Talk:Happy Trails (album)

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Greatest Evah!

This is perhaps the greatest rock album of all time. However, everything I could say about it would be opinion or a reference to someone else's opinion. I'd rather not put that in the article. Let me say here, for people who want to edit the article in the future, that the first side is by no means merely a "performance cover" of "Who Do You Love" but an extended rock suite in which each player takes a solo (the audience participation can be considered part of the drum solo). This suite had been practiced live, over and over, by the band. The reprise and finale are unmatched in rock recording for sheer energy, and the musicianship (as on all of Quicksilver's albums) is first-rate. The second side is not a continuous suite, like the first, but three pieces segued, followed by the title song. "Calvary" is not a "studio acid trip" but Duncan's take on a classical theme, somewhat reminiscent of Berlioz's "March To The Scaffold" in the "Symphonie Fantastique". The live performance of "Calvary" (which the band called "The B-Minor Thing" if I recall correctly) was shortened (a bootleg of the original live performance is out there) and studio overdubbing was done with feedback, tympani, acoustic guitars, and other effects to go all-out to try to make the most cosmic rock album ever. "Calvary" was an album name for the piece only: the other members of the band were willing to play this impressive music live, but they called it the B-Minor Thing because it had no real name, and presumably they thought it was rather pretentious for a rock band to play this for an audience. In the middle of the album version, as the feedback swells, you can hear Duncan yell "Call it anything you want!". "Happy Trails" is of course a joke about LSD. Enjoy. 70.112.186.143 (talk) 04:51, 13 October 2010 (UTC) Eric

The erroneous current article (including, especially, the belittling reference to the "studio acid trip") was copied by last.fm for their review :-). Seeing no further comments, I will work on the article and get an improved version up here before the New Year, I hope. Although I'm a fan, I'll try to source everything, and make it non-fan-sounding. I maybeam not sure if listening to the album counts as a "source", but I am going to list the instruments used on 'Calvary". 24.27.31.170 (talk) 01:04, 29 December 2011 (UTC) Eric

I'd like to say that one problem I am having is I can't find any source that has anything really negative to say about this album, although some statements about it seem a little out there. :-) I'm going to take a little longer because material on the web on this record is limited. I'll see if I can find something at the library on my next visit. I have an 1100-word draft prepared. If I substitute it for what's there now, will anyone notice? Ahem. Oh, yeah, what about references to the original live recordings available as "bootlegs" (sugarmegs.org) ... 24.27.31.170 (talk) 05:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC) Eric

The revised article is submitted. The references don't work -- I thought they worked automatically when the link was created. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. 1. I have removed references to drug use. Not to say that no drugs were abused while making this album, but it's unimporatant a unverifiable compared to the music. I ran across one review of the album that said that Quicksilver played music only so they would have money to do drugs, which is absurd, even if Cipollina did not come from a rather wealthy family and the band had a Marin county estate to live on. Bands that put drugs above music do not get record contracts. 2. The comparison of this "experimental" recording with "experimental" music by The Mars Volta 40 years later is cognitively dissonant. So is the review that says that the Who Do You Love Suite is "an extended solo from (mostly) guitarist John Cipollina" -- Duncan has at least as much solo time on this album as Cipollina. Well, take a look. It's better, I think. 24.27.31.170 (talk) 22:29, 8 January 2012 (UTC) Eric

^ Umm, actually, it's probably correct. I'm pretty sure you did not live in SF at that time or you would not be so doubting. You haven't lived until you've ridden a 74 on acid :) (Gary and Jorma both had choppahs.) For the record, David Freiberg has said the same thing, in print. Also, there were no "Marin County estates" at that time. Marin had yet to be overwhelmed by yuppies, it was mainly agricultural with several individualistic small towns sprinkled about. Even Sleazalito (when playing live in SF, Quicksilver would change the line in Fresh Air to "sweet Sausalito sunshine") was not pretentious. It was the home of Juanita's Galley, fer chrissake :) Bands that put drugs above music do indeed get recording contracts ... if the record company can make money off them.

Given all that though, I believe you are correct in removing stupid moralistic allusions to "evil drugs." There's nothing evil about pot or acid and never has been, except for perhaps the lingerie-wearing head of the FBI imprisoning everyone he could point his finger at over nothing.

Oops. Gotta edit myself here a little : drugs above music would not be correct. Again, I think if you were not there it would be difficult to understand. The drugs were part of the music. Or maybe the other way 'round. It was all intertwined. To this day, I can hear the SF guitar sound and see trails. It's all one. 210.22.142.82 (talk) 05:41, 16 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. I don't like it when it looks like I'm talking to myself. I grew up in the Bay Area and bought this album as soon as it came out. I did not do drugs, then, though. The band did live on an Marin County estate for a while (called a "ranch") and it adjoined the ranch on which the Grateful Dead lived, and the two bands would play Cowboys and Indians against each other, which perhaps partially explains the cover art and the title. http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/11/avalon-ballroom-june-10-11-1966.html 173.174.85.204 (talk) 18:51, 29 August 2016 (UTC)Eric

I figured out that I was leaving out the "ref" tags and fixed that. 24.27.31.170 (talk) 22:45, 8 January 2012 (UTC) Eric

I thank the person who added the CD Rereleases section and repaired the references, which was beyond me to do. Kudos. 72.177.123.145 (talk) 20:19, 28 April 2013 (UTC) Eric

Well, some one has edited out the information abot the original live recording being cut (perhaps) to make it fit within the 25 minutes or so that can be fit on the side of an LP, and they left a sentence fragment. I don't know why anyone would do that. I'm putting it backin, using different words instead of "reverting" which I don't know how to do, anyway.. I want to mention that I have uploaded the original live performance of "Calvary" to youtube, and you can find it be searching for the "F-sharp thing." 72.182.33.219 (talk) 00:17, 30 March 2015 (UTC)Eric

Kind of funny how you disclaimed, "Although I'm a fan, I'll try to source everything, and make it non-fan-sounding", and proceeded to add in two negative reviews from self-published websites. Methinks you overcompensated! :) Needless to say I removed those two reviews in my big cleanup a few minutes ago, since self-published reviews are not notable/reliable.--Martin IIIa (talk) 06:45, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

Martin, if you are the person who revised my revision, I have to say I completely approve of the reorganization and rewriting! Thank you. 173.174.85.204 (talk) 17:15, 14 June 2017 (UTC) Eric Hehe. I made one change. I added "piano" back in as a percussion instrument. It's pretty avant-garde, but it's there. It's that mashy sound in the introduction to Calvary. 173.174.85.204 (talk) 17:28, 20 June 2017 (UTC) Eric

Another remark: There are two "citation needed" tags in the article, the first about part of Duncan's "When You Love" solo being cut out, and the second about the "ironic comment at the beginning of side two." There will probably never be citations for these things, because 1) They can only be known by comparing the original recording with the album itself, and 2) they are trivial and no reviewer will bother to mention them. However, "There was also substantial editing and additional overdubbing done at Golden State Recorders to both sides of the record." is wrong, IMHO. Those two things, some weirdness and noise edited out on "Where You Love" (especially a baby crying; people brought their babies to the Fillmore back then), and the substitution of the studio "Calvary" for the live one are the only changes from the original recording. However, I have not removed that, instead I have added an ironic "citation needed." 173.174.85.204 (talk) 17:41, 27 June 2017 (UTC) Eric

The piano isn't a percussion instrument, though. The self-contradicting classification system which lumped keyboard instruments in with the percussion family (even at eight years old I realized that system makes no sense) has since been done away with.

Don't be so sure about that information being unverifiable. Album reissues frequently include notes on stuff like that, and it's not impossible that they would be mentioned in a biography of the band.

I find it hard to believe that there was no studio overdubbing on the live portions of Happy Trails. Back then, pretty much every live album received substantial overdubbing, and the balance on the record is too even and clean to have been created solely with contemporary live recording techniques. Compare it to Jimi Hendrix: Live at Woodstock and you'll see what I mean.--Martin IIIa (talk) 17:14, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Very well, if a piano isn't a percussion instrument, then I will list it as an instrument that Elmore plays in addition to percussion. With a two-by-four, I suppose. As for overdubbing, I do not think so, but some things were engineered out, like about a minute of Duncan's guitar solo; and the baby crying, some echo, and a very loud and bizarre shout during "Where You Love." (I have compared the original recording with the released album.) 173.174.85.88 (talk) 15:19, 22 September 2017 (UTC) Eric

One of the funniest things I've ever seen

I'm sorry if this doesn't meet the strict guidelines for Talk Page content, but there's no place for this in the article and I think all Quicksilver fans would get a kick out of this. "Quicksilver Messenger Service" and "Happy Trails" are two of my favorite albums from my misspent youth. When I first moved to the Annapolis, MD area I was in a small record shop in Parole, somewhere between 1978 and 1979. As I was walking out a cassette tape caught my eye: it was "Happy Trails," and I burst out laughing because some idiot, probably some late-70s high-school stoner that didn't know his musical history, had put it in the Country & Western bin! I can just imagine some poor hard-core C&W fan bringing this tape home by mistake! Long live Quicksilver's music! (I'm listening to "Quicksilver Messenger Service" on YouTube at the moment, geezing my way back to the late 60s.) Stargzer (talk) 15:56, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

I like it. Perhaps wikipedia could also reproduce the fine artwork on the back of the vinyl album, showing the Statue of Liberty, Coit Tower and the members of the band dressed in western gear, and two of them with guns (oh NO!) 72.182.33.219 (talk) 03:10, 31 August 2014 (UTC) Eric