June 27-29, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Barry Melton and The Fish/Kaleidoscope/Los Flamencos de la Santa Lucia (FDGH '69 III)

The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, ca. 1969

The Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA
The Family Dog was a foundation stone in the rise of San Francisco rock, and it was in operation in various forms from Fall 1965 through the Summer of 1970. For sound historical reasons, most of the focus on the Family Dog has been on the original 4-person collective who organized the first San Francisco Dance Concerts in late 1965, and on their successor Chet Helms. Helms took over the Family Dog in early 1966, and after a brief partnership with Bill Graham at the Fillmore, promoted memorable concerts at the Avalon Ballroom from Spring 1966 through December 1968. The posters, music and foggy memories of the Avalon are what made the Family Dog a legendary 60s rock icon.

In the Summer of 1969, however, with San Francisco as one of the fulcrums of the rock music explosion, Chet Helms opened another venue. The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, on the Western edge of San Francisco, was only open for 14 months and was not a success. Yet numerous interesting bands played there, and remarkable events took place, and they are only documented in a scattered form. This series of posts will undertake a systematic review of every musical event at the Family Dog on The Great Highway. In general, each post will represent a week of musical events at the venue, although that may vary slightly depending on the bookings.

If anyone has memories, reflections, insights, corrections or flashbacks about shows at the Family Dog on the Great Highway, please post them in the Comments.

660 Great Highway in San Francisco in 1967, when it was the ModelCar Raceway, a slot car track

The Edgewater Ballroom, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA
As early as 1913, there were rides and concessions at Ocean Beach in San Francisco, near the Richmond District. By 1926, they had been consolidated as Playland-At-The-Beach. The Ocean Beach area included attractions such as the Sutro Baths and the Cliff House. The San Francisco Zoo was just south of Playland, having opened in the 1930s. One of the attractions at Playland was a restaurant called Topsy's Roost. The restaurant had closed in 1930, and the room became the Edgewater Ballroom. The Ballroom eventually closed, and Playland went into decline when its owner died in 1958. By the 1960s, the former Edgewater was a slot car raceway. In early 1969, Chet Helms took over the lease of the old Edgewater.

One of the only photos of the interior of the Family Dog on The Great Highway (from a Stephen Gaskin "Monday Night Class" ca. October 1969)

The Family Dog On The Great Highway
The Great Highway was a four-lane road that ran along the Western edge of San Francisco, right next to Ocean Beach. Downtown San Francisco faced the Bay, but beyond Golden Gate Park was the Pacific Ocean. The aptly named Ocean Beach is dramatic and beautiful, but it is mostly windy and foggy. Much of the West Coast of San Francisco is not even a beach, but rocky cliffs. There are no roads in San Francisco West of the Great Highway, so "660 Great Highway" was ample for directions (for reference, it is near the intersection of Balboa Street and 48th Avenue). The tag-line "Edge Of The Western World" was not an exaggeration, at least in American terms.

The Family Dog on The Great Highway was smaller than the Bill Graham's old Fillmore Auditorium. It could hold up to 1500, but the official capacity was probably closer to 1000. Unlike the comparatively centrally located Fillmore West, the FDGH was far from downtown, far from the Peninsula suburbs, and not particularly easy to get to from the freeway. For East Bay or Marin residents, the Great Highway was a formidable trip. The little ballroom was very appealing, but if you didn't live way out in the Avenues, you had to drive. As a result, FDGH didn't get a huge number of casual drop-ins, and that didn't help its fortunes. Most of the locals referred to the venue as "Playland."

• For a complete list of Family Dog shows (including FDGH), see here
• For the previous entry (June 20-22, 1969 w/Sons Of Champlin) see here
  
• For a summary and the link to the most recent entries in this series, see here

 

June 27-29, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA:  Barry Melton and The Fish/Kaleidoscope/Los Flamencos de las Santa Lucia (Friday-Sunday)
Barry "The Fish" Melton had been playing for Chet Helms since October 21, 1966, when Country Joe and The Fish had first opened for Seattle's Daily Flash at the Avalon. The band had played there many times since. Back in Fall '66, they had been an underground Berkeley band with a self-released EP available at a few Berkeley shops. By Summer '69, Country Joe and The Fish were nationally known, with two best-selling albums on Vanguard that were staples of FM radio and college dorms nationwide.

Country Joe and The Fish had a new album, too, their third for Vanguard, Here We Are Again. The official release date was July, but the record had already been reviewed in the SF Chronicle and was probably available in stores. So, why, with a new album, was Barry Melton headlining the Family Dog without Joe McDonald? While the exact details aren't known, it's pretty likely that Country Joe and The Fish did not really exist as a functioning band in June, 1969, even with a new album.

Now, in fact, Joe McDonald and Barry Melton had always considered themselves a duo, not a band. The advice they were given in late 1966, however, when they signed with Vanguard, had made the other members of the group (David Cohen, Bruce Barthol and Gary "Chicken" Hirsh) equal partners. When Joe and Barry wanted to move on early in 1969, they had to buy out the other three. Joe and Barry would find new people to play with them live, but Country Joe and The Fish was a duo that had an electric supporting cast. No fans knew this at the time, nor would they have probably cared. As far as fans were concerned, Country Joe and The Fish were a band.

The last tour of the "original" Country Joe and The Fish had ended January 12, 1969 at Fillmore West. All their friends showed up to jam--Jerry Garcia, Mickey Hart, Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Casady and Steve Miller--and it even got recorded (and released in 1994). A new English band called Led Zeppelin had opened for them, however, so no one really recalled the event. In March 1969, Country Joe and The Fish had toured Europe with a new lineup. Peter Albin and Dave Getz, formerly of Big Brother, were on bass and drums, respectively. The new keyboard player was East Coaster Mark Kapner (how Kapner had hooked up with the duo isn't quite clear). That lineup toured the States in April and early May, but it was a one-time thing, as Big Brother had their own plans to reform.

Country Joe and The Fish would kick off their Summer tour a few weeks later, on July 18, 1969 at Fillmore West, with Joe Cocker and The Grease Band opening. By mid-August, the new lineup would be playing Woodstock. As far as I know, however, that band did not exist in June. The Woodstock lineup would be

• Country Joe McDonald-vocals, guitar, harmonica
• Barry "The Fish" Melton-lead guitar, vocals
• Mark Kapner-organ, keyboards
• Doug Metzner-bass
• Greg Dewey-drums

Metzner was from the Greenwich Village band Group Image. Greg Dewey had been in the Berkeley band Mad River, who had only recently broken up. So who was playing at The Family Dog? We don't actually know--there isn't a review, there isn't a picture or a tape, and I'm not aware of eyewitness accounts. 

Joe McDonald and Barry Melton periodically played separately. The band had nearly broken up in late 1967. Joe had gone solo, and considered hiring a Vancouver band (the United Empire Loyalists). Melton, meanwhile, had toured with the other three members as "The Incredible Fish." In the nomenclature of local rock billing, if Melton was appearing as with "The Fish" it meant he would be playing electric, but without Country Joe. I think the Family Dog was a warmup gig for the new Fish lineup, and I suspect that Melton played with Kapner, Metzner and Dewey. 

Did Country Joe show up? Very likely not. McDonald had a two-week engagement with a satirical performance troupe called The Pitschel Players. He was appearing as part of their revue at The Intersection on Union Street, and it was widely advertised. As if that wasn't enough, on Sunday afternoon (June 29), Country Joe was headlining a show at the Frost Amphitheater in Stanford. So Joe was booked, and The Fish would be swimming without him. 

The Kaleidoscope were from Los Angeles, and they were decades ahead of their time. They pretty much invented World Music, and pretty much no one was ready for it. In June 1969, the band had released their third album on Epic, Incredible! Kaleidoscope. It lived up to its name. While the band was still fronted by guitarist/multi-instrumentalist David Lindley, multi-instrumentalist Solomon Feldthouse and organist/multi-instrumentalist Chester Crill, they had a new rhythm section. Paul Lagos was the drummer and Stuart Brotman played bass. Anyone who ever saw the band live was lucky.

The Avalon had a reputation for finding cool bands before anyone else. If Helms booked a band at the Avalon, and they got good notices, Bill Graham wasn't far behind, offering them more money and a higher profile. Kaleidoscope had played the Avalon various times since early '67, and while they were too far ahead of their time for most listeners, other musicians just about lost their minds. When Kaleidoscope had played the Avalon on May 24-26, 1968 (booked between the Youngbloods and the Hour Glass, with Duane and Gregg Allman), the Yardbirds were booked at the Fillmore West the same weekend. Jimmy Page has told the story of taking time out between sets to walk the 12 blocks over to the Avalon just to catch the Kaleidoscope, and then walking the 12 blocks back to play his late night set with the Yardbirds.

In August 1968, the Kaleidoscope had finally played the Fillmore West, opening for the Grateful Dead (August 20-22), but they had never gotten over the hump. The hippie rock world--nor anywhere else--was just not ready for them. By 1969, they were back with Chet Helms, second on the bill at the Family Dog. David Lindley and Solomon Feldthouse had played the Jabberwock club in Berkeley, back in 1966, when Country Joe and The Fish were getting their start--Brooklynite Melton would play solo gigs as "Blind Ebbets Field"--so I wouldn't be surprised if some jamming took place. But we have no record of these shows, so we don't know.

Los Flamencos de Las Santa Lucias were a troupe of local Flamenco performers, but beyond recognizing their name I know nothing about the group.

For a link to the next post (July 4-6, 1969 Flying Burrito Brothers), see here