The Dusty Shelf: The Flamin’ Groovies

[The Dusty Shelf is a weekly column that showcases a tragically overlooked album from the music snob's library.]

Don’t let their San Francisco roots fool you.  The Flamin’ Groovies are no flower power band – they are raw power, more in line with the early 70s’ proto-punk Detroit scene.  Even as early as their 1970 sophomore album Flamingo, the Groovies were all about careening freight train chaos.  The album’s third song, “Headin’ for the Texas Border”, remains one of rock and roll’s supremely unrelenting hard rock anthems, even if most people have never heard it (though bands as recent as the Raconteurs have been known to cover it live).

The Flamin’ Groovies were victims of no other misfortunate than the simple fact that they inhabited a scene that was fueled by bands like the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane.  MC5’s Wayne Kramer once said of the west coast bands, “I think they all hated us because they had to play with us in Detroit, where we kicked all their asses.”  In a way, this applied to the Groovies, except that they were already native Californians and had to make do in spite of it.

While the band went through its share of personnel changes, the Groovies were founded by Cyril Jordan (guitar/vocals), Roy Loney (guitar/vocals), George Alexander (bass/harmonica/vocals), Tim Lynch (guitar/harmonica/vocals) and Danny Mihm (drums).  It was the initial and immediate team play between Jordan and Loney that made the Groovies a sort of hellhound mix of surf rock, punk and power pop (emphasis on power).  This duo collaborated on the band’s first three studio albums, 1969’s Supersnazz, Flamingo, and 1971’s Teenage Head.

Teenage Head, the band’s last before Loney’s departure, dove into roots blues while adding a primitive garage rock element, a combination that won the praises of Mick Jagger (the Rolling Stones came out with their own blues album, Sticky Fingers, the same year).  Yet it is impossible to name a definitive Flaming Groovies album, not least of all because the band enjoyed a rather long career despite their relative lack of fame.

It was those first three albums that marked the Groovies’ legacy of classic pop music, although even after Loney left, Jordan led the band through another great album, 1976’s Shake Some Action.  Jordan proved a formidable leading songwriter on his own, but there was something about Loney’s profound rambunctiousness that was always lacking afterwards.

The Flaming Groovies may have sounded a bit out of place in the tie-dye jam scene of San Francisco, but that is a symbol of how ahead of their time (and place) they were.  Their body of work isn’t entirely consistent, but the songs they produced in the early 70s remain to be some of the decade’s most formidable rock creations.