Canned Heat

IT is quite something rediscovering a record cover some 30 years after you last saw it. Certainly, Boogie with Canned Heat was a pivotal album in our lives growing up in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Especially impressive was Fried Hockey Boogie, in which The Bear introduces each band member by his nickname, and then they let rip with some superb solos.

And the few Canned Heat songs on the Woodstock album, from that seminal 1969 music festival, were equally important, and loved, elements in our association with this band. But that was virtually all there was. Oh, and of course John Mayall’s eulogising of the group on The Bear, from Blues From Laurel Canyon, cemented the outfit as being iconic performers in a time of titans.

Who were Canned Heat, and how did that name come about? There doesn’t seem to be much on Wikipedia, but let’s see what we can find out. They describe them as a “blues-rock/boogie band that was formed in Los Angeles in 1965”. They were important, says Wikipedia, not only for their blues-based music, but also for “their efforts to reintroduce and revive the careers of some of the great old bluesmen, and their improvisational abilities”. It seems Bob Hite (The Bear) was not the sole leader of the band. This big, burly, bearded vocalist and harmonica player seemed to dominate at Woodstock, and is praised by Mayall on that song. But Wikipedia says the band was led by him and Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson, who played guitar as well as contributing vocals and harmonica. As we’ll observe on that famous Boogie track later, The Bear introduces all the guys, including “The Sunflower”, Henry Vestine, another guitarist who was formerly a member of Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention. Larry “The Mole” Taylor was a session bassist with the Monkees before joining Canned Heat full-time in 1970.

So where did the name come from? Well, it seems that Tommy Johnson’s 1928 Canned Heat Blues was the inspiration. It was a song about an alcoholic who during Prohibition had desperately turned to drinking Sterno which is generically called canned heat. For those of us living outside that separate world known as the United States of America, Sterno, according to Wikipedia, is a fuel made from denatured and jellied alcohol. It is designed to be burnt directly from its can. Its primary use is in the food service industry for buffet heating. It is also used for camp stoves and as an emergency heat source. And this poor blighter was drinking the stuff! This makes me realise, perhaps, why on several songs, Canned Heat take a firm stand against substance abuse.

This is a potted, not canned, history of the group. Wikipedia tells us their debut album, Canned Heat, was released not long after they appeared at the seminal 1967 Monterey Pop Festival. Ah, and here’s a name to conjure with. Wikipedia notes that Fito De La Parra (born in Mexico City in 1946) replaced Frank Cook as drummer for their second album, the famous, fantastic, Boogie With Canned Heat, which was released in 1968. This album contained the band’s virtual signature tune, On The Road Again. The next year, 1969, they released a double album, Livin’ the Blues which, while not as successful, contained Goin’ Up The Country, the song they performed at Woodstock to such acclaim. The song is, says Wikipedia, built around Henry “Ragtime Texas” Thomas’s reed fife riff from the late 1920s recording, Bull Doze Blues. Which shows the extent of Canned Heat’s blues roots – they go w-a-a-a-a-a-y back, man!

Then comes a long period in the band’s history I knew nothing about, having really lost track of them after Boogie and Woodstock. But, says Wikipedia, 1970 was “the musical high point for the original line-up”. They recorded a double album with blues legend John Lee Hooker called Hooker ’N’ Heat that year, giving Hooker his first album on the charts. It reached No 73 in February, 1971. Tragedy struck in September, 1970, with Wilson dying of a drug overdose in an apparent suicide, says Wikipedia, prior to the album’s release. The cause of death remains inconclusive.

In the 1970s, Hite’s younger brother Richard joined the band, singing, playing bass and helping with arrangements. One More River To Cross, their next album, features the Memphis Horns.

Bob Hite died in April, 1981, marking the end of the original line-up. But the rest of the band kept up their associations with Hooker, with the band guesting on his album, The Healer, in 1989. It became a big hit. Wikepedia says De La Parra leads the current band, with Larry Taylor having returned in 1994 after leaving in 1970. Band members have excelled elsewhere, with Taylor playing bass for the likes of Tom Waits and ex-Heat guitarist Harvey Mandel being considered to replace Mick Taylor in the Rolling Stones. He performs on their 1976 album, Black and Blue.

But it was way back when, back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, that we Bentley boys got into Canned Heat in a big way, just as they were starting out, playing that wonderfully uplifting form of the blues. Judging by their discography, it would take a lifetime to do justice to all they have achieved in their many line-ups since those early days. There were albums – sometimes two or three a year – throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, before tailing off considerably in recent decades, but still with a steady flow of musical heat pouring forth from that can.

Boogie with Canned Heat

But let’s get back to those early albums. The cover of Boogie with Canned Heat featured a painting of the band members’ faces, with light emanating from the centre like a sunrise. It was one of those iconic, for want of a better cliché, covers from the late 1960s that are assured a place in the history of music – as obviously is the album itself, a real cracker-jack performance. I don’t know when I last saw the album itself, probably in the mid-1970s, but I was fortunate to pick up a compilation CD of Canned Heat songs at a second hand shop for a pittance – and it includes most of the key songs from Boogie. Wikipedia notes, as I mentioned earlier, that Amphetamine Annie is a “warning about the dangers of amphetamine abuse”. On The Road Again became a Top 10 hit, and Fried Hockey Boogie was the “first example of one of Canned Heat’s boogies, or loose jams”. Unlike their debut album, this featured mostly original material.

Canned Heat: The Best Of, was a compilation CD released in Holland in 1997. It contains six tracks off Boogie With Canned Heat, including the immortal On The Road Again, which upon listening to it again can actually become quite monotonous given that one guitar note is sort of played continuously throughout. There are some “harmonics” struck on the guitar strings before a harmonica launches into that famous melody. Then those usually high-pitched vocals. But who was singing, and what were the words? Written by Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson and F Jones, the song, nearly five minutes long, starts with those famous words – which I never quite heard before: “Well, I’m so tired of crying, but I’m out / on the road again. / - I’m on the road again. / Well, I’m so tired of crying, but I’m out / on the road again. / - I’m on the road again. / I ain’t got no woman / Just to call my special friend.” It was spine-tinglingly good stuff, with the backing vocals rounding off the song as each line is repeated. “You know the first time I travelled out / in the rain and snow, / - In the rain and snow. / You know the first time I travelled out / in the rain and snow, / - In the rain and snow. / I didn’t have no payroll, / Not even no place to go.” This is a classic blues tale. “And my dear mother left me when / I was quite young, / - When I was quite young. / And my dear mother left me when / I was quite young, / - When I was quite young. / She said ‘Lord, have mercy / On my wicked son.’” But this song isn’t prepared to take anymore flak. “Take a hint from me, mama, please / don’t you cry no more, / - Don’t you cry no more. / Take a hint from me, mama, please / don’t you cry no more, / - Don’t you cry no more. / ’Cause it’s soon one morning / Down the road I’m going.” Then the concluding verse. “But I ain’t going down that / long old lonesome road / All by myself. / But I ain’t going down that / long old lonesome road / All by myself. / I can’t carry you, Baby, / Gonna carry somebody else.” I’m not at all sure what this song is about, but it seems to be a coming of age story, with the young man striking out alone after a rather troubled childhood. It was nonetheless a timeless piece which was to make the blues accessible to my generation in a way that doesn’t seem to occur these days. Where are the young white men and women doing what these guys were doing: really relating to the music of the early black bluesmen and re-interpreting their work?

Amphetamine Annie is the next track on the CD, and also on the Boogie album. Credited to the whole band, the song starts with The Bear talking, as he does on so many of these tracks. “This is a song with a message … I want you to ease on …” Well what does he say there? I need a copy of these lyrics fast, because I can’t pick up all the words on the rest of the song either. Ah, perfect! Just found the entire thing. By the way, the earthy, thumping blues sound here is archetypal Canned Heat. “This is a song with a message / I want you to heed my warning”. That’s how it starts. Then he starts singing: “I wanna tell you all a story / About this chick I know / They call her Amphetamine Annie / She’s always shovelling snow / I sat her down and told her / I told her crystal clear / ‘I don’t mind you getting high / But there’s one thing you should fear. / Your mind might think its flying, baby / On those little pills / But you ought to know it’s dying, ’cause / Speed kills’. ” That’s quite a powerful warning at a time when Speed was one of the drugs of choice among the decadent youth. Of course his warning is half-hearted or ambiguous, because he says he doesn’t mind her “getting high”. Which is probably why he failed to stop her destroying herself. “But Annie kept on speeding / Her health was getting poor / She saw things in the window / She heard things at the door / Her mind was like a grinding mill / Her lips were cracked and sore / Her skin was turning yellow / I just couldn’t take it no more / She thought her mind was flying / On those little pills / She didn’t know it was going down fast, ’cause / Speed kills.” His tries again to talk some sense into her, but as I saw even in my limited experience, drugs could take people down quite easily. “Well I sat her down and told her / I told her one more time / ‘The whole wide human race has taken / Far too much methedrine’ / She said ‘I don't care what a Limey says, / I’ve got to get it on / I’m not here to just see no man / Who come from across the pond / She wouldn’t heed my warning / Lord, she wouldn’t hear what I said / Now she’s in the graveyard, and she’s / Awfully dead.” Which makes me wonder who the Limey was from “across the pond”. Perhaps one member of the band was British … Most importantly, this song showcases the brilliant electric guitar of “Blind Owl” Alan Wilson, surely one of the finest blues guitarists ever. He seems to have been a more natural blues player than the likes of even Eric Clapton, Peter Green and Mick Taylor. Perhaps it is to do with living in the land of the blues, the US, where even for a couple of honkeys, it was in their blood. Certainly, The Bear’s vocals are as close to those of the great black American blues singers as you’re likely to hear.

The next track on the CD, My Crime, is also off the Boogie album, and is another composition credited to the whole band. Again it is the harmonica and lead guitar which lead the assault on this slow blues. It’s funny how you can mishear things. I always thought this song started: “I went to town / Late last fall.” In fact, having gleaned the lyrics off the Net, I see it goes: “I went to Denver / Late last fall / I went to do my job / Yeah I didn’t break any law / We worked a hippie place / Like many in our land / They couldn’t bust the place / And so they got the band / ’Cause the police in Denver / No, they don’t want none of them / long hairs hanging around / And that’s the reason why / They want to tear Canned / Heat’s reputation down.”

Now for me those words are a revelation. This song is about how the cops bust the band. I was hearing things like “turn his reputation down”. In fat it was “tear Canned Heat’s reputation down”. The song continues: “You people in Denver / Will know what I mean / Yeah, the things I’m gonna tell ya / Yeah, you’ve all heard and seen / You remember when a cop on the beat / Used to rob and steal / Today they’re gone, / but the others get it on / So you know just how I feel / ’Cause the police in Denver / Lord, they don’t want none of them / long hairs hanging around / And that’s the reason why / They try to tear Canned / Heat’s reputation down /Yeah, they try to tear it down, boy / They ain’t gonna do it though / Let me tell you this just one more time / Just one more thing I wanna tell ya / Before I go / It’s a shame the Man in Denver / Has to lie and mistreat people so / Now six months ain’t no sentence / One year ain’t no time / When I hear from one to ten / It worries my troubled mind / ’Cause the police in Denver / Lord, don’t want no long hairs around / And that’s the reason why / They try to tear Canned / Heat’s reputation down.”

For interest’s sake I checked out the lyrics of Evil Woman, also from the Boogie album, and could not find my memory jolted. No doubt were I to hear the song itself, it would all come flooding back.

The next song on the CD off Boogie is Whiskey-Headed Woman, another warning song, this time about the scourge of liquor. But it, too, I fear, carried a mixed message. Written by Richard Hite, Bob, The Bear’s younger brother, it is introduced again by Bob, who says that “in 1940 Tommy Bolin did Whiskey-Headed Woman”, and “we’re going to do Whiskey-Headed Woman No 2”. I was unable to find the lyrics on a Heat site, for some reason, but I think they’re very similar to Bolin’s originals. It’s a song about this woman who “stays drunk all the time”. And she’s warned: “Now, if you don’t stop drinkin' / Now, I believe you’re goin’ to lose yo’ mind.” Like most of those Mayall songs, this is just a vehicle for some brilliant electric guitar solo work by Wilson, backed up superbly by pulsing bass.

The final track on the compilation off Boogie is the seminal Fried Hockey Boogie, which I was delighted to hear again after all those decades. Was it just nostalgia that made me think this is a riveting seven minutes’ worth (it seems longer) of music, or was it really very good. A key component of the song, which though recorded in the studio takes on the format of a live act, is The Bear’s spoken remarks and introductions. I tried in vain to find a transcript of these on the Net, so have made a few notes which are sure to be inaccurate. The concept is Larry Taylor’s, but it is Bob “The Bear” Hite who does the talking, as they launch into a variation of the On The Road Again riff, with guitar, bass and cymbals. Then there is a dramatic drum roll before Hite states: “That’s called getting ready for the boogie …” He then says that “ever since the days of our last album, a lot of folks have asked why we don’t get it on on our next album…”, or words to that effect. He says the first “to do the boogie” is the Blind Owl – Alan Wilson – and he produces some assured, very structured rhythm guitarwork – which makes me wonder if it isn’t the other guitarist, introduced further on, who provides the real virtuoso lead solos. Holding the thing together, all the time, is Hite, who says things like, “yeah, all-night boogie”, and after Wilson’s solo is over he says: “Yes, I know, Blind Owl, that was delightful!”. He adds: “Now in order to have a good boogie you gotta have a bottom, and on that bottom we have Mr Larry Taylor, alias The Mole …” He goes on to say that Larry comes from New York and Memphis and “he claims to be from a whole lotta other places”. This oratory, which I recall so well from my youth, is followed by a beautiful bass solo – though solo only in the sense that it is the lead instrument, because there is continual accompaniment by the other musicians, which keeps the song interesting. After again proclaiming the solo “delightful”, Hite suggests you “lie back and medidate, like the Maharishi says”. He then announces that “23 years ago there was a birth on Christmas Day – that’s the day the Sunflower came into being. I sure am glad. Go ahead, buzz a little Henry. Then follows a truly great electric guitar solo. Packed with feedback and just perfect timing and pitch, Hite becomes so inspired by Henry Vestine’s performance he even makes a Hendrix allusion: “Are you really experienced?”. Later, as the solo just builds and builds, he adds: “Love can be found anywhere – even in a guitar.” With the bass adding a further dimension, he becomes overcome with excitement: “Have mercy! It’s even better than the last time, Henry.” But even once this bit of magic finally ends, one more surprise is in store, as Hite introduces us to the drummer, saying: “Yeah! Now all the way from south of the border comes old Fito de la Parra. Fito, beat it out baby!” This is another lovely solo. The charm about this whole concept is that one doesn’t get the sense, as so often occurs in pop groups, that each guy is trying to show off. Instead, everything is laid back and understated. Even as Fito tears into the vellum and steel, there is literally a constant buzz from the electric guitars, and the bass guitar is ever-present too. But eventually all good things must end. “Well folks, that’s about all … all we’ve got left is one lonely minute. Oh my, don’t you feel good now after listening to all that boogie? I sure am glad.” After saying “goodbye everybody, so long”, he finally launches into a bit of song – “well I’m gone, my babe I’m gone” – before concluding with the famous line: “And don’t forget to boogie … boogie … boogie.” Fried Hockey Boogie, which has nothing to do with hockey, is one of the most memorable and delightful moments in the history of modern music.

Canned Heat

Several songs on the CD are from that 1967 debut album, simply titled Canned Heat, which was released shortly after their appearance at the Monterey Pop Festival. It mainly features blues covers. The first track, Rollin’ and Tumblin’ is a classic blues, written by Muddy Waters, according to Wikipedia, although another lyric site has M Morganfield as the originator. “I roll and I tumble, cried the whole night long / Yes I roll and I tumble, I cried the whole night long …” Here the lead guitar and harmonica are already superb, harbingers of what was to come with Boogie.

The next track, Bullfrog Blues, by William Harris, is also on that compilation disc. It is another nice, tight blues that pierces those parts of the brain that need a jolt. “Now did you ever wake up with those bullfrogs on your mind?”

Next up is the so-often-done Dust My Broom, written by Robert Johnson and Elmore James. And this has to be the best version of it I’ve heard. The piano plays a key role on this track, but what sets it apart from similar versions by the likes of Peter Green is the more subtle use of the lead guitar, which sounds very lightly amplified and not too overbearing. The Bear’s vocals are again top hole. There are another eight tracks on this album, each I am sure equally fine performances of classic blues numbers.

Living the Blues

But what of their third album? Living The Blues was a double album, released in October 1968. The cover features a psychedelic photograph of the band, and is indicative of the album’s content, for this seems to have been their most experimental work, though it also features their signature song, Going Up The County, which became so famously symbolic of the Woodstock Music and Arts Fair of the summer of 1969 and is on that compilation CD. Interestingly, Wikipedia notes that John Mayall plays piano on Walking By Myself and Bear Wires, which is a play on Mayall’s own Bare Wires album and song. Parthenogenesis, from this album, is a 20-minute-long blues-laced bit of inventiveness, and is also on that CD, otherwise I would not have heard it. But I see Living the Blues also features a 40-minute, album-length Refried Boogie, recorded live, which is no doubt a fresh take on Fried Hockey Boogie, and is no doubt superb.

But let’s get back to that wonderfully evocative song, Going Up The Country, a Wilson composition. When I think back to first hearing the Woodstock album, it was this song probably which best captured the spirit of the occasion – along with Joni Mitchell’s post-Woodstock composition, Woodstock, made famous by Crosby Stills Nash and Young. Understated electric guitar gets Going Up The Country rolling, before that wonderful flute melody is introduced. And now it seems clear the high-pitched vocals are by Alan Wilson, not Bob Hite. I had always misheard the opening lines, but according to lyrics of the Net, it goes like this: “Gotta get goin’, cause I can’t stay here long, now. / Cause I’m tired of the way, I’ve been dogged around. / Well, I’ve got to roam, maybe find me a brand-new home.” The reason I never really heard those words before was because they were usually subsumed by the mood of the music, and especially that sublime flute, which demands attention. Even the chorus I only half heard. It seems it is an invitation to head out into the country – perhaps to Max Yasgur’s farm outside New York City? “I’m goin’ up the country, baby don’t you wanna go? / I’m goin’ up the country, baby don’t you wanna go? / I’m goin’ to some place where I’ve never been before.” Even the next verse evokes images of those young people swimming in a small lake at Woodstock: “I'm goin’, I’m goin’ where the water tastes like wine. / Well, I’m goin’ where the water tastes like wine. / You can jump in the water and stay drunk all the time.” Then the song stops. But only momentarily, before it restarts with that hauntingly beautiful flute again to the fore. “I’m gonna leave this city, got to get away. / I’m gonna leave this city, got to get away. / All this fussin’ and fightin’, man you know I sure can’t stay.” Then there’s a speeded up section, a sense of urgency: “Now baby, packin’ up the truck you know I got to leave today. / Just exactly where I’m goin’ I can not say, but we might even leave the USA. / It’s a brand-new game and I don’t wanna play.” This seems to speak of disillusionment at the clampdown on the youth-led “revolution” that swept the US in the late 1960s. “No use of you running or screaming and crying / But you got a home man, long as I got mine.” All in all, another all-time classic from Canned Heat.

But what to make of Parthenogenesis? Wikipedia tells us this word refers to an “asexual form of reproduction in females where growth and development of an embryo or seed occurs without fertilisation by males”. It occurs among most lower plants, invertebrates like water fleas, some bees, scorpions and wasps, and among vertebrates like a few species of reptiles, fish, birds and sharks. It is also the term used for the Christian belief that Jesus was a “virgin birth”. Whether any of that has relevance to this 20-minute jam session is a moot point. What is clear though is that this is, if nothing else, very interesting. Often things this long can get boring. Not so here. It starts with almost an orchestral feel, with big drums and reverb. Then a Jew’s harp provides a steady rhythm alongside more percussion and reverberating sounds. Finally the Jaw’s harp fades, before a harmonica-led bass riff with steady drums leads one into a quick blues. After slowing, via some cracking lead guitar, the song stops. Then follows a fine piano solo, and the first bit of vocals: “Well you know a man needs a good woman all the time / Well you know he needs someone to ease his worried mind.” Of course, in true blues fashion, his good woman “left me yesterday” and the “blues got in every way”. Then, he says he “needs a little girl to drive my blues away”, before this reference to a key blues landmark: “Oh the 61 Highway, longest road I know … / Reaches from Atlanta, Georgia, down to the Gulf of Mexico”. What follows then is not a drum solo, it’s a drum duo. Two drummers seem to duel for a couple of minutes in fascinating symbiosis, before a fuzzy, feedback-ridden guitar – in a way reminiscent of Mayall and the Velvet Underground, indeed even Hendrix himself – blows away any remaining mind cobwebs, before that reverberating sound, accompanied by the Jew’s harp, returns. As the harp fades, a harmonica takes up a cold, bold, chillingly clear refrain against a background which resonates with a post-apocalyptic hum. Soon, though, this is replaced by a fast blues, and another excellent guitar solo, interspersed with interesting “grunts” from the rhythm guitar. As this fades, the Jew’s harp returns to set a steady, breathy rhythm in which you can almost visualise the player’s cheeks being sucked in and puffed out to shape the notes. Finally, the sound fades to silence. Parthenogenesis. Apart from listening to some riveting music – this, by the way, was a joint Canned Heat composition – I’ve learnt a new word. I must also stress this track, indeed this album, passed me by in my youth. But even today, it sounds as fresh as it would have way back when.

There are a couple of songs on that compilation disc I’ve yet to track down: Time Was and Let’s Work Together. Whatever their origins, they too are wonderfully understated works featuring that inimitable Canned Heat texture. Time Was is a tight blues with a great lead solo and some lovely bass. That haunting voice is just perfect. “Time was ... when we got along / Time was ... when we got along / It’s too bad, that the feeling’s gone.” The next verse is also simplicity itself, showing that in order to get a good blues number together, you just need one simple musical idea, and the rest flows: “Time was ... when we could agree / Time was ... when we could agree / That time’s gone, now you find fault with me.” After that lovely guitar solo, the final verse: “I’ve got time, things will work out fine / Trouble ... will not wreck my life / Trouble ... will not wreck my life / Someday you’ll like, what I’m putting down.”

Let’s Work Together is a song which seems to have been part of me forever. You know how some songs are so familiar-sounding even if for the life of you you can’t recall when or where you heard them first? This is one of them. Composed by one Wilbert Harrison, it cleverly relies on an old adage: “Together we stand, divided we fall / Come on now people, let’s get on the ball and work together / Come on, come on, let’s work together / Now now people / ’Cause together we will stand ev’ry boy, girl, woman and a man.”

I’ve done a bit of delving on the Web, and found a review of Fried Hockey Boogie by someone on Amazon.com. It might be interesting to see what this person made of that classic and others to which I referred earlier from Boogie With Canned Heat. Chris Meesey calls them “one of the best American blues bands from the late ’60s”, but says they were also “the original hard-luck boys”. Ah, and here I discover for the first time about the inspiration for that song referred to earlier, Mr Crime. For it seems they were “busted in Denver and had to sell the rights to their songs to get out”. This, says, Meesey, is why today’s band leader, De la Parra, still has to perform live and cannot rely on royalties to survive. Ah, again. It seems that while most of their songs were sung by the growly Bear, their two most famous numbers were sung by Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson. One of those, it seems, was indeed Going Up The Country. Meesey seems convinced that Let’s Work Together was on Boogie With Canned Heat, and says it was one of The Bear’s few hits as a singer. But not according to Wikipedia’s track list. Anyway, he also describes Wilson as “a musical genius” and “the best harpist (harmonica-player) in the world according to John Lee Hooker”. However, he says, his “falsetto vocals are an acquired taste”. Well I certainly acquired that taste, as did most Heat fans. He describes Fried Hockey Bookie as “a wonderful jam”, adding that “Vestine’s guitar work will blow your mind … the band would never sound better than this”. The reason the band “never achieved the success they deserved”, he notes, is that both Wilson and Bob Hite (and much later Vestine) “would die too young from their self-destructive lifestyle”. Clearly a case of bluesmen living and dying for the cause.

I also stumbled on an “official” Canned Heat website which may cast some light on these matters. Written by one Peter Lindblad, it seems to be the definitive web piece on the band. He says the “earthy, outlaw boogie-blues band” was in turmoil at the end of 1967 after the “infamous Denver Pot Bust, allegedly staged by the Denver Police Department”. Again, we find the source to My Crime. While that debut album reached No 76 in the US, the band was in financial and emotional trouble. Along with “reckless drug and alcohol abuse”, the band was battling to accommodate jazz-orientated drummer Frank Cook. He was replaced by Fito de la Parra, then just 19. A “total square” playing rhythm ’n blues places, he had never smoked weed or tried. “I was not exposed to the cultural explosion of the ’60’s until I joined Canned Heat. They took care of corrupting me real good.” He became the ideal Heat drummer, who had ironically met Cook as a teen in Mexico City and talked to him about Canned Heat.

Bob “The Bear Hite and Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson

While Wikipedia has them down as being formed in 1965, this article says Hite and Alan Wilson – nicknamed Blind Owl due to his thick-framed glasses – founded the band in 1966. The website offers deeper insights into the characters of Hite and Wilson, who grew up on opposite coasts, with Hite being raised in Torrance, California by a mother who was a singer and a father who played in a dance band. He heard blues from a young age, and once hooked, became an inveterate record-buyer, eventually owning his own store. With his vocal style, almost “shouting the blues”, and hirsute, larger than life personality behind a big brown beard and large body, he soon earned the nickname, The Bear.

Wilson was raised in Boston, where he attended Boston University and majored in music. He first worked the Cambridge folk coffeehouses, while making a study of bluesmen Robert Pete Williams and Son House for a magazine. He helped the elderly House make a comeback album, Father of the Delta Blues, while in turn learning from House’s technique. A slide guitarist, Wilson had a tenor voice which, says the website, “could morph into an ethereal falsetto”. He also played inspired harmonica.

One interesting snippet: the band recorded its first album in 1966, but it was only released in 1970, as Vintage Heat. It includes various blues standards, including Willie Dixon’s Spoonful, John Lee Hooker’s Louise and Muddy Waters’s Rillin’ and Tumblin’.

De la Parra takes credit, once he joined the band, for bringin a tighter R&B influence, especially in terms of the horn arrangements. He also brought some business savvy. Sadly, he notes that the others “started drinking a lot, doing a lot of drugs, and then Alan killed himself in 1971”. But before they imploded they had turned the world onto blues, especially with On The Road Again. Says the website: “The spooky crawl of Wilson’s harmonica and his otherworldly falsetto, plus Wilson’s work on tamboura and guitar, made it an instant classic …” And, says De la Parra, it was thanks to one disc jockey in Dallas, Texas, that the song gained initial exposure.

The site also confirms my earlier view about Goin’ Up The Country, off Livin’ The Blues from 1968. It says it was this “simpler song that defined Woodstock and made Canned Heat a household name”. While only reaching No 11 in the US, it topped the charts in 25 other countries. De la Parra explains on the website how the song was arrived at. He says on the back of On The Road Again’s success, they were under pressure to come up with another hit. They were sitting around in rehearsal “and Alan shows up, and we’re just spacing out, maybe smoking a joint or something, and Alan starts going ‘dot-da-da, dot da-da, dot da-da’ and goes, “You know, I heard this song called Bull-Doze Blues by Henry Thomas. It’s got a real nice hook and it’s a nice song.’ So, he starts singing ‘Goin’ up the country, baby don’t you wanna go’ and Larry and I jump in and start playing, almost like magic. Before the first verse is over, we stop playing and look at each other, and Larry looks at me and says, ‘This is going to be a fucking hit’.” The band, for so long on the fringes, was suddenly a commercial hit. Once they had the flute part in place, “we knew that song was going to break”.

The website confirms that Canned Heat’s “popularity exploded after knocking them dead at Woodstock in 1969”. And De la Parra almost never made Woodstock. He tells how he was so exhausted from internal ructions and performing at the Fillmore, that when it came time to head for upstate New York to play at Woodstock he felt too tired to go. “I was really exhausted. I didn’t know how important that gig was going to be. To me, it’s just another gig. So that night, I was really tired. I didn’t want to go, but Skip Taylor actually got a key for my room, and if he hadn’t been in my room, I wouldn’t have gotten out of bed. So, he got the duplicate key and started turning the TV on, and ‘Look at this! There’s all these people out there. This is going to be a great gig. Come on, let’s go!’ He still baulked. “I said ‘F**k you, I’m quitting. I hate this shit.’ I remember saying that. I hate to play when I’m exhausted, and part of being on the road is being always tired and always hungry. So, he basically pulled me out of bed – he was bigger than me anyway – and dressed me up… and we finally took off. When we were in the helicopter, finally, a few hours later, and (we) made it to the festival, that’s when I realised, ‘My God.’ I said, “Look at these people.” And that’s when I realised ‘I’m glad he got me out of bed.” De la Parra says: “I think we got the best ovation of the festival.”

In May, 1970, Harvey Mandel and Larry Taylor left to join John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. This precipitated another lineup change, before the release of that album with Hooker.

Then in 1970 they released Future Blues, whose cover depicted five astronauts on the moon in the famous Iwo Jima pose – except the flag is upside down, a warning, says the website, that the earth was in trouble. As was Wilson. On September 3, 1970, he was found dead on a hillside behind Hite’s Topanga Canyon home. Beset by psychological problems, exacerbated by personal relationship hassles and his growing anger at the pollution afflicting Los Angeles, he had attempted suicide several times before.

This led to major changes in the band, which I am not going to go into. For us, that was Canned Heat at their prime – those few albums, the couple of great hit singles, and that incredible presence at Woodstock. As observed earlier, The Bear would die in 1981 of a heart attack, and Vestine in 1997.

But for a few years, as the 1960s peaked, Canned Heat were one of the greatest bands in the world – and we were privileged to be of an age where we tapped right into the energy they exuded. De la Parra, on that website, credits the band with bringing blues orientated music to white audiences. He adds that the hits On The Road Again and Goin’ Up The country successfully married country-blues and rock and roll for the first time. Whatever the definitions, this band, for us, marked a very special period in the history of modern music.