siLLy puPPy IRON BUTTERFLY is synomous with being one of the most famous one-hit wonders in the entire history of rock music. IN-A-GADDA-DA-VIDA, the band’s second album and surprise hit single is perhaps a testament to how an endless series of mishaps, happenstance and unplanned moments conspired into capturing the zeitgeist of an entire generation and somehow against all odds ended up becoming one of the biggest selling albums in all of music history. The San Diego based IRON BUTTERFLY was just another acid rock band that permeated the late 1960s led by organ player and vocalist Doug Ingle who was the primary songwriter and lyricist. The band was fairly typical of the era and delivered a rather average garage band style of psychedelic rock. Like many bands IRON BUTTERFLY was also plagued by lineup changes and after the release of the band’s 1968 debut “Heavy,” things got even more turbulent. The band was part of the L.A. psychedelic scene along with bands like The Seeds and The Strawberry Alarm Clock but never really stood out in any particular way.

It actually seemed like a sophomore album might never materialize due to the fact guitarist Danny Weis quit the band just before the recording sessions were due to take place. In a state of desperation the band replaced him with Eric Braun who had started to learn how to play the guitar three months prior. The title track was also a pure fluke in its creation. It’s peculiarity was the result of nothing more than Doug Ingle going on a drunken binge one evening and uttering unintelligible lyrics to drummer Ron Bushy who misinterpreted what was supposed to be “In The Garden Of Eden” that he could only make out as IN-A-GADDA-DA-VIDA. If that wasn’t strange enough, after writing five songs that would become the A-side of the original vinyl LP release, what would become a huge hit was nothing more than a soundcheck never intended to be recorded but by sheer chance was accidentally caught on tape while the band was waiting for their producer Jim Hilton to arrive at the studio.

While the usual method was for IRON BUTTERFLY to write structured psychedelic pop rock songs, the band just decided to improvise for over 17 minutes with the results being the entire B-side of the original album. The band’s ATCO Records for some reason thought that all the mishaps would make a great B-side and took the chance releasing the unedited 17-minute track as a raw performance that included all the unintended mishaps but somehow thought it might resonate with the psychedelic haze that permeated the summer of 1968. The gamble obviously paid off and the album became a massively huge hit outselling every other album for the next year and by 1969 had surprised a million copies in sales. The title track was released as a single but butchered down to a mere 2 minutes and 52 seconds. Since the appeal of the track was the long jamming session that featured trippy organs, impromptu drum solos and a repetitive psychedelic guitar riff with mumbled lyrics, the album was instantly endearing to the post-flower power crowds that wanted a bit more acid fuzz in their rock music.

Likewise the rather pop oriented five tracks on the A-side also appealed to the hippie crowd with short tributes to “Flowers And Beads” and the flower power themed “Are You Happy” which provided the perfect gateway to the unconventional title track that followed. Due to the fact the appeal in the album was the 17-minute title track which was never released as a single in its entirety, the only way to obtain it was to buy the album thus the album for a brief moment became the biggest thing in the USA outperforming bands like The Doors, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix and the biggest names in the world of psychedelic rock. The fact that the album has gone down in history as both a critical step towards the later world of heavy metal and progressive rock has only cemented its status as one of those essential albums that one must hear and own despite the fact the album really doesn’t exhibit any particular traits of a classic band that stands the test of time. The album basically was a complete surprise hit that absolutely nobody could’ve planned if they tried and proof that sometimes fate determines things more than any amount of calculated planning. To date IN-A-GADDA-DA-VIDA has sold more than 30 million albums! Amazing!

Perhaps if i was there in the summer of 1968 and in the midst of the hoopla i would be as enamored with the whole IRON BUTTERFLY thing but honestly i can’t say find this album as anything more than an average standard psychedelic pop rock album of the era. It’s true that the phenomena of the title track does indeed make this a legendary release and for that reason i do own a personal copy because after all the title track is a part of the overall culture for better or for worse. From a critical point of view the first side of the album is decent with catchy psychedelic hippie songs that are quite listenable if rather unremarkable but there’s no denying that the legendary title track was and remains unlike anything that came before or came after and serves as a significant musical milestone as far as experimenting with rock music is concerned. The sloppiness and rather amateurish performance really only highlights the slacker drop out and do your own thing ethos of the era. After all 1968 was a very turbulent year politically across the world so a nonsensical anthem that was nebulous and could be interpreted differently by individuals and still resonated collectively was obviously exactly what the doctor ordered. A true anomaly of history yet will be in the collective consciousness for eons to come. This has to be one of the most unlikely hit albums of all time!

siLLy puPPy These days the 1960s band IRON BUTTERFLY has virtually become a synonym for the band’s biggest selling album and single “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.” I mean who could even think of anything else the band has released, with the exception of heavy psych addicts of course. While true that the band’s 1968 album which has to date over 30 million albums worldwide completely eclipses any other thing the band had released, the band is not only still officially together (albeit in name only) but released a total of six albums from 1968 to 1975.

HEAVY was the band’s debut and although the IRON BUTTERFLY is credited for influencing both progressive rock and the heavy metal scenes that would develop, in 1968 when this album was released, we’re not talking HEAVY in today’s vernacular referring to loud, raucous and quickened but rather 60s style as in “man, that’s heavy!” Yeah here HEAVY refers to cosmically deep which was what the psychedelic 60s were all about of course with some bands a bit more adroit at tapping into their inner cosmic nature than others.

IRON BUTTERFLY was the product of the West Coast psychedelic scene which took over the USA during the latter half of the 1960s however this band emerged from the unexpected conservative city of San Diego. The band’s lineup changed substantially even before this debut was released with this first album of 1968 which appeared in January featuring Doug Ingle (organ, vocals), Ron Bushy (drums), Darryl DeLoach (tambourine, vocals), Jerry Penrod (bass, vocals) and Danny Weis (guitar). Although “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” would quickly follow in June of the same year, the lineup had already been reduced to a quartet with only Bushy and Ingle remaining.

Graced with the coolest and most groovy album cover of the band’s career which depicted a statue of a giant ear, the music itself is nothing really to get overly excited about. While referred to as hard rock retrospectively, this was not even close to the noise level of contemporary bands like Blue Cheer or even some tracks from The Kinks. What HEAVY offers is a 30-minute ride into the world of 60s psychedelic acid rock based on blues rock, beat music and rhythm and blues. The tracks at this point were quite short with most only a couple minutes long.

This is a pleasant slice of late 1960s acid rock with a strong emphasis on dramatic organs and eccentric vocals however the music is basically blues rock that seems like it just got its feet wet in the world of psychedelia. Despite the plaudits the band has received as a proto-prog or proto-metal band, none of those have manifested on this debut album HEAVY which unfortunately doesn’t convey its modern titular connotations. While the music doesn’t exactly blow me away i have to say that i like the moody vocals quite a bit and how can you not possibly love that bitchin cool cover art? THAT’s worth the price of admission alone!

aglasshouse Every time I've seen Iron Butterfly's history, their profile has a whole, and the music they've created, I've always thought of them as steadfast. In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, for all intents and purposes, should not have been as successful as it was. An 18-minute long acid trip jam? Many others at the time tried to achieve the same thing and failed, but these Californians somehow managed to turn such a product of the times into a product that stands the test of time (and made a boat-load at that). Something as miraculous as this is hard for anyone to followup, let alone a half-stoned shit rock band like Iron Butterfly was. They managed it though, the following album Ball (1969) charting even higher than it's predecessor in the U.S.

Iron Butterfly managed to make magic happen twice. I guess the obvious question that should and was asked was: "can they do it again?" Yes and no.

There's a difference this time around. Metamorphosis, released the following year after Ball, charted at 16 in the U.S. Now, in any other circumstance this would be laudable, because obviously it's not easy to whip up a record that charts in the first place. But for Iron Butterfly, this was practically dismal. Granted, 'Easy Rider' did chart 66 on Billboard, being I.B.'s biggest hit since 'In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida', although I personally owe this more to the success of the latter and name recognition as opposed to song quality (who knows, the 70's were easily pleased). So, financially-wise, Iron Butterfly were sort of able to hit the gold once more. However, musically-wise, Metamorphosis is different from all of it's predecessors, even including Heavy. What I was saying about Iron Butterfly's seeming fragility comes into play here, because the band slowly started going downhill after their monster-hit, and Metamorphosis was the last album regarded at least decently by critics. On this particular album, the original line-up is broken, with guitarist Erik Brann parting ways due to band conflicts. Replacing him, flatteringly enough, was four different session guitarists. Mike Pinera of Blues Image and Alice Cooper (as well as Ramadam, a supergroup formed with Mitch Mitchell of Jimi Hendrix Experience), Larry Reinhardt (future Captain Beyond along with Dorman), Bill Cooper, and even producer Richard Podolor on the twelve-string.

Metamorphosis is really the culmination of Iron Butterfly's slowly building up musical consistency since In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. This applies for musicianship (because honestly they weren't the greatest players), production, and songwriting. The production is much higher, and allows for a more dynamic sound in both the experimental and traditional departments. Speaking of experimental, critics tend to refer to Iron Butterfly post-Vida as being more and more musically adventurous, and I would tend to agree. Metamorphosis puts a much greater emphasis on the progressive/space rock side of the band, something I've always found remarkably endearing when it comes to them in particular. Mostly this is on the smash epic 'Butterfly Bleu', a masterpiece of proto-metal and prog music that rivals even I-A-G-D-V (except is much more structured and, dare I say, intelligent?). Still retaining a spaced-out, pseudo complex attitude, 'Butterfly Bleu' manages to be heavy, emotional, and eclectic all in on package. It also funnily enough features one of the earliest uses of a talk-box (yeah, that thing Bon Jovi used on 'Livin' On a Prayer' to make his guitar go "rwoworwowrwow") during a gritty section on the latter half of the epic. Of the traditional we have 'New Day', a Steppenwolf-esque song headed off by a disarmingly good catchy riff. 'Shady Lady' is, at times, your standard brand of funky blues-rock, but it delves into extremely dark tonal shifts at certain areas. The rest of the album is rather expected of Iron Butterfly, being basically cheesy rock n' roll tunes molded by quasi-hippie zeitgeist ('Soldier In Our Town'), but I suppose the big single 'Easy Rider' has it's moments as well.

The band itself does very well for itself on this particular album. As aforementioned, four different multi-talented guitarist make themselves well-known on Metamorphosis. Mike Pinera's (presumably) part on 'Butterfly Bleu' with the talk-box always makes me smile ever time I hear it. It really makes the song have a bigger personality (of course his vocals on the rest of the song is good as well, putting on a zealous, emotional performance). The Iron Butterfly themselves are nothing to scoff about of course, But it's clear that the talents of Ingle, Dorman, and Bushy are not without merit. The band's made their abilities clear ever since 'Vida' in '68, and here they meld almost perfectly with their session musicians.

Some may get turned off by Iron Butterfly's material, but for me Metamorphosis is nothing short of a wonderful surprise. People wanted the Butterfly, and they got the Butterfly.

voila_la_scorie I used to read this metal magazine that was published in Canada called "Metallion". It covered everything from hard rock to thrash metal and was great for featuring homegrown metal bands. There was also a page called "Roots of Metal" that featured bands like The Yardbirds, Ten Years After, Cream, Vanilla Fudge, and Iron Butterfly. I recall one part of the Iron Butterfly article that said after the fantastic success with "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida", the same line-up returned to record an album that "sounded like it was recorded between someone's coffee breaks".

As for me, I don't view the album so derisively. "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" had some great moments but there was also the other side of Iron Butterfly, the Butterfly side that was pretty hippy dippy ("Flowers and Beads" anyone?).

"Ball" opens with a stunningly heavy intro complete with harsh power chords, cymbal crashes, and a bizarre dragging/pulsing effect that creates an ominous and forbidding atmosphere. The song itself is a cross between haunting and pretty with inserts of heavier moments, particularly near the song's conclusion. Though not as straightforward as say "Iron Butterfly Theme" or the short version of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida", this song shows Iron Butterfly's darker side.

The rest of the album covers a variety of approaches, bringing in some light funk mixed with psychedelia like "Soul Experience", or the tension-filled "Real Fright" with its hurried suspense/spy movie bass line. There's Doug Ingle's balladeer vocal showcase, "Lonely Boy" which will either have you stabbing at the skip button right away or you might appreciate it for the effort. "This Must Be Love" sees a gradual building of psychedelic hard rock guitar, and "Belda Beast" is credited to young Eric Braun who shows of his vocal and guitar talents.

On "Ball" there's also an overall impression that Iron Butterfly was moving into more progressive territory. In particular, I find songs like "Her Favorite Style" and "Filled with Fear" feature an almost classical approach to composition in the way the guitar, bass and keyboard work together. The song structures take the album away from the standard pop song, and for that I actually find this album to be an interesting and enjoyable musical melange of psychedelic adventures. Of course such a mixed bag will have songs that bomb for some people, and I myself don't claim every effort to be a treat. In a way, this album is one of the last of its kind because heavy psych, heavy blues, and hard rock was taking a turn in 1969 and things were getting a whole lot heavier. Still, Braun makes some good use of his fuzz box at times.

Four stars for creativity but three for the overall result.

Warthur Call me a philistine, but I actually think the first side of Iron Butterfly's In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida is better than the side-long title track. The brace of heavy psych numbers (reminiscent of Love and, occasionally, the wilder moments of the Doors) the album opens with benefit from tight songwriting and an absence of filler (and tedious drum solos) that the second side can't boast. Although side-long songs would end up becoming a tradition for prog and the proggier end of heavy psych, this early example of the form fails to satisfy because the fact is that it's a three-minute psych number padded out with 14 minutes of filler and redundant repetition. Still, at least side A cooks.