Weeds

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Michael Brewer and Tom Shipley’s overlooked 1969 gem of the hippie-psych area is equal parts California folk-rock, crafty pop harmonies, and driving country rock. The pedigree for their second album is huge too: the backing group includes, among others, keyboardist Nicky Hopkins (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Kinks), guitarist Mike Bloomfield (Bob Dylan, Paul Butterfield Blues Band), fiddler Richard Greene (Bill Monroe), and underground producer legend Nick Gravenites (Electric Flag, Quicksilver Messenger Service). The album’s an early model of country rock. Songs such as “Pig Head,” “Lady Like You,” and “Rise Up (Easy Rider)” epitomize the genre as well anything by The Byrds or The Flying Burrito Brothers. “Indian Summer” is a heartwarmer that climbs magnificently on picking guitars, tinkling pianos, and swishing fiddle until it becomes an aural equivalent of a lovely desert monsoon. Brewer & Shipley’s harmony-driven covers of Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower” and songwriter Jim Pepper’s ode to peyote “Witchi Tai To” are anything but throwaways, and you can hear the kind of harmonies that made it onto their massive hit “One Toke Over the Line.”

via Apple Music

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