Haslop's Hitstory
(As heard on The Bruce Millar Show)

www.safm.co.za/programmes/current/bruce_miller.html

13 March 2002
LOVE

Arthur Lee celebrated his 57th birthday on the 7th of March. For the first time in several years he was not in jail at the time.

On the 12th of December last year, he was released from the California state correctional facility where he was serving an eight to twelve year sentence for illegal possession of a firearm and firing a gun into the air, allegedly during an argument.

He had two previous convictions, and that meant that, according to California law, he was going to jail.

That was despite the fact that a New Zealander by the name of Doug Thomas twice flew to Los Angeles to testify that it was he, and not Lee, that had fired the shot, and that it had been by mistake.

Lee has always maintained his innocence, and last December a federal appeal court agreed with him, apparently finding that the prosecutor had been guilty of misconduct relating to the trial.

Lee had served more than five years by the time of his release. It seems that it is possible that he may face a retrial, or else he may just be left alone.

Arthur Lee, born Arthur Taylor Porter in Memphis in 1945, seemed at one stage to have the charisma, connections, and, above all class and competence, to become one of the real greats. As it is his band recorded what is generally regarded as one of rock's finest albums, as well as two others that have strong critical support at least. But, in fact, since 1967, there has been precious little of real musical worth from him.

It apparently always riled him that, musically (and in a number of other ways) he was a psychedelic black man at least contemporaneously with Jimi Hendrix and Sly Stone, and probably even before them, but that his output was pretty much overlooked when compared with theirs.

"I was the first black person wearing those clothes and doing that stuff," he said later, "but the credit went to Jimi."

Lee, who took his stepfather's surname when his mother remarried, moved to Los Angeles and formed a group called Arthur Lee & the LAGs (standing for Los Angeles Group in tribute to Booker T. & the MGs, which stands for Memphis Group).

He recorded a few singles that flopped, as well as producing a single entitled My Diary by one Rosa Lee Brooks for which he hired the then unknown Jimi Hendrix - whom he had seen backing the O'Jays - as a session guitarist. Some, including Lee, of course, say it was Hendrix's first recording session.

He then formed an outfit which he wanted to call the Grass Roots, but there was already a band by that name - a band that went on to have fourteen US Top Twenty hits between 1966 and 1972 - so he called his new group Love instead.

Original drummer Don Conka was a heroin addict who was soon replaced by Swiss born Alban "Snoopy" Pfisterer, though Lee himself played drums on some of the early recordings.

The group's song Signed D.C., which cropped up on its first album, was almost certainly about Conka, though Lee often denied that.

Ken Forssi joined on bass from the Surfaris, who had had a No 2 hit without him in 1963 with Wipe Out, while another black man, Johnny Echols, was on lead guitar. Remember, multi-racial rock bands were most unusual at the time.

At a Byrds gig, a teenage roadie working for that band begged Lee to allow him to join. Lee agreed. The roadie was Bryan MacLean, a surfer type from a wealthy LA family, who had once dated Liza Minelli at school, and he became the band's third guitarist and second main singer.

And so Love, which Rolling Stone magazine referred to as "the missing link between the Byrds and the Stones", but which Peter Albin of Big Brother & The Holding Company suggested ought to have been called Hate, was formed.

It seems that the only other real contender for MacLean's spot was Bobby Beausoleil, who would go on to compose the music for Kenneth Anger's underground film Lucifer Rising, and become a member of the murderous Manson Family.

Love's first single was My Little Red Book, which had been written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David and sung by Manfred Mann in the film What's New Pussycat? Love's version, which was punky and garage band-like, went to No 52 on the American charts - not quite the impact Lee was hoping for.

Love's version of the song later became the chordal basis for Pink Floyd's Interstellar Overdrive, when their manager mis-sang the song to Syd Barrett, who tried to follow him on the guitar without ever having heard it. It also turned up recently as part of the soundtrack to the film High Fidelity.

Love, who had been signed to the then extremely hip Elektra label - their first two albums predate the debut by the Doors and Jim Morrison is supposed to have said that he hoped his fledgling outfit could be as successful as Love - followed this with a version of Hey Joe that MacLean had seen the Byrds playing live.

It would be a US Top 40 hit in the hands of garage band the Leaves, and a bigger UK hit by Jimi Hendrix.

Then came 7 And 7 Is, which some have identified as one of the earliest proto-punk singles. It reached No 33, and was the last Love single to make the charts at all.

The self titled debut album was released in September 1966 and went to No 57, after which Snoopy Pfisterer moved to keyboards, and the band employed Michael Stuart on drums and Tjay Cantrelli, whose real name was John Barberis, on sax and flute.

Thus expanded, the group's sound changed quite radically for the next album, Da Capo, the whole of whose second side was given over to one long track, the first rock album to do this. The first side, though, was tight and often superbly melodic, and in many ways a significant advance on the output of most of the era's other rock outfits. Perhaps this is reflected in its poorer chart showing - it only made No 80.

However, another reason for Love's failure to garner significant commercial success was Lee's almost complete refusal to promote his band outside of the LA area. He refused tours and TV appearances as well as 1967's Monterey Pop festival - which, after all, was just a little way north, but still in California. He was happy, it seems, to remain big in LA.

The band was renting a Gothic mansion that had once belonged to horror movie actor Bela Lugosi, and this imposing building featured heavily in Love's promotional material. Behind the castle walls, though, things were beginning to fall apart.

Lee has been described as haunted, reclusive and baffling, and very difficult to get along with. He clearly saw Love as his own vehicle, and in an interview with the group's biographer Barney Hoskyns, MacLean's mother claimed that Lee had formed a production company which ensured that any royalties due to the band members would come directly to him. Yet it seems that the band were still friends at this stage.

However, their road manager, himself a long term junkie who eventually died of an overdose later referred to in Lee's Your Friend And Mine, which would appear on the group's fourth album, had introduced them to heroin, and at least three of the members had become heavy users.

The third album was due, but the band was in such bad shape, apparently, that their label planned to record it with session men backing Lee and MacLean, depending upon whose songs were being sung at the time.

Neil Young was slated to co-produce the album, but only ended up arranging one song, while members of Phil Spector's legendary studio outfit, the Wrecking Crew were brought in to replace the band, and actually recorded a couple of songs.

Remarkably, given the circumstances, the band was spurred into action by this, got its act together just in time, and proceeded to record one of rock's true classic albums.

We'll deal with that next week. In the meantime, here is Love with 7 And 7 Is.