Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

It was about 1:30 AM, Monday 18 August.  Bethel’s dairy farmers would be up soon and hoped that the roads would be open so trucks could pick up their milk.  Many Catskill weekend vacationers bemoaned their luck to have picked a weekend when 500,000 others unintentionally closed down the area.

For those who had remained at the festival, there were still four more bands yet to play after Blood, Sweat and Tears to complete Sunday’s lineup: Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Sha Na Na, and Jimi Hendrix. The rain storm had delayed the day’s progression, but even without the downpour, the festival would still have stretched out into early Monday.

The live performance often gave individual band members the chance to stretch out their studio performances. The set lasted about 55 minutes.

Personnel:

• David Clayton-Thomas: vocals, guitar
• Steve Katz: guitar, harmonica, vocals
• Dick Halligan: keyboards, trombone, flute
• Jerry Hyman: trombone
• Fred Lipsius: alto sax, piano
• Lew Soloff: trumpet, flugelhorn
• Chuck Winfield: trumpet, flugelhorn
• Jim Fielder: bass
• Bobby Colomby: drums

Setlist:

• More and More
• Just One Smile
• Something’s Coming on
• More Than You’ll Ever Know
• Spinning Wheel
• Sometimes in Winter
• Smiling Phases
• God Bless the Child
• And When I Die
• You’ve Made Me So Very Happy

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

More and More

The song is from the band’s second album, Blood, Sweat & Tears. Little Milton first covered it.

According to the funky16corners site: The tune, which was written by a mysterious pair named Don Juan and Vee Pee Smith, would later be covered by Blood Sweat and Tears. Listening to the Little Milton original, it’s not hard to see why David Clayton-Thomas wanted to cover it, as it’s right up his (and the bands) stylistic alley. They take it at a much faster pace, in which the tune loses a little bit of its built-in funk, but it’s still worth a listen.

Like medicine baby
You’re good for me
Like honey, darlin’ girl
I know you’re sweet to me
Each passing day,
Brings us much closer together
And the love you bring me darlin’
Just gets better and better
That’s why my love for you
Keeps on growin’
More and more
All the time
More and more
All the time, yeah!

Uh huh,
Gonna say it again, now now now
Hah!
Like a ship that’s driftin’ baby
You’re apart from me
Like old man time
You controll my destiny
If from my life, you ever tried to go
It would destroy in a second
What took a lifetime to mold
That’s why my love for you
Just keeps on growin’
More and more
All the time
More and more
All the time

As sure as a sunrise
I’ll stand by your side
As sure as the daybreak
I’ll love you for Heaven’s Sake
I’m ready to pay, yeah
My dues for lovin’ you
For lovin’ you too much woman,
You know I stand accused

More,
And more
All the time
More and More!

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

Just One Smile

Written by Randy Newman and from the first Blood, Sweat and Tears album, Child Is Father To the Man.  The Tokens recorded the original version of the song in 1965. It was the B-side to their single “The Bells Of St. Mary“.

Can I cry a little bit
There’s nobody to notice it
Can I cry if I want to
No one cares
Why can’t I pretend
That you love me again?
All I had has been taken from me
Now I’m cryin’
And tears don’t become me
Chorus: Just one smile,
Pain’s forgiven
Just one kiss, girl
Now the hurt’s all gone
Just one smile to my
Make my little life worth livin’
A little dream to build my world upon
How I wish
I could say
All the things that I got to say
How I wish you
Could see what’s here
In My heart
I don’t ask for much
A look, a smile, a touch
Try to forget
Well, the Lord knows I’m tryin’
But it’s so hard to forget girl,
When your whole world is dyin’
(Chorus)
(Solos)
Try to forget
Well, the Lord knows I’m tryin’
But it’s so hard to forget girl,
When your whole world is dyin’

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

Something’s Coming on

Also from the first Blood, Sweat and Tears album. Chris Stainton and Joe Cocker wrote it and had performed it about 12 hours earlier!

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

More Than You’ll Ever Know

The band seques right into the next song. Al Kooper wrote More Than You’ll Ever Know and again it is from the first Blood, Sweat and Tears album. Here’s Kooper’s live version. You can decide whose you prefer.

If I ever leave you
You can say I told you so
And if I ever hurt you baby
You know I hurt myself as well

Is that any way for a man to carry on ?
You think he wants his little loved one gone
I love you baby, more than you’ll ever know
More than you’ll ever know

When I wasn’t makin’ too much money
You know where my paycheck went
You know I brought it home to baby
And I never spent one red cent

Is that any way for a man to carry on ?
You think he wants his little loved one gone
I love you baby, more than you’ll ever know
More than you’ll ever know

I’m not tryin’ to be any kind of man
I’m tryin’ to be somebody you can love, trust and understand
I know that I can dream, yeah
A part of you that no one else could see
I just gotta hear, hear you say : ‘It’s all right, yeah, yeah, yeah’

I’m only flesh and blood
I can be anything that you demand
I could president of General Motors baby, heh
Or just a tiny little grain of sand

Is that any way for a man to carry on ?
You think he wants his little loved one gone
I love you babe, I love you babe
I love you more than you’ll ever know

Yeah
Yeah, yeah

If I ever leave you
You can say I told you so
And if I ever hurt you
You know I hurt myself as well

Is that any way for a man to carry on ?
You think he wants his little loved one gone
I tried to tell I love you baby, love you baby, yeah love you baby
I love you more than you’ll ever know, ooh yeah yeah …

I love you, I love you, I love you baby

Well all right!
I told you so many times before
I love you, I love you, I love you
If you don’t know then I’ll tell you one more time
I love you, I love you, I love you .

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

Spinning Wheel

Written by David Clayton Thomas and from Blood, Sweat & Tears second and then most recent album, Blood, Sweat and Tears.  

On the critical side,  Jon Landau of Rolling Stone  wrote in his March 1969 review: “The listener responds to the illusion that he is hearing something new when in fact he is hearing mediocre rock, OK jazz, etc., thrown together in a contrived and purposeless way.”

William Ruhlmann of All Music wrote: “ the second BS&T, under the aegis of producer James William Guercio, was a less adventurous unit, and, as fronted by Clayton-Thomas, a far more commercial one. Not only did the album contain three songs that neared the top of the charts as singles — “Happy,” “Spinning Wheel,” and “And When I Die” — but the whole album, including an arrangement of “God Bless the Child” and the radical rewrite of Traffic‘s “Smiling Phases,” was wonderfully accessible. It was a repertoire to build a career on, and Blood, Sweat & Tears did exactly that…”

What goes up, must come down
Spinning wheel got to go round
Talkin’ ’bout your troubles, it’s a cryin’ sin
Ride a painted pony, let the spinning wheel spin

You got no money and you, you got no home
Spinning wheel, all alone
Talkin’ ’bout your troubles and you, you never learn
Ride a painted pony, let the spinning wheel turn

Did you find a directing sign on the straight and narrow highway?
Would you mind a reflecting sign?
Just let it shine within your mind
And show you the colors that are real

Someone is waiting just for you
Spinning wheel spinning through
Drop all your troubles by the riverside
Catch a painted pony on the spinning wheel ride
Ha!

Someone’s waiting just for you
Spinning wheel spinning through
Drop all your troubles by the riverside
Ride a painted pony, let the spinning wheel fly

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

Sometimes in Winter

Also from the Blood, Sweat & Tears album written by Steve Katz. Katz still sings it.

Sometimes in winter
I gaze into the streets
And walk through snow and city sleet
Behind your room

Sometimes in winter
Forgotten memories
Remember you behind the trees
With leaves that cried

By the window once I waited for you
Laughing slightly you would run
Trees alone would shield us in the meadow
Makin’ love in the evening sun

Now you’re gone girl
And the lamp posts call your name
I can hear, them
In the spring of frozen rain
Now you’re gone girl
And the time’s slowed down till dawn
It’s a cold room and the walls ask
Where you’ve gone

Sometimes in winter
I love you when the good times
Seem like memories in the spring
That never came

Sometimes in winter
I wish the empty streets
Would fill with laughter from the tears
That ease my pain

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

Smiling Phases

From Blood, Sweat & Tears album written by Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi, and Chris Wood of Traffic.

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

God Bless the Child

Also from Blood, Sweat & Tears album. Billie Holiday and Arthur Herzog Jr. wrote “God Bless the Child” in 1939. It was first recorded on May 9, 1941 and released by the Okeh Records in 1942.

It’s likely impossible to top her version.

David Clayton-Thomas says as the song starts, “I don’t think ever in my lifetime…there’s a song that seems so appropriate to me.”

Them that’s got, shall get
Them that’s not, shall lose
So the Bible says
And it still is news

Mama may have
And papa may have
But God bless the child that’s got his own will
That’s got his own

And the strong seem to get more
While the weak ones fade
Empty pockets don’t
Ever make the grade
Cause mama may have
And papa may have
But God bless the child that’s got his own
That’s got his own

And when you got money
You got lots of friends
Their crowding round your door
When the money’s gone
And all you’re spending ends
They won’t be round anymore, no, no, no

And rich relations may give you
A crust of bread and such
You can help yourself
But don’t take too much
Mama may have
And papa may have
But God bless the child that’s got his own
That’s got his own

And when you got money
You got lots of friends
Their crowding round your door
But wait a minute children
When the money’s gone
And all you’re spending ends
They won’t be round anymore, no, no

And rich relations may give you
A crust of bread and such
You can help yourself
But don’t take too much
Mama may have
And papa may have
But God bless the child who can
Stand up and say
I got my own

Every child’s got to have his own bell

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

And When I Die

Again from the Blood, Sweat & Tears album. Laura’s is pretty good, but then a composer’s own version would seem closer to their intent.

With tongue in cheek, Steve Katz introduced the song by saying, “We hope you look upon this next little number as a little piece of sunshine amidst a lot of sunshine.”

I’m not scared of dying
And I, don’t really care
If it’s peace you find in dying
Well then, let the time be near

If it’s peace you find in dying
Well then dying time is near
Just bundle up my coffin
‘Cause it’s cold way down there
I hear that it’s
Cold way down there, yeah
Crazy cold, way down there

And when I die, and when I’m gone
There’ll be, one child born
In this world
To carry on, to carry on

Now troubles are many
They’re as
Deep as a well
I can swear there ain’t no Heaven
But I pray there ain’t no hell
Swear there ain’t no Heaven
And I’ll pray there ain’t no hell
But I’ll never know by livin’
Only my dyin’ will tell, yes only my
Dyin’ will tell, oh yeah
Only my dyin’ will tell

And when I die, and when I’m gone
There’ll be, one child born, in this world
To carry on, to carry on
Yeah yeah

Give me my freedom
For as long as I be
All I ask of livin’
Is to have no chains on me
All I ask of livin’
Is to have no chains on me
And all I ask of dyin’ is to
Go natrually, only wanna
Go naturally
Here I go!
Hey hey
Here come the devil
Right behind
Look out children, here he come
Here he come, heyyy

Don’t wanna go by the devil
Don’t wanna go by the demon
Don’t wanna go by satan
Don’t wann die uneasy
Just let me go
Naturally

And when I die, and when I’m dead
Dead and gone
There’ll be
One child born, in our world
To carry on, to carry on.

This was the “last” song, but the crowd cheers brings back the band for one more song.

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

You’ve Made Me So Very Happy

Written by Gordy Berry, Frank Wilson, Brenda Holloway, and Patrice Holloway, it is from the Blood, Sweat & Tears album

I lost at love before
Got mad and closed the door
But you said child just once more

I chose you for the one
Now we’re havin’ so much fun
You treated me so kind
I’m about to lose my mind

You made me so very happy
I’m so glad you
Came into my life

The others were untrue
But when it came to lovin’ you
I’d spend my whole life with you

‘Cause you came and you took control
You touch my very soul
You always show me that
Lovin’ you is where it’s at

You made me so very happy
I’m so glad you
Came into my life

Thank you, baby

I love you so much you see
You’re even in my dreams
I can hear
Baby, I can hear you calling me
I’m so in love with you
All I ever want to do is
Thank you baby, thank you baby

You made me so very happy
I’m so glad you
Came into my life

You made me so very happy
You made me so, so very happy
I’m so glad you
Came into my life

Mmmm, I want to thank you, girl
Every day of my life
I wanna thank you
You made me so very happy
Oh, I wanna spend my life thanking you
Thank you baby, thank you baby
Thank you baby thank you baby

Blood Sweat Tears Woodstock

The next act is Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young

Johnny Winter Woodstock

In it’s December 7, 1968 issue, Rolling Stone magazine’s Larry Sepulvado and John Burks wrote in an article titled “Tribute to the Lone Star State: Dispossessed Men and Mothers of Texas” :

The hottest item outside of Janis Joplin, though, still remains in Texas. If you can imagine a hundred and thirty pound cross-eyed albino with long fleecy hair playing some of the gutsiest fluid blues guitar you have ever heard, then enter Johnny Winter. At 16, Bloomfield called him the best white blues guitarist he had ever heard. 

Winter reportedly received $600,000 for signing with Columbia Records in 1969. That was a huge sum of money for that time.

The band started at midnight; played a little over an hour.

Personnel:

• Johnny Winter: vocals, guitar
• Edgar Winter: keyboards
• Tommy Shannon: bass
• “Uncle” John Turner: drums

Setlist:

• Mama, Talk to Your Daughter
• Leland Mississippi Blues
• Mean Town Blues
• You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now > Mean Mistreater
• I Can’t Stand It* 
• Tobacco Road* 
• Tell the Truth* 
• Johnny B. Goode* 

* with Edgar Winter

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Mama, Talk to Your Daughter

The band starts minus brother Edgar Winter.  JB Lenoir wrote the song. The song would appear on Winter’s third album and the third Columbia Records release for Winter in 1969!

Mama, mama please talk to your daughter ’bout me
Mama, mama please talk to your daughter ’bout me
She made me love her and I ain’t gonna leave her be

You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
She made me love her and I ain’t gonna leave her be

I ain’t gonna stand no quitting and she won’t have me aroun
I ain’t gonna stand no quitting and she won’t have me around
If she got me a ride, she’d be six feet in the ground

You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
She made me love her and I ain’t gonna leave her be

You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
You should talk to your daughter (talk, talk)
She made me love her and I ain’t gonna leave her be

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Leland Mississippi Blues

Written by Johnny Winter, the song appeared on The Progressive Blues Experiment, his first album. Austin’s Sonobeat Records label originally issued the album in 1968, but when Winter signed to Columbia Records, the rights were sold to Imperial Records who reissued the album in 1969.

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Mean Town Blues

Johnny Winter wrote it and it also appeared on his first Columbia Records album.

Lord my mother she done told me and my
Father done told me
Grandfather told me too
My mother she done told me
And my father done told me
Grandfather told me too
It’s a mean old town to live in by yourself

Yeah, I worked for a dollar could not
Save a lousy
Could not save a dime
You know I worked for a dollar could not
Save a lousy
Could not save a dime
Ain’t nobody worried, man, ain’t nobody crying

Everybody’s got a hand out trying to
Get a hold on
Trying to get some of my cash
Everybody’s got a hand out trying to
Get a hold on
Trying to get some of my cash
Smiling great big smiles, man, keep on talking trash

You know I packed up my suitcase and I
Moved on down the
Hit that lonesome road
You know I packed up my suitcase and I
Moved on down the
Hit that lonesome road
I’m still trying to make it, man, when the day is done

Johnny Winter Woodstock

 

You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now > Mean Mistreater

BB King and Joe Josea wrote You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now and had been on his 1960 album. Written by Jimmie Gordon, “Mean Mistreater” appeared on Winter’s second album. My Kind of Blues.

Oh, baby you done lost your good thing now
Oh, baby you done lost your good thing now
Well the way I used to love you baby
Baby that’s the way I hate you now
You used to say that you loved me
But baby I believe you’ve changed your mind
You used to say that you loved me
But baby I believe you’ve changed your mind
Well I don’t blame you baby
Because you ain’t what you used to be
Let me love you just one more time
Yes let me love you just one more time anyway
Oh, let me love you, let me love you, let me love you
One more time baby
Let me love you just one more time anyway
Oh you can’t quit me now baby
Because you didn’t mean me no good anyway
Well you know where I’m from baby
So please don’t try to mistreat me
Yes you know where I’m from baby
So please don’t try to mistreat me
Yes because I’ll make your mother a present
Baby of you and your casket too
Oh you once said you loved me
And you would do anything I said
Oh you once said you loved me baby
And you would do anything I said
Oh but the way you treat me now baby
I just soon rather be dead
Oh, baby you done lost your good thing now
Oh, baby you done lost your good thing now
The way I used to love you
Baby that’s the way I hate you now

Johnny Winter Woodstock

I Can’t Stand It

Brother Edgar Winter now joined Johnny, who explained that they’d just finished cutting their next album in Nashville and that I Can’t Stand It was one of the tracks from it. That album would be Second Winter,  but the song does not appear on it and will not appear on any album until Columbia Legacy released Winter’s complete Woodstock set as part of the The Woodstock Experience album in 2009.

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Tobacco Road

By John Loudermilk the song has become especially associated with Edgar more than Johnny. In fact, Edgar is the vocalist on this song.

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Tell the Truth 

By Lowman Pauling  wrote it and it was supposed to be included on Winter’s next album, but wasn’t released until a 2004 re-release.

 

Johnny Winter Woodstock

Johnny B. Goode

The crowd called for more and Johnny Winter gives Chuck Berry’s classic composition a great treatment. It did appear on Second Winter.

Johnny Winter Woodstock

The next act was Blood, Sweat and Tears.

The Band Woodstock

It was still Sunday and The Band came on around 10 PM. The weekend’s most persistent rumor had been that Bob Dylan would show up. He didn’t, of course, but having having The Band was a close and satisfactory second.

They would play for about 55 minutes.

Personnel:

• Robbie Robertson: guitar, vocals

• Garth Hudson: organ, keyboard, saxophone

• Richard Manuel: piano
• Rick Danko: bass, vocals

• Levon Helm: drums, mandolin

Setlist:

• Chest Fever
• Don’t Do It
• Tears of Rage
• We Can Talk
• Long Black Veil
• Don’t You Tell Henry
• Ain’t No More Cane on the Brazos
• This Wheel’s on Fire
• I Shall Be Released
• The Weight
• Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever

The Band Woodstock

Chest Fever

Written by Robbie Robertson and featuring Garth Brooks on organ at the start, the song was one of several in the set that had been on their only album to that point, Music From Big Pink which Capital Records had released on July 1, 1968. Bob Dylan had done the cover artwork.

The Band Woodstock

Don’t Do It

A Band cover. Motown composers Lamont Dozier, Brian Holland, and  Edward Holland originally wrote and intended the for the Supremes, but eventually reassigned to Marvin Gaye to record and he had a hit with it.

From Wikipedia:  “The Band recorded the song numerous times under the title “Don’t Do It”.  Different versions, both studio and live, appear on several of their albums and box sets, including the 1972 live release Rock of Ages.

” “Don’t Do It” was the encore performed by The Band in Martin Scorsese‘s 1976 concert film The Last Waltz, though it was featured first in the film. Although it was not included on the 1978 soundtrack album, the track was included in the 2002 box set edition of The Last Waltz soundtrack.

“The version of “Don’t Do It” from Rock of Ages was issued as a single, reaching #34 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the autumn of 1972; the track was the second – following “Up on Cripple Creek” – and final Top 40 single for the Band. Billboard called this version a “dynamite dance treatment.”

The Band Woodstock

Tears of Rage

Also from Big Pink, Bob Dylan and Richard Manual co-wrote the tune.

The Band Woodstock

A trickle…

Chip Monch pauses the performance for a few moments because there is an PA issue. A bit of “Testing one two” and Chip again asks those on the light tower to get down and to stay away from the tower’s guy wires as “there is [an electrical] trickle in that area.”

The interruption lasted a few minutes.

We Can Talk

The third song from Big Pink. From Wikipedia:“We Can Talk” shows unrelated snippets of conversation between members of The Band. Levon Helm wrote in his autobiography “It’s a funny song that really captures the way we spoke to one another; lots of outrageous rhymes and corny puns.”

The Band Woodstock

Long Black Veil

The fourth song from Big Pink, but a cove a 1959 country ballad, written by Danny Dill and Marijohn Wilkin and originally recorded by Lefty Frizzell.

The Band Woodstock

Don’t You Tell Henry

Someone calls out “Where’s Dylan!” Another says, “We want Dylan.” He’s not there of course, but some of his songs were. Like this one. A Dylan UK site has a lot to say about the song.

The Band Woodstock

Ain’t No More Cane on the Brazos

Ain’t No More… is a cover of a traditional work song and sometimes attributed to Huddie Ledbetter (Lead Belly), but no references can be found for that idea, nor can ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax find that connection.

The Band Woodstock

This Wheel’s on Fire

Fifth song from Big Pink and another Dylan collaboration, this with Rick Danko.

 

The Band Woodstock

I Shall Be Released

Sixth song from Big Pink and another Dylan song.

The Band Woodstock

The Weight

The seventh from Big Pink and arguably the best and best known song by the Band, a Robbie Robertson composition.

The Band Woodstock

Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever

After Chip Monck says that he thinks the crowd will have to convince them and the crowd responding enthusiastically, The Band’s encore was another Motown-based song, “Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever.” a 1966 song written by Ivy Jo Hunter and Stevie Wonder and performed by the Four Tops

The Band Woodstock

The next act was Johnny Winter.