby, here I am By the railroad tracks Waiting for my baby Because he’s coming back Coming back to me On the 503 And it won’t be long No, it won’t be long”

Now, Adam Gustafson, trying to prove his ultra-feminist bona fides, writes:

As much as the song rocks, it plays into the same male fantasy of girls pining away for boys who have run off.  “I get so lonesome since the man has been gone,” she sings, echoing a tired trope. Despite the message, it’s Franklin’s voice – jubilant and strong – that takes over. By the end, the meaning no longer matters. What’s left is Franklin, who clearly doesn’t seem all that bothered about the idea of her man staying or leaving.

https://theconversation.com/how-aretha-franklin-asserted-control-over-her-career-paving-the-way-for-female-musicians-101708

God forbid that a girl pines away for a boy, or that a boy pines away for a girl, for that matter. Adam, baby, loosen up!

As to the Columbia-Atlantic battle, Richie Unterberger takes the conventional position:

Franklin ended up with Columbia, to which she was signed by the renowned talent scout John Hammond. Franklin would record for Columbia constantly throughout the first half of the ’60s, notching occasional R&B hits (and one Top 40 single . . . ) but never truly breaking out as a star. The Columbia period continues to generate considerable controversy among critics, many of whom feel that Franklin’s true aspirations were being blunted by pop-oriented material and production. In fact, there are a number of fine items to be found on the Columbia sides, including the occasional song . . . where she belts out soul with real gusto. It’s undeniably true, though, that her work at Columbia was considerably tamer than what was to follow, and suffered in general from a lack of direction and an apparent emphasis on trying to develop her as an all-around entertainer, rather than as an R&B/soul singer. When Franklin left Columbia for Atlantic, producer Jerry Wexler was determined to bring out her most soulful, fiery traits. . . . [M]uch of . . . her ’60s work would be recorded with the Muscle Shoals Sound Rhythm Section . . . . The combination was one of those magic instances of musical alchemy in pop: the backup musicians provided a much grittier, soulful, and R&B-based accompaniment for Franklin’s voice, which soared with a passion and intensity suggesting a spirit that had been allowed to fly loose for the first time.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/aretha-franklin-mn0000927555#biography

Mark Harrington counters:

Soul meets Jazz in the fresh sounding 18 year old Aretha’s debut lp. The Ray Bryant trio are augmented as songs require, with a bluesy rhythm guitar behind most tracks, and selective inclusion of r&b styled Tenor sax . . . & Trombone . . . . The myth we were all fed was that the Columbia sides were all a bit tame, and that her arrival at Atlantic unleashed a raw side to her, and maybe in fact there is some reining in to the later Columbia’s, but here, this is gutsy and stripped back . . . . Every bit as effective is her own piano accompaniment as she sings . . . “Won’t Be Long” . . . . In fact it seems to drive the gospel edge to her embellishments, giving plenty of depth and variety to a quite astonishingly accomplished first album for a teenage woman just stepping away from the Church door. This is at least the equal of any album in her distinguished career.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/aretha-1961–mw0000956146

Keith Phipps tries to bridge the divide:

Franklin made her breakthrough in 1967 at the age of 24 with “I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Loved You),” her first single for Atlantic and the first time producer Jerry Wexler teamed her with a team of red-hot musicians based in Muscle Shoals and Memphis who understood how to follow Franklin’s lead. The single’s success, and the success of its follow-ups, effectively relegated everything she’d recorded before to prehistory, but Franklin had already cut nine albums for Columbia by that point, after signing with the label at the age of 18. Yet despite the resources of a major label and the guidance of producer John Hammond — who’d already played key roles in the careers of Billie Holiday, Count Basie and many others and would later do the same for Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen — Franklin never enjoyed more than moderate success at Columbia. The main problem: Columbia didn’t quite know what to do with her or whether she would be their next great jazz artist, an R&B star, or a blues singer. The answer was all of the above but also none of the above. But while Franklin’s defining work as the Queen of Soul still lay ahead of her, there’s much to enjoy from her Columbia years. Though she sometimes lacked direction and had to settle for questionable material, Franklin’s voice and interpretive skills were already evident.

https://www.gq.com/story/aretha-franklin-30-underrated-songs

Here are two incredibly amazing live versions. The first is from the Steve Allen show. “This is as near to perfection as you will ever hear from a live tv performance. Aretha was 22 here!! An unbelievable performance. It sounds like a f*cking studio track. All hail the absolute Queen.” (misterspigot88, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93S2e_ceelg “We remember Aretha for her incredible vocal talent but do we remember how good a piano player she was?” (avbove88, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93S2e_ceelg):

Live again:

Here is Dusty Springfield:

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,160) Ian & the Zodiacs — “No Money, No Honey”

Germany’s favorite Star-Club playing British beat group! OK, other than the Beatles. This ‘66 A-side “is exceptional, powerful mod R&B with fuzz guitar and a pounding beat with forceful drumming in a tight rhythm section, and a strong vocal” (Bayard, https://rateyourmusic.com/release/single/ian-and-the-zodiacs/no-money-no-honey-ride-your-pony/), a “R&B fuzz pounder. . . . one of the tunes that melts away at your mind, fuzz action, caveman drum beat, great vocals. Should have been a smash.” (Acid Revolver, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5qKehcPd9yo&pp=ygUlbm8gbW9uZXkgbm8gaG9uZXkgaXNuIGFuZCB0aGUgem9kaWFjcw%3D%3D)

About the Zodiacs, Bayard tells us that:

The Zodiacs formed as a jazz band in Crosby, near Liverpool, England in 1958. Ian Edwards joined the group in 1960 which from that point adopted a more rock-orientated approach. They were a popular local live attraction . . . . In late 1964 they commenced what was supposed to be a month long tour of Germany, but they ended up staying in that country for three years, becoming extremely popular there due to their live performances and TV appearances. They were promoted by Manfred Weissleder, owner of the famed Star-Club in Hamburg, and Ian & The Zodiacs played there and at Weissleder’s other venues. The band issued three charting albums in Germany. . . . [and] continued to perform in Germany until July 1967 when Ian Edwards’ wife fell ill, so Ian disbanded the group in order that he could return to the UK. He reformed the band in Germany with German musicians in 1968, but they couldn’t recapture their success.

https://rateyourmusic.com/release/single/ian-and-the-zodiacs/no-money-no-honey-ride-your-pony/

Bruce Eder adds:

It was in 1964 that, after years of languishing in obscurity in Liverpool, the band went to Germany and became major stars — they were supposed to stay for a few weeks and didn’t really leave for three years. . . . [T]he group . . . cut three LPs . . . that were released exclusively in Germany on the Star Club label, which was part of Polygram, and two albums of Beatles covers issued under the name the Koppykats. . . . Their audience was centered in the German-speaking world, despite some attempts at releasing their work in England and America. . . . The group’s sound on records was centered on covers of Motown songs . . . current U.S. hits . . . U.K. hits . . . blues . . . plus some forays into pop-jazz . . . some of which were released in America . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/ian-the-zodiacs-mn0001210722#biography

Here are the Invaders:

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,159) Freddie Scott — “He Ain’t Give You None”

Freddie Scott (see #735) cut a “fine version of Van Morrison’s [see #188, 253] big-voiced beat ballad” (Heikki Suosalo, https://www.soulexpress.net/freddiescott.htm), and it reached #100 (#24 R&B). Fine? It is so fine, so funky, and the female backing singers are killer. Scott does Morrison proud. How did the only deep soul belter from . . . Rhode Island (!) get a song from Van the Man? In “[t]hose days Freddie and [songwriter and producer] Bert Berns used to work with Them”. (Heikki Suosalo, https://www.soulexpress.net/freddiescott.htm)

“I give you my heart and soul, baby He ain’t give you none”

As to Scott, Jason Ankeny writes that:

Best remembered for his 1966 R&B chart-topper “Are You Lonely for Me,” deep soul belter Freddie Scott was born . . . in Providence, RI. . . . [He] gravitated toward a career in medicine . . . at Paine College in Augusta, GA. There Scott joined the Swanee Quintet Juniors, a teen version of the famed gospel act . . . . He soon abandoned med school in favor of a performing career, crossing over from spiritual gospel to secular soul . . . . In late 1956 he was called up for military duty, briefly serving in Korea. . . . After completing his military stint, Scott landed with the short-lived Enrica label for 1959’s “Come On, Honey,” and when it met the same indifference that greeted his previous records he focused on songwriting, teaming with Helen Miller to compose for Al Nevins and Don Kirshner[] . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/freddie-scott-mn0000798809

Heikki Suosalo takes up the story:

[At] Aldon Music . . . [Scott] provid[ed] material for Paul Anka, Ann-Margret, Gene Chandler, Bobby Darin, Tommy Hunt and Jackie Wilson. . . . [and] also used to sing on many demos, and tried his hand at producing . . . . In ’62 Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote a tune called Hey Girl. “They brought the song to me – sounded like a country & western song – so I sort of changed it around. I went and did a demo on it, because they were originally gonna give it to Chuck Jackson. Something happened with Chuck – I had no idea what it was – so we came back to the studio and started working on it again. It laid on a shelf for awhile. I was more interested at that time being a writer and a producer. But I went back in and finished the record. Finally they put it out, and the rest is history.” . . . The success of Hey Girl sent Freddie from behind the writing desk onto the road . . . .

https://www.soulexpress.net/freddiescott.htm

Back to Ankeny:

A slow-burning rendition of Ray Charles’ R&B classic “I Got a Woman” followed, affirming Scott as a deep soul singer of uncommon depth . . . . Scott [relocated] to parent label Columbia, which dubbed him “the Million Dollar Baby” and recast him as a crooner . . . . The makeover fell flat, and Scott returned to a more traditional soul dynamic with the excellent Lonely Man. Record sales were virtually nonexistent [and] . . . the label let him go. Scott resurfaced in 1966 at Shout Records, the fledgling soul label founded by producer/songwriter Bert Berns– together they co-wrote “Are You Lonely for Me,” a simmering, bluesy knockout that reportedly required over 100 vocal takes prior to completion. [It] topped the R&B charts for four weeks while rising to number 39 on the pop charts.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/freddie-scott-mn0000798809

Heikki Suosalo again:

“Bert Berns and I had known each other for a long, long time. I knew him as a guitarist and a writer for the Atlantic Records. After I left the Columbia situation, he said ‘why don’t you come over here’ and I did.” . . . Bert Berns, who had become a notable writer and producer (the Drifters, Ben E. King, Solomon Burke, Garnet Mimms and others) mainly for Atlantic in the 60s, set up his Bang label in ’65 and tasted pop success with the Strangeloves, the McCoys, Neil Diamond and Van Morrison. A year later he founded a subsidiary to Bang and an outlet for soul music, Shout Records, onto where he was to gather an impressive roster . . . but first and foremost – Freddie Scott. Are You Lonely For Me, Freddie’s first Shout outing, was written by Bert . . . . It was the first and the most successful of Freddie’s nine Shout singles.

https://www.soulexpress.net/freddiescott.htm

Here is Van Morrison’s version. Man, he is giggling he is so randy on this song:

Here’s a ’74 version by Jerry Garcia! —

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,158) The Syd Dale Orchestra — “Eliana”

If Swinging London had a theme song, it would be . . . OK, it would be “Soul Bossa Nova” by Quincy Jones. But had Austin Powers never shagged its way into our collective consciousnesses, it would be Syd Dale’s “Eliana”. The great British library music* composer Syd Dale (see #395, 816), an NFL films go-to, had a “dedication to grooviness and a keen sense of what works musically”. (Funky Frolic, http://funkyfrolic.blogspot.com/2011/05/ff010-legends-of-library-syd-dale.html?m=1)

As to Syd, IMDb informs us that:

Syd Dale was born . . . in York, England, UK. . . . [One] of his many production music pieces, the bongo drum and harpsichord-driven “Cuban Presto” . . . was used by WPIX (Channel 11) in New York City as the theme for its late-night movie show, The Channel 11 Film Festival, from the late 1960s to the 1980s. . . . His music is still used in productions today. For example, his “Beauty Parade” was used in the SpongeBob SquarePants episode “Spy Buddies” . . . . His music played an important role on TV, radio and advertising media of the 1960s and 1970s . . . . In 1971, he founded the Amphonic Music company and record label for the express purpose of recording and producing his compositions and supplying production music to the TV, film and radio business. . . . He was an English self-taught composer and arranger of funk, easy listening, and library music. His music . . . was composed for many television and radio projects. . . . [and] widely used by NFL Films over some four decades; his track “Artful Dodger” is given prominent use in such films as the official film recapping Super Bowl V. In 1967, he created a piece entitled Walk and Talk, which . . . appeared in the 1967 ABC television animated series Spider-Man along with many other Dale library tracks. . . . Dale started as an apprentice technician at Rowntree’s chocolate factory at 16. Soon big band music became his passion.

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0960777/bio/?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm

* Chris May tells us that:

Library music – aka stock or production music – was first recorded in the 1920s for cinemas to use as low-cost accompaniment to silent movies. Its golden age was the 1960s and 1970s, when it provided off-the-shelf incidental music for radio, television, film and advertising.

https://thevinylfactory.com/features/incidental-rarities-10-essential-library-music-records-made-for-tv-and-film/

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,157) Skip Bifferty — “Yours for at Least 24”

Here is a rollicking, shuffling, UK pop psych album track from Skip Bifferty* (see #288), who “RCA allowed . . . to cut a full LP, which contained some notable psychedelic and experimental tracks” despite the fact that “none of their [prior] singles charted”. (Bruce Eder, https://www.allmusic.com/artist/skip-bifferty-mn0000016792#biography) The album “sounds pretty much like the quintessenial aural snapshot of England in 1967, a dazzling fusion of Swinging London pop-art cool and stoned Summer of Love optimism. . . . [D]espite boasting all the trappings of the era, the album’s enduring appeal lies as much with the timeless quality of the songwriting”. (David Wells, Record Collector 100 Greatest Psychedelic Records: High Times and Strange Tales from Rock’s Most Mind-Blowing Era)

Bruce Eder describes the essence of the band:

[T]hey’re cheerfully spaced out, and their music is heavily ornamented with bells, echo, and all manner of sound effects, but at its core, this was a ballsy, hard-playing band that recognized the need for a solid rock & roll base to this kind of [pop psych] music. . . . . In all, it’s cheerful psychedelia with a hard edge and some great virtuoso playing, pleasingly heavy guitar, soaring choruses, and eerie psych-pop lyrics evoking variant states of mind, somewhat akin to Pink Floyd’s early singles laced with the kind of heavy edge that the Creation brought to the genre.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/skip-bifferty-mw0000739474

Bifferty was “discovered playing an early gig at the Marquee [Club] by . . . [Don] Arden, who soon secured them a contract with RCA. Based in London, they regularly appeared on John Peel’s ‘Top Gear’ ”. (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited). Arden had told them that “in 9 months you’ll be as big as the Stones” (liner notes to the CD reissue of Skip Bifferty). Yet, as Joynson points out, “[d]espite having more commercial appeal than many underground acts, they failed to break through”. (The Tapestry of Delights Revisited)

Eder writes that a “dispute with Arden caused the band to walk out en masse, and they next appeared together under the pseudonym Heavy Jelly, cutting an eight-minute single (‘I Keep Singing That Same Old Song’) that charted in a few European countries.” (https://www.allmusic.com/artist/skip-bifferty-mn0000016792#biography)

* There was no one named Skip Bifferty in Skip Bifferty. Joynson explains that, apparently, the band named itself after a “cartoon character of their own invention.” (The Tapestry of Delights Revisited)

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,156) Kippington Lodge — “Turn Out the Light”

Kippington Lodge* is “[b]est remembered as the vehicle for the earliest Nick Lowe . . . recordings . . . stemm[ing] from Lowe’s first band . . . which he formed with school pal, Brinsley Schwarz.” (All Music Guide, https://www.allmusic.com/artist/kippington-lodge-mn0001784212) The Lodge “put out five singles through Parlophone in perfect step with baroque-tinged pop-psych of the times.” (Terry Staunton, https://recordcollectormag.com/reviews/album/shy-boy-the-completerecordings-1967-1969). The band was a “groovy lite psych-pop outfit” (Joe Marchese, https://theseconddisc.com/2011/07/08/nick-lowe-welcomes-you-to-kippington-lodge/), “an ingratiatingly twee British psych-pop band”. (Stephen Thomas Erlewine, https://www.allmusic.com/album/shy-boy-the-complete-recordings-1967-1969-mw0002165338).

Stefan Granados tells us that:

Having failed to secure a hit with a self-composed song, it was back to the professionals for single number four, which was issued in December 1968. Written by Roger Greenway and Roger Cook, “Tomorrow Today” (see #672) sounded tailor-made for Kippington Lodge, showing their vocal harmony work and [Barry] Landeman’s organ work to great effect, yet once again the pop charts failed to yield to the charms of Kippington Lodge. Landeman composed another strong song for the flip — “Turn Out The Light” – on which Brinsley Schwarz laid down an impressive extended guitar solo, but it was another case of quality going to waste.

liner note to the CD comp Kippington Lodge: Shy Boy: The Complete Recordings 1967-1969

All Music Guide gives some history:

On leaving school, Lowe . . . decided to go and see some more of the world leaving Schwarz [who] . . . formed Three’s A Crowd who were signed to EMI Records in 1967. Changing their name to Kippington Lodge they released their debut ‘Shy Boy’ in October. This effective pop song was accompanied by the equally good ‘Lady On A Bicycle’. At this point, Lowe returned to England and joined his friends in time for the second single ‘Rumours’ which was produced by Mark Wirtz. . . . To supplement their lack of income from record sales, Kippington Lodge became Billie Davies’ backing group and released three further singles during 1968-69. . . . The last single, a version of the Beatles’ ‘In My Life’, came out in April 1969 and, after doing as poorly as previous efforts, left the group at a loose end. . . . the name Kippington Lodge was dropped in favour of that of lead guitarist Brinsley Schwarz.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/kippington-lodge-mn0001784212

* The band was actually named after the home of the Schwarz family (see https://twitter.com/NickLoweBio/status/1297878969744842754?s=20&t=1heTeO0DrOydSgVRlKfRug for a photo).

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The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,155) Double Feature — “Baby Get Your Head Screwed On”

Here is a mod-tastic A-side cover of a track off Cat Stevens’ first album — “gritty vocals combine with R&B guitar, percussion, cello, organ and horns in a superb production . . . that made pirate radio station Radio London’s Top 10.” (Jon Harrington, liner notes to Halcyon Days: 60s Mod, R&B, Brit Soul & Freakbeat Nuggets) The “short-lived Birmingham-based duo . . . added wailing fuzz guitars and ELO-style cello to a Cat Stevens pop-soul composition”. (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited) I find DF’s version far superior to Stevens’ “trippy Donovan-esque ballad[]” (Bruce Eder, https://www.allmusic.com/album/matthew-son-mw0000198640), which is marred by a totally out of place “oriental” accompaniment.

23 Daves opines that:

Cat Stevens’s track “Baby Get Your Head Screwed On” . . . is given a particularly soulful psychedelic rendition here (or should that be psychedelic soulful rendition?) complete with parping [a new word for me!] horns, proto-Electric Light Orchestra styled string solos, and a gritty, gnashing vocal.  Whilst there’s very little doubt that the track is actually quite ahead of its time, it falls just short of being brilliant by dint of the fact that the tune gets rather repetitive once they’ve set out their stall within the first minute.  There are very few fuzzy, psychedelic records of this era which will tempt you on to the dancefloor in a similar way, however, and for that reason alone it deserves the share of attention it has since had from aficionados.

https://left-and-to-the-back.blogspot.com/2011/03/double-feature-baby-get-your-head.html

Martin Crookall goes to town in his review:

Whereas Stevens’ original version was simply another pop song, a nice melody, sung in a slightly more laidback fashion than his own hits, with basically standard instrumentation, The Double Feature took a much more adventurous approach to the song. Stevens’s version is, frankly, bland. The instrumentation is light, strings heavy without being obtrusive, underlaid by piano, but it slips away from the ears, painlessly, essentially a filler track.
The Double Feature take a very different approach. To begin with, their version emphasises the percussion, driven by bongo drums, its vocals are more rasping and impassioned, and the overall sound leans towards R&B and to a lesser extent freakbeat. The instrumentation is sparser, coming in individual bursts through the first half of the song, a single cello sawing away at the seven note riff between verse and chorus, a rumbling fuzz guitar underlining that chorus, individual blasts of horn, an R&B organ driving though, a bongo solo accompanied only by the bass guitar, and then, as the song steams into its final verse, the whole ensemble coming in in force.

https://mbc1955.wordpress.com/2022/07/25/the-infinite-jukebox-the-double-features-baby-get-your-head-screwed-on/

Those with new girlfriends — be forewarned, do not play this song for them! Crookall advises that:

Lyrically, ‘Baby Get Your Head Screwed On’ is a bit of an oddity. Technically, it’s a love song: she’s lost her boyfriend and the singer is counselling her – the bit about getting her head screwed on – but his counselling is along very familiar lines, namely, Baby let your favourite daddy see you through (the missing word here is probably ‘sugar’). Oh yes, let me move in, let me take over, I’ll lift your spirits for you . . . . [It’s] a bit dodgy, a touch of the predator there, moving in on the vulnerable girl. Stevens’ laidback performance on the original undercuts the meaning of the words, but the Double Feature’s lead singer is definitely hot to get involved. It’s a lot like The Police’s ‘Every Breath You Take’ being mistaken for a song about devotion when it’s really about stalking. Yet the sound of the record, its air of freshness, its urgency still attracts me, not to mention that little cello riff that makes the song sing in my head. But it’s best to remember that this might not be the love song you’d want to play to your new girlfriend, even if she is into the obscure songs of the late Sixties.

https://mbc1955.wordpress.com/2022/07/25/the-infinite-jukebox-the-double-features-baby-get-your-head-screwed-on/

Here’s Cat Stevens:

Here are the Legends:

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,154) Sandy Posey — “Patterns”

Countrypolitan icon Sandy Posey blesses us with Barbara Cooper and Frank Catana’s alluring “supremely moody [song] (released by Cooper herself in 1967)[, which] showcases Posey at her finest”. (Joe Marchese, https://theseconddisc.com/2024/01/23/its-wonderful-to-be-in-love-cherry-red-reissues-sandy-poseys-complete-mgm-recordings/) “For countrypolitan)[, it has an] unusually brooding pop melod[y]”. Richie Unterberger, https://www.allmusic.com/album/a-single-girl-the-very-best-of-the-mgm-recordings-mw0000547717)

As to Sandy Posey, Stephen Thomas Erlewine writes:

Walking the line separating girl group pop and the Nashville Sound, Sandy Posey scored a pair of major hits with her first two singles, “Born a Woman” and “Single Girl,” both number 12 Billboard hits in 1966. . . . Posey transitioned to country music in the ’70s, earning a string of country hits that ran through the decade. . . . After graduating from a high school in West Memphis, Arkansas, she started to pursue a musical career in Memphis. Landing a job as a receptionist in a recording studio, she also started to work as a session singer. . . . [She] came to the attention of producer Chips Moman. Hearing her demo of “Born a Woman[]” convinced Moman to help Posey secure a contract with MGM Records. Moman produced “Born a Woman,” . . . [which] snag[ged] Posey two Grammy nominations in 1967 . . . . After “What a Woman in Love Won’t Do” reached 31, Posey again occupied the number 12 position with “I Take It Back.” As quickly as she shot up the charts, Posey shot back down. “Are You Never Coming Home” topped out at 59 in 1967, with “Something I’ll Remember” failing to chart in 1968. By 1971, she refashioned herself as a country singer . . . . [and o]ver the next few years, she was modestly successful on the country charts . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/sandy-posey-mn0000291724#biography

Michael D’Arcy notes that:

Posey also continued with her obligations as a back-up vocalist. She contributed to `When A Man Loves A Woman’ – a huge hit by Percy Sledge. Sandy also provided vocal back-up for Elvis Presley at Moman’s American Studios. Amongst others, her contributions are included on `Elvis’s Gospel Songs’ in 1966 and `Back In Memphis’ and `Mama Liked the Roses’ in 1969. Her activities in supporting Elvis Presley in this way led to Sandy’s appearance with Elvis on his initial Las Vegas concert in 1969. 

https://web.archive.org/web/20070203191740/http://www.countrypolitan.com/fringe0601.php

Here’s Barbara Cooper:

Here’s Kiki Dee:

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,153) Los Cuatro Monedas — “Mira de Frente”/“Look Straight”

First “Groovin’”, then “Groovy”, and now just an irresistible groove. This ‘71 B-side is “one of the[] best” (liner notes to the CD comp Fading Yellow, Vol. 14: Spanish Popsike and Other Delights) from Venezuela’s Los Cuatro Monedas/The Four Coins, who “explored the sounds of Northern soul, Motown, sunshine pop, popsike and groove.” (liner notes to Fading Yellow, Vol. 14)

Gabi_isea tells us (courtesy of Google Translate):

This group . . . was made up of the children of pianist Pat O’Brien. They started in 1963 as “Los Hermanos O’Brien” and recorded hits like “ El Patito ” or “ La Mamma ” by Charles Aznavour . . . . [In] 1968 . . . they changed their name . . . to “ Las Cuatro Monedas ” . . . . [They] are considered the first group to record . . . Reggae in [Venezuela] 1969 . . . . That same year they won at the II Barcelona International Song Festival in Spain . . . . In 1973, the youngest of the Gregory brothers entered and in 1975 they triumphed at the 10th Venezuelan Song Festival . . . . In 1976 they obtained second place at the VI OTI Festival in Mexico . . . . In 1981 they separated and each one went their separate ways. 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120928143811/http://www.salvavinilos.org/2008/04/11/las-cuatro-monedas-a-go-go-el-palacio-de-la-musica-1968/

Diana Hernández adds (courtesy of Google Translate):

The Cuatro Monedas . . . were the children of Pat O Brien, renowned pianist of the Billo’s Caracas Boys Orchestra. . . . Marlene, Brenda, Kenny and Gary O’Brien, later Gregory O’Brien would join. They were among the first interpreters of Jamaican rhythms (ska, and reggae) and soul in Venezuela. . . . [and] constitute[] one of the most important exponents [in] Latin America[] . . . of Ska YeYé (“Vintage Ska Spanish” the style in Latin America), the name given to that movement that was created in the mid-sixties simultaneously in countries such as Argentina, Spain, Mexico and of course Venezuela, which was nothing other than the free interpretation in Spanish of the Jamaican classics by Jimmy Cliff, Desmond Dekker, etc. Produced by maestro Hugo Blanco, the Cuatro Monedas become the first group to venture with Jamaican rhythms in Venezuela and in countries like Mexico and Spain . . . . Hugo Blanco, well-known Venezuelan composer and producer, . . . during his travels through the Caribbean islands, c[ame] across LPs by artists such as Byron Lee and the Dragoniers, Jimmy Cliff, Desmond Dekker, among others. . . . [H]e was fascinated with this style and swore that upon arriving in Venezuela he would look for local performers to perform it . . . . The O’Brien brothers . . . changed their name to Four Coins, which for many represented “a native version of the Jackson 5[“] . . . . At the time, the name “Four Coins” turned out to be a media strategy to be played on the radio. Finally they translate the name into Spanish . . . . It is from the O’Brien brothers that we can speak of the genesis of the presence of reggae and ska in Venezuela . . . .

https://www.last.fm/es/music/Las+Cuatro+Monedas/+wiki

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

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THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

1,152) The Fireballs — “Groovy Motions”

In the 60s, squares sometimes tried their hand at psychedelia and the results were expectedly awful, but sometimes they were positively groovy. There’s a whole CD comp — Marshmallow Skies — featuring both varieties. This ’68 B-side is of the latter kind — it is “far out”! (liner notes to the CD comp Soft Sounds for Gentle People: Far-Out and Beautiful Tracks from California and Beyond, 1966 to 1971) Larry describes the song perfectly:

[“Motions”] is a prime example of what one might consider to be “opportunistic” garage/psych. I use that term, as opposed to fake or bogus because the example in question manages to work in spite of its decidedly non-garage roots. . . . “Groovy Motions” is the kind of thing, that presented in a slightly lower fidelity, would have fit right in on a volume of Pebbles. . . . It features fuzz guitar, thumping bass, psychedelic phasing, electric sitar and trippy lyrics . . . and . . . resides just short of the real thing (if you take a look at video of the Fireballs from the time period, they look like they haven’t experienced anything more psychedelic than reruns of ‘Laugh-In’). It’s a wild record, which unfortunately made no impact at all when it was released, though it’s extremely sappy A-side ‘Goin’ Away’ was a minor hit.

https://ironleg.wordpress.com/2016/03/06/the-fireballs-groovy-motions/

As to the Fireballs, Richie Unterberger tells us:

This New Mexican group was the primary exponent of the Tex-Mex sound in the instrumental rock & roll of the late ’50s and early ’60s, landing three Top 40 hits, “Torquay,” “Bulldog,” and “Quite a Party.” . . . similar in essential respects to the Ventures. . . . [but with]. much more prominent “border” music feel to their melodies . . . .

The Fireballs . . . are actually much more famous for their controversial contributions to the Buddy Holly legacy. In the early ’60s, in association with [Norman] Petty (Holly’s former producer and manager), they overdubbed some of Holly’s demo tapes for posthumous release. Some Holly fans claim that these performances should have been left to stand as they were . . . . [T]he British Invasion wiped the[ Fireballs] out immediately. . . .

[I]n the mid-’60s they recorded some singles credited to Jimmy Gilmer & the Fireballs. These were distinguished from most other Fireballs records in that they were vocal numbers, not instrumental, Gilmer (who was second guitarist in the Fireballs) being the lead singer. [They] had a monster number one single in late 1963 with “Sugar Shack,” a light pop/rocker dominated by the vibrating sound of a primitive precursor to the synthesizer, the Solovox. . . . Gilmer and band made the Top 20 one more time with “Daisy Petal Pickin’,” a transparent “Sugar Shack” soundalike . . . . They cut various flops . . . in the mid-’60s . . . . [I]n 1967, the Fireballs had another Top Ten hit with Tom Paxton’s “Bottle of Wine,” without giving top billing to Gilmer, although he was still in the band.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/jimmy-gilmer-the-fireballs-mn0000358957#biography, https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-fireballs-mn0000069645#biography

“Groovy Motions” was also a track on the Bottle of Wine LP.

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Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).

The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 750 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.

All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.

When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.

Just click on the first blue block for a month to month subscription or the second blue block for a yearly subscription.