HEAR FACTOR: THEM DAMN HIPPIES

Download entire Damn Hippies! (.zip)

When I finally found my Hear Factor cd, conveniently stashed under the couch by Mrs. kpdexter, I was excited to see so many titles I was unfamiliar with. The Traffic titles were a pleasant surprise to me, I guess I never considered them a hippie band, though “You Can All Join In” certainly has that feel, generally a feel-good kind of song.

Now, “The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys” has always held a special place in my heart, and it excited me to see it here. I often reflect back on Halloween 1991, enjoyed at the Halloween Mecca, Ohio University, in Athens, Ohio. A carload of us drove the 3-hour trip from Dayton to Athens, armed only with 12-packs of Milwaukee’s Best Light, a few packs of smokes, some low-grade weed (of which I did not partake), and a bunch of shitty cassettes, a mixture of Canned Heat, early Ween, some weird Beach Boys stuff, a few Dead boots, and a Traffic mix tape. Now, the ride down was relatively uneventful, the driver was a bit paranoid because of all the contraband, and the fact that several of us were underage as well, so we played it cool, we sipped some beers and played some music, and talked about shit, school, and whatnot. We played some crappy Dead tape on the way there, and all lamented the fact that we were unable to score any psychedelics for the trip. I remember a rousing version of Franklin’s Tower>Help on the Way>Slipknot, but not much else, it was a pretty standard setlist, nothing too earth shattering.

We finally arrived at our destination, a bit after dusk, a slight chill in the air, but generally speaking, sweatshirt weather, perfect for late October. We rolled out of the car gathered our stuff, and headed in to our buddy Kid’s house. The party immediately kicked into high gear, and the hours began to fly by. As it got close to midnight, the party realized it was time to head into town to hit the major parties. Me, my buddy Dennis, and our other buddy Joe, who also lived at this particular house, decided that with all the beer that we had left, we should just stay behind and get hammered and listen to tunes on the stereo.

We listened to some Blackfoot, the harmonica in “Train Train” particularly got our rocks off. We then moved to the Canned Heat, I believe it was the Hooker and Heat lp, it was my first exposure to both John Lee Hooker and Canned Heat, and the three of us pretty much agreed it was the greatest thing ever, a fact that still makes us laugh to this day.

At some point, one of us decided to throw on some Traffic, I’m fairly certain it was a mix of The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys lp and John Barley Corn Must Die. I’m also fairly certain that it blew our collective minds. The playing was unbelievable; Steve Winwood’s voice was unbelievable, so much so that I bought the Blind Faith lp soon after this. But what really killed me was the dramatic tension; the slow build up on “The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys”. We played it over and over in our stupor, but we were coherent enough to realize we were hearing something amazing.

Eventually, things got out of hand; I ended up starving hungry, couldn’t find any food, and ate some uncooked bacon out of the fridge. Dennis and Joe continued to drink, and as I was about to pass out, I heard them arguing about religion.

“Would you cut your balls off for Buddha? I would.”
“Would you cut your hair? I would”

It should be noted that Joe had perhaps the coolest hair I’d ever seen on a dude in the pre-grunge era, long, but not too long.

You guessed it; I woke up the next morning, passed out on the couch, head next to the stereo speaker, which was blaring Ween’s first album at an inappropriate volume. It seemed like the longest album ever recorded.

Joe comes out of his room, completely bald, and just looks at me and laughs. Neither one of us ever said much about that night, we just knew. It was the kind of night that we’d refer to in a passing way and just knowingly nod. It was pretty damn cool.

We went home later that day, hungover as hell. I went to a record store later that day, as I said, disappointed that they didn’t have that Traffic cd. Time passed, and a few months later, I did finally score a copy of the cd from BMG. I eagerly threw it in the CD player, and skipped ahead to the end, to get to the title track. What was sad was that even though I could still get some joy out of the song, I didn’t get that feeling again, that feeling of hearing the greatest thing ever. Sadly, I still don’t. I still think it’s a good song though, but it’s of a certain time and place for me, as is a lot of this music.

I thought it was all pretty good, particularly the Eric Burdon cuts. “Magic Mountain” and “Winds of Change” were pretty great. The Dylan and The Band cut was one I was familiar with; it’s a great one.

I don’t know if I’d run out and get any of this stuff though, except for perhaps the Burdon stuff. It just doesn’t excite me enough anymore. But there was a time when it definitely WOULD HAVE.

It’s a good cd, who made it by the way?