West Coast vs. West Coast

from wikipedia article on Santana:

"The group's first audition with this line up was at the Avalon Ballroom in the late summer of 1967. After the audition, Chet Helms the promoter, in concert with The Family Dogg, told the band that they would never make it in the San Francisco Music Scene playing Latin fusion and suggested Carlos keep his day job washing dishes at Tick Tock's Drive-In on 3rd St."

there's also just more sf-in-1969 in sly's music whereas like ccr's whole thing is that there really isn't and people to this day think it's a southern band

Closing night at the Fillmore West in '71 was Santana, Creedence Clearwater Revival, the Grateful Dead, and Quicksilver Messenger Service. CCR must have been viewed by Bill Graham and by the audience as being in the general orbit of those bands. (If the argument is that they were radically different in terms of style and attitude, sure; but the Mothers and Mamas & Papas seem worlds apart too.)

http://www.wou.edu/las/creativearts/music/209guideFinal.pdf

33. Were the lyrics and the sound of Creedence Clearwater Revival typical of the San Francisco scene? If not, what were the differences?

obviously the answer to this FINAL EXAM is no, they were not

dude iatee, the seminal band of the whole scene was the Charlatans FFS! they played old timey music and dressed up like cowboys in victorian suits! CCR's whole style fit perfectly into the SF scene at the time. have you listened to early Grateful Dead? ever heard moby grape or quicksilver messenger service?

ccr don't even have a hint of psychedelic in their sound

again do you really think the answer for that FINAL EXAM is yes, of course it's not, so I have a western oregon university professor on my side now

Your answer is right in the question, iatee: "of the San Francisco scene." It's like asking if X-Ray Spex's sound was typical of the British punk scene circa 1977. It wasn't. Which doesn't mean X-Ray Spex wasn't part of that scene.

I would have loved to have been at any of Fifty Foot Hose's SF gigs in '67-'68. They're sort in the same camp as United States Of America, but plugged into that particular ley line of Bay Area Bummer Psychosis that The Residents, Negativland, etc. also mined.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cq-A8BouRg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WRd-MP30MY

a billboard article from nov 14, 1970 has convinced me I am wrong

I will not quote the parts that show why I am wrong and quote this part instead, because it is more interesting:

"Gleason feels like one of the most overlooked aspects of the San Francisco scene is the fact that urban renewal hadn't destroyed old buildings, so that ballrooms and clubs still existed.

The physical elements were present in Los Angeles, Chicago, but not in Boston, New York. I mean the old ballrooms, clubs, the possibility of communicating to the youth-hippie-university audience quickly and in an open way." Gleason points out. "What has happened in San Francisco hasn't happened in any other city. I don't think it could happen anywhere else. The Bay Area has a particularly homogenous nature and the radio is open."

I thought iatee was kidding at first, but he's not--the article starts on page 6.

I think I'll have to do a Markov Chain Analysis or something to figure out my vote. I'd forgotten I had this, which has some great stuff out of L.A. (half of it too early for this poll).

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51YoMBmOQnL.jpg

Trini Lopez tips this to LA for me.

(half of it too early for this poll).

it's funny though the timeframe of the question isn't really defined beyond just '60s in general, so we really should be including Phil Spector, surf music, etc. on LA's side too.

shout out to it's a beautiful day, stoneground, sons of champlain

i'm always meaning to check out more country joe.

cold blood!

the timeframe of the question isn't really defined beyond just '60s in general

I guess I was thinking from '65 to the end of the decade--that's how I interpreted the post that triggered the poll. So someone like Ritchie Valens is much too early.

Looks like CCR was playing quite a bit in San Francisco in '68
http://www.kolumbus.fi/~w419755/ccr-jcf/set.htm

Dino & Carlo's, San Francisco. In 1968, [CCR] played there each Tuesday.

What a brave band to log all those miles, commuting 15 miles one way from their "very, very different city"... if only if it was as easy as getting from Topanga to Hollywood.

its not there's a bridge

love the byrds and buffalo springfield but between santana, airplane, dead, It's a beautiful day, sly, blue cheer, steve miller band.. gotta go with norcal.

ccr don't even have a hint of psychedelic in their sound

I can't even... 20-minute versions of R&B songs? check. backwards tape effects? check. fanciful lyrics about circus animals and cowboys? check.

CCR and Sly were both huge parts of the Bay Area scene, the distinguishing factor between them and the rest of the shit is the fact that they wrote better songs. like, 3 minute pop songs that were catchy and well-written and impeccably executed.

a lot of this is admittedly just cause I don't want any reason to defend the rest of the sf scene

which was full of terrible terrible music

also the beach boys are better than every single norcal band in history so

Shit I didn't know this stuff was going to be on the final. Since Fogerty has such a distinctive voice and wrote one of the most amazing strings of hit singles in pop history it doesn't make sense to describe the band as "typical" in any way. But their old timey southern affectations were a more commercialized development of the types of influences that had been big in the bay area music scene since the early '60s folk music revival. Bands like the Charlatans and the Grateful Dead started out as old time jug bands and eventually created country rock hybrids mixing psychedelic rock with their southern folk and blues influences. The Beau Brummels (basically the first SF rock band) released their country rock album Bradley's Barn (recorded at and named after the famous Nashville studio) the same year as CCR's debut. Quicksilver Messenger Service even played Suzie Q in their live sets. Southern blues and folk influences were completely integrated into the SF music scene from the beginning.

big xp to iatees way upthread stuff

Did the early San Francisco rock stars live in seclusion or among "regular" people?

Bear in mind that the Sunset Strip is not even in LA proper, it's in the incorporated city of West Hollywood.

Other random thoughts:

Let's not forget Canned Heat on the LA side.

What about people like Lee Hazlewood/Nancy Sinatra, Neil Diamond, Sonny & Cher...?

I honestly wonder which would be more fun in reality, going to a show at the Whiskey or to a show at the Fillmore or Avalon, circa 1966. Isn't it true that the Fillmore didn't serve alcohol?

yeah, for anyone to seriously vote SF just seems like challops of the worst kind to me. LA was the center of the musical world for a few years there at arguably the pinnacle of recorded music history. It wins just on sheer volume alone. That is, if you actually like this kind of music at all. TBH I don't really get anyone who doesn't basically like every band mentioned in the thread so far.

I'd probably vote LA for Hal Blaine alone.

..sorry

la put out some pretty pop songs, sf took us to outer spaces/extra dimensions

cozmik blues shredd, ecstatic soul

yeah clem I meant that specific scene the doors sprung out of, wasn't even thinking beach boys never mind nilsson, van dyke parks, monkees - that would just make the gap larger, though i also forgot how involved sly was w/ sf scene and also thought ccr weren't really part of that scene for some reason. think in some ways this is a doors vs jefferson airplane poll.

1st 5 steve miller band albums: one of the best album runs of the late 60s.

la put out some pretty pop songs, sf took us to outer spaces/extra dimensions

shit, LA surf bands already did that back when bay area nerds were still learning to tune up their banjos.

its not there's a bridge

nope, no bridge from San Jose to San Francisco. that would be Oakland to San Francisco. San Jose is about 40 miles though.

la put out some pretty pop songs, sf took us to outer spaces/extra dimensions

shit, LA surf bands already did that back when bay area nerds were still learning to tune up their banjos.

Hell, David Axelrod's production work was equally as spaced out - just in another direction.

Was always wondering if SF's elitism was from sour grapes that the LA bands all made more money.

wrong side of the bay, bee ok

Otm re: 50 Foot Hose btw, Elvis. Another cool SF band (tho they actually formed in Ohio) is Mad River.

xp

wrong side of the bay, bee ok

what i was saying is that you don't need a bridge to get from San Jose to San Francisco.

Dionne would know

shit no she didn't know!

wtf does san jose have to do with anything? ccr was from el cerrito

but let's talk about Count Five or Chocolate Watchband if you want to

for anyone to seriously vote SF just seems like challops of the worst kind to me

This really pushes a button with me. I assure you, I'm too old for such nonsense; if I post something here, it's because that's how I actually feel. Merely starting with CCR and Sly on one side, of course someone can legitimately prefer San Francisco. In my case, when you revere the Airplane and are kind of tired of the Beach Boys, and the Charlatans and Beau Brummels just happened to hit upon this sound you love--"Alabama Bound" is as drony and as mysterious as the Velvets for me--then it's even easier.

Having said that,

don't really get anyone who doesn't basically like every band mentioned in the thread so far

sums up my own feelings well (i.e., that I basically like every band, not that I can't imagine someone else disliking some of them). Of the first 20 bands I listed, the Doors, Steve Miller, Love, and Quicksilver Messenger Service mean the least to me. But there are songs I like by all of them. I'm not that big a Country Joe fan--but I had "Janis" in a Top 100 list I posted a couple of years ago. There's just so much amazing music here, from top to bottom and on both sides.