Sixties Blues and Psychedelia
Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton
Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton (aka The Beano Album) is a 1966 blues/blues rock album recorded by John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton as part of the band. It is the second album credited to John Mayall after the live John Mayall Plays John Mayall. Clapton left to form Cream after this recording, though would team up again in 1971 for the double LP Back to the Roots.
Cream
Cream were a 1960s British rock supergroup power trio consisting of bassist/singer Jack Bruce, drummer Ginger Baker, and guitarist/singer Eric Clapton. The group's third album, Wheels of Fire (1968), was the world's first platinum-selling double album.[1][2] The band is widely regarded as the world's first successful supergroup.[3][4][5][6] In their career, they sold more than 15 million copies of their albums worldwide.[7] Their music included songs based on traditional blues such as "Crossroads" and "Spoonful", and modern blues such as "Born Under a Bad Sign", as well as more eccentric songs such as "Strange Brew", "Tales of Brave Ulysses" and "Toad".
Deadheads
Deadhead or Dead Head is a name given to fans of the American psychedelic rock band the Grateful Dead.In the 1970s, a number of fans began traveling to see the band in as many shows or festival venues as they could. With large numbers of people thus attending strings of shows, a community developed. Deadheads developed their own idioms and slang.
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton is an English rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist and separately as a member of the Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and influential guitarists of all time. Clapton ranked second in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" and fourth in Gibson's "Top 50 Guitarists of All Time". He was also named number five in Time magazine's list of "The 10 Best Electric Guitar Players" in 2009.
Acid Tests
Parties hosted by Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters which featured the Grateful Dead and LSD-spiked Kool-Aid.
The Doors (album)
The Doors is the self-titled debut album by the American rock band the Doors, released on January 4, 1967. The album features their breakthrough single "Light My Fire" and the lengthy song "The End" with its Oedipal spoken word section. The Doors credit the success of the album to being able to work the songs out night after night at the Whisky a Go Go and the London Fog nightclubs in West Hollywood, California.[citation needed] The Doors was not only one of the albums to have been most central to the progression of psychedelic rock, but is also one of the most acclaimed recordings in all of popular music. In 2012, it was ranked number 42 in Rolling Stone magazine's 500 greatest albums of all time.
The Doors
The Doors were an American rock band formed in 1965 in Los Angeles, with vocalist Jim Morrison, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, guitarist Robby Krieger, and drummer John Densmore. The band got its name, at Morrison's suggestion[4] from the title of Aldous Huxley's book The Doors of Perception,[5] which itself was a reference to a quote made by William Blake, "If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is, infinite."[6] They were unique and among the most controversial and influential rock acts of the 1960s, mostly because of Morrison's lyrics and charismatic but unpredictable stage persona. After Morrison's death in 1971 at age 27, the remaining members continued as a trio until disbanding in 1973.[7] Signing with Elektra Records in 1966, The Doors released eight albums between 1967 and 1971. All but one hit the Top 10 on the Billboard 200 and went platinum or better. Their self-titled debut album (1967) was their first in a series of Top 10 albums in the United States, followed by Strange Days (also 1967), Waiting for the Sun (1968), The Soft Parade (1969), Morrison Hotel (1970), Absolutely Live (1970) and L.A. Woman (1971), with 20 Gold, 14 Platinum, and 5 Multi-Platinum album awards in the United States alone.[8] By the end of 1971, it was reported that The Doors had sold 4,190,457 albums domestically and 7,750,642 singles.[9] The band had three million-selling singles in the U.S. with "Light My Fire", "Hello, I Love You" and "Touch Me". After Morrison's death in 1971, the surviving trio released two albums Other Voices and Full Circle with Manzarek and Krieger sharing lead vocals. The three members also collaborated on the spoken word recording of Morrison's An American Prayer in 1978 and on the "Orange County Suite" for a 1997 boxed set. Manzarek, Krieger and Densmore reunited in 2000 for an episode of VH1's "Storytellers" and subsequently recorded Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors with a variety of vocalists.
"Break on Through (To the Other Side)"
"Break On Through (To the Other Side)" is a song by The Doors from their debut album, The Doors. It was the first single released by the band and was unsuccessful compared with later hits, reaching only number 126[2] in the United States. Despite this, it became a concert staple and remains one of the band's signature and most popular songs.
Piece of My Heart
"Piece of My Heart" is a romantic love song written by Jerry Ragovoy and Bert Berns and originally recorded by Erma Franklin in 1967. The song came to greater mainstream attention when Big Brother and the Holding Company (featuring Janis Joplin on lead vocals) covered the song in 1968 and had a much bigger hit with it.
Third Stone from the Sun
"Third Stone from the Sun" (or "3rd Stone from the Sun") is a mostly instrumental composition by American musician Jimi Hendrix. It incorporates several musical approaches, including jazz and psychedelic rock, with brief spoken passages. The title reflects Hendrix's interest in science fiction and is a reference to Earth in its position as the third planet away from the sun in the solar system.
White Rabbit
"White Rabbit" is a song written by Grace Slick, and recorded by the American psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane for their 1967 album, Surrealistic Pillow. It was released as a single and became the band's second top-10 success, peaking at number eight[2] on the Billboard Hot 100.
Big Brother and the Holding Company
Big Brother and the Holding Company is an American rock band that formed in San Francisco in 1965 as part of the same psychedelic music scene that produced the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service, and Jefferson Airplane. They are best known as the band that featured Janis Joplin as their lead singer. Their 1968 album Cheap Thrills is considered one of the masterpieces of the psychedelic sound of San Francisco; it reached number one on the Billboard charts, and was ranked number 338 in Rolling Stone's the 500 greatest albums of all time. The album is also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.
Blues Incorporated
Blues Incorporated were an English blues band formed in London in 1961.
Cheap Thrills
Cheap Thrills is a studio album by American rock band Big Brother and the Holding Company. It was their last album with Janis Joplin as lead singer. For Cheap Thrills, the band and producer John Simon incorporated recordings of crowd noise to give the impression of a live album, which it was subsequently mistaken for by listeners. Only the final song, their cover of "Ball and Chain", had been recorded live at The Fillmore in San Francisco.
Country Joe and the Fish
Country Joe and the Fish was an American psychedelic rock band formed in Berkeley, California, in 1965. The band was among the influential groups in the San Francisco music scene during the mid- to late 1960s. Much of the band's music was written by founding members Country Joe McDonald and Barry "The Fish" Melton, with lyrics pointedly addressing issues of importance to the counterculture, such as anti-war protests, free love, and recreational drug use. Through a combination of psychedelia and electronic music, the band's sound was marked by innovative guitar melodies and distorted organ-driven instrumentals which were significant to the development of acid rock.
Derek and the Dominos
Derek and the Dominos were a blues rock band formed in the spring of 1970 by guitarist and singer Eric Clapton, keyboardist and singer Bobby Whitlock, bassist Carl Radle and drummer Jim Gordon. All four members had previously played together in Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, during and after Clapton's brief tenure with Blind Faith. Dave Mason supplied additional lead guitar on early studio sessions and played at their first live gig. Another participant at their first session as a band was George Harrison, the recording for whose album All Things Must Pass marked the formation of Derek and the Dominos.
Disraeli Gears
Disraeli Gears is the second studio album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in November 1967[6] and went on to reach No. 5 on the UK Albums Chart.[7] It was also the group's American breakthrough, becoming a massive seller in 1968, and reaching No. 4 on the American charts.[8] The album was No. 1 for two weeks on the Australian album chart and was listed as the No. 1 album of 1968 by Cash Box in the year-end album chart in the United States.[9] The album features the two singles "Strange Brew" and "Sunshine of Your Love".
1968 Democratic Convention
During the latter half of the 60s, anti-war protests became much more violent. At the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, protestors clashed with the police in the streets.
Electric Lady Studios
Electric Lady Studios is a recording studio located at 52 West Eighth Street in Greenwich Village, New York City. It was originally built by Jimi Hendrix and designed by John Storyk in 1970. Hendrix spent only four weeks recording in Electric Lady before his death, but it has since been used by many notable artists.
Hard rock
Hard rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music that began in the mid-1960s, with the garage, psychedelic, and blues rock movements. It is typified by a heavy use of aggressive vocals, distorted electric guitars, bass guitar, drums, and often accompanied with pianos and keyboards. Hard rock developed into a major form of popular music in the 1970s, with bands such as Led Zeppelin, The Who, Queen, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Aerosmith, AC/DC and Van Halen.
Duane Allman
Howard Duane Allman (November 20, 1946 - October 29, 1971) was an American guitarist, session musician, and co-founder and leader of the Allman Brothers Band until his death in a motorcycle crash in 1971, when he was 24 years old. The Allman Brothers Band was formed in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1969. The band had great success in the early 1970s. Allman is best remembered for his brief but influential tenure in the band and in particular for his expressive slide guitar playing and inventive improvisational skills.[1] In 2003, he was ranked number 2 in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time, second only to Jimi Hendrix. In 2011, he was ranked number 9.[2] His guitar tone (achieved with a Gibson Les Paul and two 50-watt bass Marshall amplifiers) was named one of the greatest of all time by Guitar Player.
Power Chord
In guitar music, especially electric guitar, a power chord is a colloquial name for a chord that consists of the root note and the fifth. Power chords are commonly played on amplified guitars, especially on electric guitar with distortion. Power chords are a key element of many styles of rock and especially in heavy metal, and punk rock.
Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane was a rock band based in San Francisco, California, who pioneered psychedelic rock. Formed in 1965, the group defined the San Francisco Sound and was the first from the Bay Area to achieve international commercial success. They were headliners at the three most famous American rock festivals of the 1960s—Monterey (1967), Woodstock (1969) and Altamont (1969)—and the first Isle of Wight Festival (1968) [1] in England. Their 1967 break-out album Surrealistic Pillow ranks on the short list of most significant recordings of the "Summer of Love". Two songs from that album, "Somebody to Love" and "White Rabbit", are among Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Songs of All Time."
Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix was an American rock guitarist, singer, and songwriter. Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame describes him as "arguably the greatest instrumentalist in the history of rock music".
John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers
John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers were an English blues rock band, led by singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist John Mayall, OBE. Mayall used the band name between 1963 and 1967, but then dropped it for some fifteen years. However, in 1982 a 'Return of the Bluesbreakers' was announced, and the name was in use until the band again dissolved in 2008, to be resurrected again in 2009. The name has become generic, without a clear distinction between recordings that are to be credited to Mayall alone and recordings that are to be credited to Mayall and his band.
Merry Pranksters
Ken kesey and friends who did the acid tests. They began in the summer of 1964. They traveled around the country in a neon bus called "Further"
Owsley Stanley
Owsley Stanley was an American audio engineer and chemist. He was a key figure in the San Francisco Bay Area hippie movement during the 1960s and played a pivotal role in the counterculture of the 1960s. Under the professional name Bear, he was the soundman for the rock band the Grateful Dead, whom he met when Ken Kesey invited them to an Acid Test party. As their sound engineer, Stanley frequently recorded live tapes behind his mixing board. Stanley was the first private individual to manufacture mass quantities of LSD. By his own account, between 1965 and 1967, Stanley produced no less than 500 grams of LSD, amounting to a little more than ten million doses at the time.
Woodstock
The Woodstock Music & Art Fair—informally, the Woodstock Festival or simply Woodstock—was a music festival attracting an audience of over 400,000 people, scheduled over three days on a dairy farm in New York state from August 15 to 17, 1969, but ultimately ran four days long, ending August 18, 1969. Billed as "An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music", it was held at Max Yasgur's 600-acre (240 ha; 0.94 sq mi) dairy farm in the Catskills near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel. Bethel, in Sullivan County, is 43 miles (69 km) southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, in adjoining Ulster County. During the sometimes rainy weekend, 32 acts performed outdoors before an audience of 400,000 people. It is widely regarded as a pivotal moment in popular music history, as well as the definitive nexus for the larger counterculture generation
Haight-Ashbury
Haight-Ashbury is a district of San Francisco, California, named for the intersection of Haight and Ashbury streets. It is also called The Haight and The Upper Haight. The neighborhood is known for its history of, and being the origin of hippie counterculture.
Hippie
A hippie (or hippy) is a member of a liberal counterculture, originally a youth movement that started in the United States and the United Kingdom during the mid-1960s and spread to other countries around the world. The word hippie came from hipster and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into New York City's Greenwich Village and San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district. The term hippie was first popularized in San Francisco by Herb Caen, who was a journalist for the San Francisco Chronicle. The origins of the terms hip and hep are uncertain, although by the 1940s both had become part of African American jive slang and meant "sophisticated; currently fashionable; fully up-to-date". The Beats adopted the term hip, and early hippies inherited the language and countercultural values of the Beat Generation. Hippies created their own communities, listened to psychedelic music, embraced the sexual revolution, and used drugs such as marijuana, LSD, peyote and psilocybin mushrooms to explore altered states of consciousness. In January 1967, the Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco popularized hippie culture, leading to the Summer of Love on the West Coast of the United States, and the 1969 Woodstock Festival on the East Coast. Hippies in Mexico, known as jipitecas, formed La Onda and gathered at Avándaro, while in New Zealand, nomadic housetruckers practiced alternative lifestyles and promoted sustainable energy at Nambassa. In the United Kingdom in 1970, many gathered at the gigantic Isle of Wight Festival with a crowd of around 400,000 people. In later years, mobile "peace convoys" of New Age travelers made summer pilgrimages to free music festivals at Stonehenge and elsewhere. In Australia, hippies gathered at Nimbin for the 1973 Aquarius Festival and the annual Cannabis Law Reform Rally or MardiGrass. "Piedra Roja Festival", a major hippie event in Chile, was held in 1970. Hippie fashion and values had a major effect on culture, influencing popular music, television, film, literature, and the arts. Since the 1960s, many aspects of hippie culture have been assimilated by mainstream society. The religious and cultural diversity espoused by the hippies has gained widespread acceptance, and Eastern philosophy and spiritual concepts have reached a larger audience.
Acid Rock
Acid rock is a loosely defined type of rock music that evolved out of the mid-1960s garage punk movement and helped launch the psychedelic subculture. The term, which derives its name from lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), is sometimes deployed as a synonym of "psychedelic rock", but it may also refer to a more musically intense subgenre or variation of the psychedelic rock style. Acid rock is generally defined by distorted guitars, lyrics with drug references, and long improvised jams. Distinctions between other genres can be tenuous; it may also encompass certain garage rock, 1960s punk, proto-metal and heavy, blues-based hard rock. Developing from the American West Coast, acid rock did not focus on novelty recording effects or whimsicalness as much as subsequent British psychedelia. Rather, American groups emphasized the heavier qualities associated with the positive and negative extremes of the psychedelic experience. As the movement progressed into the late 1960s and 1970s, elements of acid rock split into two directions, with hard rock and heavy metal on one side and progressive rock on the other. In the 1990s, the stoner metal genre combined acid rock with other hard rock styles such as grunge, updating the heavy riffs and long jams found in acid rock and psychedelic-influenced metal.
American Beauty
American Beauty is a studio album by rock band the Grateful Dead. Released November 1, 1970, by Warner Bros. Records, the album continued the folk rock and country music style of their previous album Workingman's Dead, issued earlier in the year. Though the Americana approach is still evident in the songwriting, comparatively the sound focused more on folk harmonies and major-key melodies, showing influence from Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young.
Ken Kesey
An American novelist, essayist, and countercultural figure. He considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. Kesey was born in La Junta, Colorado and grew up in Springfield, Oregon, graduating from the University of Oregon in 1957. He began writing One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in 1960 following the completion of a graduate fellowship in creative writing at Stanford University; the novel was an immediate commercial and critical success when published two years later. Subsequently, he moved to nearby La Honda, California and began hosting happenings with former colleagues from Stanford, miscellaneous bohemian and literary figures (most notably Neal Cassady), and other friends under the imprimateur of the Merry Pranksters; these parties, known as Acid Tests, integrated the consumption of LSD with multimedia performances. He mentored the Grateful Dead (the de facto "house band" of the Acid Tests) throughout their incipience and continued to exert a profound influence upon the group throughout their long career. Sometimes a Great Notion—an epic account of the vicissitudes of an Oregon logging family that aspired to the modernist grandeur of William Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha saga—was a commercial success that polarized critics and readers upon its release in 1964, although Kesey regarded the novel as his magnum opus.
Jerry Garcia
An American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, best known for his work with the band the Grateful Dead, which came to prominence during the counterculture era in the 1960s. Though he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader or "spokesman" of the group.
Lizard King
An alter ego of Doors lead singer Jim Morrison, to imitate a Native American shaman. Shamans identified strongly with an animal deity. Jim chose the lizard, which included the ability to shed his skin (leather pants, which he wore chronically). It may also be said he chose a Tyrannosaurus rex for "dinosaur fear" -- the theory that we have a genetic memory from the time when dinosaurs not only ruled the earth, but also snacked on our furry ancestors. References to the "Lizard King" and his greeting have since appeared in pop culture and entertainment, such as role-playing and computer games, animated cartoons, comics and literature.
Are You Experienced
Are You Experienced is the debut studio album by English-American rock band the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Released in 1967, the LP was an immediate critical and commercial success, and it is widely regarded as one of the greatest debuts in the history of rock music. The album features Jimi Hendrix's innovative approach to songwriting and electric guitar playing which soon established a new direction in psychedelic and hard rock music. By mid-1966, Hendrix was struggling to earn a living playing the R&B circuit as a backing guitarist. After being referred to Chas Chandler, who was leaving the Animals and interested in managing and producing artists, Hendrix was signed to a management and production contract with Chandler and ex-Animals manager Michael Jeffery. Chandler brought Hendrix to London and began recruiting members for a band designed to showcase the guitarist's talents, the Jimi Hendrix Experience. In late October, after having been rejected by Decca Records, the Experience signed with Track, a new label formed by the Who's managers Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp.
Frank Zappa
Frank Vincent Zappa[nb 1] (December 21, 1940 - December 4, 1993) was an American musician, composer, songwriter, producer, guitarist, actor, and filmmaker whose work was characterized by nonconformity, free-form improvisation, sound experiments, musical virtuosity, and satire of American culture.[2] In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed rock, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestral and musique concrète works, and produced almost all of the 60-plus albums that he released with his band the Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. Zappa also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed album covers. He is considered one of the most innovative and stylistically diverse rock musicians of his generation.
Freak Out!
Freak Out! is the debut studio album by the American rock band the Mothers of Invention, released June 27, 1966, on Verve Records. Often cited as one of rock music's first concept albums, the album is a satirical expression of frontman Frank Zappa's perception of American pop culture. It was also one of the earliest double albums in rock music (Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde was originally scheduled to precede it by a week, but its release was delayed until more than a month later), and the first 2-record debut. In the UK the album was originally released as an edited single disc. The album was produced by Tom Wilson, who signed The Mothers, formerly a bar band called the Soul Giants. Zappa said many years later that Wilson signed the group to a record deal in the belief that they were a white blues band.[2][3] The album features Zappa on vocals and guitar, along with lead vocalist/tambourine player Ray Collins, bass player/vocalist Roy Estrada, drummer/vocalist Jimmy Carl Black and guitar player Elliot Ingber, who later joined Captain Beefheart's Magic Band under the name Winged Eel Fingerling
Grace Slick
Grace Barnett Slick is an American singer-songwriter, musician, artist, and former model, widely known in rock and roll history for her role in San Francisco's burgeoning psychedelic music scene in the mid-1960s. Her music career spanned four decades, and involved the Great Society, Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship, and Starship, as well as a sporadic solo career. Slick provided vocals on a number of iconic songs, including "Somebody to Love", "White Rabbit", "We Built This City" and "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now".
Jim Morrison
James Douglas "Jim" Morrison (December 8, 1943 - July 3, 1971) was an American singer, songwriter, and poet, best remembered as the lead singer of The Doors.[1] Due to his lyrics, wild personality, performances, and the dramatic circumstances surrounding his life and death, Morrison is regarded by critics and fans as one of the most iconic and influential frontmen in rock music history. Morrison co-founded The Doors in the summer of 1965 in Venice, California. The band spent two years in obscurity until shooting to prominence with the #1 single in the USA, "Light My Fire", taken from their first album. Morrison recorded a total of six studio record albums with the Doors, all of which sold well and received critical acclaim. Though The Doors recorded two more albums after his death, the loss of Morrison was crippling to the band, and they disbanded in 1973. In 1993, Morrison, as a member of The Doors, was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Janis Joplin
Janis Lyn Joplin was an influential American singer of the 1960s; her raw, powerful and uninhibited singing style, combined with her turbulent and emotional lifestyle, made her one of the biggest female stars in her lifetime. She died of an accidental drug overdose in 1970, aged 27, after releasing three albums. A fourth album, Pearl, was released a little more than three months after her death, reaching number 1 on the charts. Joplin rose to fame in 1967 during an appearance at Monterey Pop Festival, as the lead singer of the then little-known San Francisco psychedelic rock band Big Brother and the Holding Company. After releasing two albums with the band, she left Big Brother to continue as a solo artist with her own backing groups, first the Kozmic Blues Band and then the Full Tilt Boogie Band. She appeared at the Woodstock festival and the Festival Express train tour. Five singles by Joplin went into the Billboard Top 100, including "Me and Bobby McGee", which reached number 1 in March 1971. Her most popular songs include: "Piece of My Heart"; "Cry Baby"; "Down on Me"; "Ball 'n' Chain"; "Summertime"; Maybe; and "Mercedes Benz", the final song she recorded.
Progressive Rock Radio
Progressive rock is a radio station programming format that prospered in the late 1960s and 1970s,in which the disc jockeys are given wide latitude in what they may play, similar to the freeform format but with the proviso that some kind of rock music is almost always played. The name for the format came from around 1968, when serious disc jockeys were playing "progressive 'music for the head'" and discussing social issues in between records. When FM broadcasting licenses were first issued by the FCC, broadcasters were slow to take advantage of the new airwaves available to them because their advertising revenues were generated primarily from existing AM broadcasting stations and because there were few FM radio receivers owned by the general public. This void created an opportunity for the disenchanted youth counterculture of the 1960s to express itself by playing music that was largely ignored by mainstream outlets. In this sense, progressive rock radio was more of a social response than a product marketed to fill a need. This change coincided with the greater emphasis on albums as opposed to singles in the rock market. Hugely popular albums such as The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant did not contain any singles, so there was clearly a need for a radio format that would explore beyond the Top 40. This in turn led to rock artists placing greater emphasis on long or experimental album tracks, knowing they could still receive radio airplay.
Quicksilver Messenger Service
Quicksilver Messenger Service (sometimes credited as simply Quicksilver) is an American psychedelic rock band formed in 1965 in San Francisco. They were most famous for their biggest hit, the single "Fresh Air" (from the album Just for Love), which reached #49 in 1970.
Riot on Sunset Strip
Riot on Sunset Strip is a 1967 low-budget counterculture-era exploitation movie, released by American International Pictures. It was filmed and released within six weeks of the late-1966 Sunset Strip curfew riots. The film stars Frank Alesia, Aldo Ray, Mimsy Farmer, Michael Evans, Anna Strasberg, Laurie Mock, Gene Kirkwood, Tim Rooney, and features musical appearances by The Standells and The Chocolate Watch Band. Earlier that year, Farmer, Mock and Kirkwood appeared in the cult classic Hot Rods to Hell, where Farmer portrayed the bad girl and Mock a vulnerable virgin. In this film, they switched characters. The film attempts to capture the essence of the period around the Sunset Strip riot, and also adds a subplot that revolves around a young girl's troubled relationship with her divorced parents. Her dosage with LSD by a would-be seductor, the subsequent 'acid trip' she experiences, and her later discovery by a police sergeant as the victim of gang rape, are among the movie's peak moments. The film is now available on DVD through the MGM Limited Edition Collection.
Rolling Stone Magazine
Rolling Stone is an American biweekly magazine that focuses on popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner, who is still the magazine's publisher, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its musical coverage and for political reporting by Hunter S. Thompson. In the 1990s, the magazine shifted focus to a younger readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors, and popular music. In recent years, it has resumed its traditional mix of content.
Santana
Santana is an American Latin rock band formed in San Francisco, California in 1966 by Mexican-American guitarist Carlos Santana. The band first came to widespread public attention when their performance of "Soul Sacrifice" at Woodstock in 1969 provided a contrast to other acts on the bill. This exposure helped propel their first album, also named Santana, into a hit, followed in the next two years by the successful Abraxas and Santana III.
Electric ballrooms
Shows held with complex light shows and LSD
Surrealistic Pillow
Surrealistic Pillow is the second album by American rock band Jefferson Airplane, released on February 1, 1967, by RCA Victor (LSP-3766 [stereo] and LPM-3766 [mono]).[1] It is the first album by the band with vocalist Grace Slick and drummer Spencer Dryden. The album peaked at number three on the Billboard album chart and has been certified a gold album by the RIAA.
The Grateful Dead
The Grateful Dead was an American rock band formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California. Ranging from quintet to septet, the band is known for its unique and eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, psychedelia, improvisational jazz, country, folk, bluegrass, blues, reggae, and space rock, for live performances of lengthy instrumental jams, and for their devoted fan base, known as "Deadheads". "Their music," writes Lenny Kaye, "touches on ground that most other groups don't even know exists. These various influences were distilled into a diverse and psychedelic whole that made the Grateful Dead "the pioneering Godfathers of the jam band world". The band was ranked 57th by Rolling Stone magazine in its The Greatest Artists of all Time issue. The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994 and their Barton Hall Concert at Cornell University (May 8, 1977) was added to the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress. The Grateful Dead have sold more than 35 million albums worldwide. The Grateful Dead was founded in the San Francisco Bay Area amid the rise of the counterculture of the 1960s. The founding members were Jerry Garcia (lead guitar, vocals), Bob Weir (rhythm guitar, vocals), Ron "Pigpen" McKernan (keyboards, harmonica, vocals), Phil Lesh (bass, vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums). Members of the Grateful Dead had played together in various San Francisco bands, including Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions and the Warlocks. Lesh was the last member to join the Warlocks before they became the Grateful Dead; he replaced Dana Morgan Jr., who had played bass for a few gigs. Drummer Mickey Hart and nonperforming lyricist Robert Hunter joined in 1967. With the exception of McKernan, who died in 1973, and Hart, who took time off from 1971 to 1974, the core of the band stayed together for its entire 30-year history.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
The Jimi Hendrix Experience was an American-English rock band that formed in Westminster, London, in September 1966. Singer, songwriter, and guitarist Jimi Hendrix, bassist and backing vocalist Noel Redding, and drummer Mitch Mitchell comprised the group, which was active until June 1969. During this time, they released three studio albums and became one of the most popular acts in rock. In April 1970, Hendrix, Mitchell, and bassist Billy Cox performed and recorded until Hendrix's death on September 18, 1970. This later trio was sometimes billed as the "Jimi Hendrix Experience", but the title was never formalized. Highly influential in the popularization of hard rock and psychedelic rock,[7] the Experience was best known for the skill, style, and charisma of their frontman, Jimi Hendrix. All three of the band's studio albums, Are You Experienced (1967), Axis: Bold as Love (1967) and Electric Ladyland (1968), were featured in the top 100 of the Rolling Stone list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, at positions 15, 82 and 54 respectively. In 1992, the Jimi Hendrix Experience was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Monterey international pop festival
The Monterey International Pop Music Festival was a three-day concert event held June 16 to June 18, 1967 at the Monterey County Fairgrounds in Monterey, California. Crowd estimates for the festival have ranged from 25,000-90,000 people, who congregated in and around the festival grounds. The fairgrounds' enclosed performance arena, where the music took place, had an approved festival capacity of 7,000, but it was estimated that 8,500 jammed into it for Saturday night's show. Festival-goers who wanted to see the musical performances were required to have either an 'all-festival' ticket or a separate ticket for each of the five scheduled concert events they wanted to attend in the arena: Friday night, Saturday afternoon and night, and Sunday afternoon and night. Ticket prices varied by seating area, and ranged from $3 to $6.50 ($22-47, adjusted for inflation). The festival is remembered for the first major American appearances by The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Who and Ravi Shankar, the first large-scale public performance of Janis Joplin and the introduction of Otis Redding. The Monterey Pop Festival embodied the theme of California as a focal point for the counterculture and is generally regarded as one of the beginnings of the "Summer of Love" in 1967; the first rock festival had been held just one week earlier at Mount Tamalpais in Marin County, the KFRC Fantasy Fair and Magic Mountain Music Festival. Because Monterey was widely promoted and heavily attended, featured historic performances, and was the subject of a popular theatrical documentary film, it became an inspiration and a template for future music festivals, including the Woodstock Festival two years later.
The Mothers of Invention
The Mothers of Invention were an American rock band from California that served as the backing musicians for Frank Zappa. Formed in 1964, their work is marked by the use of sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Originally an R&B band called the Soul Giants, the band's original lineup included Ray Collins, David Coronado, Ray Hunt, Roy Estrada and Jimmy Carl Black. Zappa was asked to take over as the guitarist following a fight between Collins and Coronado, the band's original saxophonist/leader. Zappa insisted that they perform his original material, changing their name on Mothers Day to the Mothers. After record executives objected to the name it was changed. Zappa later said "out of necessity, we became the Mothers of Invention." After early struggles, the Mothers earned substantial popular commercial success. The band first became popular playing in California's underground music scene in the late 1960s. Under Zappa's helm, it was signed to jazz label Verve Records as part of the label's diversification plans. Verve released the Mothers of Invention's début double album Freak Out! in 1966, featuring a lineup including Zappa, Collins, Black, Estrada and Elliot Ingber. Don Preston joined the band soon after.
Wall of Sound
The Wall of Sound (also called the Spector Sound) is a music production formula developed by American record producer Phil Spector at Gold Star Studios in the 1960s, with assistance from engineers Stan Ross, Larry Levine, and the session musician conglomerate known as "the Wrecking Crew".
Dr. Timothy Leary
Timothy Francis Leary (October 22, 1920 - May 31, 1996) was an American psychologist and writer known for advocating the exploration of the therapeutic potential of psychedelic drugs under controlled conditions. Leary conducted experiments under the Harvard Psilocybin Project during American legality of LSD and psilocybin, resulting in the Concord Prison Experiment and the Marsh Chapel Experiment. Leary's colleague, Richard Alpert (Ram Dass), was fired from Harvard University on May 27, 1963 for giving psilocybin to an undergraduate student. Leary was planning to leave Harvard when his teaching contract expired in June, the following month. He was fired, for "failure to keep classroom appointments", with his pay docked on April 30. Leary believed that LSD showed potential for therapeutic use in psychiatry. He used LSD himself and developed a philosophy of mind expansion and personal truth through LSD. He popularized catchphrases that promoted his philosophy, such as "turn on, tune in, drop out", "set and setting", and "think for yourself and question authority". He also wrote and spoke frequently about transhumanist concepts involving space migration, intelligence increase, and life extension (SMI²LE), and developed the eight-circuit model of consciousness in his book Exo-Psychology (1977). He gave lectures, occasionally billing himself as a "performing philosopher". During the 1960s and 1970s, he was arrested often enough to see the inside of 36 different prisons worldwide. President Richard Nixon once described Leary as "the most dangerous man in America".
Sunset strip/Whiskey a go go
Whisky a Go Go is a nightclub in West Hollywood, California. It is at 8901 Sunset Boulevard on the Sunset Strip. The club has been the launching pad for bands including System of a Down, The Doors, The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, Steppenwolf, Van Halen, Johnny Rivers, Guns N' Roses, Linkin Park and Mötley Crüe. In 2006, the venue was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Who Are the Brain Police?
Who Are the Brain Police? is a Frank Zappa song, performed by The Mothers of Invention, released on the Mothers' debut album, Freak Out!. It was released by Verve Records as a single in 1966. Zappa stated that the song was one of religious theme.
Workingman's Dead
Workingman's Dead is the fourth Grateful Dead studio album. It was recorded in February 1970 and originally released on June 14, 1970. The album and its studio follow-up, American Beauty, were recorded back-to-back using a similar style, eschewing the psychedelic experimentation of previous albums and focusing on Americana-styled songcraft.
