Mid-West Spotlight: The Blue Things - La Do Da Da/I Must Be Doing Something Wrong

Mid-West Battle of the Garage Bands takes us to Hays, Kansas. You can't get more Mid-West than that! Today we spin the major label debut from The Blue Things.

The Blue Things were Mike Chipman, Richard Scott, Val Stoecklein, and Bobby Day. The band had released two singles on the Texas label Ruff Records when RCA came around. In came Dale Hawkins to produce a full length album cut down in Nashville. Speaking of Dale Hawkins...as usual we are going to flip the record over and spin La Do Da Da first. The Blue Things give the Dale Hawkins number a raucous, garage take. (We wrote about his original version back in September of 2014, you can hear it here.) Stoecklein's vocals are mixed deep in the record but the lead guitar work of Chapman is really something to behold. 

The A-side of the single is the band composed I Must Be Doing Something Wrong. It's a little over produced in our opinion, but not too bad. Harmonies aplenty (including some female-like falsetto) and chimey guitar give this number a nice Byrds meets The Beau Brummels folk feel to it.  

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

The South Spotlight: We The People - When I Arrive/Ain't Gonna Find Nobody (Better Than You)

We The People - When I Arrive by On The Flip-Side on Mixcloud

We The People - Ain't Gonna Find Nobody Better Than You by On The Flip-Side on Mixcloud

Day three of our Battle of the Garage Bands in The South region gives us We The People from Orlando, Florida. This is the third time we've written about the band! It's beginning to be kinda a thing with us. Last time we wrote about In The Past and that prompted a great conversation with songwriter, Wayne Proctor, over at our Facebook page. Prior to that we wrote about their scorcher in the first degree, You Burn Me Up And Down.

But today we turn to the band's final single. Released in April of 1968 on RCA Records, the band's farewell release finds the Orlando combo down from a five piece band to a four piece band. Wayne Proctor had left the band to go to college and avoid the draft and drummer Lee Ferguson had been replaced by Tommy Cox.

As usual we're going to flip the record around and spotlight the Flip-Side first. When I Arrive was written and sung by Tommy Talton, perhaps the band's most prolific songwriter. A psych-rager, When I Arrive features some blistering guitar work, defiant lyrics and great, great production. To this listener you could put this in with any UK Freakbeat compilation and it would fit right in with Wimple Winch, John's Children and the likes. The extended guitar break in the middle is nothing less than epic. The song goes into a lulling backing vocal run through a Leslie Speaker before reigniting into Talton's aggressive vocals for the finalé.

The A-Side was written and sung by guitarist David Duff who presents us with a soulful number in the vain of The Young Rascals. In an interview I recently read over at It's Psychedelic Baby, Wayne Proctor went on record that Ain't Gonna Find Nobody (Better Than You) remains his favorite We The People song of all time. We won't go that far (heck, we much prefer the Flip-Side), but we agree, it's damn good and it goes to show just how deep the talent pool was in this band, even after Proctor had departed. In reading up on this band, I must say it's also nice to hear from musicians who genuinely liked each other and walked away from their experience unified and happy with it.

Shortly after this double sided gem was released, Tommy Talton left the band. In a nice little dovetail with the last post on The Tasmanians, we can report that Tommy Talton was replaced by one Mr. Mike "Gypsy" Carns after his band dismantled about the same time.

I've lifted a few photos with permission from the aforementioned website, It's Psychedelic Baby.

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

New England Teen Spotlight: The Others - I Can't Stand This Love, Goodbye

[Please see comment section below for some updated info from one of the band members for more on this great song]

New England Battle of the Bands takes us to today to tiny little Rhode Island.

Goodbye. What a powerful, multiple-meaning word it is. The intent of the word is entirely in the tone. It can be a flat statement of departing. It can be a sad, sorrow-filled departing. It can be an anger filled statement to end a conversation. Or it can be to the tone of, as sung by Kingston, Rhode Island's The Others, something along the line of "piss off you mean mistreating girl."

The Others were formed by a bunch of University of Rhode Island college students and one student from nearby Brown University: Jim Destout, Mike Brand, Pete Shepley, John Costa and Mike Patalano. On the connections and dollars of one of their As the result of a chance meeting Mike Brand's father had with an established talent manager, Bob Marshall, the Ocean-Staters headed down to New York in June of '65 to cut some demos. Dad's connections was able to pull some strings and get  led to an RCA executive audition who liked what he heard and signed the boys on the spot. Next thing you know The Others are on a major label and opening for The Byrds and The Lovin' Spoonful.
I Can't Stand This Love, Goodbye (written by Brand and Shepley) is the first (and best) single from the boys. It was released by RCA Records in September of 1965. It features a biting guitar riff that plays throughout the song, a nasty little scream leading into a perfect guitar solo and some classic 60's garage lyrics about how all these poor, innocent teenage boys are treated poorly by runaround teenage girls. This world only existed on record, by the way.

Well I hate to leave you but I have to go, goodbye. Well you played me bad, you deserve it so...goodbye. I can't stand this love, so goodbye!

Now, ironically, I first heard this song as performed by punk pilgrims, The Damned (click here to read a Flip-Side article on the Damned). The boys from London once recorded a one-off record under the monicker of Naz Nomad and the Nightmares and this song was one of their standouts. How they came to it, is beyond me. Ironically, that same record, Give Daddy The Knife, Cindy, featured a cover of the Boston based group the Rockin' Ramrods' 1964 recording of their non-hit song, She Lied! That song got a little flip-love from us back in April. Check it out here.

I'm gonna wrap it up but, for full disclosure and for those who want more info on The Others, I suggest you check out this fine interview with drummer Mike Patalano from a site called Fancy Mag. It's got tons of cool pics of The Others.

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

Song of the Week: The Monkees - As We Go Along

The Monkees were left for dead following the "studio musician" scandal that exposed The Monkees to be a manufactured band who didn't write much of their own material or play instruments on their earliest work. Gasp! I've always defended the band. If you sit back and listen to some of the work and don't get hung up on process, just outcome, you have to admit, The Monkees put out some pretty damn good material.

The last work by The Monkees as the original band was the suicide note of a movie, Head. Co-written and produced by Jack Nicholson, musical input by Frank Zappa, songwriting by Carole King, instrumentation by The Monkees themselves (and guests). It was their swan song of sorts. Peter Tork would leave the band upon the movie's release. The lone single from the soundtrack would be the stellar Porpoise Song released on Colgems Records on October 2, 1968. (my copy above is the Aussie release on RCA).

The Flip-Side is also stellar and is our feature today. Written by Carole King, produced by Gerry Goffin, arranged by Jack Nitzsche, As We Go Along has a wonderful languid quality to it. It's remarkably un-Monkees like. Slow, acoustic guitar work with beautiful lead work throughout. It's got a loose ramble that feels like it could be from Pete Townshend's first solo album or from the Ron Wood and Rod Stewart era Faces. In fact, I would argue that it sounds a lot like a Faces song...but with a better singer. Oooh! We think you'll enjoy this one. 

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side. 

Song of The Week: The Small Faces - All Or Nothing

Yesterday we spun an Ides of March cover of The Small Faces' third single, Sha-La-La-La-Lee. So today we are going to make the obvious connection and play a Small Faces single for you. As we decided which of the many fine singles from The Small Faces to feature, we thought about how Sha-La-La-La-Lee is about our least favorite single from The Small Faces. Not bad, but just a little bit of a "meh" factor when compiling our favorite songs from the diminutive mod wonders. So we are going to with our favorite Small Faces single ever (at this moment at least. Ask me tomorrow and I may have a different single picked out).

From August of 1966, The Small Faces perform the Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane penned, All Or Nothing. We already featured the superb Flip-Side, Understanding, back in 2012, so it's only right that we flip that seven inch over and play the A-Side now. The single was released on Decca in their native UK and it was one of only two singles of the band's to be released on RCA Victor in the US. It even came with a beautiful picture sleeve. 

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

Song of the Week: The Creatures - Ugly Thing

We're winding down our Down Under focus this week and we feature, by request from Jack Hayden, The Creatures doing their RCA Records release from 1967, Ugly Thing. It's the song that inspired the Raven Records collection of Aussie bands and the now 30 year old fanzine on crazed and depraved records, Ugly Things, run by Mike Stax.

The Creatures hailed from Mildura, a rural town in Victoria. The band was centered around three brothers, Herman Marcic on bass, Eric Marcic on guitar and Rudolph Marcic on drums. Greg Lawrie was also on guitar and Keith Matcham on vocals. Matcham and Lawrie are the composers of Ugly Thing, a song about, well, I'm not too sure. Mostly because I have no idea what Keith Matcham is saying at the beginning of the song. Or for most of the song, for that matter. But it still sounds cool.

The Creatures, as you can see from the picture below, liked to dye their hair various different colors. Truly some Ugly Things. 

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

Song of the Week: Sam Cooke - A Change Is Gonna Come

Here we have the Flip-Side of Sam Cooke's 1964 single, the beautiful and gentle, A Change Is Gonna Come. 

Song of the Week: The Small Faces - Understanding

From one of all my all time favorite bands comes one of my all time favorite songs of the band. The Small Faces, newly inducted in the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame, released Understanding as the flip-side to the equally stellar All Or Nothing in 1966 on Decca Records. This is perhaps their best single ever. They were the only band to ever rival The Who for the affection of the Mods and they were certainly one of the most talented to hit the stages in their day. Not much happened for them Stateside until they scored a hit when Itchycoo Park hit number 16 in the late Summer of '67.

Click here to listen to the A-Side, All Or Nothing. 

Song of the Week: "That's All Right", Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup

We're back under the covers this morning. Today we're snuggling up with a very young Elvis Presley. In fact, musically, it doesn't get any younger. Today we're looking at Elvis' first ever recording: That's All Right, Mama made for Sam Phillips' Memphis based Sun Records in 1954. Everyone should know this recording. After all, it was one of the earliest "rock" recordings ever made and has made every Elvis Greatest Hits collection out there. It's a great upbeat song and deserves all the praise one can give it. It's just Elvis, Scotty Moore on guitar and Bill Black slapping away at the bass in a live performance in the tiny studio.

The break-out hit for Elvis has its origins from 8 years earlier when it was recorded by it's composer, Mississippi based delta blues musician Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup. Crudup's version is a surprisingly upbeat total band performance that features Crudup's tinny guitar front and center.

Click here to listen to both versions of That's All Right.