Loading Zone Performance List 1971 (Loading Zone cont II)

 

The debut album of The Loading Zone was released by RCA in June, 1968

The Loading Zone-Performance List 1971
The Loading Zone, while obscure, are a uniquely important group in Bay Area music history. The Zone had a singly dizzying history. Loading Zone had initially been formed out of the ashes of a Berkeley group called The Marbles (who played the first Family Dog Longshoreman’s Hall Dance on October 16, 1965). The two guitarists from The Marbles then joined with organist/vocalist Paul Fauerso (formerly of Oakland’s Tom Paul Trio, a jazz combo) and played a hitherto unheard mixture of psychedelic blues and funky R&B.

Loading Zone were based out of Oakland, in a house on West 14th Street, and while they had played the original Trips Festival and many dates at the Fillmore and Avalon, they also played many soul clubs in the East Bay. They added horns, and after some false starts, a powerhouse vocalist named Linda Tillery, and released an under-rehearsed album on RCA in 1968. The band also had a brief national tour, and played all the clubs in the Bay Area.

The Loading Zone thus laid the blueprint for the progressive soul music of Bay Area bands like Sly and The Family Stone and Tower of Power. Indeed, a Zone roadie, high school student Steve Kupka, played baritone sax with the band’s horn section, when there was room on stage and he was allowed in the club. At one such gig, he met a Fremont band called The Motowns, and they joined forces to create Tower Of Power.

The Loading Zone, ca. 1968

The unique status of the Loading Zone led to a major research project on their history. Besides creating a log of all known performances, based on the information available to us at that time, Ross created a spectacular Loading Zone Family Tree. The Tree gives a well-articulated picture of how the band was formed, and what it created. In retrospect, we did a really good job on the 1960s Loading Zone. Our information on the band in the early 1970s, however, was very limited, and some of it was actually incorrect.

With new information sources easily available, I am beginning a series of posts about the performance history of the Loading Zone from 1970 through their breakup in September 1972. The logging of the band's gigs, large and small, also acts as a survey of the different types of bookings available to a working rock band in the Bay Area at the time. I have previously published a post on all the known performances of the Loading Zone during 1970. This post will focus on all the known performances of the Loading Zone from 1971. Anyone with updates, corrections, insights, recovered memories or flashbacks with respect to the Loading Zone is heartily encouraged to put them in the Comments.

 

Loading Zone guitarist Pete Shapiro on the front porch of the Loading Zone house on 14th Street in West Oakland, sometime around 1967 (the house was identified by Shapiro's then-girlfriend)

The Loading Zone-1960s
1966-The Loading Zone were formed out of the ashes of the Tom Paul Jazz Trio and The Marbles, a British Invasion-styled rock band. They debuted on January 14, 1966. The band pioneered a blend of rhythm and blues with psychedelic guitar solos, showing that the blend worked in both hippie ballrooms and regular R&B dance gigs. The Loading Zone played the Trips Festival and many other foundational ballroom events, while playing dance clubs at the same time.

1967-The Loading Zone expanded their membership, experimenting with a female vocalist, and adding a horn section on occasion. The band played gigs all over the Bay Area, particularly in the East Bay.

1968-In early 1968, the Loading Zone added the dynamic young vocalist Linda Tillery. Female lead vocalists for San Francisco bands were hot, and the Zone was signed to RCA. The band recorded their debut album, probably too soon, and went on a National tour when the album was released around June. The band continued to improve and got better and better notices, although the album did not reflect that (for a good representation of the '68 Loading Zone, here is a mis-dated tape from September '68).

1969-At the end of 1968, Linda Tillery was signed to a solo contract by Columbia Records. The Loading Zone marched on, with Paul Fauerso taking over the lead vocals from the organ chair. In May '69, some original members left the band and the group was reorganized around Fauerso. The new members had more sophisticated jazz backgrounds. The mid-69 model of the Zone mixed the original funky drive of the band with some advanced jazz sounds. Tillery, meanwhile, released the Sweet Linda Devine album on Columbia, produced by Al Kooper in mid-July. She toured around the Bay Area with a trio.

The Loading Zone's second album, One For All (Umbrella Records early 1970)

1970-1970 was a year of change for the Loading Zone. The band had taken on a much jazzier approach by the end of 1969. Yet Linda Tillery, despite her talent, had been dropped by Columbia and had returned to the Zone in early 1970. In June, however, founder and organist Paul Fauerso dropped out of the music business, and the Loading Zone disintegrated. Shortly afterwards, however, Linda Tillery and some new band members reorganized the band. Tillery was the voice and face of the band, and they probably played much of the same material, so it wasn't invalid. Still, it was a new band. Only bassist Mike Eggleston remained from any earlier incarnations.

In my previous post, I reviewed all the known information about every show that the Loading Zone played during 1970.

Al Kooper had produced the Sweet Linda Devine album for Columbia in 1969, but by 1970 the label had dropped Linda Tillery, so she re-activated the Loading Zone

The Loading Zone-Known Performances, 1971

At the beginning of 1971, the members of the Loading Zone were: 

Linda Tillery-vocals
Tom Coster-Hammond organ
Mike Eggleston-bass
Al Coster-drums

The Coster brothers had been regulars on the Oakland jazz scene. They had played in a regular trio with saxophonist Jules Broussard in downtown Oakland, as well as backing other jazz musicians. Tom Coster, later to become well-known in Santana, was an amazingly versatile Hammond organist, able to play creatively in a wide variety of styles. Bassist Mike Eggleston had joined the Zone back in 1969.

January 8-9, 1971 Keystone Korner, San Francisco, CA: Chet Baker/Loading Zone (Friday- Saturday)
The Keystone Korner was at 750 Vallejo Street, near Columbus. The club mostly featured blues and rock, but it veered into jazz as needed. Owner Freddie Herrera would start up the Keystone Berkeley in 1972 (taking over a club called The New Monk), and Keystone Palo Alto in 1977 (taking over a club called Sophie's). By mid-72, Herrera would sell the Keystone Korner to Todd Barkan, who turned it into a legendary (if perpetually financially struggling) jazz club.  Back in '71, however, it was still run by Herrera and was more oriented towards rock and blues.

The Loading Zone's year began with a booking supporting jazz legend Chet Baker. Baker was at perhaps the lowest ebb of his career. Baker (1929-88) had been a brilliant, original trumpeter in the early 1950s. He had played with Charlie Parker, and made some creative and influential records with saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. Baker also turned out be a fine singer, and seemed tagged to have a great pop career in tandem with his considerable jazz talents. As if that wasn't enough, his good looks made him appealing to Hollywood, but Baker had declined a 1955 studio contract in order to continue being a musician.

Baker, however, had serious issues with heroin. As a result, in the latter 50s and early 60s, he had numerous legal run-ins that hampered his career, and he was known to be unreliable. In 1966, outside the Trident club in Sausalito, he was attacked during an attempted robbery, possibly related to an attempt by Baker to buy drugs. Baker's tooth was cracked, and it ruined his embrochure, leaving him unable to play trumpet. For the next several years, to the extent he performed Baker was just a singer (he also worked in a gas station at some point). Jazz was at a low commercial ebb, and he had not recorded since '66. 

It's likely that Baker was booked at Keystone Korner just as a singer. It's also at least plausible that the Loading Zone was backing Baker as well as playing their own set. If that was the case, then it was most likely that it was the Costers and bassist Eggleston, with Linda Tillery stepping aside for Baker's set (although a duet would have been awesome). Even in his reduced state, a giant like Baker could easily have sung standards with pros like the Costers. 

Baker would ultimately get dentures and re-learn to play the trumpet, and his career was appropriately revived in the late 1970s. He remained very popular in Europe until his death in 1988.

The Montclair Recreation Center at 6300 Moraga Way in Oakland was used for local rock concerts from 1970 through 1972. Loading Zone were regular performers there.

January 9, 1971 Montclair Recreation Center, Oakland, CA: Loading Zone (Saturday)
As the 1970s dawned, many Bay Area parents didn't really object to rock music, but weren't necessarily enamored of the idea of their children traveling to San Francisco or Berkeley at night just to see rock bands. In the Fall of 1970, the parents in the Montclair district of Oakland arranged to have rock shows on Saturday night at the local recreation center. The idea was to give kids something fun to do in their own neighborhood. There were rock shows most Saturday nights for the next year. The bands were local, but they were good ones. Many of them had played the Fillmore West, and a few of them even had albums.

The Montclair Recreation Center was at 6300 Moraga Way, on the main road through Montclair, but just outside the district shopping area. The Rec Center was just above a Fire Station, and there was even a light show. The shows were listed in the Oakland Tribune, and supposedly there were flyers as well (although I've never seen any of them). The shows seem to have started on September 19, 1970 and the Loading Zone played five weeks later, on October 30. Just over two months later, the Zone returned to Montclair, so it must have gone well.

Since the Montclair Rec Center was for suburban teenagers, it would have ended early. There would have plenty of time to load out and take the short half-hour drive to San Francisco to make the Keystone Korner gig.

A photo from the January 8, 1971 San Mateo Times shows a 4-piece Loading Zone. They would begin a month-long residency on Monday and Tuesday nights at The Beach House in San Mateo

January 11-12, 1971 The Beach House, San Mateo, CA: Loading Zone  (Monday-Tuesday)
For prosopographical purposes, we are lucky that the suburban San Mateo Times has been digitized, since the suburban daily gives us some unexpected insight into the life of a working band like the Loading Zone. The Zone was without a recording contract at this point, but their goals would have been to play and record the music of their own choosing. Ultimately, records and radio play led to financial success and a chance for musicians to play what they desired. But bands had to eat, and for a band like Loading Zone, that meant playing residencies in bars. I believe the band played weeknights at dance clubs and lounges throughout their career (1966-72) but thanks to the San Mateo Times we actually get a snapshot of that in the first part of 1971.

The Beach House was a recently-opened establishment at 1875 S. Norfolk Avenue in San Mateo. For those that know the geography, the location was right next to the CA-92 entrance to the San Mateo Bridge, and just opposite the canal to Foster City. The location was quite suburban. San Mateo was 20 miles South of San Francisco, in between the City and Palo Alto. Many residents commuted to San Francisco for work, and there was a long string of towns along the Peninsula that were similar. Any nightlife was going to be somewhat suburban, likely for younger people, but also people who lived in a suburb rather than a college town or cool city neighborhood. By 1971, however, there were 20- or 30-somethings in suburbs who fit that description, but liked rock and soul music. So rock bands like the Loading Zone were no longer exclusively confined to hippie joints, like they might have been in the 60s. 

The listing in the San Mateo Times (above) says that the Loading Zone were one of the "most original" bands on the West Coast, which I think was code for saying they weren't a Top 40 copy band. The Zone would be playing Monday and Tuesday nights "indefinitely," with "no cover, no minimums." The pitch here was that patrons could drop in to listen to music, maybe buy a drink or some food, but not have to plan for a night out. The Loading Zone could probably play what they wanted, as long as they kept a groove going, and maybe played a familiar cover once in a while. Since that is what the Loading Zone did anyway, it probably worked out fine. Making a little money on Monday and Tuesday was better than not doing it, and they wouldn't be missing out on better nightclub gigs on those nights.

January 17, 1971 Lion's Share, San Anselmo, CA: Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen/Loading Zone (Sunday)
The Lion's Share, at 60 Red Hill Avenue in San Anselmo, was about 10 minutes from downtown San Rafael. Marin County's population was tiny, but a lot of musicians lived in Marin. So the Lion's Share, with a capacity of about 250-300, always had good bands during this period. Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen had arrived from Ann Arbor, MI in the Summer of '69 and had built a solid local following around Berkeley. The Lion's Share generally paid local bands a percentage of the door, to discourage them from letting every single patron in for free, since the bands knew so many people.

No doubt the Loading Zone had plenty of weekend bookings that I have not been able to find, or else they would have folded. Many of those gigs, however, would have just been dance gigs that would not have advertised in the paper. Some of the dance gigs may have been better paying than nights at a rock club, but a band would have been constrained from jamming too much, as well as under pressure to cover popular songs.

January 18-19, 1971 The Beach House, San Mateo, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)
Most Bay Area residents don't think of San Mateo having a beach, but actually it does. The beach is at Coyote Point Recreation Area, on the San Francisco Bay. So the name "The Beach House" was a play on the location, since it was only a few miles away.           

January 25-26, 1971 The Beach House, San Mateo, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)            

January 29-30, 1971 New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Foxglove (Friday-Saturday)
The Loading Zone had been playing the New Orleans House since 1967. The North Berkeley club, at 1505 San Pablo Avenue (near Hopkins), had been one of the first clubs in the Bay Area to book original rock music. Initially, there were so many bands and so few places to play that the New Orleans consistently had good, interesting bands. By 1971, there was a lot of concert activity around the Bay Area, particularly out in the suburbs, and bookings at the New Orleans House were not as impressive. Still, the Loading Zone played there every other month, so things must have gone well for them at the club.

A listing in the  January 29, 1971San Mateo Times for the Loading Zone's Monday and Tuesday residency at DeeJay's in Belmont. The paper used the same promotional photo as the previous month.

February 1-2, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)  
The Loading Zone continued to play on Mondays and Tuesdays on the Peninsula, but they moved over to a Belmont club called DeeJay's. DeeJay's was at 210 El Camino Real, between East Hillsdale Boulevard and Ralston Avenue. The club seemed to have live music seven nights a week. Once again, it is a peculiar accident that the San Mateo Times has been digitized, and that Deejay's regularly advertised in that paper. Who knows what happened at The Beach House, but it must have at least gone well enough that a different club hired the Loading Zone for those nights.

February 3, 1971 Keystone Korner, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone/Mike Finnegan-Lane Tietgen Group (Wednesday)  
The Loading Zone returned to the Keystone Korner for another Wednesday night. In 1970, organist Mike Finnegan had been in the Jerry Hahn Brotherhood, an interesting band who had released an album on Columbia. Most of the songs on the album were written by one Lane Tietgen. Tietgen and Finnegan were both from Kansas (as was Jerry Hahn, in fact), and they had made an album with a band called The Serfs. By 1971, Tietgen had moved out to San Francisco, and played regularly, if informally, with his old bandmate.

February 7, 1971 Presidio Theater, San Francisco, CA: "Roseland" Premier
By a series of machinations unknown to me, the Loading Zone provided some music for a movie called Roseland. There is a peculiar video sequence in circulation, kind of like a rock video. I have no idea if this is indicative of the rest of the movie or anything else. Still, when you google "Loading Zone"+1971, this often comes up. I think--I am not much good on film history--that Roseland was rated R or X and was supposed to be an "Art" film. Anyway, the San Francisco premier at the Presidio Theater (2340 Chestnut, at Scott) was advertised in the February 7, 1971 San Francisco Examiner.

February 8-9, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)   

February 11, 1971 [venue], Skyline High School, Oakland, CA:  Loading Zone/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen/Crystal Gardens/Grootna  (Thursday)
A Thursday night may seem like an odd choice for a High School gig, but at this time Lincoln's Birthday (February 12) was a separate holiday from Washington's Birthday (February 22). Ultimately, these were merged into "President's Day," a Federal  Holiday on the third Monday of February. Of course, that merger ensured that celebrating Abraham Lincoln's Birthday would not anger those who wanted to enshrine supporters of the Confederacy as "sincere" rather than "Traitors." In any case, this Thursday night was effectively a Friday.

Skyline High School, at 12250 Skyline Boulevard in Oakland, was up in the Oakland Hills. I don't know why there was a commercial rock concert there, but certainly the gym or auditorium at Skyline (I'm not sure which) could draw on a different pool of teenagers, since it was so far from downtown Berkeley. Commander Cody and Grootna were Berkeley-based bands, and Loading Zone was based in Oakland, so this would have been a convenient gig. At this time, neither Cody nor Grootna had yet released their debut albums (both would do so by year's end).

The Loading Zone must have had regular shows on Friday and Saturday, and likely almost every weekend, but I have been able to find no trace of them yet.

February 15-16, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)      

February 18, 1971 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)   
The Inn Of The Beginning, at 8201 Old Redwood Highway in Cotati, had opened in 1968. It only held about 200, but most Bay Area bands liked to play there to fill in the gig sheet. Calling beautiful Cotati, in Sonoma County, "bucolic" does it a disservice. Since Sonoma State College had opened in nearby Rohnert Park in 1966, the area was starting to move from purely agricultural to somewhat suburban.   

February 22-23, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday) 

February 27, 1971 Auditorium, Chabot College, Hayward, CA: Loading Zone/American Canyon (Saturday)
Chabot College was a junior college in the lower Oakland hills, at 25555 Hesperian Boulevard. Junior colleges had entertainment budgets in those days, and made it easy for student groups to put on rock concerts. The show was in a school auditorium, because the gym was most likely in use for a sports event.  American Canyon was community in Napa County, but also the name of a local band (probably from American Canyon).

An ad for Deejay's, at 210 El Camino Real in Belmont, from the February 25, 1971 San Mateo Times. "Live Music 7 Nites A Week." The Loading Zone played Monday and Tuesday, with Sound Barrier the other nights.

March 1-2, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

March 4, 1971 Mandrake's, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)
The Loading Zone played a Thursday night show at Mandrake's, where they had been playing since 1969. The club, at 1048 University Avenue in Berkeley, was near the corner of University and San Pablo Avenue, nearly two miles from campus. During World War 2, with the Oakland and Richmond shipyards booming, tired workers with money in their pockets needed to relax. San Pablo Avenue was known as "Music Row," with clubs from one end to another. Mandrake's was a remaining legacy. The 200-seat room had opened in 1965, initially a pool hall that sometimes booked music. It focused on blues and jazz, initially, but rapidly expanded to include rock. The little club served beer, wine and food, and was a good place for bands to fill out their gig sheet.

March 8-9, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

March 13, 1971 University of Nevada at Reno, Reno, NV: Loading Zone/Wilderness/Good Life (Saturday)
The Loading Zone played two shows in Reno. Reno had lots of work for musicians, for obvious reasons, but there wasn't much in the way of original rock bands. San Francisco bands played Reno regularly, and Reno bands playing original music often gigged in the Bay Area. Reno to San Francisco is about a 5-hour drive (if you step on it). The opening act, Good Life, was probably the band previously known as Johnathan Goodlife, who had played a little in San Francisco in 1970.

The University of Nevada at Reno was actually the main campus of the University of Nevada, but it has since been eclipsed by the campus in Las Vegas. UNR was located at 1664 North Virginia Street. I assume the bands played at the gym. Many of the University students may not have been old enough to get into casinos (legally, anyway), so a campus rock show made fiscal sense. A picture in the Reno Evening Gazette showed the same four members of the Loading Zone.

March 14, 1971 Washoe County Fairgrounds, Reno, NV: Cold Blood/Stoneground/Loading Zone (Sunday)
Sunday's Washoe County Fairgrounds (at 1011 Wells Avenue) probably drew a slightly different crowd than the University. Since all three bands were from San Francisco, the radio ads could say "straight from the Fillmore West" or words to that effect. In a place like Reno, without a real local rock scene, "Fillmore" was a mark of quality. All of the bands had albums, if not well-known ones, and all of the band names would be recognizable from famous posters on dorm walls and in head shops. And, in fact, all three were really good bands, so no one should have gone home disappointed.

March 15-16, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

March 20, 1971 Montclair Recreaction Center, Oakland, CA: Loading Zone (Saturday)         

March 22-23, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

March 27, 1971 New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Stuart Little Band (Saturday)
The Loading Zone returned for a night at Berkeley's New Orleans House.  Opening the show was a Stockton band called Stuart Little. Stuart Little came close to making a record, but never got over the hump. A member of Stuart Little wrote a book about the band's experiences, an interesting chronicle about being an aspiring rock band in the Bay Area during the early 1970s.

March 29-30, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

April 2-3, 1971 Friends and Relations Hall, San Francisco, CA: Aum/Loading Zone/Flamin Groovies (Friday-Saturday)
Friends and Relations Hall was the new name for the former Family Dog At The Great Highway, Chet Helms' operation from June 1969 to August '70. The locals had called the hall, at 660 Great Highway, "Playland," and probably still did. There were a fair number of shows put on at the hall in 1971, but I think the room was just for rent. The Flamin' Groovies, a San Francisco band from the mid-60s who had stuck with their British Invasion sound, were likely the promoters.

April 5-6, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)

The Lion's Share, at 60 Red Hill Avenue in San Anselmo, sometime in the early 70s

April 9-10, 1971 Lion's Share, San Anselmo, CA: Loading Zone/Sorry Muthas (Friday-Saturday)
The Sorry Muthas were a Marin county jug band. 

April 12-13, 1971 Deejay's, Belmont, CA: Loading Zone (Monday-Tuesday)
The exact ending date of the Deejay's residency is unknown, but this was the last date I could confirm.

May 2, 1971 Noe Valley Street Fair, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone/others (Sunday) Afternoon show
The "Street Fair" seems to be another 60s San Francisco innovation, rapidly adopted throughout San Francisco, and then the United States and now probably everywhere. Now, of course, there had been street fairs as long as there had been cities. The 60s San Francisco version, however, was that some streets were closed off to traffic, loud rock bands played on a stage, for free, and vendors sold food, drinks and stuff. Meanwhile, all the bars and shops would be packed. San Francisco had a lot of rock bands, and vendors, and everyone understood "free concerts," so it caught on fast. 

The first major 60s "Street Fair" in San Francisco was a three-day event organized by Synanon, the charitable drug rehab organization (generally speaking, in Synanon rehab addicts did "good works" as part of their therapy). The fair was held at Embarcadero and Lombard from June 24-27, 1967. Embarcadero and Lombard is near downtown and the waterfront and the Financial District. The Financial District was a ghost town on weekends, and there weren't that many residents down there. Thus closing off the streets for a few days wasn't too inconvenient.

Synanon's innovation was to take on all the expense of building the stage, providing a sound system, organization, security, and so on, in return for the rights to be the vendors. Numerous San Francisco rock bands played, the most famous of which was Big Brother and The Holding Company. Everyone had a roaring good time, and lots of money was made. The city liked it because there was little or no city expense and businesses liked it (at least bars and restaurants) because they made money. In effect, the Free-In-The-Park concert had been monetized. 

Haight Street had its first Street Fair in March, 1968. There wasn't supposed to be a band, but two flatbed trucks arrived on Haight from opposite directions, creating a stage, and plugged their mounted amplifiers into the Straight Theater power grid, while Jerry Garcia walked out of 710 Ashbury with his guitar and the Grateful Dead jumped on the makeshift stage. It's still going strong to this day. Fairs have spread to neighborhoods all around the city. 

The Noe Valley neighborhood is next to the Mission District, and also next to (and below) Bernal Heights and Diamond Heights, as well as the Castro District. At this time, Noe Valley was just developing an identity as a neighborhood. The Fair was anchored around Sanchez at 24th Street. A Street Fair both drew outsiders to the neighborhood, and gave some identity to the residents. For a band that headlined a street fair, this would have very likely been a paying gig, and on a Sunday afternoon at that.

May 13-15, 1971 Lion's Share, San Anselmo, CA: Sopwith Camel/Loading Zone (Thursday-Saturday)
The weekend at the Lion's Share may have been the opportunity to break in new guitarist Bruce Conte. Conte, from Fresno, would later end up joining Tower Of Power for a few years, after Loading Zone broke up in late 1972. Since Tower and the Zone apparently shared a rehearsal studio, the changeover would have been easy. An advertisement in the May 16 SF Chronicle (below) showed a five-piece Loading Zone, so Conte had to have joined beforehand. Hypothetically, the last indication of the Zone lineup was during March in Reno (see March 13 above), when the paper used a photo of the quartet. Conte could have joined anytime in-between.

Sopwith Camel had been an original Fillmore band, way back in 1966. They had been one of the first to sign a record contract, one of the first to have a hit ("Hello Hello") and one of the first to have been accused of being "sellouts." They had broken up in 1968. In Spring 1971, they had gotten back together with four of their five original members, and had just started to play around the Bay Area.

The Sunday, May 16, 1971 SF Chronicle Datebook had a promotional photo of the Loading Zone with 5 members. Fresno guitarist Bruce Conte had recently joined the band.

May 15, 1971 Brooks Hall, Civic Center, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone/Ice Earth Quake/others World Premiere of Arts And Industry (Thursday)
Brooks Hall was the exhibition hall underneath the San Francisco Civic Center, connected by underground tunnel to the nearby SF Civic Auditorium.  It was built in 1958 (closed 1993) and generally used for trade shows. Bands would sometimes play there as part of events. There was plenty of room for a stage, although the low ceilings probably didn't make for great sound. There was a 10-day event called the World Premiere of Arts And Industry. The idea, apparently, was to have a continuous exhibition of music, plays and art in the same, vast space. A number of bands were listed as performers. In a (Friday) May 14 review, Examiner critic Phil Elwood mentioned that Loading Zone was scheduled for Saturday. He commented that "a mostly empty Brooks Hall is a bleak and hostile cement tomb."

May 22, 1971 Montclair Recreation Center, Oakland, CA: Loading Zone  (Saturday)

May 27, 1971 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)  

May 28-29, 1971  New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Maze (Friday-Saturday) 

May 30, 1971 Football Stadium, Monterey Peninsula College, Monterey, CA: Youngbloods/Good Thunder/Loading Zone/Wildwood Monterey Music Festival (Sunday) noon-dark
Monterey Peninsula College was just across the road from the Monterey County Fairgrounds, where the Monterey Pop Festival had been held in 1967. I think the football field had been used during the Festival as an emergency hippie campground, and the Grateful Dead and others played for free on a makeshift stage. The Football Stadium would have been quite small, by football standards.

Although Monterey is quite famous, the city and County are actually very thinly populated. Monterey Peninsula College was the best place locally for rock shows. The Millard Agency regularly used the gym for concerts in 1969 and 1970. The Youngbloods were a well-known band by now, since the success of the single "Get Together."

June 11, 1971 Longshoreman's Hall, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone/Gold/Urge/Marlow Mayday Defense Fund Benefit (Friday)
Longshoreman's Hall was a building available for rent. It was located at 400 North Point, near the Pier 43, between Mason and Taylor. Since it was owned by a Union, it was often used for benefits. I'm not sure what the Mayday Defense Fund was.            

June 13, 1971  Tiki New Moon, Palo Alto, CA: Loading Zone/Tonto Basin Band/Kidd Africa  (Sunday)   
While Downtown Palo Alto had no bars, and had chased out the only rock club (the Poppycock), there were a lot of hotels on the El Camino strip, south of town. They had lounges and bars, and booked music. Most of them did not book rock bands, aiming instead for an older crowd. In this case, the Tiki New Moon, at 3740 El Camino Real, seems to have been booking what would now be called an "All Ages Show" for Sunday afternoon. 

Tonto Basin Band is unknown to me. I recognize the peculiarly-named Kidd Africa from various bills, but I have no idea what kind of music he (or they) played.

Cubberley High School, at 4000 Middlefield Road in Palo Alto, sometime in the 1960s

June 17, 1971 Gymnasium, Cubberley High School, Palo Alto, CA:  Loading Zone  (Thursday)
The date is not precise, but I am certain of the booking. A 1971 Cubberley High graduate confirmed that the Loading Zone played his graduation dance. Cubberley High had been Palo Alto's second high school, and was located at 4000 Middlefield Road (the school was closed in 1979, but it is now a Community Center)     

June 18, 1971 Center Theater, Fremont, CA: Loading Zone (Friday)
The band played a midnight show at a movie theater in suburban Fremont.             

July 2-4, 1971 Frenchy's, Hayward, CA: Loading Zone (Friday-Sunday)
Although it was in Southern Alameda County, Hayward was not the upscale, upper-middle-class commuter town that it is today.  As noted above, much of the area East of Mission Boulevard was unincorporated farm land, and the biggest employer was the GM factory in Fremont. Frenchy's, way out on Mission Boulevard (at 29097 Mission, near Tennyson Rd), had been a big nightclub since the 1960s. Frenchy's had been through every fad, Go-Go dancers, topless, the British Invasion and all sorts of things. At different times, Frank Zappa and Sly and The Family Stone had played there. The club sold a lot of drinks and was one of the primary destinations for that part of the County.  

Frenchy's periodically booked rock bands, and the Loading Zone had played there before (definitely on September 4-6, 1970). Sometime later in 1971, Frenchy's would lose their liquor license as a result of getting caught serving underage patrons. The club recovered, however, and remained open into the 1980s.  

July 4, 1971 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Santana/Creedence Clearwater Revival/Tower Of Power (Sunday)
Bill Graham closed the Fillmore West this week, with much fanfare (in the Bill Graham fashion). The Loading Zone did not play the closing week, most likely because they did not have a record company to insist that they get on the bill. Their mates Tower Of Power got on the final bill because they were on Bill Graham's record label (San Francisco Records, distributed by Warners). Nonetheless, after hours on the final night, there was a big jam session, all broadcast on FM radio. Along with the likes of Carlos Santana and Mike Bloomfield, Linda Tillery can be heard belting out a few songs, a sign of her status with her musical peers. Presumably the band dropped by after the Frenchy's gig. 

[update 20230516: scholar David Kramer-Smyth found footage of the Loading Zone from an obscure movie called "Alabama Ghosts," directed by Fred Hobbs, who had also directed "Roseland." Tom Coster composed the soundtrack music, and here's some footage of the band, probably miming. The lineup appears to be Linda Tillery, Tom Coster, Tony Smith, Bruce Conte. Tillery playing bass. The movie was released in 1972. Kramer-Smyth reports that the movie is "not good."]

July 23-24, 1971 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: Loading Zone (Friday-Saturday)

August 19, 1971 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)          

August 27-29, 1971 The Warehouse, San Jose, CA: Loading Zone (Friday-Sunday)
I know nothing about The Warehouse. There were essentially no venues booking original rock in the San Jose area. Every now and again, a club or promoter would try and do something, but I have never seen another reference to the venue (honestly, I can't even figure out where we found this reference). 

September 3-4, 1971 Long Branch, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Staton Brothers (Friday-Saturday)
Berkeley's Long Branch, at 2504 San Pablo Avenue (at Dwight Way), had opened in May of 1971. The site had been a music club since at least 1962, and had gone through various incarnations. From 1969 to early 1971, it had been called The Babylon. The club sold beer and booked local original rock bands. Owner Malcolm Williams decided to expand the club. He doubled the capacity to about 350, and was able to book higher profile bands. They were still largely local, but many of them had albums, so they had bigger followings. At this time, the somewhat larger New Monk, nearer to campus, was still largely a Fraternity beer joint. In 1972, The New Monk would start booking bands full time and turn into the Keystone Berkeley.

The Staton Brothers were an East Bay band from Hayward who had been signed by the Monkees' management around 1967. Jeff and Mike Staton were both singing guitarists, broadly in the style of Buffalo Springfield. The band had toured with the Springfield and others in the 1960s. In late 1972, the Staton Brothers had released an album on Epic, but there was a problem with distributors, so the album did not sell. Ultimately both Staton brothers worked with Stephen Bishop and many others as guitarists and songwriters, mostly based in Nashville. Since "Staton" was often misunderstood, and just an adopted name anyway, they used different names.

September 8, 1971 Long Branch, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Mike Finnegan (Wednesday)
Organist and singer Mike Finnegan was from Wichita, KS. Unlike most musicians, the 6'6" Finnegan had gotten a basketball scholarship to the University of Kansas. He had moved to the Bay Area around 1969, and he had been a member of The Jerry Hahn Brotherhood, who had put out a highly regarded 1970 album on Columbia. Unfortunately, the album went nowhere, and Finnegan had left the band. At this time, Finnegan had another band with singer Jerry Wood, and he worked with the re-activated Big Brother and The Holding Company as well. For club gigs, Finnegan pretty much played blues. He was a powerful vocalist as well as a great organ player, so he could play with any combination of musicians. Some of his "friends" might have been had notable musical pedigrees and would definitely have been good players. 

September 18, 1971 Montclair Recreation Center, Oakland, CA: Loading Zone (Saturday)

September 25, 1971 Friends And Relations Hall, San Francisco, CA: Jef ferson Airplane/Black Kangaroo/One/Ace Of Cups/Jack Bonus/Grootna Grunt Records Party (Saturday)
The Jefferson Airplane had been the first really big rock band to come out of the San Francisco scene. Since their initial breakout, other local bands like Sly And The Family Stone, Creedence Clearwater Revival and Santana had come along, selling more records and having a wider cultural reach. Nonetheless, the Airplane had special status by virtue of being first. In 1971, RCA Records had renewed the Airplane's record deal by giving the band its own label. In record company lingo, Grunt Records was an "Imprint," financed, manufactured and distributed by RCA, but with creative decisions made by the Airplane members. Of course, the band immediately signed all their friends, some of who were talented and some not so much.

On September 7, 1971, Grunt Records had its first release. Bark was the new Jefferson Airplane album. It wasn't that good an album, in fact, but the Airplane were local heroes. A few weeks later, the Airplane decided to have a party to celebrate, and invited 1000 friends or so to the former Family Dog at the Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, known colloquially by the locals as "Playland." It was just a venue for rent now, using the name Friends And Relations Hall. The Examiner's Phil Elwood reported on the huge party that the Airplane had to celebrate their new album and their new label. Jefferson Airplane headlined the show, but came on very late and were not in terrific performing shape (ahem).  

Opening the show were a few bands who would release albums on Grunt. Black Kangaroo featured guitarist Peter Kaukonen, Jorma's brother. Grootna was associated with Marty Balin, who had left the band but was still part of the record company. Ace Of Cups were a long-standing San Francisco band, friends with the Airplane, who unfortunately never got to record anything for Grunt. "One" featured a Bolinas neighbor of Paul Kantner's, who used the stage name of Reality D. Blipcrotch. I have no reports on his (or their) performance. "One" did release an album on Grunt. 

Another Grunt artist was songwriter Jack Bonus. Bonus' background is somewhat mysterious, but he seems to have been friends with Peter Rowan and David Grisman (he played on an Earth Opera album). Based on his album, Bonus was both a singer/songwriter and a decent sax and flute player. His 1972 Grunt album is mainly known for the original version of his "Hobo Song," made somewhat famous by Peter Rowan when he played it with Jerry Garcia in Old And In The Way. Tom Coster, Bruce Conte and Tony Smith played on five tracks on the album.

Elwood's review mentions a big jam session, after the Airplane set, where Jack Bonus was backed by members of Loading Zone. I assume that Bonus was playing sax or flute, and Tom Coster and some other Zone members were on stage (Elwood would have recognized Coster). Bonus had a number of health issues that prevented him from performing in support of his album, so he largely disappeared.

September 30, 1971 Long Branch, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/In Your Own Backyard (Saturday)
The Loading Zone were back again at the Long Branch, so things must have gone pretty well.

October 7, 1971 Bo Jangles, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)
Bo Jangles was a new music club in the Tenderloin district in San Francisco, at 709 Larkin (near Ellis). It was near to the site of what would become the Great American Music Hall (at 859 O'Farrell). 

At some point in late 1971, Santana drummer Michael Shrieve invited his friend, New York bassist Dougie Rauch, to move to California. Rauch (1950-79), the son of an opera singer, had played with numerous bands. He was part of a group called Voices Of East Harlem, a choir of mostly school kids singing over a funky rock band. The Voices had opened for Santana a few times, and Shrieve and Rauch were friends. Now, the Santana band had serious problems at this time--at one point in 1971, Carlos himself had actually quit the band--and among other things were looking for a new bass player.

By early 1972, Dougie Rauch had joined Loading Zone as their bass player, replacing Mike Eggleston. I do not actually know when Rauch joined the Loading Zone. I do know that Santana was using bass player Tom Rutley (an old jazz pal of Shrieve's from San Mateo) through October. Rutley was just a fill-in, however, and Santana needed someone stronger. Still, Santana would not go on tour until September 1972. 

Since the Santana and Loading Zone groups went way back--the Santana Blues Band's first Fillmore performance was substituting for the Loading Zone in June 1967--Shrieve must have hooked Rauch up with the Zone. Rauch was a fantastic bass player, and since both Tom Coster and Rauch would ultimately join Santana, we know they played well together. I am still searching for evidence as to when Rauch moved to California and joined the Zone.

Another new addition to the Loading Zone would be singer Wendy Haas. Haas had once been the bassist in an "all-girl" semi-psychedelic rock band from the Atherton called the Freudian Slips. They had played various hip venues in 1966-67, and even got their picture in Life magazine. Of course, the band broke up when most of the members went to college. Haas, who had been the bass player for the Slips, soldiered on as the lead singer for an R&B band called Western Addition. Western Addition broke up, and somehow Haas would end up in the Loading Zone by the beginning of 1972.

It's not clear to me why Haas got added to the Loading Zone. Of course, she is a great singer and a talented musician, so that isn't in question, but the Zone already had Linda Tillery. The band must have killed it with two singers, but no tapes survive. I think Haas played keyboards as well, but I'm not sure if she played them with Loading Zone. Just like Dougie Rauch, it's uncertain exactly when Haas joined.

October 8, 1971 Gym, Cal State College at Hayward, Hayward, CA: Loading Zone/Bittersweet (Friday)
Hayward State was part of the California State College system (separate from the University of California). It had been founded in 1959 as Alameda State College, and had moved to Hayward in 1961. By 1963 it had been re-named California State College at Hayward, although everyone called it "Hayward State," following the naming conventions of other colleges in the system. Hayward and Southern Alameda county were booming. This Saturday night event was probably a start-of-quarter dance. Bittersweet was a rock band from Chico, CA, who moved to the East Bay. Rock historian Bruno Cerriotti has a detailed history of their adventures.  The Hayward State campus was (and still is) at 25800 Carlos Bee Boulevard, off Hayward Boulevard, nestled in the Hayward Hills. After some evolution, the school is now California State University of the East Bay (CSUEB).

October 21, 1971 Long Branch, Berkeley, CA: Loading Zone/Wormwood (Thursday)

8201 Old Redwood Highway in Cotati, the site of the Inn Of The Beginning, as it appeared in 2010

November 10-11, 1971 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: Loading Zone (Wednesday-Thursday)

November 20, 1971 Montclair Recreation Center, Oakland, CA: Loading Zone (Saturday)

November 24, 1971 Serra High School, San Mateo, CA: Loading Zone/Gropus Cackus/Felix (Wednesday)
Serra High School was (and is) a Catholic High School for boys at 451 W. 20th Avenue (near Alameda de las Pulgas, if you know the area). This would have been the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I don't think that, strictly speaking, it was a school event, since it was noted in the paper. Serra had a student body of only about 600. During this period, it wasn't uncommon for private schools to have "multi-school" dances that were open to any teenager with a student ID. So the shows were publicized, and tickets were sold, but there were some restrictions on who could actually attend.

A multi-school event would be more likely to afford a real working band like the The Loading Zone. The oddly-named Gropus Cackus were a very popular band on the Peninsula throughout the early 1970s.

December 16, 1971 Gym, Diablo Valley College, Pleasant Hill, CA: Tower Of Power/Loading Zone/Labrynth (Thursday)
Diablo Valley College (or "DVC" as it is known) was a junior college for southern Contra Costa County, at 321 Golf Club Road (which tells you about Pleasant Hill). This would have been an end-of-term dance, directed at students but open to the public.

December 16, 1971 Bo Jangles, San Francisco, CA: Loading Zone (Thursday)
Once again, the Zone was booked at a school dance, and still had a nightclub booking. It's a sign of a hard-working band that they would open for Tower in Pleasant Hill, load out and head straight to the city.

The Loading Zone ended the year somewhat as they began it. The band was working steadily, both at dance gigs and original rock clubs. They had some status since they had played the Fillmore and released an album, but they no longer had a record contract. They must have been playing good music, since they kept getting re-booked where they had played before, but the band seemed to be treading water. The band had added Bruce Conte on guitar, and probably another singer (Wendy Haas), so they were expanding their sound, but they hadn't expanded their footprint beyond San Francisco and the immediately surrounding counties.