Various Artists “Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968″

by Beverly Paterson in Album Reviews

Various Artists “Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968” (Rhino Records 519759) 

If there was ever a time in rock and roll when the rock really rocked and the roll really rolled, it was the mid to late sixties. Because the music was still relatively young, there were no preconceived notions to be had, nor was there such an obsessive emphasis on image and marketing as there is today. Enthusiasm and experimentation reigned supreme. Some of the most thrilling sounds spawned during this period stemmed from the sprawling metropolis of Los Angeles, and here’s a box set, four discs in all, that guides the listener on a mercurial voyage of what was happening then. Christened after Dick Clark’s television show of the same name, “Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968” contains a whopping one hundred and one tracks, which are split between famous faces and obscure acts.

 Rather than championing songs that have been reissued over and over and over again, “Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968” flashes the lens on buried treasures. For example, there’s the sneering punk angst of Sonny and Cher’s “It’s Gonna Rain,” the brain bending, synthesizer riddled “Daily Nightly” from The Monkees, an alternate version of the topsy turvy “Heroes and Villains” by The Beach Boys, the swinging “Somebody Groovy“ from The Mamas and The Papas, The Association’s positively blissful cover of Bob Dylan’s “One Too Many Mornings,” the spooky, sinister whispers of “Hideaway” by The Electric Prunes, Rick Nelson’s day-glo dusted “Marshmallow Skies,” the pulsating protest cries of “Riot On Sunset Strip” from The Standells, The Music Machine’s fuzzed to the max “The People In Me” and the Who styled blast of “High On Love” by The Knickerbockers. Also included on the collection is the shamelessly Beatlesque “You Movin’,” which The Byrds cut shortly before jingling and jangling their way into the smoke rings of the world’s consciousness. And speaking of The Byrds, they additionally flutter their feathers on Jackie DeShannon’s sweet and sparkly “Splendor In The Grass,” as her back up band. The menacing “Grim Reaper Of Love” by The Turtles, The Bobby Fuller Four’s Buddy Hollyish “Baby My Heart” and Del Shannon’s mind melting “I Think I Love You,” where sitars coincide with strings ever so ravishingly, are not to be missed either.

A lot of interesting things are going on within the walls of The Whatt Four’s “You’re Wishin’ I Was Someone Else,” which shrewdly incorporates an impossibly cheery chorus, rotating rhythms, needling breaks and psychedelic flourishes into a raw garage rock context. The wispy harmony pop of The Lamp of Childhood’s “No More Running Around,” the ghostly glare of Opus 1’s “Back Seat ‘38 Dodge” and the hooky hard edged “Our Time Is Running Out” from The Yellow Payges are further wonders heard on “Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968,” along with the conga induced “(You Used To) Ride So High” by The Motorcycle Albine, a duo actually consisting of Warren Zevon and producer Bones Howe.

A nasty punk approach wires “She Done Moved” by The Spats, while Limey and The Yanks do little to conceal their admiration for Bo Diddley on the savage, shuffling “Guaranteed Love.” Brimming with vim and vigor, Nino Tempo and April Stevens step up to bat with a gorgeous copy of “I Love How You Love Me” that odd as it may seem, is laced with bagpipes. Glistening jewels from The Guilloteens, The Knack, Jesse Lee Kincaid, The Ballroom, The Peanut Butter Conspiracy, The Chymes, The Deepest Blue, Gene Clark and The WC Fields Memorial Electric String Band also cement the set. Running the gamut from folk to pop to garage punk to acid rock to downright weirdness, “Where The Action is! Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968” is powered by a marvelous marriage of primal genius and slick talent. Hopefully, a second volume of the stuff is on the table, as Southern California, in the sixties, was a bottomless pit of remarkable audio works that have yet to be matched.