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From Bands

The New Salvation Army Band was the house band at the Roaring Twenties night club in North Beach for a few months in 1967. I think Salvation’s manager called us (Mount Rushmore) to fill in for a weekend when they had a better gig at a ballroom. We were both playing many of the same ballrooms and clubs in the Bay Area in 1967, but I don’t think we had crossed paths.

Then in about March of 1968 Mount Rushmore broke up. I had no money. I hitchhiked to visit a friend who was caretaker for a beautiful piece of dark forest land. The first day I was there he got a fundraising ad in the mail. It was a giant folded art piece announcing Zen Center of San Francisco was opening the first Zen Monastery in America, at Tassajara in the Ventana Wilderness. They were also taking registrations for their 3-month training period, which cost $100. I immediately decided I wanted to go, but I needed to figure out how to raise the money.

 The next moment the phone rang, and it was for me. Somebody from Salvation, I don’t remember who, or even if I ever knew. They were about to go into the studio in LA to record an album and their drummer had freaked out. They asked if I would come sit in to play on the record immediately. I told the guy about the mailer and asked if they could guarantee me $100, he said yes, and I was off. I thought it was like manna from heaven. Didn’t even occur to me to negotiate for a reasonable amount.

My vague memories of being in LA with Salvation include cruising the Sunset Strip in a convertible,  and visiting Cousin Elliott in his little cottage. The keyboard player with Salvation, known only as U.S. Of Arthur because he was a fugitive from something he wouldn’t talk about, took us to hang out one afternoon with his cousin Elliot. Elliott Ingber played guitar with Frank Zappa’s Mothers and co-wrote and recorded the mythic underground hit Don’t Bogart that Joint.

IN THE STUDIO: I had never heard the band play a note. We never rehearsed. I’d never heard any of the songs. The first song in the studio was Handles of Care, which starts with a free form drum part nobody could explain to me. I struggled with it for what seemed like a very long time. Finally the producer (Bob Thiele, who produced all of the records of John Coltrane’s great classic quartet that we had at home) gave up on me and called in the 2 best studio drummers in town, Jimmy Gordon (Derek and the Dominos) and Hal Blaine (of the Wrecking Crew, part of the group of the first side men ever inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame). Janis Joplin’s roadie, who was a friend of mine from San Francisco, appeared and took me across the street to watch Janis putting the finishing touches on Summertime, for their album Cheap Thrills. Gordon and Blaine did all the drumming on the album. The credits on the album read:

Performer [Honored Playing People] – Bill Plummer, Hal Blaine, Jay Lewis, Jimmy Gordon*, Mike Wofford, Paul Beaver, Tom Scott

Performer [Playing And Singing] – Al Linde*, U.S. Of Arthur*, Artie McLean, Joe Tate

LIVE GIGS: I did play some live gigs while with the band: at the Shrine Auditorium with the Electric Flag, Dr. John and the Velvet Underground, at some club on the Sunset Strip, and an outside day gig in Griffith Park. The only one I’m sure of was the Shrine.

Friday and Saturday May 24-25th, 1968 shows at the Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Times dated Mon. May 27, 1968 has a review of the show which clearly states the appearance of Mike Bloomfield’s Electric Flag, Dr. John the Night Tripper, Salvation and The Velvet Underground. Review: Concert of Rock, Blues at Shrine by Pete Johnson in Los Angeles Times, May 27, 1968. Reproduced in The Inevitable World of The Velvet Underground (p. 248). http://olivier.landemaine.free.fr/vu/live/1968/perf68.html 

LIFE AT THE RANCH: Chanting Hare Krishna in the chicken shed. No drums. Rotating Beatles, Stones, Doors, and Dylan. Listening to Beach Boys 20/20 in the house.

The cook was a very special dude. I loved listening to his stories in the kitchen. I split a tab of acid with him on a day that we had the compound to ourselves. He came to my graduation ceremony as head trainee at ZCLA 20 years later, in 1988, as Issan Dorsey.

To Spahn’s Ranch to score speed. The band all shot speed, injected amphetamines. I went along in the back seat once when they went to a neighboring ranch commune to score drugs and hang out. It was called Spahn’s Movie Ranch. When we pulled into the dirt circle of run down western shacks I had a very strong feeling I didn’t want to go in. Something about it gave me the creeps. I was so glad I stayed in the car when I later read about the Manson Family murders. They lived at Spahn’s Movie Ranch. That’s as close as I ever came.