Corby's Orbit

Corby's Orbit
Listening in All the High Places illustration by John Kricfalusi

Saturday, June 17, 2017

Brainwashed ~ Canada's 150th Birthday ~ Our 17 Greatest Songs ~ Thirteenth Post

Illustrator from Buenos Aires Al Markha 


Street fighting reform school grad David Clayton Thomas got his rewards later, after replacing Al Kooper in Blood Sweat & Tears, but he was already an  anti-authoritarian icon and an important musical innovator after his hit single with The Bossmen in Canada in 1966. On the a.m. radio, Brainwashed was censored with a significantly irritating beeeep at the point in the lyric where he roared "60 million people reading all about Viet Nam / 85 percent of them don't give a damn". 

Aggressive snare and guitar, combined with a frenzied bridge of jazz keyboard / bass, all of it mixed waaay into the red, gave the song instant status as a standout track of social change, paving the way for songs like Ohio and Black Day In July. A future of musical breakthroughs, Junos and Grammies followed, but this moment stands as a high-water mark of ferocious Canadian song-writing.




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