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Beatles, Music et al, Music of the 60s

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

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1966 Beatles Release Revolver

UK, August 5, 1966
US, August 8, 1966

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

1965

When we think of the 1960s’ powerful music, certain musicians and albums come to mind. Albums in particular, but it wasn’t until the mid-60s that performers released those albums.

1965 is the turning point.

Bob Dylan released “Bringing It All Back Home” on  March 22 that year. He’d recorded it over three days, January 13 – 15, 1965. Exclamation point.

The Beatles had recorded Rubber Soul between  October 12 and November 15, 1965. That album that changed the way many bands envisioned making music and created albums, . They released the album December 3, 1965.

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

Got Back

From 6 April 6 – June 21, 966, the Beatles were back in the studio to record again. As you hear above, Paul thinks of this album as Rubber Soul part 2.

I think it is, but then again not so much.

It’s a matured Rubber Soul if that’s true. The newness of Rubber Soul  isn’t new now. We know that the Beatles are still helping us explore places we didn’t know existed.

And using typical Beatle humor, why Revolver? What does a record do? Yup. That simple.

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

UK v US

The Brit kids heard Revolver two days before we Yanks, but they also heard the album that the Beatles created, not the album that Capital Records made out of that album.

Most now know that the British-released Beatle albums had 14 songs, unlike the typical 12 that Americans got. (That difference would change in 1967 with Sgt Pepper.)

Americans didn’t get I’m Only Sleeping”, “And Your Bird Can Sing,” and “Doctor Robert” on their album, but they’d actually already gotten those three on Yesterday and Today.

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

Cover

Klaus Voormann [BBC article], an old Beatle friend, did the cover. illustrations. Voormanb was a name that Beatle fans regularly saw over the Beatle years including occasionally playing bass.

Clever Voormann put his  own photograph and name (Klaus O.W. Voormann) into Harrison’s hair on the right-hand side of the cover. Click on the pic to enlarge and view better.

Robert Whitaker took the photos that are incorporated into Voormann’s drawings. He also took the back cover photograph as well as the infamous and belatedly cancelled butcher cover for Yesterday and Today.  [2011 NYT Whitaker obit]

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

Track by track

Think about what you heard on each of Revolver’s songs:
Side one
  • George Harrison’s “Taxman.” Few if any of us were in the same financial position as George and his mates were as far as taxation, but if George complained about the government then we were on board with that, too.
  • “Eleanor Rigby.” What were we listening to? If we’d read an English literature by now (and many of us had) we thought perhaps the Beatles had ripped off a Bronte sister. “Wearing a face that she keeps in a jar by the door.”
  • “I’m Only Sleeping.” Not as simple as the title.  And that backward guitar. More going on here than meets sleep. “Stay in bed, float upstream.”
  • George Harrison’s “Love to You” with its sitar dominating the instrumentation. We now knew that sitar was not a misspelling of guitar. “Make love all day long.”
  • Paul’s “Here There and Everywhere.” A slow song supreme. “Knowing that love is to share.”
  • Ringo’s “Yellow Submarine.” What fun! “So we sailed up to the sun
    Till we found the sea of green.”     Uncredited, Patti Boyd, Donovan, Marianne Faithful, and Brian Jones help with background vocals.
  • John’s “She Said She Said.” “I know what it’s like to be dead.”
Side two
  • “Good Day Sunshine.” “Then we’d lie beneath the shady tree
    I love her and she’s loving me.”     You hear it now and still sing along at the fading end repeating the title with Paul.
  • “And Your Bird Can Sing.” American fans likely didn’t realize bird meant girl. “You tell me that you’ve heard every sound there is
    And your bird can swing, But you can’t hear me, you can’t hear me.”
  • “For No One.” Back to lost love. “You stay home, she goes out.”
  • “Dr Robert.” Amphetamines, but I’m not sure we knew that. “He helps you to understand.”
  • George’s “I Want To Tell You.” Is that piano out of tune? Cool. “But if I seem to act unkind, it’s only me it’s not my mind“
  • “Got to Get You Into My Life.”
  • In 1967 we’d have “A Day in the Life.” At the end of Revolver we have “Tomorrow Never Knows.” What is going on? Have I ever heard anything like this? Tibetan Book of the Dead we heard. George brought India to our ears. John put Tibet in our heads.
1966 Beatles Release Revolver

The best?

Rob Sheffield, writing in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), said that the album found the Beatles “at the peak of their powers, competing with one another because nobody else could touch them“, and concluded that, “these days, Revolver has earned its reputation as the best album the Beatles ever made, which means the best album by anybody.” [Brackett, Nathan; with Hoard, Christian (eds) (2004). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th edn). New York, NY: Fireside/Simon & Schuster.]

1966 Beatles Release Revolver

The future was close…

The Beatles started recording Sgt Pepper’s on Nov 24,  1966.

1966 Beatles Release Revolver
Festivals, Music et al, Music of the 60s

1968 Newport Pop Festival

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1968 Newport Pop Festival

August 3 & 4, 1968
Orange County Fairgrounds,  Costa Mesa, California

1968 Newport Pop Festival

While…

..we wait for the Woodstock Music and Art Fair’s anniversary to roll around, I figured we could visit a non-1969 festival.

1968 Newport Pop Festival

Pre-Woodstock

The Newport Pop Festival can cause some confusion because of its name.  Newport, in this case, refers to California’s Newport, not Rhode Island’s. And the event was not held in Newport, California anyway.

Then, neither was Woodstock held in Woodstock!

So this is the 1968 Newport Pop Festival held at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa, California

1968 Newport Pop Festival

First site

The promoters, Wesco Productions (West Coast Productions), first selected an outdoor pavilion at the Orange County Fairgrounds. Advanced tickets sales were so successful that Wesco decided to move the site to nearby parking lots.

Woodstock Ventures had three weeks to move their festival 40 miles from Wallkill to Bethel. Wesco had three days to move several hundred yards. Neither completely succeeded.

As with any large event facing such challenges, Newport’s problems included having to bring water to the new site using hoses and then attendees had to bring their own containers to fill up.

Food concessions ran out before the first day ended. Lack of shade in southern California’s August sun made the site unbearable for some.

1968 Newport Pop Festival

Line up

The line up was a good one with no folk as such, but plenty of blues and rock. Sonny & Cher, though popular for many, did not fit into the mix, though and fans reportedly did not accept them well.

Saturday 3 August

  • Alice Cooper
  • Canned Heat
  • Chambers Brothers
  • Charles Lloyd Quartet

Sunday 4 August
  • Illinois Speed Press
  • Iron Butterfly
  • Jefferson Airplane
  • Quicksilver Messenger Service
  • The Byrds
  • Things to Come

There are no good recordings of any performances. Surprisingly, as ubiquitous as Grateful Dead tapes are, neither they nor any known audience recordings apparently exist, but YouTube does have some silent footage of the Dead with a different date playing over it:

1968 Newport Pop Festival

Future Woodstockers

Woodstock Ventures scheduled six of the Newport bands to their little party in Bethel a year later. Five of them got there.

  • Canned Heat
  • Country Joe & the Fish
  • Paul Butterfield Blues Band
  • Grateful Dead
  • Jefferson Airplane
  • Iron Butterfly (scheduled but didn’t perform; perhaps still waiting for the promised helicopter flight from LaGuardia Airport?)
1968 Newport Pop Festival

Primary Criticism

It is always interesting to read an article about an event written at the time of the event. Decades can deglaze  the bit and pieces that others saw firsthand.

Here are a few observations that Digby Diehl of the Los Angeles Times made.

  1. “the Newport Pop Festival was an outpouring of post-Beatles rock. And as the Blue Cheer pushed heavy amplifier-speaker equipment offstage into the crowd, Eric Burdon thrashed around, falling off the stage, as Country Joe and the Fish led the crowd in an obscenity cheer and the Jefferson Airplane fostered a spirit of riot.”
  2. “Arthur Brown set(s) his headdress on fire, the Asylum Choir takes nude advertisements, and some rock performers have become sideshow freaks…”
  3. “…when a young singer like John Kay of Steppenwolf wears tight leather pants and ruffled shirts, rocks back on his heels and gestures exaggeratedly while singing, he is indulging in the sensational.”
  4. Regarding Country Joe’s “Fish Cheer” : “It was as cheap a way for Country Joe to win the Festival audience as for Wayne Newton singing “Danny Boy” is to win a Vegas audience.”
  5. “Rock has to follow the trail blazed by Lennon-McCartney or Bog Dylan by speaking to the point, not shocking. “
1968 Newport Pop Festival
1968 Newport Pop Festival
Music et al, Music of the 60s

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

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John Mayall Blues Breakers album

with Eric Clapton 
released July 22, 1966
“Another Man” from the Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton (1966)

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

Ah, those British blues

As with so many young British musicians in the 1960s, American blues attracted their attention. The Rolling Stones, the Animals, and perhaps most notably, John Mayall.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

Not the new kid on the block

Older than most of the “kids” moving up the musical chops lists, John had already lived a bit after leaving school. He brought his love of the blues with him while in the British National Service even in Korea.

His father’s 78 records of jazz and blues were Mayall’s introduction to the genres. The piano, then the guitar, then the harmonica became obsessions, but he was mostly alone in his love of such stuff.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

30 years old

In 1962 Alexis Korner and Cyril Davies had founded the Ealing Club, which featured performances by their band, Blues Incorporated, and other similar bands. The club attracted young blues enthusiasts such as Mick Jagger and Eric Burdon.

Earning a living and playing the blues are not a lucrative combination, but in 1963 with the Ealing Club providing a venue, Mayall quit his job as a clerk and started playing full time.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

1965: John Mayall Plays John Mayall

In 1965, Decca released a live album: John Mayall Plays John Mayall, a title that is surprisingly apt as nine of the 12 songs are Mayall’s. Surprisingly, because, Mayall, as did most of those early British blues bands, typically covered American blues songs.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

Blues Breakers

The Yardbirds were another British band that the blues had inspired and one of its guitarists, Eric Clapton, decided he wanted even more than the band did. John Mayall offered Clapton a spot in the Blues Breakers and on July 22, 1966, Mayall’s second album was released.

Mayall had hoped to again record a live album, but the quality wasn’t good and the band went into the studio. Though Clapton’s live guitar playing was what Mayall wanted, the studio Clapton was no slouch and scorches the songs.

Side one
  1. “All Your Love” (Otis Rush) 
  2. “Hideaway” (Freddie King/Sonny Thompson) 
  3. “Little Girl” (Mayall)
  4. “Another Man” (Mayall)
  5. “Double Crossing Time” (Clapton/Mayall) 
  6. “What’d I Say” (Ray Charles) 
Side two
  1. “Key to Love” (Mayall) 
  2. “Parchman Farm” (Mose Allison) 
  3. “Have You Heard” (Mayall)
  4. “Ramblin’ on My Mind” (Robert Johnson)
  5. “Steppin’ Out” (L. C. Frazier)
  6. “It Ain’t Right” (Little Walter)

You will notice that most of this album’s songs are covers. Doesn’t make any difference. The whole album’s greatness shines through with every cut.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

Guitar radar

Clapton left after the Blues Breaker’s album to help form that little super group called Cream. The bassist, John McVie, went on to help form Fleetwood Mac–the names coming from Mick Fleetwood’s last name and McVie’s nickname. Another Mayall guitarist, the temporary replacement for Clapton, Peter Green, was part of that group’s foundation as well.

Later, Mayall guitarists Andy Fraser formed Free and Mick Taylor joined the Rolling Stones.

Mayall certainly had great guitar radar.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

March 26, 2022

John Mayall ended a storied 6-decade touring marathon with a performance on March 26th, 2022 at The Coach House in San Juan Capistrano, CA.  With his band of Greg Rzab (bass), Jay Davenport (drums) and Carolyn Wonderland (guitar/vocals), John brought the house down for a final time with a fearless rendition of Room To Move.

This poignant moment was captured by Casey Reagan and Kimberly Kagy for musicUcansee.com and released on YouTube.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album

July 22, 2024

Sadly, on July 23, 2024, the following post appeared on Mayall’s Facebook page accompanied by the photo above:

“It is with heavy hearts that we bear the news that John Mayall passed away peacefully in his California home yesterday, July 22, 2024, surrounded by loving family. Health issues that forced John to end his epic touring career have finally led to peace for one of this world’s greatest road warriors. John Mayall gave us ninety years of tireless efforts to educate, inspire and entertain.

In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, John reflected, “[blues] is about – and it’s always been about – that raw honesty with which [it expresses] our experiences in life, something which all comes together in this music, in the words as well. Something that is connected to us, common to our experiences.” That raw honesty, connection, community and playing of his will continue to affect the music and culture we experience today, and for generations to come.

An appointed OBE (Officer of the British Empire), 2x Grammy-nominated artist and recent inductee to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, John is survived by his 6 children, Gaz, Jason, Red, Ben, Zak and Samson, 7 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren. He is also surrounded with love by his previous wives, Pamela and Maggie, his devoted secretary, Jane, and his close friends. We, the Mayall family, cannot thank his fans and long-list of band members enough for the support and love we were blessed to experience secondhand over the last six decades.

John closed that same Guardian interview by reflecting further on the blues, “To be honest, I don’t think anyone really knows exactly what it is. I just can’t stop playing it.” Keep on playing the blues somewhere, John. We love you.

John Mayall Blues Breakers album