Play All Night Playlist Project #6: Chapter 4.1: The California rock scene

“We had chops out the ass but didn’t have the originality thing down yet.” Gregg Allman

Welcome back to another edition of Long Live the ABB: Conversation from the crossroads of Southern music, history, and culture.

And welcome to new subscribers and a huge THANK YOU to all of my paid subscribers, who help sustain my work. My hope is that I’ll provide you at least $2.50/week in value between this page and my social media. Posts for paid subscribers (such as this) are a bonus.¹

On to today’s content…²

Here’s the 6th installment in the Play All Night Playlist Project. My idea is to give some musical context to what you’re reading in the book.

It comes out of my own needs when I read music books. I know it can be somewhat overwhelming to have so much *new* music at my fingertips and I thought I’d close that gap some by posting playlists to help y’all get familiar with the music in the book.

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Here are all the playlists I’ve published thus far:

Play All Night Playlist Project

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This is the first of 3 playlists that accompany Chapter 4: Frustration in California (1967-8).³

The prospects seemed bleak for Duane to make the leap from success in a regional cover band to the professional world of Los Angeles music making.

Though discouraged after failures in in New York and Nashville, John Loudermilk’s encouragement was validating.

Duane was the undisputed leader of the Allman Joys, but his creative input remained limited to guitar and arrangements.

He would eventually learn that originality came in two forms, songwriting and arranging. It is in this era he matured as an arranger, which helped him further develop his artistic voice.⁴

The playlist focuses on the California rock scene that Duane and Gregg were part of when they moved to LA.

As always, this is not comprehensive. I mentioned most (if not all) of the bands in Play All Night, which is the main reason certain songs and artists made the cut.

PLAYLIST: Frustration in California (1967-8)

SPOTIFY

Youtube

Chapter 4.1: California Rock Scene

🔗🔗 Playlist link 🔗🔗

Here are my thoughts on this 16-song, 80ish-min playlist:

Hour Glass on Upbeat! in Cleveland, OH, April 1968.

Chapter 4 (part 1): Frustration in California (1967-8) California Rock Scene

I’ve made the playlists public, but am reserving my commentary for paid subscribers.

UPDATE 9/24/24: This is now free to all subscribers

Buffalo Springfield “For What It’s Worth” “Mr. Soul”⁵ One of the most important bands of the early rock era, Buffalo Springfield featured two lead guitarists, Floridian Stephen Stills and Canadian Neil Young. These are probably the most well-known Springfield songs by both of them. “For What It’s Worth” hits pretty hard right now, I gotta tell ya.

The Doors “Light My Fire” From their debut album, 1966. This song was all over the radio in summer 1967. It features a pretty long instrumental vamp, a motif the Allman Brothers Band would make famous.

The Byrds “Eight Miles High” and “Hey Joe” The former is a seminal track in the development of psychedelic rock. Its supposed drug connotations got it banned from radio. I included “Hey Joe” to share a cover by someone other than Jimi Hendrix. The story of the song’s authorship is pretty tangled.⁶

Canned Heat “On the Road Again” “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” Canned Heat and Hour Glass were labelmates at Liberty Records, which makes it all the more puzzling Dallas Smith’s decision to remake the band into pop-psychedelia.⁷

Jefferson Airplane “Somebody to Love” “White Rabbit” I could choose any number of Airplane tracks, but I went with my two favorites. Pay close attention to Jack Casady’s basslines. His lead bass was a major influence on Berry Oakley.

Grateful Dead “Alligator” “Morning Dew” I’ve included versions that appeared on vinyl around the time Duane and Gregg were in California. “Alligator” is often cited as an influence on “Mountain Jam” and Garcia does briefly quote “There is a Mountain.” The Dead’s most famous version of “Morning Dew” is on Europe ’72. In September 1968, Duane and Gregg recorded a much different arrangement with Butch Trucks’s 31st of February.⁸ But more importantly, listen to Phil Lesh’s bass for an idea of how he influenced Berry Oakley.⁹

Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company “Ball and Chain” Janis Joplin brought the house down at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival. Fortunately, there’s video proof. Though Big Brother’s original set wasn’t filmed, Joplin and company got an encore a day later. This take on Big Mama Thornton’s original is pretty incredible if you ask me.¹⁰

Quicksilver Messenger Service “Who Do You Love?” Their version of the Bo Diddley classic. Here’s where early rock & roll/rhythm & blues meet contemporary American blues rock. This is also some truly wonderful guitar playing from Gary Duncan and the great John Cipollina.

Electric Flag “Going Down Slow” Guitarist Mike Bloomfield’s band with Barry Goldberg and Buddy Miles, among others, made their debut at Monterey. In early 1969, Duane recorded this Howlin’ Wolf track at FAME in sessions for his aborted solo album.

Jimi Hendrix “Like a Rolling Stone” Jimi’s entire Monterey performance has mesmerized me from the first time I rented the D.A. Pennebaker film.¹¹ There’s just something about Jimi’s performance on this particular track, the first of his set. “Excuse me, let me play my guitar…”

Otis Redding (with Booker T. and the MG’s) “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long” This is one of the finest live performances of any song, ever. Do yourself a favor and watch it. You’re welcome.

I’m struck by how prevalent guitar is in these tracks.

This was definitely the sound Duane was going for, a sound Dallas Smith at Liberty Records roundly rejected.

Even worse, is that Liberty Records had a success with blues-based acts. Canned Heat hit the Billboard 200 in 1967-8. Liberty handled national distribution for Johnny Winter’s first album. And, of course, it was the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band that introduced Liberty to the group. Not blues, but they had a much more organic sound than what Hour Glass ended up recording.

The “B.B. King Medley” from Hour Glass’s Muscle Shoals demos stands up really well with much of the material above. It wasn’t *as* original in arrangement—an issue Duane struggled with until he found the collaborative environment of Muscle Shoals and his Allman Brothers Band partners. Fast-forwarding in the narrative just a bit, here’s a quote from Play All Night p31:

Next, Allman assembled a band of players who could add more originality to the music than he could on his own. Combined with artistic freedom, great players afforded the opportunity to “go ahead and do what you please.” The problem with Hour Glass wasn’t the combination of musicians; it was his dissatisfaction with their musical direction. That wasn’t the case with the Allman Brothers—“five of the smokin’est cats I’ve ever met in my life.”

I added the bold to point out a question that long vexed me.

Why didn’t Hour Glass work?

It’s easy to say, “It wasn’t quite ready…” but why?

This was by all accounts a shit-hot band, one that the bands in/around California both lauded and feared. Said Stephen Stills to Gregg Allman years alter, “You sure were a tough act to follow.”

The band didn’t lack for talent. Paul Hornsby (keyboard) and Johnny Sandlin (drums) both turned down Duane’s offer to join his new band in 1969. Bassist Pete Carr ended up the lead guitarist at Muscle Shoals Sound. Hornsby and Sandlin became in-house producers for Capricorn in Macon.

Like Duane and Gregg, they were top-flight, professional musicians

The difference is Berry Oakley, Dickey Betts, Butch Trucks, and Jaimoe. Together with Gregg, Duane’s longest collaborator, they helped unlock Duane’s creativity in spring 1969.

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Random notes

Jaimoe

Jaimoe played drums for Otis Redding April-September 1966, leaving when Redding toured the U.K. Jaimoe had lost his wallet and had no identification to travel.¹²

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Otis and Jimi: Historic Performances Recorded At The Monterey International Pop Festival

In 1970, Reprise released an album of the Redding and Hendrix sets. A really killer pairing, particularly when you consider Jimi’s time on the R&B chitlin’ circuit.

“You Don’t Love Me”

Quicksilver Messenger Service was one of many bands that played Willie Cobbs’s “You Don’t Love Me” in this era. John Mayall released a version in 1967. In 1968, Stephen Stills and Al Kooper recorded it on Super Session. Ike and Tina Turner covered it in 1969. Not sure anyone’s touched it since the ABB’s 19-minute tour-de-force on At Fillmore East.

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“.44 Blues”

Johnny Winter recorded Howlin’ Wolf’s “.44 Blues” on his debut album. Warren Haynes sings on Derek Trucks Band’s cover from their Out of the Madness album.

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Thanks again for reading and thank you for supporting my writing. I really appreciate your comments and thoughts.

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1. Thank you for supporting me this way. I realize this is the PBS model, where I give you a $5 DVD for a donation.

2. Originally published for paid-subscribers July 2023.

3. The other two are here

Play All Night Playlist Project

4. Play All Night! Duane Allman and the Journey to Fillmore East, 55. Reflected a bit on the importance of arrangements here:

When Musical Worlds Collide

5. Widespread Panic has been covering “Mr. Soul” for years. I’m mulling over some points I want to make about WSP, a really important band to me and many others.

6. Wikipedia on the authorship of “Hey Joe.”

7. Johnny Winter has a scorching version of “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” as does Tedeschi Trucks Band. (There’s that #unbrokencircle again. I’m nothing if not consistent.)

8. Based on the Jeff Beck Group's version on Truth. Here’s my take on the 31st of February’s version.

9. Lots more about that influence in Play All Night and here:

Remembering Berry Oakley—Brother B.O.

10. I’ve visited the grounds of the Monterey Pop Festival and was stunned how small the venue was. Maybe 10,000 folks at a time max.

11. One in series of reasons I am so drawn to live music.

12. Here’s Otis from the U.K. in 1966.