1966 on the West Coast of the USA was a time where bands really were turning their dials to 11, using the dual effects of narcotics and increased amplification to move away from the traditional 3-minute single format to longer, wierder, heavier "album orientated" rock, which often consisted of single ringing chords, stop-gap time signatures and heavy distortion. Bands began to explore this relatively new genre, and furthermore had the help of not only US FM radio stations to help them (FM at the time was the hip alternative to the mainstream AM stations) but also record labels who had money to throw at musicians and sometimes weren't too fussy about what the music was like! It was a great age for making music, and a whole plethora of acts came out of the scene, which would eventually find its niche as termed alternatively "garage" or "pyschadelic" rock.
There are too many to name them all but suffice to say that people like The Byrds, It's A Beautiful Day, HP Lovecraft, Quicksilver Messenger Service and The Doors made the West Coast of 1966-68 a very good place to hear music. San Diego's Iron Butterfly could be considered among the second division of acts, with their debut album "Heavy" being released on Atlantic's "experimental" label Atco in 1967. A solid enough collection, it enjoyed modest chart
sucess but the band fragmented at the end of the year, losing their bassist, singer and guitarist. leaving only keyboardist/singer Doug Ingle and drummer Ron Bushy. An album had to be made, so with Ingle and Bushy now effectively leading the band the Butterfly took flight once more, replacing ex-guitarist Danny Weis with the then 17 year old prodigy Erik Brann and Ingle took over the sole ownership of singing from Darryl DeLoach. The real masterstroke came with the recruitment of Lee Dorman in place of Jerry Penrod. Dorman, a really fluent and inventive bassist whose melody lines became something of a signature for the band's subsequent sound, adds some heavy dropped-octave texture to this album, in contrast to Brann's somewhat scratchy guitar lines. In fact it could be said that the organ / bass combination is more important to the overall sound than the usual guitar-orientated one prevalent at the time of its release.
In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida starts with the ridiculously happy Most Anything That You Want, where Dorman puts down a fabulous sliding bassline that works to great effect with Dorman's B-movie baritone singing. A really fun bouncy song that remains one of the forgotten classics of the 1960's, followed by the quaint tripe of Flowers And Beads, a dippy surf/pysch love song with cringe-inducing lyrics "flowers and beads are one thing, but having a girl, that's something", though the utterly charming chorus redeems it. Band: "girl, he just knows he loves you now" : Ingle: "you're all I talk about, and everything I say ah".
Things start to get heavy with My Mirage, a jarring organ/guitar sound that builds up to some faintly melodramatic lyrics "my mirage, I'll be drawing you so ooo oooh uuuhnn" etc. A taster of what is to follow further on. The shorter Termination, a throwaway track and the weakest selection on offer, shows the band noodling away in an effort to create an atmosphere but failing miserably. Skip this one. The better Are You Happy marries the first two songs' lighter feel with "Mirage"'s heavier vibe and thuds along with its basic but effective falling scale. The lyrics though are still a bit lightweight: "met a pretty girl on the train last night, let me tell ya now she was groovy"...yeah.
Centrepiece of the whole release is the epic 17 minute title track. Legend has it that it was to be called In The Garden Of Eden but Doug Ingle was so faced that he couldn't pronounce it properly, and thus In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida it was. Again the lyrics are nothing special "don't you know that I love you, don't you know that I'll always be true, girl won't you come with me, and take my hand, girl won't you come with me, and walk this land....." that 's basically it.....but the music makes up for it. A blues riff in Fmaj (it is!! it is!!) all the members of the band get to have a solo: Brann, after some earlier featherweight guitar lines, showcases his scat style nicely with some edgy schizo lines; Ingle puts down an Egyptian style organ - watch out at about 11.13 in when he chucks in a sample of "God Bless Ye Merry Gentlemen"; Dorman's bass dominates the earlier part of the epic before taking a rest until the last two bars. The famous / infamous drum solo melodically takes the honours though. Bushy's use of snare / bass drum was for its time quite innovative and remains the most-remembered bit of the whole composition.
Very much an album of its time, it shot to the top of the US charts becoming the first platinum album, selling over 3 million copies in 1968-69 alone, to date something like 30 million copies all told, but as the years went by it slipped into a mere paragraph in rock history. The band struggled to follow its sucess - though they did have a big US hit with its follow up Ball - but it was more or less over. The comeback began in the late 1980's when the title track appeared in Micheal Mann's taut thriller "Manhunter" (ironically itself a film that gained kudos as the years went by) being cemented when the makers of The Simpsons put in the numerous references to the track in episodes of that ever-popular show. The band are still going, and popular enough to tour 600-700 seat venues.
In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida: for sure a long long way away from being the best album ever made, but an essential addition to your late-1960's collection if that's your bag, baby. RIP Erik Brann: 1952-2004
For the record, the bassline, after much practice, runs like this: Fmaj: A A C B F G slide up to Cmaj diminished: E Db D C Now I bet you really wanted to know that. It's a bassline that has often rocked the house in the Cheese Sandwich Towers, much to the annoyance of our square neighbours.
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Great Review. I loved this music in final shoot out in Manhunter. The Simpson's cover of this song is also among the best moments in their history.
Gary25 22.09.2008 00:20
I have the original cassette version of the Manhunter film containing this track, that I managed to track down in The States. Great song in the context of the film (I've a review of the film on Ciao).
tumblewheel 14.08.2008 13:02
Another band I knew nothing of before reading your great, informative, review.
Iron Butterfly's 1968 album veritably defined the burgeoning genre of hard-rock, primarily ... more
by way of its utterly over-the-top title cut. Reportedly composed by keyboardist/lead singer Doug Ingle in such a stoned-out, numb-tongued condition that he coul...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Iron Butterfly's 1968 album veritably defined the burgeoning genre of hard-rock, primarily ... more
by way of its utterly over-the-top title cut. Reportedly composed by keyboardist/lead singer Doug Ingle in such a stoned-out, numb-tongued condition that he coul...
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours...
Iron Butterfly's 1968 album veritably defined the burgeoning genre of hard-rock, primarily ... more
by way of its utterly over-the-top title cut. Reportedly composed by keyboardist/lead singer Doug Ingle in such a stoned-out, numb-tongued condition that he coul...
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours...
Iron Butterfly's 1968 album veritably defined the burgeoning genre of hard-rock, primarily ... more
by way of its utterly over-the-top title cut. Reportedly composed by keyboardist/lead singer Doug Ingle in such a stoned-out, numb-tongued condition that he coul...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Apr 24th, 2008
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