Ken Frankel was a veteran musician by the time he decided to attend MIT as a biophysics graduate student. He played rock and roll in high school then folk music with the likes of Jerry Garcia in Hart Valley Drifters. At MIT, he returned to rock music forming a band with fellow graduate student Carey Mann.
Over the course of the band's early life, they settled on a name and a style that echoed the mix of folk, jazz, garage rock and psychedelia brewed in San Francisco. Like the Bay bands, Ill Wind were skilled musicians and brought a different kind of psychedelia with their unique and dreamy amplifications. But their version of the San Francisco Sound lacked grit or much complexity, smoothed down to be shapeless and inoffensive and, as a result, forgettable. They released their only album Flashes in 1968 on ABC Records before departures led to Ill Wind's eventual abatement.
"...all sorts of people were in and out of there all the time, because they had heard about it, like the local beats—that term was still used—a bunch of kids from a pad called the Chateau, a wild-haired kid named Jerry Garcia and the Cadaverous Cowboy, Page Browning." — excerpt from Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
Despite attracting a number of curious cats while at Perry Lane, Ken Kesey and his early entourage turned away a number of seekers that didn't mesh including the likes of Jerry Garcia. Jerry and his future band would, ironically, go on to become the electric sound of the Acid Tests, Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco and the hippie movement but before The Beatles touched down in America, Jerry Garcia was a banjo-playing folkie.
In the early sixties, Jerry Garcia was ever-present on the Bay Area's radio stations playing live folk music—seemingly, every time with new accompaniment and a new band name. From the start, Jerry is personable with his bandmates and the audience with a knack for bringing everyone in the room together. He is also largely irreverent towards the folk music he plays. He respects the songs but warmly mocks the history and songwriters from which he learned them and, in doing so, pleasantly mocks himself. Folk is nothing to take too seriously because, to Jerry Garcia at least, they are more of a vehicle for his pursuit of chops. Jerry never recorded an album with these early folk groups but many transcriptions of his radio performances do survive. The album Folk Time consisting of a 1962 performance with the Hart Valley Drifters is our anchoring tour stop today. It is warm, off-the-cuff, mistake-riddled and filled with some mighty fine playing... an experience that Jerry Garcia would eventually master.
Note: Again, 1962 is not the year the album was released but the year the session was recorded.
Here is the Hart Valley Drifters discography:
Folk Time
Before the Dead (compilation album by Jerry Garcia and friends)
"Salt Creek" by Black Mountain Boys
"Deep Elem Blues" by Jerry Garcia and Sara Garcia
"Legend of the Johnson Boys" by Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers
"One Way Ticket (A Classic)" by Ken Kesey & The Merry Pranksters
"At last Kesey returns with the last to be rescued, Mary Microgram, looking like a countryside after a long and fierce war, and Kesey says let's haul ass out of here." -- excerpt from Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.
Before Denise Kaufman was an Ace of Cup, she was Merry Prankster Mary Microgram read above having survived a Beatles concert. The Merry Pranksters were not a musical group but were rather a mix of post-Beat and proto-hippie disciples, followers, hangers-on of author Ken Kesey, a best-selling author who had turned his back on the literary world to spread the gospel of the casual use of mind-expanding drugs (mostly LSD) and, more generally, a greater freedom. After a criss-cross of the United States by The Merry Pranksters in the DayGlo painted school bus Furthur, the Pranksters put on happenings known as Acid Tests where communal drug-taking was supplemented with light shows, live music, film projections and any other component of a multimedia event.
The Merry Pranksters were self-sufficient amateurs. They were their own mechanics, sound engineers, event organizers, publicists, publishers, printers, artists, navigators, musicians, circus performers, drug-takers, trip guides, nurses, fugitives, cinematographers, zealots, drivers, recruiters and doom spellers. Their amateurism was the point (Kesey referred to himself as the "non-navigator") and their naivete had a regional influence on art, music, film, sexual mores, drug taking and concert-going of the late-sixties and a national influence on the greater story of 60s America. Kesey released The Acid Test in 1966 on the single-use Sound City label. The (non-)record chronicles The Sound City Acid Test and the kind of atmospheric sound collages, feedback, "music", monologues and raps that would characterize a Prankster event as the collective pursued the ultimate LSD experience.
Here is Ken Kesey (and The Merry Pranksters's) discography:
Quicksilver Messenger Service and the Ace of Cups were both managed by Ambrose Hollingsworth with Ron Polte taking over after a car crash turned Hollingsworth paraplegic. The five-woman band played amongst the giants of the San Francisco acid scene but never got to expand their reputation outside of it. The record labels and their manager could never swing the Cups a worthwhile record deal and touring outside of the Bay area was a non-starter for young women with filial obligations.
So, the Ace of Cups never released an album or even a single (in their first incarnation, anyway) and all the testament of their sixties sound can be found in the compilation album It's Bad for You But Buy It! released by Big Beat Records (with 1968 being the year the last recording on the record was set.) The album is a grab bag of potential never refined. At their best, they find a mix of genres (R&B girl groups, gospel, acid rock,...) that suit their skills and voices, but the surviving evidence on the albums has them repeating winning formulas too often and not quite finding other signs of sleeping hits or dizzying jams. With the compilation album alone not enough to make their case for lost gems, the Ace of Cups's sixties reputations remains with those who witnessed them... like Jimi Hendrix who touted their guitarist (Mary Ellen Simpson) as "hell, really great."
Noted: Included in the discography is a recording by future-Cup Denise Kaufman with her high school band.
Here is the discography surrounding Ace of Cups's debut compilation album:
Boy, What'll You Do Then (1966 single by Denise and Co.)
Girls in the Garage (compilation song by Denise and Co.)
"It's Been Too Long" by Quicksilver Messenger Service
When Jefferson Airplane was in need of a drummer, they recruited Skip Spence, a guitarist from the early lineup of Quicksilver Messenger Service, a band that rehearsed at Marty Balin's Matrix Club. (Another source says Spence was actually a member of the garage rock band The Other Side when called over to Airplane, but we'll stick with Quicksilver.)
Quicksilver Messenger Service formed haphazardly around misfits and jailbirds (for marijuana possession) into a psychedelic jam blues band. Their brand of blues excelled when their extended jams sought to push the genre into a more psychedelic or hard blues direction, though they could just as easily lack in cleverness or inspiration within the same song. Quicksilver's worst quality was that they lost all sense of the blues whenever either David Friedman or Gary Duncan started to sing, and their pop song craft was too weak to stand on its own in a jam session setting.
But I'm not being fair to the band because their debut LP Quicksilver Messenger Service (released in 1968 on Capitol Records) is actually very good. The record does away with Quicksilver's reliance on the Blues in their live sets and focuses on a more contemporary pop sound anchored in the dueling guitars of John Cipollina and Gary Duncan, and it's a wonder what actually hitting your harmonies can do to help a song along.
But the album doesn't capture what Quicksilver's sound was trying to achieve in the live setting, a "new sound" sourced from jazz, folk and blues that, at this early stage of the band's lifespan, was only just an insoluble mix of blues and psychedelic pop with both components stronger apart than stirred together.
Also included on this tour stop is the garage rock band in which Gary Duncan and Greg Elmore started their recording career: The Brogues.
Here is the discography surrounding Quicksilver Messenger Service's debut album:
But Now I Find (1965 single by The Brogues)
Don't Shoot Me Down (1965 single by The Brogues)
Live in San Jose - September 1966 (live album)
Live at the Avalon Ballroom, San Francisco, 9th September 1966 (live album)
Live at the Avalon Ballroom, San Francisco, 28th October 1966 (live album)
Fillmore Auditorium - November 5, 1966 (live album)
Live at The Fillmore, San Francisco, 4th February 1967 - Early Show (live album)
Live at The Fillmore, San Francisco, 4th February 1967 - Late Show (live album)
Fillmore Auditorium - February 5, 1967 Live (live album)
Live at The Fillmore, San Francisco, 6th February 1967 (live album)
Live at the Winterland Ballroom - New Year's Eve 1967 (live album)
Live at The Carousel Ballroom, San Francisco, San Francisco, 4th April 1968 (live album)
Live at the Fillmore, June 7, 1968 (live album)
Revolution (1968 soundtrack album)
Dino's Song (1968 single)
Quicksilver Messenger Service
Stand by Me (1968 single)
Smokin' Sound (1968 live album)
The Hush Records Story (compilation album featuring The Brogues)
Unreleased Quicksilver Messenger Service: Lost Gold and Silver (compilation album)
"Dino's Song (Live at the Monterey Pop Festival)" by Quicksilver Messenger Service
"Acapulco Gold and Silver (Live at The Fillmore)" by Quicksilver Messenger Service
Jorma Kaukonen's nickname "Blind Thomas Jefferson Airplane" (which sounds more like a short-lived inside joke) was given to him by a friend after one of his influences Blind Lemon Jefferson. Jorma proposed the shortened Jefferson Airplane as a silly idea for a band name which then seriously became the band's name.
When the band released their debut album Jefferson Airplane Takes Off (in 1966 on the RCA Victor label), they were a tight musical group with folk-inspired harmonies and a killer bass player in Jack Casady. The band's songwriting wasn't yet a match for their musical talent and the album came too early in LP history to highlight their exciting, extended jam sessions.
Included in this entry is Marty Balin's first folk group, The Town Criers.
Here is the discography surrounding Jefferson Airplane's debut album:
Live in San Francisco (1964 live recording by The Town Criers)
It's No Secret (1966 single)
Come Up the Years (1966 single)
Bringing Me Down (1966 single)
Jefferson Airplane Take Off
Signe's Farewell (1966 live album)
"It's No Secret" by Jefferson Airplane
"And I Like It (alternate version)" by Jefferson Airplane
A formative event in the life of Lightnin' Hopkins was his fateful meeting, at the age of eight, with Blind Lemon Jefferson at a church function in 1920. Blind Lemon Jefferson carved out the definition of Texas Blues with his improvisational, fast-paced guitar picking. His first compilation album, The Folk Blues of Blind Lemon Jefferson, came out in 1955 on London Records long after he passed away (in 1929.)
Here is the discography surrounding Blind Lemon Jefferson's "debut" album:
Booster Blues (1926 single)
Long Lonesome Blues (1926 single)
Long Lonesome Blues (1926 single)
Black Horse Blues (1926 single)
Jack O Diamond Blues (1926 single)
All I Want Is That Pure Religion (1926 single as Deacon L. J. Bates)
Old Rounders Blues (1926 single)
That Black Snake Moan (1926 single)
Wartime Blues (1927 single)
Bad Luck Blues (1927 single)
Rabbit Foot Blues (1927 single)
Black Snake Moan (1927 single)
Match Box Blues (1927 single)
Rising High Water Blues (1927 single)
Hot Dogs (1927 single)
Black Snake Dream Blues (1927 single)
Rambler Blues (1927 single)
Chinch Bug Blues (1927 single)
Gone Dead on You Blues (1927 single)
Where Shall I Be (1928 single as Deacon L. J. Bates)
Sunshine Special (1928 single)
'Lectric Chair Blues (1928 single)
Lemon's Worried Blues (1928 single)
Balky Mule Blues (1928 single)
Lemon's Cannon Ball Moan (1928 single)
Piney Woods Money Mama (1928 single)
Blind Lemon's Penitentiary Blues (1928 single)
Lockstep Blues (1928 single)
How Long How Long (1928 single)
Christmas Eve Blues (1928 single)
D B Blues (1929 single)
Competition Bed Blues (1929 single)
Eagle Eyed Mama (1929 single)
That Black Snake Moan No. 2 (1929 single)
Oil Well Blues (1929 single)
Peach Orchard Mama (1929 single)
Bakershop Blues (1929 single)
Bed Springs Blues (1929 single)
Pneumonia Blues (1929 single)
Hometown Skiffle (1930 single by The Paramount All Stars)
Southern Woman Blues (1930 single)
Cat Man Blues (1930 single)
The Cheaters Spell (1930 single)
Bootin' Me 'Bout (1930 single)
The Folk Blues of Lemon Jefferson
Blind Lemon's Penitentiary Blues and Other Folk Songs by Blind Lemon Jefferson (1955 compilation album)
Blind Lemon Jefferson Sings the Blues (1957 compilation album)
Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order Volume 1 (compilation album)
Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order Volume 2 (compilation album)
Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order Volume 3 (compilation album)
Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order Volume 4 (compilation album)
"That Black Snake Moan" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Corinna Blues" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Shuckin' Sugar Blues" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Easy Rider Blues" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Hot Dogs" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"D B Blues" by Blind Lemon Jefferson
"I Want to Be Like Jesus in My Heart" by Deacon L. J. Bates
