Jingle Jangle Morning by Richie Unterberger

Author:Richie Unterberger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2014-08-09T04:00:00+00:00

The most commercially successful recording of a Fred Neil composition was not by the singer himself, but this hit cover of “Everybody’s Talkin’” by Nilsson.

It didn’t help that he had utter disregard for the usual machinations of the record business, not touring or even giving interviews, aside from one given to Hit Parader in 1966. The album market created by the rise of FM radio in the late ’60s was just beginning, and he couldn’t coast off of that for a living, in the way other, similar artists were starting to do without the benefit of hit singles. His prospects were further hindered by a meandering second album for Capitol, Sessions, in which the raga element that had pleasantly tinged some of his work started to overwhelm it, and the takes often sounded like spontaneous jams rather than focused, concise songs.

Offers John Sebastian, “I’ve always felt like the Capitol recordings were a real letdown, a real ‘oh, let’s just give up and let Fred have his head and underachieve.’ That Capitol material really didn’t have that tautness created by having [Felix] Pappalardi and I bugging the hell out of him about these arrangements and things [as they had on Neil’s Elektra recordings]. I think it was inferior to the Elektra body of work, simply because it did not have the effort. Venet, when he writes about Fred and those sessions, makes it sound like this was a real accomplishment to kind of let Fred have his way. But in fact, I thought it was a lazy man’s approach.” (An amused Jerry Jeff Walker remembers asking Sebastian, “How did Freddie ever play a 12-string? He didn’t have discipline.” [John] said, ‘When Freddie’d go smoke a joint, I’d go tune the 12-string.’ ’Cause John also had to play harmonica with it, and he wanted to sound in tune.”)

If Neil’s problem was an inability to handle fame, Phil Ochs had almost the opposite predicament: Fame wasn’t coming quickly enough. In particular, he couldn’t match the fame of Bob Dylan, the competitor whose discarded topical song torch he was bearing, and who ruthlessly put Ochs down as a singing journalist. Although he remained an active performer in 1966 and 1967, Ochs sat out the folk-rock tempest for about a year-and-a-half as his Elektra contract expired and he shopped for another deal, moving to Los Angeles from New York. Aside from his fine, virtually unheard UK-only single with an electric version of his protest classic “I Ain’t Marching Anymore,” he hadn’t released a single electric folk-rock recording on Elektra. (Intriguingly, however, Lee Mallory had a minor hit in 1966 with an elaborately produced harmony sunshine pop-rock version of a song written by Ochs and folkie Bob Gibson, “That’s the Way It’s Gonna Be.”) “Phil Ochs was beset by a devil that was very difficult for me to deal with, and that was his Dylan fixation,” says Holzman. “We did great records with Phil. But he didn’t feel we were doing enough for him. When

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