1

I think the first time I heard “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die” was on WBAI, the public radio station in New York.

You see underground FM radio was the internet of its day. Not that it was truly underground, the stations were all legal, but they were an alternative, they were subversive… Do not conflate the FM radio of the sixties with that of the seventies, when the playlist was tightened and…

Then again, Country Joe and The Fish had something to do with that. They were an indelible part of the Woodstock movie, and that flick changed the course of history.

Before that, rock music was a sideshow. But Woodstock woke up the industrialists, they saw all those people and they saw all that MONEY!

And that’s what it became about. With the purchase of Warner and Elektra by Steve Ross, after the prior purchase of Atlantic. As for the consolidation today, with only three major label groups, back then new companies were popping up like flowers, there was money to be made, music SCALED! The costs of production were recouped quickly, and after that there was a ton of profit. The Warner music division paid for the Warner cable system. Movies got all the respect, and there were some great ones in the late sixties and into the seventies, but the true cultural action was all in music. And those films utilized music to set the tone, to root the action.

Now the first upheaval came from the U.K., the so-called “British Invasion.” But after that came the San Francisco Sound.

But unlike the British Invasion, it was more than music, it was cultural. Sure, we had Carnaby Street in London, and there were fashions in the Haight, but there was also a mind-set. That life was about loving your brother, doing drugs and f*cking your brains out. And this was all done to a soundtrack of music, played by acts that didn’t wear suits, that didn’t even seem to care about the system, they were subversive.

Yes, Jefferson Airplane had hits, but Grace Slick was unpredictable. She was America’s worst nightmare. She went to Finch with Tricia Nixon, but then she jumped the track. And she was not the only one. People came to San Francisco in droves, they wanted to be where it was at. Money? You could get by on the kindness of strangers. Or at least you believed you could. People were not going to work for the bank, they thought there was more in life than money. And many from that era still believe this is true.

2

Now you knew the names of the bands, but that did not mean you knew the music. Sure, the Airplane had successful singles, but the rest of the acts had nothing that could fit on AM playlists. It was all word of mouth. Until FM radio.

You knew if you were different, the credo was “question authority.” This was no longer the fifties, where you cut your hair and flew straight. High school became bifurcated, like society. Football was seen as brutal and fascist. And the athletes had contempt for those who had contempt for them, and oftentimes they got physical about it.

But the script flipped with the war. By time we hit ’66, ’67…it was clear that Vietnam was an aberration. We’d heard for decades that America was all powerful, but we couldn’t beat these lone rangers in ragged clothing.

Now if you were brain dead, you just supported the war. America, rah, rah! But for those who questioned the country’s path, there was a whole ecosystem of culture on the other side of the fence.

Start with Kurt Vonnegut. After all, the Grateful Dead named their publishing company, “Ice Nine.”

And there were the poets of San Francisco, not only Allen Ginsberg, but Lawrence Ferlinghetti and the City Lights bookstore and…

Off-Broadway was littered with anti-government work, like “MacBird.” And “Hair” started at the Public Theatre in ’67, it crossed over to Broadway the following year and became a phenomenon.

But music was the primary driver of the revolution. Music led the way. Music was all about freedom, something you could feel, and truth.

So when you heard “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die”…

3

Actually, it was entitled “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die Rag.” And that was important. It hearkened back to the folk era of the early sixties, and there was no pretension that this was mainstream, for everybody, this was truth, with a sense of humor.

Now the world was smaller then. And there were fewer alternatives.

First you had to get a record deal, which was difficult to come by. But if you made a statement, if you rang the bell, there were people who were hungry for your music.

Now Country Joe and The Fish were on Vanguard Records, known primarily for classical music and some folk and jazz. Joan Baez recorded for Vanguard, but by time we hit ’67, her heyday was over, not to return until “Diamonds and Rust” in the next decade. Most of the folk fans were gone, starting families, but some of their leaders remained…and they led the protests, whether it be Mario Savio in People’s Park or Mark Rudd at Columbia or the Chicago Seven…

But really, the slate had been wiped clean. What did Jimi Hendrix say, “You’ll never hear surf music again”?

These were not the denizens of the fifties…the hipsters, the thinkers, the kids who blew up the music business were younger, wet behind the ears, and they were all ears.

“Are You Experienced” came out in 1967. Actually, the Mothers of Invention’s debut, “Freak Out!,” came out in ’66! But that was on Verve, which was not much better than Vanguard, and they were from Los Angeles and it took longer for Frank and his minions to gain traction. L.A. was seen as flash, but San Francisco had soul. And infrastructure for said soul. With the Avalon Ballroom and the Fillmore and Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters, with their Acid Tests.

So we were primed. We were paying attention to San Francisco.

And that’s when I heard “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die.”

4

I had to buy the album, it was not like the song was in regular rotation on any radio station. Which now included multiple outlets on FM…WOR, WABC, WNEW…with AM jocks now speaking slowly in deep tones, like Scott Muni.

So I purchased the album, also called “”I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die.”

So what I did, after breaking the shrinkwrap, after shutting the door to my room, was drop the needle and study the album cover.

And Country Joe was almost the most normal looking of the bunch. Barry Melton had his frizzy hair. David Cohen looked like a magician. And Chicken Hirsch? These were aliens, they didn’t fit in anywhere in America, and they didn’t care. They were just doing their thing.

The music was insight into another world, that of San Francisco.

And I couldn’t get enough. Who could? Either you were on the bus or you were off.

This record was unlike anything I’d previously purchased. These were not tight singles made for radio play. Especially the second side. It was atmospheric, you either bought in or you didn’t.

I did.

And that made me a member of the club. Because I was hip to Country Joe and The Fish.

5

Now when you had the album of a band and it became your favorite, you had to see them live.

It wasn’t like today, there was nowhere else to be exposed. And it wasn’t your motivation, but if you got on the bus early enough, you had bragging rights.

But I must say, my mother hipped me to the Country Joe and The Fish show at Woolsey Hall in New Haven on May 26, 1968.

Now you’ve got to know, my friends and I were only fifteen, we didn’t have driver’s licenses. Which meant…

We had to take the train. The New Haven Railroad, it got you there but it was dirty and scummy and…

The last ride back was at midnight.

Furthermore, it was Sunday night. But that didn’t make a difference to my mother, when it came to culture, all limits were off. Truly..

So I went with two buddies and…

We had to walk from the train station to the hall and…at that point New Haven was dangerous, full of racial tension, most people would not even walk in this area at night.

But we got to Woolsey Hall and…

This was not the Heman’s Hermits crowd, this was unlike any crowd I’d experienced previously. There was no rabidity, there was a lot of milling around, and there was marijuana in the air and…

There was an opening act, and then Country Joe and the band took the stage, started with “Rock and Soul Music,” and then played for nearly an hour with no tunes recognizable to me. We were in New Haven, but they were in San Francisco. They were loose. And they left the stage saying they’d come back for a second set.

WHAT?

This was not fair!

We ultimately ran to the railroad station and made the train…and if you didn’t, you had to stay in New Haven all night…but not before I bought a poster. You needed ownership, evidence of your fandom.

6

So I bought the follow-up, “Together,” which was less out there, more traditional, but playable. I was a deep fan.

But that was the end. The album after that, “Here We Are Again,” was substandard.

But I was still a fan of the band…it was more than the music, it was the attitude, the irony, the humor…THIS WAS THE COUNTERCULTURE!

And the counterculture had its moment in August 1969, when the general public was positively shocked that all those kids showed up at Woodstock. Today it’s de rigueur, back then it was unfathomable.

But Country Joe didn’t gain mainstream notoriety until the movie came out. With its “Give me an F!” cheer.

What’s that spell?

A movement. And Country Joe was at the epicenter.

Not every market had an underground radio station. People may not have even heard of Country Joe and The Fish.

But now they had.

So you’d be places and someone would yell…GIVE ME AN F!

Yup, it was part of the culture, bedrock.

And then the band broke up and Country Joe put out solo albums and “Rolling Stone” wrote about them and he’d play solo here and there, but ultimately there was a long fade-out from public consciousness, until he died a few days back.

7

And that brings it all back. Not only Country Joe, but the sixties. We were optimistic, we felt we had power, we were testing limits, we were in control. And our leaders were musicians. Not selling perfume or tchotchkes…

That’s the modern paradigm, become a brand and leverage it.

But Country Joe and The Fish were just a band. Making music. Sure, they wanted to get paid, but that was not the primary motivation…the experience was.

And we all joined in, wanted to be part of that experience too.

Now it’s not like I ever forgot Country Joe, but I must say I always wondered what he was living on, how he made ends meet. You die young and all your problems are solved, live, and they pile up.

And he lived to 84. That’s not a bad run.

But now he’s in the rearview mirror, and either you were there or you were not.

And in the modern era, we find out the backstory that was unavailable in the pre-Internet era. His parents named him after Joseph Stalin. And he called himself “Country Joe” because Stalin used that moniker.

His parents were Communists. My grandfather was a member of the Workers Circle. He came from Russia, with nothing, he had a sense of equity and opportunity, two factors that are absent in today’s society.

So it was a different time.

But what a time it was.

Music was not the background, it was positively foreground. If you wanted to know what was happening, what to think, you listened to FM radio. Musicians were gods, we listened to them opine. They were thinkers, they had something to say.

And Country Joe was right at the center of it.

To me he’s a founding father.