The BEST country rock band... no one ever heard of!..

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 27 Jan 2011 6:03 am

Jesus wept!.. I play the Euphoria LP to see if people I know are as deranged as I am, the greatest psyche-country LP ever! (apparently the steel parts are by Lloyd Green from the Nashville portion of the LP sessions, eg the rest was cut in LA, with the orchestra parts cut in the UK)

One of the Euphoria members cut a solo LP for Capitol in 1971, well, it was him, Richard Greene, his missus and some others.. under the name Addie Prey. It didn't come out, but a CD-R is officially available via CDBaby.

Free Beer are a good country-rock band, some other obscure delights are the Wildweeds (1970 LP on Vanguard), Timber (two early 70s LPs), Clean Living (two early 70s LPs on Vanguard), Feather, Heartfield, Uncle Jim's Music (1971 and '72 LPs), Chris Darrow's early 70s solo debut, Bob Carpenter's super obscure Reprise LP "Silent Passage" from '75, Buckwheat have some good stuff from '70-74, but can be a hit-and-miss affair.
Country Funk have a great little self-titled LP from 1970, shimmering psyche country to more standard,.. but mellow country-rock. Kangaroo's 1968 LP 'Kangaroo' on MGM sounds like a country-rock Blue Cheer.. lossa fun. Canadian transplants Jericho have a 1971 self-title LP, sounds like a prog version of the Band. Also lossa fun!

Rio Grande's 1971 LP on RCA is a must, and features forumite Bob Tuttle on steel. Oh yeah, there's a great little west coast combo called Santa Fe, two albums in the early 70s. They were on the same label as Mason Proffit, and when Warner Bros. took over the label, I guess they only wanted one awesome country-rock band, and Santa Fe issued ther second LP on their management's tiny label.

Then there's UK country-rock bands like Cochise, Country Fever, Heads-Hands & Feet, Quiver, Home, and Plainsong, Mighty Baby.. to name a few, and yes there's Ian Matthews various ventures, but thay have been well discussed here.

There's some great country rock from here (Australia), The Dingoes and Bluestone both had great self-titled debut LPs from '74, Country Radio, Stars, Axiom..(they're a bit more rural rock)

Cowboy were Capricorn's stab at the country-rock market, and the label's first new band after the Allman Bros. A gorgeous band, the first two albums from 1970-71 are in a mellow Poco-vein. The latter material, is as already mentioned, basically Boyer-Talton, and real good stuff.

Morning are an excellent rural-rock combo, the review of their debut in Billboard Magazine; November 28 1970, starts "Morning, a subtle six-man West Coast rock band, has an auspicious disk debut with this Vault album. Their sound is clean, rather than overpowering. All 12 cuts are worthy of note."
Also a more recent review here:
http://therisingstorm.net/morning-morning/

And it's been reissued on Cd.

There's also a myspace page:
http://www.myspace.com/morningfromthe70s

There's also a great rural-rock outfit called the Stalk-Forrest Group, kind of like the Workingman's Dead-American Beauty era Greatful Dead meets C,S&N and Moby Grape.. real intense jamming and super harmonies as well. Elektra nixed their 1970 LP, although acouple of CD version have surfaced since 1998. The band later became Blue Oyster Cult of "Don't Fear The Reaper" fame.

Kevin Hatton · Post by **Kevin Hatton** » 27 Jan 2011 6:24 am

If you like that steel work above on "Morning", that is indeed the genius of Al Perkins on his Fender 1000. See allmusic.com.

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 27 Jan 2011 6:44 am

Dave Mudgett, sorry I doubled up on some of the links you used.

Have you ever heard the band Eagle, the Boston spin-off band from The Beacon Street Union?.. their 1970 LP on Janus mixes rural-rock and Rolling Stones tye stompers like "Kickin' It Back To You" .. which is better than anything the Stones did after '72 (then again, I hate Goats Head Soup and It's Only Rock n' Roll..)

Red Rhodes appears on the lone LP by Bamboo on Elektra from '69, that's actually a rather adventurous rural-rock album as well.

Bob Carlucci · Post by **Bob Carlucci** » 27 Jan 2011 8:58 am

Dennis Ellerbee wrote:One band most people never heard of was Fools Gold. This was Dan Fogelburg's back up band for several years. They put out two albums. Some good steel work, but I am not sure who played on the albums. Great vocals.

Real good band with great steel work by Doug Livingston who is a member here under a funny name.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 27 Jan 2011 4:28 pm

Just to refresh memories, I espoused about the virtues of "Fools Gold" for many years, here.

Here are some cuts:

I Will Run - http://picosong.com/YTD

Rain, Oh, Rain - http://picosong.com/YHd

Choices - http://picosong.com/YUJ

Sailing To Monterey - http://picosong.com/YUE

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 27 Jan 2011 9:08 pm

I always get the Fools Gold albums mixed up, is Doug on both?
Doug Livingston is also on the White Horse LP from '77 as a sideman, there's a recent topic about that LP floating around.

Dave Harmonson · Post by **Dave Harmonson** » 27 Jan 2011 10:57 pm

Just opened up this thread. An old friend of mine had one or two of the Free Beer LP's back in the mid 70's and we used to play a few of their tunes. I think one was "That's The Way It Always Here In Baltimore". I heard a female singer covering the tune in the last year or so. Can't remember who. Might've been The Wailing Jennies. Anybody else remember this tune and remake?

Joachim Kettner · Post by **Joachim Kettner** » 28 Jan 2011 7:01 am

Jason Odd mentioned Cochise. They were a british band from the seventies feat. B.J. Cole and Mick Grabham.
Cochise (they looked different):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V96IkArc ... re=related
A solo piece by B.J. Cole from a Cochise album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjKHUMfLuOg

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 28 Jan 2011 8:15 am

Also, "Clean Living" was based in the Northampton/Amherst MA area; and "The Wildweeds" were from the Hartford CT area.

Two local greats, for sure. Al Andersen (Wildweeds) went on to become a pretty prolific songwriter.

The Wildweeds had a charting hit with "No Good To Cry".

NGTC - http://picosong.com/9Ae

Jonathan Shacklock · Post by **Jonathan Shacklock** » 28 Jan 2011 12:59 pm

Jason, I'm definitely not as deranged as you...but trying!

Lloyd Green eh? That's as good a reason as any to buy Euphoria - the vinyl reissue anyway, I hear the original goes for BIG money. I'm going to have many happy hours rummaging for the records on your list as well as the others on this thread

Bob Carlucci · Post by **Bob Carlucci** » 28 Jan 2011 3:46 pm

Chip Fossa wrote:Just to refresh memories, I espoused about the virtues of "Fools Gold" for many years, here.

Here are some cuts:

I Will Run - http://picosong.com/YTD

Rain, Oh, Rain - http://picosong.com/YHd

Choices - http://picosong.com/YUJ

Sailing To Monterey - http://picosong.com/YUE

Doug exhibits some seriously ferocious chops on
I will Run.. I was dumbfounded when I first heard it in the 70's...
I could be mistaken but I think he played an MSA as well at that time... I remember that because I played an MSA in the 70's and every other steel player I knew at the time was telling me that MSA's didn't "sound good"... Well Doug's sound was killer on that album... bob

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 29 Jan 2011 6:47 am

I agree Bob,

"I Will Run" is my favorite song on that LP. His licks weave in and out beautifully, and tone to die for - bassy, but not too bassy. Even though my steel was up to pitch, it just wasn't quite in tune with Doug's steel. I think he played some sort of B6 or B9 tuning. Maybe he'll chime in, and let us know.

It's deceptive, because you can hear "A-B" pedal squashing, but it's definitely not E9.

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 29 Jan 2011 10:01 pm

Al Anderson and the Wildweeds as mentioned earlier, are indeed a great band. Their one LP, issued on Vanguard in 1970 is another gem.

Al's contactual early 70s solo LP for Vanguard is basically an un-official second Wildweeds LP, and a little more sing-songwriter, but fantastic.

I'm going to do a post about this, but an expansion of an old Mike Nesmith-Red Rhodes bootleg has had a proper reissue.

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Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 30 Jan 2011 12:51 am

Chip Fossa wrote: and tone to die for - bassy, but not too bassy. Even though my steel was up to pitch, it just wasn't quite in tune with Doug's steel. I think he played some sort of B6 or B9 tuning. Maybe he'll chime in, and let us know.

It's deceptive, because you can hear "A-B" pedal squashing, but it's definitely not E9.

Thanks for the nice words. I do remember that night overdubbing on that song ("I Will Run") because it was very trying and frustrating for me as an inexperienced steel player trying to play at that tempo. I had to punch in nearly every phrase and then of course discuss it before moving on. The guitar was MSA 12 string with a C6/F9 universal tuning. It is not E9 but it might as well be since I think I only played the high strings and used just the A&B pedals. It was recorded direct (no amp/speaker) through a passive pedal, probably my DeArmond.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 30 Jan 2011 4:22 am

Thanks EB,

Super single-note lines, too. I gotta say, for an "inexperienced" steeler, that was a monumental effort.

Thanks for giving us that insight.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 30 Jan 2011 4:51 am

That box-set looks great, Jason.

Just how much is 38 pounds in US currency?

John Stewart is one of my all time favorites. I think it was Dave Guard who he replaced early-on in the Kingston Trio. He's always been a great songwriter and guitarist. A real 'folksinger'. RIP

John Stewart "California Bloodlines" http://picosong.com/9Tq

John Stewart "Never Goin' Back" (w/wild steel ala Lloyd Green) http://picosong.com/9TR

Ronald Ballister · Post by **Ronald Ballister** » 31 Jan 2011 10:26 am

Euphoria is one of my favorites. Picked up the CD from Collector's choice several years ago. Somewhere between the late Beatles and Nashville---varied and interesting. I researched it at the time---its Weldon Myrick on steel. First heard "And When She Smiles" on an old Ian Matthews album. Found out it is was originally a Wildweeds tune and tracked down the CD long ago. Great song!

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 1 Feb 2011 10:57 pm

The updated Euphoria CD (remastered and out on Cherry Red in the UK) is a better version than the 90s CD reissue on See For Miles. (which also had a few errors in the notes).
Of course the original 1969 Capitol Records vinyl copy is supposed to be great as well.

The chap who researched the more accurate and informative notes on the new CD reissue of the Euphoria set told me that after interviewing the band (really a duo at that point) it was confirmed that it was indeed Lloyd Green.

The wonderful Weldon Myrock is on that Wildweeds LP, so good!

Chip, I would guess the cost of that set wound be around $67.00 US, although I'm used to converting the Australian dollar, the US is about the same.

J.

Joachim Kettner · Post by **Joachim Kettner** » 13 Mar 2011 12:50 am

Stone Country deserves a mention here too. Read about them here:
http://therisingstorm.net/stone-country-stone-country/

Jason Odd · Post by **Jason Odd** » 13 Mar 2011 4:21 am

I love the Stone Country LP, there was an earlier version of the band pre-Steve Young, but the CD notes and the web review don't mention it.

The group played venues like the Icehouse on a fairly regular basis through '67 into '68, so one would assume that the different elements of the band, the more pop and MOR moments, were a battle of egos and taste, rather than a group that hadn't found it's sound.
I love the eclectic, but unified approach, good link to add Joachim.

Daniel Morris · Post by **Daniel Morris** » 13 Mar 2011 4:23 pm

Thanks for that link to Morning's DIRT ROAD, Ken!
I used to have that LP many years back.
It was Al Perkins on that album - I remember clearly.

Joachim, I think there were 3 albums by Cochise; I still have the first (your linked songs) on LP and CD.
I don't think the 2d and 3d were as successful, but the first had some really fine experimental moments:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rJr4JQTx28&NR=1

Joachim Kettner · Post by **Joachim Kettner** » 13 Mar 2011 11:59 pm

Daniel, thanks! What a beautiful song by Cochise. I liked Mick Grabham's contributions to Procol Harum later on.
Jason, thanks for the additional information on Stone Country. Steve Young is still making music.

Daniel Morris · Post by **Daniel Morris** » 14 Mar 2011 2:30 am

Chip: you can always check currencies at
http://www.xe.com/ucc/
Around $60US today.

David Nugent · Post by **David Nugent** » 14 Mar 2011 4:08 am

Noticed the mention of the "Wildweeds" and specifically Al Anderson, had the pleasure of seeing them play live in the '70's. If I am not mistaken, didn't this group evolve into "NRBQ"?

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 14 Mar 2011 9:25 am

Thanks Daniel for that link.

Yes, indeed, David N., Al was part of "NRBQ" for awhile.

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The BEST country rock band... no one ever heard of!..

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