This rough image readily translates to the amazing Happy Trails (1969) and its deliciously kitsch cowboy artwork for Globe Propaganda by George Hunter (a member of The Charlatans he) which references Dale Evans out on the range tune penned for Roy Rogers TV show. Boasting the classic quartet line-up Quicksilver Messenger Service consists of some gorgeously elegiac acoustic and electric pieces like the opener ‘Pride of Man’ (penned by London born Buddhist folkie Hamilton Camp) and ‘Light Your Windows’ as well as brilliantly conceived jam work outs, ‘Gold and Silver’ and ‘The Fool’ where the Duncan/Cippolina axis swap and trade lead lines with a jazzy fluidity.įirmly entrenched in the San Francisco counter culture – they rarely strayed over the State line in fact – Quicksilver won a reputation as hard living rascals with a penchant for firing off rifles at their nearby neighbours the Dead’s ranch squat.
The original band included guitarist Jim Murray who can be heard on various unofficial and posthumously released live discs but our story should start with the self-titled debut (1968) which follows hard on the heels of their contributions to the movie soundtrack for Revolution. Unfortunately Dino was busted in 1965 and the other members kicked their heels and rehearsed awaiting his release from Uncle Sam’s clutches. He wanted them to perform with then revolutionary wireless guitars and all manner of gizmos and female backing singers. The original Quicksilver Messenger Service was a project dreamt up by Dino Valenti (aka Chester Powers among many alter egos). Always an outfit for the West Coast aficionado they have never really received the appropriate accolades, bells, gongs and whistles of others but that doesn’t matter because their music reigns supreme. Their career spans 1965 to this very day since Freiberg and Duncan still go out to thrill crowds as QMS.
They also left behind a quite splendid body of recorded work and also used the studio to mix live and pieces into their sound – especially on the classic Happy Trails – which gave them a wraparound sonic groove that has never dated. With the added bonus of a dynamic rhythm section – David Freiberg’s sonorous bass welded to Greg Elmore’s metronomic punchy tom tombackbeat, this bunch of sharp looking hombres became regulars in Bill Graham’s Fillmore Scene as well as the Carousel and Avalon and slayed crowds at every major club and ballroom and outdoor festival they graced.
Co-founding member Dino Valenti (from Connecticut) brought in his own unique folk bag style, learnt in the coffee houses of Berkeley and New York City, and he introduced a blend of gothic traditional and beatnik poetry that made the group unique.
Alongside their friends and rivals the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver epitomised the free form sound of a heady era with the twin guitar attack of Gary Duncan and John Cippolina mixing up vibrato, reverb, finger picking and some of the most influential experimental passages in Californian rock – both men being West Coasters through and through. One of the most revered psychedelic bands from the 1960s and 1970s the great Quicksilver Messenger Service bossed the Bay Area as a live act in the hazy daze of acid rock. And it was through this constant stream of live performances that afforded them the opportunity to tighten up every loose end in their repertoire while stretching out musically and evolving their sound beyond any reasonable set of expectations. They put off signing with a label for years to avoid the pressures of touring and consequently getting rushed by record companies into making albums not up to their own standards. Living on a ranch north of San Francisco in high style with their ladies, grass, guns and living out their space cowboy trips, QMS also benefited greatly from an abundance of local gigs they picked up in the absence of The Airplane or The Dead, whose unavailability was due to national tours and out of town engagements. Grounded in the primitive stomping of drummer Greg Elmore, the interplay between Gary Duncan’s chugging rhythm guitar and John Cipollina’s quivering lead lines was thrilling and hypnotic.įrom the seeds of the Byrds and the Buffalo Springfield – the hipper LA representatives at Monterey – came a new scene in Southern California, one that would dominate the sound of the LA canyons for several years. With an evocative cover designed by the Charlatans’ George Hunter, that live album caught the intense and almost dangerous quality of San Francisco’s late Sixties sound. The Quicksilver Messenger Service were a wild quartet of jamming longhairs whose finest hour would come on the album released in 1969 Happy Trails.