My Music Library - 1968
Ahhhh 1968. Hot Wheels and 60 Minutes make their debut. The former would prove to be invaluable to my parents in their attempts to get me potty trained. The latter would prove to be invaluable to investigative journalism. Pierre Trudeau becomes Prime Minister of Canada. Congress repeals the requirement for a gold reserve to back U.S. currency. The Civil Rights Movement threatens to derail as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr is assassinated. Perseverance gets The Civil Rights Act of 1968 passed.
The Soviets steamroll into Czechoslovakia to ensure freedom there stayed in a coma.
It was the year that Vietnam got downright in-your-face ugly. There was the Tet Offensive. This execution is photographed for all to see and then there's the My Lai Massacre. Attitudes towards the war change in a big way. It's no longer some fringe group of hippies against the war. It's mainstream. It threatens to tear apart the Democratic Party. Three weeks after barely edging out McCarthy in the NH primary, LBJ announced he wouldn't seek re-election. RFK enters the race only to be assassinated months later.
Nixon is elected president and the presidency is forever changed.
Oh yeah. And I was born.
While many a musician has gone on to have an acting career, the reverse hasn't been true. Case in point: William Shatner. While I don't own a copy of his 1968 album, The Transformed Man, I've heard bits of it and it is so awful it's hilarious.
More weirdness this year came in the form of Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. While side one is largely forgettable, side two's 17 minute title track is a superb mix of proto-heavy metal and psychedelia. You don't have to be stoned to enjoy it, but it certainly adds a certain element to the listening experience.
The Beatles released their magnum opus: The White Album. While some would argue that it was their best, I only thought that half of it was good. While Side 1 is great from start to finish, Side 2 leaves me flat. With a couple exceptions, Sides 3 & 4 follow the same pattern. If they only released half the album, containing the songs I like of course, I think that it would've been a much tighter package. But I know millions disagree. :)
Once again, for me, the top three albums, in ascending order, were from Pink Floyd, The Doors, and The Jimi Hendrix Experience.
1968 was a painful transition year for Pink Floyd. The pervasive use of psychedelics upon a fragile mental health ruined Syd Barrett. David Gilmour was brought on board in hopes that he would fulfill Barrett's duties live but Syd proved to be too erratic to work with. By April of that year, the band gave up on Barrett and he was set free.
As the band entered the studio to record their second album, A Saucerful of Secrets, there was an obvious vacuum that needed to be filled. The band did what they could Roger Waters and Richard Wright rose to the occasion and offered the band (and their fans) two different styles.
Waters wrote the space rock songs “Let There Be More Light” and “Set the Controls for The Heart of the Sun,” the latter being a beautifully moody piece with the bass guitar carrying the melody as the keyboards and guitar flit in and out. Nick Mason accentuates the piece with xylophone and kettle drums. He also penned, “Corporal Clegg,” an anti-war song that paints an unflattering portrait of a WWII veteran. And to add weight to the ironic lyrics, we’re served up with a dissonant chord progression and kazoos.
Richard Wright’s offerings, “Remember A Day” and “See Saw”, were more moody psychedelic affairs. The former was actually recorded the year before and featured Barrett on slide guitar. Both songs come across as forlorn longings for a childhood that will never return.
All four remaining band members collaborated on the title track. As an instrumental, each member gets to explore his instrument to bring forth mysterious and sinister elements. But it’s Mason and Wright who own this song. The percussion and keyboards are what draw the listener in and hypnotize them. After the guitar has had its way with their brains, it is Wright’s keyboard that restores tranquility to the listener’s mind.
“Jugband Blues” closes the album. It’s the last Barrett song to be included on a Pink Floyd album. The lyrics call attention to his deteriorating condition while the music strives to be joyful, in a drunken way.
* * *
The Doors were riding high off the success of their first two albums. But all that success fueled Morrisson’s excessive drinking. In December of 67, Morrison was arrested after an obscenity laced tirade on stage in New Haven. Angry audience members rioted.
Morrison’s drinking made recording Waiting for the Sun difficult. Envisioning himself a pagan god, Morrison wanted his 17 minute, “Celebration of the Lizard,” to be this album’s monumental opus (as “The End” and “When The Music’s Over” were on the previous two albums”) but it was alleged that the band couldn’t perform it well enough for Morrison’s liking. In the end, only the section entitled “Not to Touch the Earth” was used. To make up for it, a couple of older demo songs were pulled out of the closet, “Hello, I Love You” and “Love Street.” The mix of old and new material marks “Waiting For The Sun” as a transitional album for the band.
“Hello, I Love You” starts off funky with the song’s groovy (sorry) melody held down on the keyboards. It’s all about scoring with a hot chick and it’s great. The song builds and builds and by the end it crescendos in a cacophony of fuzz box distortion with Morrison shouting “Hello!”
“Not To Touch The Earth” starts with dissonant chord progression and dizzying chords on the keyboards. The song is reigned in for the chorus as Morrison pleads, “Run with me.” But after the second chorus the song crescendos into chaos and madness ending in crash of keyboards and Morrison stating that he is the Lizard King.
“Love Street”, “Summer’s Almost Gone”, and “Wintertime Love” serve as counterbalance to the mania of those two. “Love Street” is a happy hippy song that only The Doors can do. “Summer’s Almost Gone” sounds almost mournful with its bluesy guitar bidding adieu to the Summer of Love. The harpsichord evokes a waltz in “Wintertime Love”. There’s a certain sweetness to it.
“The Unknown Soldier” opens with a haunting keyboard whistle and then Morrison sets the stage telling the tragic fate of the song’s namesake. In the middle of the song, a military style execution takes place. During live performances, the band would act this part out on stage. The haunting keyboard whistle cues up the last section as Morrison re-sings the first verse ending with “the war is over.” Bells ring out. Crowds cheer.
“Spanish Caravan” is a real gem. The flamenco guitar intro alone would carry the song (Krieger credits Albeniz) but it becomes a keyboard carnival caught up in a tornado. Morrison doesn’t overplay his part (for once) letting the guitar and keyboards work their magic.
But with all that’s good on this album, not all of the experimentation works. “My Wild Love” builds slowly but comes across as lethargic. It’s all vocal chant over a simple beat. It’s an experiment gone awry. “We Could Be So Good Together” sounds like leftover material from one of their previous two albums. “Yes, The River Knows” is a vocal over piano with Densmore providing a soft jazz backbeat. The guitar is sparse, coming across as desperate not to impede upon the song.
“Five To One” ends the album on a defiant note. Morrison drunkenly pleads his case for revolution and the band is eager to lend a hand. Krieger’s guitar work trumpets, perhaps signaling the end of this phase of The Doors’ career.
* * *
Unfortunately, Morrison wasn’t the only rock star with a drinking problem. Jimi Hendrix found that parties could be had at any time so long as he was around. And when he drank too much, he became a mean drunk. He hit his girlfriends. He even trashed a hotel room and got into a fight with bassist Noel Redding in Stockholm.
Jimi wanted to mix business with pleasure while recording Electric Ladyland, so he invited his friends over to watch and listen. This didn’t sit well with either Redding or producer Chas Chandler. The latter eventually got fed up with Hendrix’s perfectionist approach (“Gypsy Eyes” took 43 takes, 20 takes for the acoustic guitar part in “…Watchtower”, and playing the bass tracks on six tracks) and drug use and quit. He even sold his stake in the management company that handled the Experience.
“…And the Gods Made Love” is disposable noise. It may have been inventive in its day, but it feels like a cheapened rip off of “Third Stone from the Sun”. It doesn’t so much introduce the listener to the album so much as distract from it.
“Have You Ever Been (To Electric Ladyland)” is the proper introduction to the album. The song invites you to come along for what promises to be an event. Hendrix sings "I want to show you..." in falsetto as the track winds down. Indeed he does.
You know “Crosstown Traffic”. It grabs your attention and lends itself to radio airplay. 1968 must’ve been the year of the kazoo because Hendrix used it here too.
“Voodoo Chile” is a 15 minute blues number that was recorded live in the studio. Redding got upset with Hendrix over the crowded conditions in the studio and took the night off. Jack Casady (Jefferson Airplane) filled in for him and Steve Winwood (back when he was cool) plays keyboards.
“Little Miss Strange” is the sole track where Noel Redding gets the spotlight. He wrote the track, plays acoustic guitar and sang it with Mitch Mitchell. It’s the one track that Hendrix let Redding call the shots and not interfere. As for the song itself, musically its tight, although the lyrics a bit simple and innocent. It’s a nice little number though.
“Long Hot Summer Night” starts funky then rocks out, even with the piano. “Come On” is a rockin’ cover of Earl King’s blues number. “Gypsy Eyes” is another blues rocker, but for all the effort put into it, it’s only about average.
In “Burning of the Midnight Lamp” Hendrix got the idea to use electric harpsichord from the Beatles and the wah-wah pedal from Frank Zappa. Arethra Franklin’s backing singers provide the harmony vocals. Amazingly the whole thing works and the song soars into the stratosphere.
“Rainy Day, Dream Away” was another one of those spontaneous slow burn blues jams. Organ and tenor sax show up and Buddy Miles filled in on drums.
There’s a lot of speculation about what “1983 (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)” is all about. I'm not hung up on it. It's just a fantastic song full of sonic invention with feedback, phasers (no, not the Star Trek kind), reverb and delay. Mitchell goes insane on a drum solo in the middle but reins himself in. The one weak point in the song is when Hendrix just noodles on the bass and there’s nothing else to hear. That small bit sounds amateurish. "Moon, Turn the Tides... Gently Gently Away" is the coda to that song.
“Still Raining, Still Dreaming” picks up where “Rainy Day…” leaves off. Literally.
“House Burning Down” is a furious blues rock number
The band’s cover of “All Along the Watchtower” is phenomenal. You know it. You've heard Classic Rock Radio play it a billion times. Even Bob Dylan changed the way he performs his song to match the Hendrix version.
“Voodoo Child (Slight Return)” sounds nothing like the 15 minute number, and that's a good thing. As good as the other track, this one is awesome. Hendrix sings, "I stand up next to a mountain and chop it down with the edge of my hand" while his guitar is doing exactly that.
Electric Ladyland would be Hendrix’s masterpiece but it would also signal the beginning of the end of the Experience. Recording was no longer a band effort. If you didn’t live up to Jimi’s standards, or just do things his way, he did it himself. All one could do was hop on and enjoy the ride or get the hell out of the way. It's a tragedy that the Hendrix train would derail two years later.
\_/
DED
The Soviets steamroll into Czechoslovakia to ensure freedom there stayed in a coma.
It was the year that Vietnam got downright in-your-face ugly. There was the Tet Offensive. This execution is photographed for all to see and then there's the My Lai Massacre. Attitudes towards the war change in a big way. It's no longer some fringe group of hippies against the war. It's mainstream. It threatens to tear apart the Democratic Party. Three weeks after barely edging out McCarthy in the NH primary, LBJ announced he wouldn't seek re-election. RFK enters the race only to be assassinated months later.
Nixon is elected president and the presidency is forever changed.
Oh yeah. And I was born.
While many a musician has gone on to have an acting career, the reverse hasn't been true. Case in point: William Shatner. While I don't own a copy of his 1968 album, The Transformed Man, I've heard bits of it and it is so awful it's hilarious.
More weirdness this year came in the form of Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. While side one is largely forgettable, side two's 17 minute title track is a superb mix of proto-heavy metal and psychedelia. You don't have to be stoned to enjoy it, but it certainly adds a certain element to the listening experience.
The Beatles released their magnum opus: The White Album. While some would argue that it was their best, I only thought that half of it was good. While Side 1 is great from start to finish, Side 2 leaves me flat. With a couple exceptions, Sides 3 & 4 follow the same pattern. If they only released half the album, containing the songs I like of course, I think that it would've been a much tighter package. But I know millions disagree. :)
Once again, for me, the top three albums, in ascending order, were from Pink Floyd, The Doors, and The Jimi Hendrix Experience.
1968 was a painful transition year for Pink Floyd. The pervasive use of psychedelics upon a fragile mental health ruined Syd Barrett. David Gilmour was brought on board in hopes that he would fulfill Barrett's duties live but Syd proved to be too erratic to work with. By April of that year, the band gave up on Barrett and he was set free.
As the band entered the studio to record their second album, A Saucerful of Secrets, there was an obvious vacuum that needed to be filled. The band did what they could Roger Waters and Richard Wright rose to the occasion and offered the band (and their fans) two different styles.Waters wrote the space rock songs “Let There Be More Light” and “Set the Controls for The Heart of the Sun,” the latter being a beautifully moody piece with the bass guitar carrying the melody as the keyboards and guitar flit in and out. Nick Mason accentuates the piece with xylophone and kettle drums. He also penned, “Corporal Clegg,” an anti-war song that paints an unflattering portrait of a WWII veteran. And to add weight to the ironic lyrics, we’re served up with a dissonant chord progression and kazoos.
Richard Wright’s offerings, “Remember A Day” and “See Saw”, were more moody psychedelic affairs. The former was actually recorded the year before and featured Barrett on slide guitar. Both songs come across as forlorn longings for a childhood that will never return.
All four remaining band members collaborated on the title track. As an instrumental, each member gets to explore his instrument to bring forth mysterious and sinister elements. But it’s Mason and Wright who own this song. The percussion and keyboards are what draw the listener in and hypnotize them. After the guitar has had its way with their brains, it is Wright’s keyboard that restores tranquility to the listener’s mind.
“Jugband Blues” closes the album. It’s the last Barrett song to be included on a Pink Floyd album. The lyrics call attention to his deteriorating condition while the music strives to be joyful, in a drunken way.
“It’s awfully considerate of you to think of me here
And I’m almost obliged to you for making it clear that I’m not here”
...
“And I’m wondering who could be writing this song”
The Doors were riding high off the success of their first two albums. But all that success fueled Morrisson’s excessive drinking. In December of 67, Morrison was arrested after an obscenity laced tirade on stage in New Haven. Angry audience members rioted.
Morrison’s drinking made recording Waiting for the Sun difficult. Envisioning himself a pagan god, Morrison wanted his 17 minute, “Celebration of the Lizard,” to be this album’s monumental opus (as “The End” and “When The Music’s Over” were on the previous two albums”) but it was alleged that the band couldn’t perform it well enough for Morrison’s liking. In the end, only the section entitled “Not to Touch the Earth” was used. To make up for it, a couple of older demo songs were pulled out of the closet, “Hello, I Love You” and “Love Street.” The mix of old and new material marks “Waiting For The Sun” as a transitional album for the band.“Hello, I Love You” starts off funky with the song’s groovy (sorry) melody held down on the keyboards. It’s all about scoring with a hot chick and it’s great. The song builds and builds and by the end it crescendos in a cacophony of fuzz box distortion with Morrison shouting “Hello!”
“Not To Touch The Earth” starts with dissonant chord progression and dizzying chords on the keyboards. The song is reigned in for the chorus as Morrison pleads, “Run with me.” But after the second chorus the song crescendos into chaos and madness ending in crash of keyboards and Morrison stating that he is the Lizard King.
“Love Street”, “Summer’s Almost Gone”, and “Wintertime Love” serve as counterbalance to the mania of those two. “Love Street” is a happy hippy song that only The Doors can do. “Summer’s Almost Gone” sounds almost mournful with its bluesy guitar bidding adieu to the Summer of Love. The harpsichord evokes a waltz in “Wintertime Love”. There’s a certain sweetness to it.
“The Unknown Soldier” opens with a haunting keyboard whistle and then Morrison sets the stage telling the tragic fate of the song’s namesake. In the middle of the song, a military style execution takes place. During live performances, the band would act this part out on stage. The haunting keyboard whistle cues up the last section as Morrison re-sings the first verse ending with “the war is over.” Bells ring out. Crowds cheer.
“Spanish Caravan” is a real gem. The flamenco guitar intro alone would carry the song (Krieger credits Albeniz) but it becomes a keyboard carnival caught up in a tornado. Morrison doesn’t overplay his part (for once) letting the guitar and keyboards work their magic.
But with all that’s good on this album, not all of the experimentation works. “My Wild Love” builds slowly but comes across as lethargic. It’s all vocal chant over a simple beat. It’s an experiment gone awry. “We Could Be So Good Together” sounds like leftover material from one of their previous two albums. “Yes, The River Knows” is a vocal over piano with Densmore providing a soft jazz backbeat. The guitar is sparse, coming across as desperate not to impede upon the song.
“Five To One” ends the album on a defiant note. Morrison drunkenly pleads his case for revolution and the band is eager to lend a hand. Krieger’s guitar work trumpets, perhaps signaling the end of this phase of The Doors’ career.
Unfortunately, Morrison wasn’t the only rock star with a drinking problem. Jimi Hendrix found that parties could be had at any time so long as he was around. And when he drank too much, he became a mean drunk. He hit his girlfriends. He even trashed a hotel room and got into a fight with bassist Noel Redding in Stockholm.
Jimi wanted to mix business with pleasure while recording Electric Ladyland, so he invited his friends over to watch and listen. This didn’t sit well with either Redding or producer Chas Chandler. The latter eventually got fed up with Hendrix’s perfectionist approach (“Gypsy Eyes” took 43 takes, 20 takes for the acoustic guitar part in “…Watchtower”, and playing the bass tracks on six tracks) and drug use and quit. He even sold his stake in the management company that handled the Experience. “…And the Gods Made Love” is disposable noise. It may have been inventive in its day, but it feels like a cheapened rip off of “Third Stone from the Sun”. It doesn’t so much introduce the listener to the album so much as distract from it.
“Have You Ever Been (To Electric Ladyland)” is the proper introduction to the album. The song invites you to come along for what promises to be an event. Hendrix sings "I want to show you..." in falsetto as the track winds down. Indeed he does.
You know “Crosstown Traffic”. It grabs your attention and lends itself to radio airplay. 1968 must’ve been the year of the kazoo because Hendrix used it here too.
“Voodoo Chile” is a 15 minute blues number that was recorded live in the studio. Redding got upset with Hendrix over the crowded conditions in the studio and took the night off. Jack Casady (Jefferson Airplane) filled in for him and Steve Winwood (back when he was cool) plays keyboards.
“Little Miss Strange” is the sole track where Noel Redding gets the spotlight. He wrote the track, plays acoustic guitar and sang it with Mitch Mitchell. It’s the one track that Hendrix let Redding call the shots and not interfere. As for the song itself, musically its tight, although the lyrics a bit simple and innocent. It’s a nice little number though.
“Long Hot Summer Night” starts funky then rocks out, even with the piano. “Come On” is a rockin’ cover of Earl King’s blues number. “Gypsy Eyes” is another blues rocker, but for all the effort put into it, it’s only about average.
In “Burning of the Midnight Lamp” Hendrix got the idea to use electric harpsichord from the Beatles and the wah-wah pedal from Frank Zappa. Arethra Franklin’s backing singers provide the harmony vocals. Amazingly the whole thing works and the song soars into the stratosphere.
“Rainy Day, Dream Away” was another one of those spontaneous slow burn blues jams. Organ and tenor sax show up and Buddy Miles filled in on drums.
There’s a lot of speculation about what “1983 (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)” is all about. I'm not hung up on it. It's just a fantastic song full of sonic invention with feedback, phasers (no, not the Star Trek kind), reverb and delay. Mitchell goes insane on a drum solo in the middle but reins himself in. The one weak point in the song is when Hendrix just noodles on the bass and there’s nothing else to hear. That small bit sounds amateurish. "Moon, Turn the Tides... Gently Gently Away" is the coda to that song.
“Still Raining, Still Dreaming” picks up where “Rainy Day…” leaves off. Literally.
“House Burning Down” is a furious blues rock number
The band’s cover of “All Along the Watchtower” is phenomenal. You know it. You've heard Classic Rock Radio play it a billion times. Even Bob Dylan changed the way he performs his song to match the Hendrix version.
“Voodoo Child (Slight Return)” sounds nothing like the 15 minute number, and that's a good thing. As good as the other track, this one is awesome. Hendrix sings, "I stand up next to a mountain and chop it down with the edge of my hand" while his guitar is doing exactly that.
Electric Ladyland would be Hendrix’s masterpiece but it would also signal the beginning of the end of the Experience. Recording was no longer a band effort. If you didn’t live up to Jimi’s standards, or just do things his way, he did it himself. All one could do was hop on and enjoy the ride or get the hell out of the way. It's a tragedy that the Hendrix train would derail two years later.
\_/
DED
posted by DED at 10:37 PM
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First up is 
Next up is the 
Last, but certainly not least, is Dragon Stout, from the Red Stripe folks. I didn't have high expectations for this one. Red Stripe is an ok beer from what I remember of it. I wasn't sure that Jamaica was the right place to brew a stout. Well, I was wrong.
