by Robert Wilkinson
Saint Swithun's Day is the birthday for two radically different awesome talents, each remarkable in their own way. Because of the quantity of incredibly great tunes for your listening and dancing enjoyment, we begin the party early and dance through this afternoon and evening!
Linda Ronstadt (July 15, 1946) needs no introduction to most of us. She's been a major talent since the 60s, when she broke into the national charts with the Michael Nesmith penned "Different Drum," and from there went on to be a huge part of inventing the "Southern California sound" with Jackson Browne, Waddy Wachtel, the Eagles, J. D. Souther, and a hundred other major talents.
She's won ten Grammys, an Emmy, and countless other awards and nominations. This "First Lady of Rock" has collaborated with too many major talents to list here, and has worked for human rights for many years. She's a truly classy lady, and has given us some great tunes over the years, so without further ado, here are a few from the magnificent Linda Ronstadt! We'll begin with the song that introduced this awesome talent to the world, "Different Drum"
From 1976, live and backed by one of the greatest bands on Earth (with Waddy Wachtel, Andrew Gold, Kenny Edwards, Dan Dugmore, Brock Walsh and Michael Botts), here’s Linda doing "You're No Good"
From the Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour in 1970, Linda singing "Long Long Time." Here's Linda and Bobby Darin doing "Long Long Time"
From very early in her career, here’s Linda on The Midnight Special in 1973 doing ”Long, Long, Time,” "You're No Good" and “When Will I Be Loved.”
From 1975, a b/w gem from the Capitol Theater in Passaic, NJ, of Linda giving us "Desperado,"
From 1976 at Rockpalast, Linda very live belting out “Silver Threads and Golden Needles” which we’ll follow with our birthday girl doing the legendary Lowell George truck drivin’ tune “Willin’”
Linda doing Little Feat! Live in London in Nov 1976, the classic “Willin’”
From 1977 in Atlanta, I found a performance of Linda doing the Warren Zevon masterpiece “Poor Poor Pitiful Me,” and the Martha and the Vandellas smash hit "Heatwave”
Here’s the whole show, except for the clips not allowed in the US. The link takes you to the first clip, and the rest autoload. Linda Ronstadt Live in Atlanta - 1977"
Linda giving us her version of the Roy Orbison hit, "Blue Bayou"
Linda in 1978 doing the Buddy Holly prototypical rockabilly smash, "That'll Be the Day."
Linda doing the legendary hit by the Everly Brothers, "When Will I Be Loved"
Linda interpreting the great Cat Stevens hit, "First Cut Is The Deepest"
While the whole show has disappeared, I found this clip from her Live in Hollywood 1980 HBO special with 7 of the 12 songs she did! Linda Ronstadt Live in Hollywood - 1980 (“You’re No Good,” “Just One Look,” “Desperado,” “Blue Bayou,” “Party Girl,” “Back in the USA,” and “First Cut is the Deepest.”)
From that gig, here’s Linda doing the Doris Troy hit, "Just One Look."
In 1986, she wound up on stage in a great live performance from Hail Hail Rock and Roll where we have Linda, Keef Richards, Robert Cray, and the Master cranking out “Back in the USA.”
From Letterman in 1999, the Trio of Linda, Dolly, and Emmylou live performing Neil Young's "After the Gold Rush"
Here's their extraordinary album. Trio and the second, Trio II
And because the song is so cool, we'll close this birthday celebration with Linda in 1975 at Balboa Stadium doing a good time version of "Heat Wave"
For our first encore, Linda at her 1976 Rockpalast show doing smoking versions of ”You’re No Good” and "Heat Wave"
Last year we had her entire 48 minute show in London from 1976 but it’s gone. So instead, from the same tour, for our second encore, I found the entire hour and 16 Rockpalast show in November! Linda Ronstadt Live in Offenbach, Germany - 1976
Thanks to friend of the site Steve Taylor, here's a 90 min. gem from the Library of Congress! Off The Record - the Linda Ronstadt Interview 1986
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We now move into a birthday tribute to my old friend from Austin, the legendary Roky Erickson (July 15, 1947 - May 31, 2019). He was the screaming lead vocalist for the Thirteenth Floor Elevators, the first band to feature the word "psychedelic" on an album cover. They were the prototypical psychedelic sound created by amazing songs, guitar work, and an electric jug bass that was tuned by adding to or subtracting from the amount of weed inside of it! (That's the legend, anyway. How he actually got that amazing sound is another story. But the band was seriously into LSD for a while, and of course everyone smoked.) And all this in "2 to life for a joint" redneck Texas in the mid-60s!!
They made the pilgrimage to San Francisco in the Autumn of 1966 to promote their single “You’re Gonna Miss Me,” where they shared bills with Quicksilver Messenger Service, the Great Society with Grace Slick, and Moby Grape. No doubt the Elevators had more than a little effect on many of the bands playing around those parts because of the radically original style of their music and playing. The 13th Floor Elevators may have been uneven talents at times, but it was no doubt due to the radical amounts of hallucinogens ingested by all the players during that very psychedelic time in history.
The Elevators, and Roky's story as well, read like epic tragedies of an era when experimentation was in, when we sang that "The Kingdom of Heaven is Within You," and believed that a little rebellion against the machine would be relatively harmless, which of course it wasn't. I met him after he had been discharged from Rusk State Hospital and was still in the Austin State Hospital, and helped promote and produce a couple of his first appearances after leaving that gothic institution where Friday night movies and dances inspired such tunes as "I Waltzed (Walked) With A Zombie," "Creature With the Atom Brain," "Two Headed Dog," and other very interesting songs.
Rather than go any further into the legend here, we'll move into the videos. There's precious little live video performances of the band, and most of the Elevators' music out there are from the studio recordings set to stills. But I found a bit, so enjoy one of the most unique sounds in the history of modern music! For your enjoyment, Roky Erickson and the Thirteenth Floor Elevators!
Here's where the legend began! Rare footage of Roky and the Elevators in September 1966 on Where the Action Is lip-synching to their national hit "You're Gonna Miss Me" with lots of closeups of Tommy Hall and his electric jug! (Dick called them “the Sixteenth Floor Elevators…..)
Here's another appearance on American Bandstand from October of that same year (with some very strange camera effects) with the Elevators lip-synching to "You're Gonna Miss Me" Last year’s clip featured the interview after the song. When Dick asks Tommy "who's the head" Tommy responds "We're all heads." Wow. This wasn’t the Monkees, folks! This year the whole clip is gone, but here’s the 1 minute interview. "You're Gonna Miss Me"
To give you a sense of just how pioneering the Elevators' sound was, here are a few off their first two studio albums, set to pictures and the album covers:
From their first album The Psychedelic Sounds of the Thirteenth Floor Elevators, "Roller Coaster" and "Reverberation (Doubt)"
Here’s an “uptempo” version of this magnificent tune, live in Houston in 1967! “Reverberation”
Here’s a reverb and echo drenched live version, slower and a bit sloppier, but they were still unique! “Reverberation”
Super rare footage from a radio interview followed by a live performance of “Fire Engine”
A real treat! This is the “B” side of “You’re Gonna Miss Me,” and a lot faster tempo than the album, which is far more laid back. "Tried to Hide" Here’s the version on the album, with a more laid back driving groove. "Tried to Hide"
Here’s the exciting "Fire Engine"
This year I have a gem! It’s an unused alternate take from the recordings of the first album, with a lot less production and a cleaner sound. “Roller Coaster.”
Here’s a live performance by the Elevators at the Avalon Ballroom in 1966 of “Fire Engine”
Last year I had the audio of “Roller Coaster” from the Avalon gig, but it’s disappeared this year.
A few covers from that gig! They took a shot at the Kinks with this version of “You Really Got Me,” and went full R&B with “Before You Accuse Me.” Here’s a very strange cover of “Roll Over Beethoven.” We’ll close with one of the stranger renditions of the Beatles’ tune “The Word”
Here’s 43 minutes of that show! The 13th Elevators Live at the Avalon Ballroom – September 1966
From that West Coast tour, here’s a great interview (sounds like an LA DJ) followed by some very grainy live performance footage of the Thirteenth Floor Elevators of “Fire Engine”
Two from the first album! "Don't Fall Down" and "The Kingdom of Heaven Is Within You"Here’s the entire live show from the La Maison club in Houston in 1965 or 1966 of a classic Elevators performance! I put them in order of the set list.
“the Kingdom of Heaven is Within You.”“She Lives In A Time of Her Own”
Moving into the studio, here's the amazing poetic masterpiece which said to be a "transcendental epic." From their second album Easter Everywhere, "Slip Inside This House"
Also from Easter Everywhere, "Levitation" and the equally awesome "Earthquake" The album ended with this strange psychedelic soul tune “Pictures (Leave Your Body Behind)”
This was a promotional copy sent to DJs, and is longer than what was released on the album. "Earthquake"
Here are four of Stacy Sutherland's extraordinary psychedelic compositions from Bull of the Woods. If you listen closely, you’ll hear things that influenced more than a few musicians during the Bay Area psychedelic music years. Some of his playing could easily have been an influence on mid-60s Jefferson Airplane or Quicksilver at the beginning of their careers.
"Scarlet and Gold"And a royal treat! The astonishing closing number of that album, written by Roky, and exquisitely delivered by Stacy, set to a video of the band performing some other song back when drenched in a red hue. "May The Circle Remain Unbroken"
The following are all live performances set to still photos or other types of video effects:
From May 1966, a live recording of the Elevators set to a very interesting visual doing their hit "Roller Coaster"
It resurfaced again. Here’s the audio of the band live on The Larry Kane Show in Houston doing "Don't Fall Down"
Unfortunately the weird clip by the 13th Floor Elevators of one of a very strange version of “Roll Over Beethoven” plus an even stranger version of the Beatles’ “The Word” have disappeared. However, I found this from very psychedelic Austin in 1967 (when Gilbert Shelton and the Furry Freak Brothers still lived there), the gentle psychedelic folk song “I Had To Tell You” (Last year I had “Roll Over Beethoven” and “The Word” but they’ve disappeared.)
Also from Austin in 1967, “Fire In My Bones”
The Elevators doing Van Morrison's hit "Gloria"
Here they are doing the Kinks smash hit "You Really Got Me"
Last year I had the entire 78 minute set of The Thirteenth Floor Elevators Reverberation in the Round - Live At the Houston Music Theater from 1967, but it’s gone. However, I found these three clips from that classic show!
Here are entire 13th Floor Elevator albums!
The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators (1966 – 35 minutes)
Easter Everywhere (1967 – 43 minutes)
The first two were pretty much done at the same time, and the band disintegrated shortly after Easter. That left Stacy to assemble what he could of a band, and this features his songwriting, both solo and with Tommy Hall.
Bull of the Woods (1969 – 34 minutes)
It’s gone again. Every so often a copy of their unreleased 1968 album, A Love That’s Sound shows up, but this year it’s disappeared, as has the clip of “Wait for my Love” which I had last year.
Here are a few single clips from that album!
“Sweet Surprise (Sign of the Three Eyed Men)”
Last year I had the whole 64 minute album from 1999 titled 13th Floor Elevators – Singles and Rare Stuff, but this year it’s nowhere to be found. This year it’s still gone, as is the 121 minute 1999 gem with some true rarities, Thirteenth Floor Elevators – His Eye Is On the Pyramid. I also had a monster 2 hour 26 clip from one of the oldest TFE fan groups on the web, with all their studio material on one clip, but Thirteenth Floor Elevators – Attack of the 8 Tracks is gone.
We’ll close this Elevators section with our intro clip from Where the Action Is in September 1966 with the band doing what they do best to a backing track, cranking out the unmistakable psychedelic sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators at their peak, screaming and howling, giving us the classic “You’re Gonna Miss Me”
This year we’ve lost a classic show. It was some serious kinetic energy from a 1966 live show at the New Orleans Club at 11th and Red River in Austin Texas, which was one of my hangouts from 1969 to the early 70s, and is now part of the Symphony Square complex. From February and March 1966, it’s said to be the earliest recording of a live 13th Floor Elevators show, but this year these two short sets of the Elevators live courtesy of KAZZ are gone. Better luck next year.
This year I found this great 3 hour clip with several live performances from a 1966 radio show, several tunes from the Sumpin’ Else TV show, some of the La Maison 1966 concert, some of the Avalon Ballroom set, the electric Grandmother show, and a few by Roky from 1973 and 1984. 13th Floor Elevators Live in Texas – The Ultimate Live Collection 1966-1984
In a final nod to the Elevators, here’s a 39 minute documentary on the band. 13th Floor Elevators Documentary “You’re Gonna Miss Me.”
Here are a few from Roky post-Elevators:
Last year I had the entire 41 minute original haunted studio album from 1975 titled I Think of Demons but it’s nowhere to be found. Instead, I found a later reincarnation of that album titled The Evil One (This album is awesome. It’s worth your time to hear it, since it’s a classic by a classic! And yes, it’s haunted. The alternate mix album has disappeared.)
Here’s a live gem by Roky and the Aliens from 1975! It’s the full 1 hour 20 minute audio only set at Berkeley! Roky Erickson & The Aliens Live at the Longbranch Saloon, Berkeley - 1975
Here's the original Sponge EP version of "Mine Mine Mind." As the video notes explain, "this record was released in 1976 or 1977, just after Roky's release from the Texas mental institution. The demons he suffered from as a result of the inhumane treatment there were expressed in a series of recordings that were done at several smaller studios." From that ep, another of his classics from that nightmare, the harrowing "Two Headed Dog (Red Temple Prayer)"
From The Evil One another tune of his experience at the Texas State Hospital during their "weekend dances." It was also titled "I Waltzed With A Zombie." For your "rock and roll chord progression" enjoyment with Roky doing his best Mick Jagger impersonation in "I Walked With A Zombie."
The 56 minute clip from 1977 of Roky Erickson and the Aliens Live in San Francisco has disappeared, as has their hour and 20 show Live at Berkeley that same year.
Roky really took off when he was backed by the Explosives, a major Austin legend, featuring Cam King on lead, Roky on rhythm and vocals, Walter Collie on bass, and Fred Krc on drums. This year we have the entire 1979 album for your enjoyment! Casting the Runes
From that album, classic "Mine Mine Mind" From the same album, here they are doing "Night Of The Vampire."
Roky and the Explosives also have a live album recorded in 1979 at the legendary Raul’s in Austin (where I used to hang and promoted a few shows). In fact, I recorded one of his shows there in 1979. The master tape was stolen just after the last note, and I never did find out who took it. The tape I had last year titled Roky and the Explosives Live at Raul’s 1979 has disappeared from you tube and is nowhere to be found.
From Winter Solstice 1979, an entire 45 minute set at Houston’s Rock Island club! Roky Erickson & The Explosives (live) Rock Island, 1979
Here’s 18 clips of live material in that era! Roky and the Explosives - Halloween Live 1979-81
From 1980, a live performance of "Two Headed Dog"
From 1980, Roky doing "Creature with the Atom Brain"
At his birthday, Roky Erickson doing "Two headed dog" & "Starry Eyes"
From his album All That May Do My Rhyme, one of my favorite songs he's ever written, "Starry Eyes"
His hour and 7 b/w live clip in Baton Rouge in 1982 during his very haunted period has disappeared.
Here's "Stand For the Fire Demon," from Demon Angel, a video done about this amazing legend. As the site says, "A Rare glimpse into the mind and music of Roky Erickson, one of American Rock's most influential and inspirational singer-songwriters. Demon Angel contains live performance footage shot on Halloween night, 1984 in Austin, Texas. Roky performs his songs solo on electric and acoustic guitar and in duet with guitarist/producer Mike Alvarez."
Also from 1984, a live acoustic version of "Night Of The Vampire"
Here's studio version of Roky and the Aliens doing "Cold Night For Alligators." (He really was pretty haunted!)
Here's the album version of "Stand for the Fire Demon"
From 1993, a great live birthday performance in Austin at La Zona Rosa by Roky and the Mystic Knights of the Sea of 4 of his best!
From the same show, "Red Temple Prayer (Two Headed Dog)"
From the Paramount Theater in Austin, TX in July 2007. A live performance of "Don't Shake Me Lucifer"
From 2005, a legendary appearance at the Saxon Pub. Here’s 39 minutes of Roky Erickson and the Explosives Live at the Austin City Limits Music Festival - 2005
Back on Austin City Limits in 2007 with the Explosives and Billy Gibbons on lead, here’s 23 minutes of Roky ready to rip it up! This is an exceptionally good show! Roky Erickson on Austin City Limits 2007
Last year I had the full hour and 25 set at Oyafestivalen 2007, but it’s disappeared. However from that show, here’s one of his greatest! Roky Erickson Live at the Oyafestivalen – “Two Headed Dog (Red Temple Prayer)” Simply awesome, and Cam’s solo is exquisite. From that same show, Roky Erickson Live at the Oyafestivalen – “Cold Night for Alligators”
The full hour and 16 video clip of the show in Sweden in June 2007 is gone, but I found two clips of 30 minutes each!
Roky Erickson and the Explosives Live at Hultsfred, Sweden – Pt. 1
Roky Erickson and the Explosives Live at Hultsfred, Sweden – Pt. 2
The clip with the full 38 minute set at the El Rey Theater in LA on Halloween has disappeared, but I found this 16 minute video of Roky and the Black Angels in a totally raucous performance of “Hey Bo Diddley!” Roky Erickson and the Black Angels at the El Rey - 2008.
Last year I had 6 tunes from his December 2010 Rockpalast show, but they’re gone. Instead, here’s the first 44 minutes of the show! Roky Erickson and the Explosives Live at Rockpalast - 2010
Set list: ”Cold Night for Alligators,” “Don’t Shake Me Lucifer,” "Starry Eyes," “The Wind and More,” “Bloody Hammer,” “Reverberation,” “Don’t Slander Me,” “John Lawman,” the Thirteenth Floor Elevators hit, “Roller Coaster," his twisted versions of two of his more twisted tunes (both written about his time in a state hospital participating in "dances" with other residents of that institution), "I Walked With A Zombie" and "Two Headed Dog." (Last year I had the end, a medley of old and new with “Reverberation" and "Don't Slander Me," but they’re nowhere to be found.)
Here’s what he did in his final years.
From April 2016 in Copenhagen, an entire hour and 16 show! Roky Erickson Live in Denmark 2016
In Austin March 2017, “Night of the Vampires”
Going back to LA, here’s his one hour show at the Roxy in 2017. Roky Erickson at the Roxy in Hollywood - 2017
We'll close this birthday celebration for a true American legend with three from Stockholm, performed live in December 2010. For your enjoyment,
And to make sure the "circle is unbroken," we end with two performances of the tune that brought Roky to international fame, the first from Stockholm in 2010! "You're Gonna Miss Me."
Now it’s back to our intro clip from Where the Action Is in October 1966 with the band doing what they do best to a backing track, cranking out the unmistakable psychedelic sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators at their peak, screaming and howling, giving us the classic “You’re Gonna Miss Me”
A most happy and merry to you, Linda and Roky. It’s sad that we lost Linda’s voice and she no longer performs, and Roky checked out not long ago. Roky, I am truly happy you found peace and prosperity after so many years of neither.
© Copyright 2024 Robert Wilkinson
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