Original photograph by Alex Waterford Hayward
Those of you familiar with my post on ART DECADE a couple of weeks back will already know that one of the chief tracks featured was the Box Tops' version of Holland-Dozier-Holland's "You Keep Me Hangin' On", replete with tongue-in-cheek "... walked on down the hall" reference to Jim Morrison & the Doors.
In all truth I was itching to post the Tea Company's splendid version of the same song too, but at 8:47 the file size proved prohibitive. This is Bubblegum Psychedelia at its absolute finest ; a prolongued dizzy jam which recalls the house-band from your senior prom, perhaps, if you happened to live in the USA at that particularly emotional juncture. Throwing up whiskey drunk straight from a hip flask in the flower beds behind your school, sniffing sticky fingers a good few years before the Rolling Stones made them fashionable.
And the very next week - if you were unlucky - choking back tepid water from a government issued canteen deep in the roiling jungles.
NYC group, the Tea Company, were never going to make it big. They struggled just to get to first base. They evolved apparently from a ballroom support band playing permanent second fiddle to Ritchie Havens and the Lovin' Spoonful. Once, they even opened for Bob Dylan.
With a 12 string Rickenbacher and Syd Barrett era inspired lunacy, these friends of Vanilla Fudge mashed out this near perfect 9 minute jam which rightly dominates their debut LP on Smash - home to the Left Banke - from 1968. Freshly remastered, it melts the Fudge and puts Alex Chilton's version simultaneously in the shade.
▼ THE TEA COMPANY: YOU KEEP ME HANGIN' ON from "Come And Have Some Tea With Me" LP (Smash) 1968 (US)
4 comments:
Hey man, the site, the logo and the tagline are all brilliant. Well played, sir. This is a great version. A little side order of Pictures of Matchstick Men on this interpretation. Speaking of the 'Fudge, I saw Carmine Appice out and about not too long ago at a jazz show -- Sonny Fortune (of Miles Davis "Agharta" fame) and Rashied Ali (Coltrane's post-Elvin Jones drummer), to be precise. So anyway, yeah. Music to retire to - I'll drink to that. :)
Hey IB, sorry for being desultory in dropping by. It looks great. Delioghted to see more MC5 and this track is a delight. I was genuinely curious as to how they'd fill those last 2 minutes..it has a prom meet acid test vibe. Good stuff.
Hey Emmett, thanks for commenting favourably on the site ; it's good to get positive feedback and even better when it comes directly from your peers.
Cool you mentioned the "Matchstick Men" homage on the intro. More on that may well be forthcoming...
As for the Carmine Appice gig, words fail me. Just jealous is as much as i can muster! Oh, for the days of Radio Caroline, with a boat moored in international waters.
Sheridan! Good to see you here at last. Glad this one as well as the MC5 is to your liking! Prom Meet Acid Test is just about right...
Drop by again, dude, when you get the urge. Otherwise i'll maybe catch up with you down the road on GTG.
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