AM Gold - Late '60s Classics

Artists

Album Info

Release Date: 1995

Labels: Warner Special Products, Time Life Music

Time-Life released this disc as Various - Superhits - Late-'60s Classics (SUD-18) in the Super Hits series in 1992, and as Various - AM Gold - Late '60s Classics (AM1-12) in the AM Gold series in 1995.

Track durations obtained from software.

Complete liner notes:

By 1968, the Young Rascals weren't so young anymore, and neither was their era. This Long Island soul band, made up mostly of working-class Italian­Americans, had called themselves the Rascals when they signed with Atlantic, but corporate wisdom dictated that "Young" be added to the name for marketing purposes. Good Lovin', their second single, went to No. 1 in
1966. Within a couple of years, the band had enough commercial clout to demand a return to its original name.

In the spring of 1968, Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy were both assassinated, and in a show of faith in the face of such horrors, the Rascals came out with People Got to Be Free, which incorporated several stock phrases from black gospel and soul music. Atlantic didn't want to release it, but the band insisted. People Got to Be Free became the Rascals' biggest hit yet (albeit its last top-10 ever).

The late '60s have always been credited with turning rock serious and artistic, but lightweight pop never went away. The signs were everywhere. Oliver (born William Oliver Swofford) was a North Carolina lad who had come to New York with his group, the Virginians. He joined the Good Earth Trio, which was produced by veteran popster Bob Crewe, but the group quickly mutated into a duo called, simply, Good Earth. When Oliver left Crewe to go solo with his top-10 Good Morning Starshine (from the hippie musical Hair), the producer released an LP of old material including Jean, from the sound track of The
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

Kenny Rogers and the First Edition were fronted by a former New Christy Minstrel making the move from pop­folk to pop-country. Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town was written by Nashville whiz Mel Tillis, who based the song on a couple that lived near his family in his Florida hometown. The man had been wounded in Germany during World War II and was sent to recover in England, where he fell in love with his nurse. The couple married and moved to Florida, but recurring problems from his wounds sent the man back to the hospital for long periods, during which his wife would stray. Tillis reset the story in the Vietnam years and changed the ending: In real life, the vet killed his wife and himself.

Among bands, Gary Puckett and the Union Gap-formed in San Diego as the Outcasts but renamed after the town of Union Gap, Washington­got to No. 4 on their first try with Woman, Woman. On the other hand, Sweet Cherry Wine came near the end of Tommy James and the Shondells' string of hits. The New Jersey quartet the Happenings scored with a remake of George and Ira Gershwin's I Got Rhythm, from the 1930 musical Girl Crazy. Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead, from The Wizard of Oz, was the sole hit for the Fifth Estate, a Connecticut band built around MIT / Harvard student and keyboardist Wayne "Wads" Wadhams. Everything That Touches You marked the last top-10 hit for Los Angeles harmonizers the Association, while the Turtles enjoyed a second wind thanks to songs from Garry Bonner and Alan Gordon (formerly of the Canadian group the Magicians) like Happy Together and its equally confident follow-up, She'd Rather Be with Me.

Three Dog Night boasted three lead singers, each more or less responsible for finding his own material. For the group's debut sessions, Chuck Negron chose One off an album by emerging L.A. singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson. Although Frankie Valli's solo singles seemed to justify his group's reputation for light pop, with the 4 Seasons he was actually cutting much tougher material like C'mon Marianne.

The Cowsills were out-and-out bubblegum, a Rhode Island family group founded in the mid-'60s by retired naval chief petty officer William "Bud" Cowsill. The singers were his wife, daughter and four sons; the other two sons acted as roadie and sound engineer. When the clan enjoyed a short stay in the limelight with tracks like Indian Lake, television's Partride Family was created in emulation.

In England, the Tremeloes began as the backup band to Brian Poole (who had a 1963 hit there with Twist and Shout). After going out on their own, they learned Silence Is Golden off the B side of an old 4 Seasons single. The Bee Gees were the three sons of British bandleader Hugh Gibb. The family moved to Australia in 1958, and the group began recording there in 1962. They got far enough to have their own Australian television show but were unable to crack the British market until they moved back in 1967 and hooked up with manager Robert Stigwood, a business partner of Beatle boss Brian Epstein. Holiday was the type of Beatles harmony ballad that launched the first phase of their career in England and America.

On both sides of the Atlantic, middle-of-the-road singers enjoyed success with music aimed primarily at an older audience. Tom Jones's Delilah was such an overblown tale of passion and revenge that it became the song of choice for comics parodying the Welshman. American journeyman O.C. Smith traveled with the Air Force variety show in the early '50s and sang with the Count Basie Orchestra a decade later. In the late '60s he enjoyed a handful of MOR hits; chief among them was the Grammy­winning Little Green Apples, previously cut by Roger Miller and Patti Page.

Lulu was the stage name of Scotswoman Marie McDonald McLaughlin Lawrie, who first charted in 1964. Hired to play a rebellious London schoolgirl in the Sidney Poitier movie To Sir with Love, she wound up also recording the title song. Overseas, it was merely the B side to Let's Pretend, but in America it went to No. 1.

Hugo Montenegro did nearly as well with the title song from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, one of Sergio Leone's spaghetti Westerns starring Clint Eastwood. A New Yorker who had been around the Hollywood movie and music scene since 1955, Montenegro had managed Andre Kostelanetz and arranged for Harry Belafonte in addition to making his own music. Feeling out of touch before recording the sound track, he ransacked his kids' rock record collection, and he credited that with his decision to rely on novel instruments such as ocarina, electric violin and electric harmonica.

The Foundations were a real oddity. Discovered in a basement club by a London record store owner, the multiracial group had members aged 19 to 38; three were English, and the other five came from all over the Commonwealth, from Ceylon to the Caribbean. Colin Young took over lead vocals when they cut Build Me Up Buttercup, the second of the two hits they achieved.

Ain't No Mountain High Enough was Marvin Gaye's first success with Tammi Terrell, who was by far his most apt duet partner. He continued singing with the young Philadelphian (previously a member of James Brown's revue) almost until her death in 1970.

One of the biggest hits of the era was a Motown song remade by a white group. You've Made Me So Very Happy was cowritten and recorded by Brenda Holloway in 1967. Holloway, a native of Watts and the first West Coast artist signed to Motown after the label opened its L.A. office, took it only as far as No. 39. It proved her last hit after she complained that the label ignored her because she wasn't from Detroit.

Two years later, Blood, Sweat and Tears-the arty horn group begun by Al Kooper-was changing direction after its leader's departure. With newcomer David Clayton-Thomas singing, You've Made Me So Very Happy became the first of several eclectic singles for what had been an experimental album group just a short time before. But the song also established another, equally important, trend-in the next decade, it would become common practice for white groups to bolster commercially sagging careers with remakes of old Motown gems.

-John Morthland

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