I've been doing a few guest posts at
The Perfect American which to the unintiated, is a roiling vortex of lust for the illness called Rock n' Roll. It's a journey, and for me, it's been kinda liberating, and thanks to Mr. Jyn for asked me to plug in some stuff.
There's a post about Spade Cooley stomping his wife to death, one about Jim Carroll & those who worship and/or study his Basketball Diaries, one about singer Billie Davis, with a broken jaw, pulling Jet Harris from the Shadows out of a wrecked limo and lastly I'll mention the one that led to this post; the one about Dino Valente Quicksilver Messenger Service was my first concert. It was right after their second album featuring Dino, and it was all we were listening to at the time. Eric Burdon and War opened and my eyeballs almost fell outta my head when I realized that the Boss of the Animals was up there singing "Spill the Wine" It was cooler than anything, and why in hell did my parents let me go?!?!?! But yay!
But Dino - kind of an interesting guy as explained in this exact transcription from my 1st edition of Lillian Roxon's
Rock Encyclopedia (1969)
DINO VALENTI (Chester Powers)/Dino Valenti is one of those living legends. He worked in a carnival for seventeen years, was a trapeze artist for three of them, sang around the clubs of Los Angeles for years, but never made a record because he wanted it to be perfect when he did. (The story was that he kept making them, refusing to have them released, dropping them and making more.) He spent nearly a year in jail for possession of amphetamine and sold his rights to his most successful song, Let's Get Together, to get money to get out of jail. It's one of the most recorded songs ever (the song's composer is listed as Chester Powers)—the Youngbloods, Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service have all done it. He also co-wrote Hey Joe. But his album, finally out in 1968, has none of this—just strange, mysterious, intimate songs that sneak up behind you. "An underground Bob Dylan," said critic Ralph Gleason. Well, he has that curly Dylan look anyway. "A five-year-dead Orphan Annie," said Emmet Lake of the East Village Other. Yes, he's a songwriting legend, and a one-year-in-gaol-for-amphetamine legend, and a macrobiotics-solar-energy legend, but mainly he's a ladies' man legend. It was San Francisco radio personality Tom Donahue who said simply: "If every chick Dino's ever known buys the record, it will be number one."
Album/DINO (October 1968): Time; Something New; My Friend; Listen To Me; Me And My Uncle; Tomorrow; Children Of The Sun; New Wind; Everything Is Gonna Be OK; Test.Now lissen:
boomp3.com
And here's the original program from the show- click to
embiggen SOME ARE EVEN GIANTER FOR VIEWING EASE
