Cool British Singles Released in March 1968
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 11 ก.ย. 2024
- Once again, it's time to revisit some cool British singles released in 1968.
March 1968 was a particularly excellent month for singles.
So, without further ado, let's take a look at some great British releases from October of that year.
I got to meet Graham Nash a few years ago and I told him that the best Hollies song ever was “king Midas in reverse”, and he proudly pointed to himself and said “I wrote that song you know!”
My favourite Hollies song was 'Dear Eloise' which at the time led me to buy their album 'Butterfly'. As usual, the British (and Commonwealth) album version was superior to the US release.
Look through any window one of the greatest songs ever written and performed ✌️
"King Midas In Reverse" is my favourite Hollies tune, too. Brilliant song.
@@michaelrochester48 On the live album,Four Way Street, CSNY did an acoustic version of the song. That’s how I was first introduced to King Midas in Reverse. I don’t recall hearing the Hollies version on AM radio in 1968.
King Midas in Reverse was my favourite Hollies single as well, I thought Butterfly, released around the same time was their best album too. Part of the problem was the Hollies were never taken as anything other than a pop singles band, although John Peel did include them in his round up of "Underground" band that appears on this channel. I went off the Hollies after Graham left, though my musical tastes were changing around that time anyway which was probably the main reason. I still think the Hollies were one of the best pop bands to come out of the sixties though.
Thank you so much for posting. you have one of the best channels on youtube
Thank you!
Status Quo proves that you can walk and chew gum at the same time. In flares!
Hahaha!
... andf I'm all out of chewing gum
As a Yank who came of age in the 60s, I am absolutely fascinated by all of the British bands and music I'd never heard of back then. The British psychedelic scene was so much more groovy and spacey than the American psychedelic sound, I think. Thanks for this great series!
As a Brit I think Americans produced some fantastic psychedelia. Suzy Creamcheese by Teddy and his Patches for instance.
@@crowhillian58 13th Floor Elevators with Roky Erickson also made some good music.
Easter Everywhere was a great album, even if it isn’t well known; they did a first rate cover of Bob Dylan’s It’s all Over now, Baby Blue.
Robert Plant sings a bit like Roky Erickson, and he was also reputed to be a fan of theirs.
For those who were teenagers in the 60s this is easily the best and most interesting channel on TH-cam. 10/10
For those who were not teenagers in the 60s, too 😊
I swear. I can spend all day watching YP content. Wonderful.
Cheers!
This series keeps getting better and better.
Nice to see Kenny Everett! 🙂
That Spencer Davis Group b-side "After Tea" has two Traffic guys helping out: Chris Wood & Dave Mason. Cool track!
Nimble bread and the balloon. That brings back memories. 😁
Did you know that the first Nirvana band gave permission to the Kurt Cobain band with certain provisions to allow them to use the name without copyright violations?
They did, with financial inducement though.
Yesterday's Papers, I can't get enough of your content, so I subscribed!
Thank you very much, cheers!
Such a great channel!!
Every YP episode I hope to hear a song I used to love but havn't heard or even remembered for 60 years, and then you got to Honeybus, yaaay, thanks YP
Cheers!
I always thought Lady Madonna was a homage to Alan Price. Strangely, I never associated it with the short-lived rock 'n' roll rival moment. This nugget make your channel what it is... Fab!
60s Pop was the best Pop ❤
No doubt about that at all.
Lady Madonna sounds so much like Macca doing a great impression of the Alan Price Set. Priceless.
Yeah, McCartney loved the Alan Price Set.
Been a while since I've visited your page. And we are getting psychedelic (excellent!)
Cheers.
Why when it comes to the Hollies everyone focuses on every song except in my opinion the greatest song they ever did Look Through Any Window also one of the greatest songs of all time🤔✌️
I love that song.
You are a wise man.
I agree
I love that song. BUT they did plenty of others that were just as good.
@@paulgoldstein2569 that's why I said "In my Opinion"✌️
The very best Britpsych channel ever made on youtube, really. Thanx
I was listening to this episode as I was doing some cleaning when the Turquoise song The Ballad of Flossie Fillette came on. I was thinking, oh, that must be Ray Davies, and the Kinks, a release I had not heard before. The lead vocalist sounds just like him. Then it was mentioned the group was influenced by the Kinks, which makes perfect sense. Thank you, YP, for the trip back to 1968.
Cheers! Glad you enjoyed the video.
And it did not go unnoticed that one of the members of Turquoise had his hair parted in the middle - just like Dave Davies (and The Pretty Things' Phil May, RIP).
In 1964, that sort of thing was unheard of and scandalous, but by 1968, it was wasn't that big of a deal. See also, the bass player for The Left Banke, Tom Finn (RIP), who also wore his hair that way.
God Save The Kinks!
Excellent vlog as usual. Adore The Inner light- Chinese quote set to Indian music by a Liverpudlian. Beautiful underrated track . Apparently Humphrey Lyttleton was very philosophical about inspiring Lady Madonna - he apparently said everything is inspired by something else!
Always cited The Fabs leading the way out of psychedelia as early as Feb '68 with Lady Madonna. "The Band" would push most to abandon psychedelia and get back to roots. The remainders developed into prog.
"... the single failed to chart", thanks for these - always really interesting to hear the contemporary reviews.
Thank you! Always a great day when a new YP drops. The research is impressive, and the presentation is outstanding (all that archival footage is a treasure). Hearing "My Father's Name is Dad" hit me like a brick, I haven't even *thought* about that song in years and had to give it a relisten asap (I remember one time having a particularly unsettling acid trip that kicked off right about the time that song came on the stereo... "insane escapades"... those were the daze 😂).
Cheers! "My Father's Name is Dad" is such a great song.
As a Yank I am constantly amazed, although I'm not sure why, at the plethora of fine singles released in the psychedelic era in Britain. I've discovered so much good music listening to your excellent posts, YP..
I think I read that another reason Graham wanted out of the Hollies was they wanted to start singing Bob Dylan songs. Is that right?
Love the little touches you add like the "Why"....lol....that was exactly what I was thinking that second.
Thanks YP. You're the best!
Cheers, Willie! The Hollies ended up releasing an album of Dylan covers shortly after Graham left the band. "The Hollies Sing Bob Dylan", very forgettable LP.
@@YesterdaysPapers I think Nash did sing on one version of Blowing in the Wind but that version stinks. It sounds like a Frank Sinatra .Las Vegas gold lame suit song. What a misstep. .
@@YesterdaysPapers Not their best album. Furthermore, it was at a time when it became less fashionable to fill albums with covers. But they were planning the album before Graham left, to appear briefly on The Scaffold's Lily The Pink, and then to head for the West Coast for greener pastures.
@@YesterdaysPapers But it did sell very well, reaching #3 on the charts I think, one of their biggest album successes. The version of Blowing in the Wind that Nash does sing on is particularly bad, a total misstep by whomever did the arrangement.
You really have a great channel here he put a lot of work into the original history and the way people look at the music in the present this is very very enjoyable for me. Learn a lot about things I've not discovered yet. Thanks to you learning more about the greatest time in music history
Thanks.
Always loved "Quite Rightly So". Shame it didn't do better.
Great song.
I'm a longtime Hollies fan, but "Jennifer Eccles" was a huge step backward IMO. They had the musical and songwriting chops to do much more sophisticated material, especially as singles. Oh well...
Agree.
Yeah, too much Herman's Hermits. The Hollies were better than that.
thank you once again for some good sounds
Thanks for the very interesting facts about "my fathers name was dad" and the reasons for the failure. What a shame, that this great single never charted!
Two more notices: "Black veils" from Status Quo charted in Germany in June 68 and peaked at 36. "After tea" from Spencer Davis had been covered by German topband Rattles. The single had been issued in May 68 and was a hit, it peaked at 26.
Another great episode, looking forward to UKs Kaleidoscope and July getting a mention
Thank you. I hadn’t even heard of most of these.
Wow, what an amazing month for releases! I had no idea so many 45s now regarded as classics were all issued within a few short weeks. Musical creativity really went into overdrive that March. Thanks for bringing these tracks to a wider audience who may not be familiar with them. As ever, brilliant visuals and presentation. The closest thing to time travel for the eyes and ears!
Cheers!
The End's Introspection album is one of those that i'm surprised isn't on everyone's favorite british psych albums list. It's certainly on mine.
Agreed. One of my all-time favourite psychedelic albums.
I bought the LP after reading about Wyman's participation in Rolling Stone. At the time, I considered Wyman to be - how do I put it - tangential to the whole world of successful pop song production - because he was "only a bass player". I was curious to listen to what he could do on his own.
I thought the LP wasn't 'bad', but after four or five full listens, I never listened to it again.
PS: I hold a lot of respect for Wyman, so my comment isn't meant to be 'negative'.
Wow what a month! Another superb video
A theme was the impact of the talented younger composers- Harrison, Winwood, and Nash- maturing and needing bigger challenges. Plus, individual members of bigger bands were sharing their talents and tastes with newer bands resulting in hits and misses.
There was a 50s revival in the UK in early 68? I had no idea. As always, I learn something new with your videos. That song by Fire is rocking. That back story about McCartney taking an interest in this single is fascinating.
You make excellent videos and I dig how you bring great obscure records out into the light. Would love to see a video about the great records of Zoot Money and how he went from R&B to psychedelia and spent time with the Animals. Best to you always
Cheers Buzza! I'll probably make a video about Zoot Money sooner or later.
Some really great singles here!
The Fire and Ice brilliant bands. Interesting background on all these bands from various psych compilations we all know and love!!
Fantastic doco. Thank you for your diligent research and hard work putting this together. Not sure where I was in March 1968 Either on Niue Island, or somewhere between Niue and New Zealans, or on a ship heading for England. I know I left Niue in 1968 and started boarding school in London later that year. Listening to transistor radios after lights out, Tony Blackburn on Radio 1 was always a favourite, and Radio Luxembourg.
Interesting stuff!!! I'd not known about a lot of these recordings before. 👍👍👍
One of my very favorites channel ever!!!
Thanks!
Wow- so much here! Bought the "Introspection" CD back in the 2000s when it was reissued and loved it- impressive what Bill Wyman was up to when not holding down the bottom for The Stones. The slice of psychedelia by Lemon Tree was a treat- and penned by poor Chris "Ace" Kefford, The Move's bassist/high-end vocalist, who right about this time was forced to retire from that band due to what was said to be a drug-induced nervous breakdown (The Move IMHO was never the same after that and began the long slide into mediocrity before Idle Race leader Jeff Lynne took over and gradually transformed it into ELO, a monster '70s hit machine that nonetheless never equalled the original charm of the '66-'68 Move). The post-SW SDG obviously did not die after Winwood left, and turned out some fine music. And how can I forget Fire's phenomenal Who-like generational outburst "Father's Name Was Dad"? Never knew that Macca himself, in a (fortunately) rare lapse of musical taste and judgment, mucked things up for the song and the band by convincing them to incorporate his ideas for "improving" the song. Thanks also for Turquoise and so many others. Another superb vid, thank you YP!
Cheers! "Introspection" is one of my all-time favourite psychedelic albums. Brilliant!
I was beginning to think I was the only one who remembers the original Nirvana
The album which Rainbow Chaser came from was great as well.
I wonder how many times the likes of Peggy Valentine or Chris Welch did get it right about future hit singles they announced. Might be a good theme for an episode of this series
Penny Valentine was famous for predicting which songs would become hits. She usually got it right.
11:09 I never like it when bands make a follow-up single that is a blatant sound-alike of their previous hit. It screams "we're not going to amount to anything but a one-hit wonder". It wasn't the case for The Status Quo, but I feel like a third of the songs from their debut albums are soundalikes to "Pictures of Matchstick Men": "Black Veils Of Melancholy", "Sunny Cellophane Skies" and to a lesser extent "Technicolor Dreams":
Sound-alikes were Quo's speciality! Still love 'em though!
Yeah, I bought it on Matchsticks strength, but wasn't expecting so many clones. By then there were so many albums w 12 good songs that sounded totally different
It’s time for a psychedelic revival. Any one of these mostly non-hit singles is way more interesting than the commercial pap infiltrating our radios nowadays.
I highly recommend those 'British Psychedelic Trip' compilations. Excellent stuff
Great month of March 1968. Can't wait for "next" month. Thank you YP for your great videos and comments !
Cheers!
GREAT video. I had a fun time learning cool music history.
I always look forward to your videos.
Cheers!
Cosmic vibes as ever 😎✌️🎸 I’ve got all of the Decca Original “Scene” series of CDs 💿 superb - particularly the sleeve notes. Currently revisiting them by playing one each day.
Those compilations are all excellent. Great stuff!
The End made my favorite psych album with “Introspection.” Everything about it is superb.
Your clip of “Loving Sacred Loving” is in mono. The mono version of that album was made for radio broadcast and is extremely rare and expensive. I’ve never heard the album in mono or even a portion of a song. I’m a big fan of mono recordings/records so I may have to see what's online.
I’m not sure if I’m the only one but your videos take me ages to get through because I take screenshots and make notes. I have a folder on my computer with over one hundred songs to find. Someday I’ll make a fab compilation. Cheers!
Cheers!
Your plethora of authentic archival info and video is astounding. Thank you and, yes, I subscribed and will keep watching.
Cheers!
O my gosh the Honeybus track is one of the first songs that I ever remember, mainly because it was on a low calorie bread advert in 1969 when I was 5. Still love it and the advert is quite nice too , as adverts go. Anyone else remember it from then? th-cam.com/video/FzPhUaVDRpg/w-d-xo.html
Nimble bread! Yes, I remember that advert well.
See...THIS is why I am grateful for thls channel. I did NOT know of a "50's revival" during this time and that The Beatles' tune was considered "compromise" by some fans. I ALWAYS like the history here. OY! Did that bloke @ 14:16 just nick a newspaper?!?!
First I've heard of it too. Sounds more like something the record industry made up.
Love this series and is an excellent source to discover some 60’s gems .
A month seemingly heavy with songs not a lot of people remember very much anymore. I hope it isn't simply MY post-1967 malaise, but the remainder of the decade already feels like it's going to be a lot more somber, a lot less hopeful than the era's psychedelic high-water moment--America's 1969 Woodstock Music Festival notwithstanding. Really loved Father's Name Is Dad--a real gem!
Didn't Jennifer Eccles put in an appearance on Lily the Pink (The Scaffold) as well? A popular lady in the late '60s!
Great video.
Thank you for another great episode.
I noticed that you didn’t include the usual singles and album charts of the U.K. and the U.S.
@@heli-crewhgs5285 Cheers! I usually only include the UK and US charts on the "Blind Date" videos.
I bet the Fire were really chuffed with Macca's help in burying their excellent single!
Sun Dragon! New to me. I'm off to explore! Thanks for the tip off.
Great work as ever!
Cheers.
Great video as usual! And very emotional for me when it gets to the Honeybus song, because I was helplessly in love with the Italian version released by a fantastic Italian band called Equipe 84... I believe I had the 45 too, and I was just a little kid in '68!!! It takes me back to happy times and loving feeling ❤ Thank you YP!!
Cheers! That's a great song.
Un angelo blu...
The Inner Light got very little airplay on the radio in the US., similar to George's other B side that appeared the next year, Old Brown Shoe.
They did get plenty of play on Underground FM radio
I forgot to mention the Nirvava track. I remember whenever they released a new single, Radio 1 which had replaced the pirate stations played them a few times each, and then you never heard them again. Rainbow Chaser got more airplay, and was their only single to chart at all, as it was their standout track. The best way to get it is on their compilation Rainbow Chaser - The Sixties Recordings, which contains their complete sixties tracks, including previously unissued alternate takes. But an alternative version of this track appears. But it is the previously released version without the overdubbed phasing in parts, and echo in other parts, and it lasts a bit longer at the end. But it is in mono. Yet it also appears in it's previously released format with the overdubbed effects in stereo, although the stereo separation isn't very wide.
As you include a lot of B sides, you should have given a snippet of the B side of The Hollies' single here. Open Up Your Eyes which was by far superior to the A side here, Jennifer Eccles, which was one of their crappier efforts.
Enjoyed this great post. Wish I had those post Winwood singles with the Psychedelic sleeves. Not likely to come across them, especially out here in San Francisco.
Great presentation thanks xxx. Honeybus +++ !
Sorry to bother you, but could you please make a full video of just the driving around 60s London listening to the radio sounds? It's so relaxing, but I can't find a video anywhere that really scratches that exact itch that those moments in your videos do.
1968 was the birth of hard rock.....Deep Purple Hush.....Spirit Mechanical World and Journey to the Centre of Your Mind by the Amboy Dukes
Lady Madonna was definitely rock ‘n’ roll influenced. In the seventies that fifties rock ‘n’ roll stuff really kicked off, with Happy Days, American Graffiti and revival acts like Showaddywaddy and Darts doing well for virtually the whole decade.
March '68 also produced many outstanding singles. Those by Fire and Nite People, of course, but I always liked "Quite Rightly So" and "Black Veils Of Melancholy" as well. Fascinating also the interference of Stones greats Wyman and Watts on The End! An obscure band, by the way. Thanks very much again YP!
Cheers Edwin! The LP by The End is well worth checking out, one of my all-time favourite psychedelic albums.
@@YesterdaysPapers
I know two songs by the End, but now you've definitely made me curious!
@@EdwinJack64 Try their compilation From Beginning To End, containing their complete recordings from 1965-1968, including some previously unissued tracks. I think it was on the Demon label.
@@paulgoldstein2569
Many thanks for the recommendation Paul. I will check it out. Cheers!
Rainbow chaser gets a regular airing on Boom radio in the UK, always a treat to hear it. Love Honeybus takes me back to my earliest memories & that Ice record is erm cool 🤦 sorry.
Colour sergeant wotsisname tho at the end is truly woeful & should never be heard of again 😂😂
Great video as always 👏👏
Great work, as always.. Well researched, detailed and fantastically presented.
Thanks!
Interesting that Nash hated the song Jennifer Eccles because he lent part of his wife’s name to the song title
Wonderful chapter - as usual - in your video series, YP. Thank you. 👍😄
I often enjoy stopping your vids to read the background stuff that tends to go by quickly, and I was pleased to see Record Mirror's short review of Raymond Lefèvre's excellent "Soul Coaxing" at (+/- ) 5:22.
There are certain songs and records that can take me back in time, and that one, along with "Daydream Believer", and "I Am The Walrus", always do it for me.
It reached US #4 on Billboard's Easy Listening chart, #37 on the Billboard Hot 100, and it got to the top ten in Boston, San Francisco, and Pittsburgh.
I suppose that there are some people who don't care for instrumentals, but I love a good one, and Lefèvre made a good one.
th-cam.com/video/ZUNNSuYJPbU/w-d-xo.htmlsi=KD9gALyKBT-7CLur
Cheers!
The Fire & Decca should have asked Paul to collaborate on a future track. Great song.
keep up this great work!
Very interesting episode. I especially like the backstory of “Lady Madonna.”
Sun Dragon did an excellent single called " Five white horses" in 68
Always sad when an episode finishes. They should have made months longer! lol
Looks like March 1968 was a bad time to release a single, most here disappeared without a trace at the time.
YP's addiction now, for me. So brilliant, once again.
Hey, a very serious encyclopedia for the futur generations. And a fabulous time capsule. *****
Oups, I meant FIVE STAR... 😉
Thank you very much, François!
Yes, one of the best channels on TH-cam, and another interesting video, again very well put together.
But unfortunately, after a very busy 1967 it was around this time that the novelty of Psychedelia had temporarily worn off, as maybe the record buyers had got tired of it for a while and were favoring more commercial styles again, as the charts were by then filled with more commercial styles, with Psychedelia shut out of the charts for a while, except for an occasional one. It was at this time that we had that fifties Rock 'N' Roll revival boom, with reissues of fifties hits hitting the lower end of the charts, and even Bill Haley creating a storm again on the live circuit. As a result, The Beatles felt that to get another number one, they were going to have to abandon their Psychedelic influences and come out with something that was more straight forward. So they came out with Lady Madona.
After that, Cliff Richard finally returned to the UK number one spot with his immortal sing-along evergreen, Congratulations. Everything just went quiet again for a while. I even picked up a TH-cam video of Pete Townshend explaining that at the time, and saying there is just no youth culture anymore. So there was little chance of any Psychedelia charting then, no matter how good it sounded. It wasn't until much later in the year that it all picked up again, and by then, Psychedelia was evolving into Progressive Rock. But during the meanwhile, the charts were filled with more commercial styles with the likes of The Tremeloes and The Love Affair, plus disastrous five minute wonders like John Rowles and Esther & Abi Ofarim, not to mention that horrible bubblegum of The 1910 Fruit Gum Company.
If there had been a second Monterey Pop Festival for 1968, it probably wouldn't have created the same effect or excitement.
But here, I think the biggest cherry in the cake here was that single from The End which struck me as being a very unusual track. Two entirely different stereo mixes of it appeared on their CD From Beginning To End, making them sound almost like different versions. That CD contained their complete 1965-1968 recordings, many previously unissued.
th-cam.com/video/8wKEHbX_T0s/w-d-xo.html
th-cam.com/video/n16vsTrBzoE/w-d-xo.html
Cheers Paul! "Intermission" by The End is one of all-time favourite psychedelic albums. Brilliant record.
I must be the only person who bought a copy of Black Veils of Melancholy 😂
LOVE the sound of Sun Dragon….another treasure trove of English psychedelia.
Another great month ... altho' I didn't hear a lot of these songs until much later!
Turquoise also name checked Keith Moon and John Entwhistle on Flossie Fillett (they helped produce one of their other singles, Village Green, I believe). They were mates of the Davies brothers and lived near them, hence the strong Kinks influence. Turquoise should have had a few hits, they were that good. Some other great inclusions here of ‘lesser known’ bands… Fire, Nirvana, The End. Quality music.
Just like The Magical Mystery Tour movie, reworking The Fires' single was further proof McCartney was human after all.
A version of ‘After Tea’ was also released by the German band ‘The Rattles’ in 1968 and reached number 26 in Germany.
Some very good, if obscure records released in March '68
What’s the song in the intro? It’s so good by the sounds of it, and would love to know the name so I can check it out.
Awesome video btw. You’re killing it.
The intro song is "A Little Bit Hurt" by Julian Covey, it's a song from late 1967, produced by Jimmy Miller-
@@YesterdaysPapersThank you so much man! You’re a lifesaver ❤
Another great month for singles especially The Fire.
Until mentioned here , I never considered Lady Madonna rock and roll. Paul's done something to the beat emphasis that is different enough to disguise it.
Professional critics get too much credit, probably because they are echoed by other journalists who have a vested interest in making the press sound like more than it is. I know what I feel when I hear great music, and I know what I feel when I hear so-so music.
Think I'll do all my comments this month in one big post ....
I can never see reference to the B-side of Lady Madonna without instantly being reminded of that occult/horror tale by Arthur Machen which has a very similar title!!
That "rock 'n' roll revival" certainly was a big thing for a while. Don't forget The Move did their bit by incorporating a Duane Eddy style lick into Fire Brigade, as well as covering Weekend, It'll Be Me and Something Else on their 1968 releases.
Remember seeing that announcement at 1:02 about Radio London' possible restart - sad it didn't happen. They were our favourite pirate station.
Re The Fire: a year or so before, we'd had The Smoke. Wrong way round, guys! (no Smoke without Fire .... ). As for Macca's "help" with the record, he was to learn the hard way how that can backfire, when Phil Spector mucked around with several of the tracks on the Let It Be album.
Santana's version of BMW is far better, in my view.
Nashville Teens doing All Along The Watchtower?? (5:22) Blimey.
My sister had to get Rainbow Chaser ordered specially, as our local record store didn't stock it. Great single, and the flip was pretty good too - should have a been a snatch of that featured here as well.
(Oh dear, out of time - have to do the rest tomorrow ....)
Great comment, cheers!
Nothing I truly love here but I enjoy 'I Can't Let Maggie Go', 'Black Veils of Melancholy', 'Quite Rightly So' and 'Jennifer Eccles', all familiar to me.
Further investigation required: 'Ice Man', 'Tales of Flossie Fillett', 'Colour Sergeant Lillywhite' & 'Lady from Baltimore', 'Far Away Mountain', 'Rainbow Chaser', 'After Tea', 'Morning Sun'
You can easily date these records as sometime in 1968 - the same is true with 1967.
Great to discover The Fire and Father's Name is Dad. True, the first version is much better, punchier. Thanks for this YP. Now on my playlist!
Great tune. Cheers!