Whoa glad this thread topped, reminds me my interlibrary loan copy of San Francisco Nights Psychedelic Music Trip is overdue. They lean on you pretty hard for interlibrary. Hey man I'm just doing my thing, this library trip is a plastic hassle.
So far all I can come up with on Murray is this quote from "San Francisco Nights," (Sculatti 1985). Great SF music primer thx @Michael "It (Quicksilver) was a sound designed to flay away the superfluous and late in '67, founding member Jim Murray himself proved expendable. With his departure, the group reached its creative apex . . ." Looks like they gave him one of these:
I read somewhere that once Quicksilver became more professional (i.e. constant practice), Murray bailed... I'm just surprised that a guy who was in a leading SF band for a couple of years (from inception?) and played Monterey, was barely quoted, interviewed etc in the plethora of books that covered that scene. Then again, maybe he was an incredibly boring person...lol
We lived in the East Bay from 1968 to 1972 and just missed the age of Aquarius. I experienced the age of People's Park, tear gas and Blue Meanies instead. Still it was interesting times. Our youngest daughter was born in San Francisco (UC Medical Center) and she sort of became a flower child. I do indeed like psychedelic music.
Unmistakeable Airplane influence here, in a far flung offshoot of San Francisco sound that surfaced in Zambia in the early 1970s, along with other rock influences, in the African crucible of "Zamrock": "Black Power" Peace
West Coast Natural Gas, out of Seattle. My ex's AA sponsor was the girlfriend or wife of _____, then later moved to L.A. and became the girlfriend of a lot of rock stars and then transitory wife of a few, stage dancer at The Whiskey A Go Go. The stories she can tell. Really amazing person, shed that crazy skin and has an illuminated spirit now. This song might be about her.
I grew up in Southern California but always felt connected to San Francisco. Friends lived there, we hitchhiked there, we drove there, we stayed there many, many times. Everyone should drive the Pacific Coast Highway in a convertible from L.A. to San Francisco at least once. One of the most beautiful drives in the world. There was a kind of famous guitar teacher (Ted Greene) who lived in the San Fernando Valley and did not like what he called the "San Francisco vibrato", too nervous and busy sounding. I did like it, not as a steady diet but as something different. Cipollina, Big Brother etc. Then there was The Dead. Life changing for me and more than a few others. That's me long ago and far away ... a half century. We used to patch those jeans until there was nothing left.
Quicksilver Messenger Service 1967-5-30 Post under construction, trying to remember the trick to posting a link to Internet Archive. Did it a few months ago but forgot how. http://archive.org/details/qms1967-05-30.sbd.flac16/02+Pride+Of+Man.flac#
Thanks! Just figured it out - deleted the "s" from https then pasted into url box. Or something equally forgettable which I already could not repeat.
always loved the San Jose 1966 recording ... pretty clear https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLq8hafG1bk2xAE_utTvizK9alLahaUTHM
The cover art of Blows Against the Empire is a Russian laquer art design. Kantner was a fan of this art form. Originally developed ages ago for icon painting. Russian lacquer art - Wikipedia Russian folk tales are often depicted, this is from one of the Firebird stories. Other examples: Do you know which story this last one is from?
I have a deck of Russian playing cards that look like that, too nice to play with! I liked the bogus newspaper gatefold of Volunteers... every LP should have extras like that! The San Francisco 'sound' to me has more of a rural blues underpinning than the Los Angeles area 'sound', just as much folk but also a touch of Spike Jones. I don't think San Francisco would've become as big a thing in it's day had L.A. not closed most live venues, especially those teens or young adults went to, while SF still had a healthy live venues scene, plus the posters... which really became their 'thing'. The posters travelled farther and wider than many of the groups. Both outlying areas and places in-between had great garage groups and labels.
