191) Johnnie Taylor — “Watermelon Man”

The Philosopher of Soul pours some soul into Herbie Hancock’s composition on this track from his ’67 album. Alex Henderson says that “[a]dding lyrics [to] Herbie Hancock’s ‘Watermelon Man,’ Taylor removes the song’s jazz elements and turns it into pure Southern R&B.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/wanted-one-soul-singer-mw0000674917)

192) The Paupers — “Think I Care”

’67 single by the Canadian band, once hyped by Albert Grossman as the next Beatles, was at least a decade ahead of its time. It would have been a big hit for the ’77-79 Talking Heads.

Single version:

Album version:

193) The Eyes — “When the Night Falls” 

’65 single, the first by the West London band. Richie Unterberger says that the Eyes’s “clutch of singles . . . stand up to the Who’s work from the same era in their blend of extremely innovative guitar feedback/ distortion and anthemic mod songwriting.” (https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-eyes-mn0000060128/biography)

188) Them — “I Can Only Give You Everything”

Them, actually Him – Van Morrison ‘66. The Nuggets II comp says that the single possesses a “magnificent, soul-stirring vocal, spawning a thousand garage-band imitators.”

189) The Brigands — “Would I Still Be (Her Big Man)”

Richie Unterberger in All Music Guide calls this April ‘65 B-side:

[An] outstanding and unusual 1966 garage band single. In addition to a good fuzz riff, the usual staple of many a 45 in the genre, there were also fairly involved lyrics espousing a working-class perspective . . . .

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-brigands-mn0000521735

Contrary to rumor, Bruce Springsteen was never in this band!

190) The Elastik Band — “In a Family Tree”

The SanFran area band’s ‘68 B-side is quite a change from their (in)famous A-side “Spazz.” Here, the band shows off its sensitive side.

185) Gabor Szabo and the California Dreamers — “A Day in the Life”

Yes, that “A Day in the Life”! Douglas Payne says that:

[The album by the Hungarian guitarist] celebrates much of what was important to [him] — the new world of rock music, the lure of California and the hope and inspiration of the “Summer of Love.” But, at best, it’s an ill-conceived jazz-rock concoction. . . . terrible vocalists, corny arrangements and occasional hints of Szabo’s unique playing.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-wind-the-sky-and-diamonds-mw0000909559

Well, I love it!

186) The Caravelles — “New York”

B-side of “Hey Mama You’ve Been on My Mind” (#139). The London girls’ ‘67 song is a paean to NYC. Not to be in an Empire State of mind, but Jay-Z and Alicia Keys, you got some ‘splainin’ to do!

Alicia Keys: “Now you’re in New York these streets will make you feel brand new big lights will inspire you.”

The Caravelles: “Not since he went to New York, the noisy streets are, the music is . . . . your head is lighter there, the lights are brighter here in New York.”

187) The Sons of Adam — “Take My Hand”

First (‘65) of 3 singles by the Sunset Strip legends – including future Blue Cheerer Randy Holden.

182) Smokey Robinson and the Miracles — “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy”

Off his ‘70 album of “wedding” songs. As Andrew Hamilton says:

A stunning concept album . . . that should have fared better. . . . Every selection is a wedding song, and Smokey caresses the lyrics like they were newborns. The heavenly harmonies of the Miracles . . . touch the soul. When they sing Brenda Holloway’s “You Made Me So Very Happy,” you don’t just hear the words; for five minutes and four seconds you experience what lovers feel.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/what-love-hasjoined-together-mw0000654817

183) The Alan Price Set — “The House that Jack Built”

This music hall-inspired song by the Animals’s original organist reached #4 in the UK in August of ‘67.

184) Shadows of Knight — “Bad Little Woman”

Off the second album in ‘66 by the Chicago garage rockers. It reached #91 in September. Bruce Eder calls it a “raunchy anthem[] to teenage lust.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/back-door-men-mw0000041183) Yup.

180) The Orange Seaweed — “Pictures in the Sky”

B-side of the English group’s only single in April of ‘68. Dazzling pop-psych.

181) Willie Mitchell — “That Driving Beat”

Grooving ‘66 song by trumpeter/bandleader (and later force behind Al Green) Mitchell.

177) Dr. John — “Mama Roux”

Off of Dr. John’s debut album Gris-Gris (’68) — which Gabe Soria calls “the spookiest album ever recorded” (https://www.trunkworthy.com/dr-johns-gris-gris-spooks-us-the-hell-out/) — “Mama Roux” is a song that Alison Fensterstock described in Rolling Stone as a “co-composition with local New Orleans R&B star Jessie Hill” that is “spooky [and] snaky” and that “[w]ith incantatory background vocals that seem composed to invoke a spirit . . . ‘Mama Roux’ is deeply, funkily New Orleans . . . .” (https://www.rollingstone.com/feature/dr-john-essential-songs-845549/)

What does all this mean? I have no idea, but this online discussion is enlightening: https://forum.wordreference.com/threads/move-he-fast-for-the-medicine-man-vernacular-english.2695324/

178) The Koobas — “Barricades”

The Liverpool band opened for the Beatles but couldn’t chart and split just as its sole LP came out (‘69), including this stunning raver featuring “thundering bass, ghostly voices, wild guitar and venomous sound effects” (Rubble comp).

179) The Jelly Bean Bandits — “Say Mann”

When asked by Psychedelic Baby Magazine in 2018 as to whether “there [was] a certain concept behind the album,” keyboardist Michael Raab of the upstate NY band said “[t]he concept was to write enough tunes to fill an LP, and write in a hurry. When Mainstream signed us we told them that we had 12 tunes ready to go. The truth was we had 3 . . . .” (psychedelicbabymag.com/2018/04/the-jelly-bean-bandits-interview-wi.html). Refreshingly honest and cheeky! The band wrote the rest of the album’s tracks in a week and recorded them all within 12 hours.

175) The Bread and Beer Band — “Mellow Yellow”

Groovy cover of Donovan by Elton John’s first band.

“The album was planned for June of 1969, but cancelled, and the band put out on their own label in a handmade sleeve. . . . Reginald Dwight was enlisted by aspiring producer Tony King to join what the latter envisioned as a studio band along the lines of the great Motown sections of the past. . . . According to King . . . . only one disc, an acetate presented to Elton on his last birthday, is in existence. ‘When I played it for Elton on his birthday,’ said King, ‘I thought It would be God-awful. We were surprised to find that it was half-decent. But everybody who played on it still likes it.’”

http://allmusic-wingsofdream.blogspot.com/2008/02/bread-and-beer-band-bread-and-beer-band.html

176) The Voice — “Train to Disaster”

The UK band’s only single (‘67) – “three minutes of guitar driven mayhem” (Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited). The song seems strangely timely.

172) The Plastic Cloud — “Art’s a Happy Man”

Sole album (‘68) by the Canadian folk-rockers. Expose yourself to Art.

173) Matthews Southern Comfort — “Something in the Way She Moves”

No, not George Harrison’s song, but Iain Matthews’s (former lead singer of Fairport Convention). The song, off MSC’s ‘69 Second Spring album, has the wisest and most self-aware rock lyrics about love and mental well-being I have ever heard.

174) Randy Newman — “Mama Told Me Not to Come”

Yeah, Randy wrote it. Three Dog Night took the song to #1 the same year (‘70).

169) Georgie Fame — “Seventh Son”

Georgie’s version of Willie Dixon’s oft-covered classic reached #25 in the UK in December of ‘69. The video is such a guilty pleasure!

Here is Dixon’s version:

170) Paul Jones — “Tarzan etc.”

From the ex-Manfred Mann lead singer’s ’67 solo album.

171) The Music Machine — “Come on In”

The B-side to “Talk, Talk,” the justly legendary garage rocker that hit #15 in the U.S. in November ‘66. Sean Bonniwell told Richie Unterberger that “Come on In” was recorded in one take and was originally to have been the single’s A-side. I think the mesmerizing song is just as good as “Talk, Talk.” Bonniwell done to a fare-thee-well.

166) Gloria Jones — “Heartbeat”

The original “Tainted Love” singer and Marc Bolan girlfriend belts out this Ed Cobb (producer of the Standells and the Chocolate Watchband) song.

Here she is on Where the Action Is from October ’66:

Here’s the single:

167) Gordon Lightfoot — “The Way I Feel”

From Lightfoot’s first album (an electric version on his 2nd album reached #36 in his native Canada). A man abandoned.

168) Bill Jerpe — “Help Me Home”

Hypnotic folk-rock recorded by the Hudson Valley, NY, singer (and former “next Bob Dylan”) in a hotel room and self-released in ‘70.

As Charlie Farmer says:

“The legends surrounding a cult classic often outstrip the music’s realities. Perhaps an album remains a ‘Best Record You’ve Never Heard’ mainstay simply because it’s rare, a collector’s way of flexing muscle. A less cynical take understands that the truth can’t compete with decades of word-of-mouth hyperbole or the expectations we’ve created as we cultivate our want lists. . . . Fortunately, there are holy grails like Bill Jerpe’s long-obscure self-titled release . . . that justify the mythology.

http://therockasteria.blogspot.com/2021/12/bill-jerpe-bill-jerpe-1970-us-beautiful.html

163) Golden Earring — “Daddy Buy Me a Girl”

‘66 single, appropriate for a band named Golden Earring. A real Dutch treat!

164) Jackie Lomax — “Sour Milk Sea”

George Harrison wrote “Sour Milk Sea” as an advert for transcendental meditation (which the Beatles picked up in Rishikesh). Such a great song, and it didn’t make it onto the White Album . . . likely because of Lennon and McCartney’s White (Album) Privilege!

The song was a first in so many ways. . . . It was Jackie Lomax’s debut Apple single . . . It was one of Apple’s first shot of four singles, including “Hey Jude” and “Those Were the Days.” . . . It was the first song George Harrison gave away. . . . It was the first song not by a Beatle that three Beatles (Harrison, McCartney, and Starr) played on.

And yet, the song didn’t chart in the UK and only reached #117 in the U.S. in September ’68. Could be because it was overshadowed by “Jude” and “Days,” and because the song was a bit hectoring. Hmmm . . . Almost seems like it belongs in Dr. Seuss’s “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!”

George Harrison’s demo:

The Beatles’s take on the song:

165) The Creation –”How Does It Feel to Feel”

The Nuggets II comp calls the ’68 single, supposedly written in five minutes, an “amazing sensory assault [with] monstrous, shuddering guitar chords[, a] heavy bass crunch, and some mind-bending vocal harmonies.”

160) The Chocolate Watchband — “Are You Gonna Be There (At the Love In)”

‘67 single by the garage rock legends – they put it together in one day for the teen-ploitation classic The Love-Ins. IMDb describes the movie: “A college professor resigns in protest to the dismissal of student underground newspaper workers and later joins their ‘hippie movement’ and becomes their ‘Messiah.’” (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061922/)

As the trailer, featuring the song, asks: “Have you ever wondered what’s it like to take a trip on an LSD sugar cube?”

https://youtu.be/8F-NowixBfA

161) Boudewijn de Groot — “Cinderella”

From the Dutch superstar’s ‘68 album Picknick, a sort-of retelling of the Cinderella tale.

162) The Standells — “Riot on the Sunset Strip”

‘67 single was the theme song of another classic teen-ploitation film – Riot on Sunset Strip. IMDb describes: “LA police captain attempts to appease Sunset Strip businessmen objecting to hippy youths hanging out, by setting a curfew. The cop also thinks the kids have a right to be there, until his estranged daughter joins the counter-culture crowd.” (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062203/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2)

The trailer proclaims: “Come on, get with it. Let’s go to a freak-out. . . . The most shocking film of our generation.”

157) Michel Polnareff — “Le Bal des Laze”

Dark masterpiece by Michel with lyrics were by Pierre Delanoë — a commoner has an affair with an aristocrat and is to be hanged for murdering her fiancé.

158) The Brogues — “I Ain’t No Miracle Worker”

The Nuggets comp calls this November ‘65 B-side from the San Joaquin Valley band a “near perfect 60s punk record.” The band’s singer and drummer would later form Quicksilver Messenger Service.

159) Robbi Curtice — “When Diana Paints the Picture”

‘68 B-side by Rob Ashmore. As he explains in a YouTube note:

“Despite much initial hype and optimism, the original production was flawed and so not accepted for release by the UK record companies. So the single was released in USA only, with ‘Soul of a Man’, originally intended as the B side, promoted to the A side. It sold well on the West coast of USA.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CQKdSsseKY

154) Kaleidoscope — “The Sky Children”

From the British psychsters’s ‘67 album, “a fairytale dream” full of “whimsical lyrics” (per Vernon Joynson, The Tapestry of Delights Revisited). It’s a close call, you be the judge:

155) Duncan Browne — “On the Bombsite”

’68 single (with lyrics by David Bretton) from an album that the CD reissue calls “an achingly beautiful compendium of ornate chamber pop wispiness . . . lyrical pretensions and Browne’s plangent, folk-derived melodies.” Yup.

Andrew Loog Oldham said that Browne was “one of the artists I was proudest to stand in a room with and watch evolve.” Oh, and to try to squeeze for £2,000 in “recording expenses” when in desperate need of cash. Yes, yet another victim of Immediate Records’s financial implosion.

156) The Merry-Go-Round — “Live”

The MGR’s March ‘67 single reached #63 and was a really big hit in LA. Led by Emitt Rhodes, with his “precocious songcraft and McCartney-esque vocals” (Mark Deming in All Music Guide), the MGR were “teen pop/rock prodigies who combined British invasion pop melodies with Baroque pop studio polish” (Richie Unterberger in AMG).

151) Edwards Hand — “Banjo Pier”

No apparent connection to Edward Scissorhands — the band emerged from Piccadilly Line. This song, from their first album (’69), was produced by George Martin. Richie Unterberger says that the album had “an ambience that captures something of the most innocuous side of the Swinging London/flower power era.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/edwards-hand-mw0000836925) The song is eerily similar to the New York Rock and Roll Ensemble’s “Mr. Tree” from the prior year (#40).

152) The Furniture — “I Love It Baby”

’67 B-side from this Galesburg, Illinois, band. David Moody, who wrote this stunning garage rocker, states on YouTube that:

I was approached on a Wednesday night by the agent of the Vagrants (The Furniture) who told me he needed two brand new songs sounding similar to the Kinks for a recording session THAT Saturday! . . . I wrote “I Love It Baby” that night . . . . [It] was receiving great airplay by DJ’s who liked it even though it was the “B” side. . . . Then for unknown reasons, [it was] pulled . . . out of publication and off the air . . . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzYGEznuOnw

153) The Pretty Things — “Midnight to Six Man”

Vernon Joynson points out that the Pretties “[w]ere considered even dirtier, scruffier and more outrageous than the Stones.” (The Tapestry of Delights Revisited) This song is pretty dirty, scruffy and outrageous. It hit #46 in the UK in January ’66, but only stayed on the chart from midnight to six.

148) The Open Mind — “Magic Potion”

MOJO says that this ‘69 song is one “whose frantic riff, demented drumming and furious guitar solos make many consider it to be the finest heavy psychedelic rock 45 ever produced in Britain.” Alas, the song was banned because of its too-obvious to deny celebration of LSD and quickly disappeared.

149) Louise Forestier — “La Boulee”

This Québécoise was named named Discovery of the Year on the Radio-Canada TV program Jeunesse oblige and then recorded the landmark song “Lindberg'” with Robert Charlebois (see #44 for another duet with Charlebois).

This ‘67 single is quite an infectious chanson. If someone who speaks French could tell me what the song is about, I’d appreciate it.

150) Richard Twice — “If I Knew You Were the One”

Richard Atkins took up music after losing a leg in a motorcycle accident, recorded a wonderful album in 1970 with fellow songwriter Richard Manning (Richard Twice, get it?) and then abandoned music for carpentry after a disastrous showcase performance for the music industry. On this song, he knows she is the one, and it hurts.

145) The Nazz — “Open My Eyes”

B-side of Philly band’s September ’68 single was a visit to Who-ville, reaching #112. The Nuggets comp says that it “was their crowning achievement, a dazzling power pop production that pits a tough, hard rock riff against soaring, Beatles-esque harmonies.” Todd Rundgren went on to bang on a drum all day.

146) Manfred Mann Chapter Three — “Happy Being Me”

’70 A-side from my favorite MM album (released after the band broke up and never released in the U.S.). As Mark Allan says of the album, “[i]t’s light years from the airy pop of “Do Wah Diddy Diddy,” . . . . This is as much jazz as rock. There’s hardly any guitar, but a swaggering horn section compensates.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/manfred-mann-chapter-three-mw0000467440)

147) The Pipe Dream — “January Girl”

Another selection from the Pipe Dream. Reminds me of January Jones!

142) The Temptations — “Message from a Black Man”

A message song (’69) from the mighty Temptations whose message is even more relevant today than the day it was written.

143) The Lemon Drops — “I Live in the Springtime”

The Drops’s only droplet (’67), only released in Chicagoland, but wow!

144) Billy Nicholls — “London Social Degree”

From the towering lost classic album Would You Believe.

Wait, London social degree . . . LSD?!

139) The Caravelles — “Hey Mama, You’ve Been on My Mind”

This gorgeous ‘67 folk-rock single was sung by Londoners Lois Wilkinson and Andrea Simpson (who named their group after the French short commercial jet). They “were co-workers who entertained at office parties and amateur shows [who were e]ncouraged by co-workers to cut a record.” (Andrew Hamilton, https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-caravelles-mn0000633144/biography). That record was “You Don’t Have to Be a Baby to Cry,” which hit #3 in December of ’63.

“Hey Mama” was first recorded the previous year by the NYC band the Restless Feelin’s, with a much different feel:

140) The Mojo Men — “She’s My Baby”

The at the time all male Mojo Men released this B-side in ’66. The Sly Stone-produced song has a great sleazy bass line (sampled by Kanye West in “Hell of a Life”). Its lyrics deserved to become movie catch-phrases:

“Hell of a Life”:

141) The Craig — “I Must Be Mad”

Wild UK freakbeat — one of two ’66 singles by the group, whose drummer – Carl Palmer – went on to form Emerson, Lake and Palmer.

136) The Peppermint Trolley Co. — “Trust”

Cool ‘68 single written by Paul Williams and Roger Nichols “performed” on a cool TV show — Mannix, the classic detective series. In the episode, as summarized by IMDb, “Mannix is hired by a secretive multi-millionaire to find his ex-wife. At least that’s what he has been told when he takes the job. The ex-wife, a prominent singer, supposedly committed suicide but has been seen since her supposed death.” (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0641711/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl) As for the PTC, “Mannix’s search for clues brings him to a music recording studio where he walks in on a rehearsal by the [band] as Mannix listens and looks on approvingly.”

Here is a clip from Mannix:

Here’s the single:

137) Nick Garrie — “Seashore”

Another outtake from The Nightmare of J.B. Stanislas, finally recorded by Nick in 2009 — a wonderful, wistful song.

138) The Haigs — “Never Die”

The Dutch band where Golden Earring vocalist Barry Hay got his start. If you close your eyes, you could swear it’s the Beatles. The first of their 5 singles, from ‘66.