Terrific 3-CD anthology of underappreciated powerhouse

Pacific Northwest powerhouse Paul Revere & the Raiders seem to have been lost in shadow of Lenny Kaye’s Nuggets and the hundreds of garage-rock compilations that followed in its wake. They aren’t exactly a secret, having recorded for Columbia, scoring fifteen Top 40 singles, garnering a feature spot on Where the Action Is and hosting their own shows, Happening ’68 and It’s Happening. But neither are they afforded the recognition their hits, B-sides, album cuts and live performances really earned. Perhaps it was the genesis of their stardom in Southern California or their major label association that kept them from garage band legend. Maybe it was the themed costumes – particularly the three-corner hats – or that vocalist Mark Lindsay had a soulful finesse which went beyond the typical garage-punk snot. Or maybe it’s that their run into the mid-70s outlasted their roots. Whatever it was, it’s left the Raiders rich catalog remembered only by a few high-charting hits.

The Raiders’ garage and frat-rock credentials were minted on a string of indie singles, and a recording of rock ‘n’ roll’s national anthem, “Louie, Louie,” that was laid down only a few weeks after the Kingsmen’s. The Raiders version bubbled under the Top 100, and along with the Wailers’ earlier version helped root the song in the Pacific Northwest. Picked up by Columbia the single had a good helping of regional success before Columbia A&R honcho Mitch Miller scuttled it. The group’s original follow-up “Louie-Go Home” sounds more like a grungy take on Otis Blackwell’s “Daddy Rolling Stone,” than a riff on Richard Berry’s original, and once again only managed to grazed the bottom of the Billboard chart. These early single, fueled by Lindsay’s fat saxophone tone and covers of R&B tunes “Night Train” and “Have Love, Will Travel,” weren’t as raw as the Sonics, but were still a lot meatier than most of their L.A., Chicago or Northeast counterparts.

“Louie, Louie,” originally released on the Sande label, turned out to be the Raiders ticket to the big time: a deal with Columbia Records. The group continued to crank out R&B covers for the next year, including a fuzz-heavy cover of Gene Thomas’ country-tinged “Sometimes” and a solid take on the Aaron Neville hit “Over You.” The group’s original were initially limited to B-sides, such as the instrumental “Swim,” but in 1965 the Lindsay/Revere composition “Steppin’ Out” began the group’s assault on the charts. Revere’s organ riffs and a confrontational lyric gave this single a tougher garage sound that took them just shy of the Top 40. A short-lived detour into Jan & Dean-styled car songs (“SS396” b/w “Corvair Baby”) was followed by a trifecta of the group’s best remembered hits.

First up was “Just Like Me,” with a wickedly insinuating organ riff, a brilliant double guitar solo, and a vocal that rises from barely contained verses to emotionally explosive choruses. Next was Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil’s anti-drug “Kicks,” turned down by the Animals and taken to #4 by the Raiders. Lindsay really sells the song, singing the lyric as both a lecture and a plea, forceful on the verses and understanding in the choruses. The group cracked the Top 10 again with another Mann & Weil tune, “Hungry,” propelled by its hypnotically powerful bass line. The group (with Terry Melcher) subsequently began writing many of their own hits and B-sides, including “Good Thing,” “Him or Me,” and “Ups and Downs,” and Melcher began adding studio musicians to the mix.

As 1967 turned into 1968 the band stretched from their Northwest rock roots into sunshine pop, bubblegum, folk rock, soul and light-psych. Fine sides from this period include the Beatle-esque “Too Much Talk,” the groovy theme songs “Happening ‘68” and “It’s Happening,” and the chewy “Cinderella Sunshine” and “Mr. Sun, Mr. Moon.” The latter two are among the sides Lindsey produced for the band after their separation from Terry Melcher and the arrival of three replacement Raiders with Southern roots. By the end of the 1960s the group’s singles were charting lower, often outside the Top 40, but their quality never dipped, and the advent of stereo releases (with 1969’s “We Gotta All Get Together”) finally detached their sound from the monophonic thrash of their Northwest roots.

Their success was renewed in 1971 with a cover of John D. Loudermilk’s “Indian Reservation (The Lament of the Cherokee Reservation Indian),” a song that had been recorded a decade earlier by Marvin Rainwater and with some commercial success by Don Fardon. The Raiders’ version topped the singles charts – their only #1 – and sold a million copies. The renewed success was brief however: a follow-up cover of Joe South’s “Birds of a Feather” just missed the Top 20, and their next four singles charted lower and lower, ending their run with 1973’s barely charting pre-disco “Love Music.” The group’s contract with Columbia ended in 1975, lead singer Mark Lindsay left for a solo career, and though the group soldiered on with sporadic new releases they became more of a fixture on the oldies circuit.

Collectors’ Choice’s 3-CD set offers sixty-six tracks that cover all of the group’s Columbia singles. The B-sides offer some real treats, including the autobiographical “The Legend of Paul Revere,” the Las Vegas grind-styled instrumental “B.F.D.R.F. Blues,” the flower-power “Do Unto Others,” the trippy “Observations from Flight 285 (in 3/4 Time),” the muscular jam “Without You,” the Band-styled country-rock “I Don’t Know,” the Peter & Gordon-ish “Frankford Side Street,” and the organ instrumental “Terry’s Tune.” There are four rarities: the withdrawn “Rain, Sleet, Snow” and its flip “Brotherly Love,” and promo songs for the GTO (“Judge GTO Breakaway”) and a Mattel doll (“Song for Swingy”). The collection closes with the post-Mark Lindsay “Your Love (is the Only Love),” featuring Bob Wooley on lead vocal. Missing are the group’s pre-Columbia singles, including their boogie-woogie instrumentals “Beatnik Sticks” and “Like, Long Hair,” and their last single “Ain’t Nothin’ Wrong.”

This recitation of the group’s Columbia singles hits most of the group’s highlights, but with fourteen LPs to their credit there are some worthy album cuts missing, such as their pre-Monkees version of “(I’m Not Your) Steppin’ Stone.” That said, this is a superb document of the band’s evolution from Northwest powerhouse into a group that could finesse pop, rock, folk, soul and R&B sounds. Their singles were of an unusually consistent quality, and the group’s ability to chart new directions while retaining the heart of their original identity is truly impressive. For most listeners the group’s name will evoke only one or two of these hits, but as eleven years of singles reveal, there was a whole lot more to Paul Revere and the Raiders than three-corner hats and Northwest garage. [©2010-2012 hyperbolium dot com]

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