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Released in September 1968, Steppenwolf’s “Magic Carpet Ride” became one of rock’s first songs to open with an extended passage of guitar distortion.

Video News Story:

Steppenwolf 'Magic Carpet Ride'
Released in September 1968, Steppenwolf’s “Magic Carpet Ride” became one of rock’s first songs to open with an extended passage of guitar distortion.

Though the song came out a year after Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxey Lady” with its shorter guitar distortion intro, “Magic Carpet Ride’s” thick guitar riff set the tone for hard rock and heavy metal bands that followed in 1969 and ’70.

Today, John Kay, the band’s lead singer and the song’s co-writer, performs as John Kay and Steppenwolf to fund the Maue Kay Foundation, which supports wildlife protection and conservation.

Mr. Kay, 72, and the recording’s lead guitarist Michael Monarch, 66, recently talked about the song’s evolution. Edited from interviews:

John Kay: In 1948, when I was 4, my mother and I escaped from East Germany.

We eventually made our way to Toronto in 1958, where I listened to rock ’n’ roll on the radio and began playing guitar.

When I was 20, I moved to Los Angeles, and from 1964 to ’65 played folk-blues guitar at coffee houses. I played my way back to Toronto in 1965 and joined a rock group called the Sparrows.

In early ‘66, the Sparrows left for New York and spent the spring playing there. We got our chops together, but none of it was really going anywhere. Then we moved to Los Angeles before heading to San Francisco in the fall.

One night, after an argument with a club owner there, the Sparrows broke up. At this point, my Toronto girlfriend Jutta received her U.S. immigration visa and joined me in L.A.

We moved into a tiny apartment above a garage at 7408 Fountain Ave. Our organist Goldy McJohn and drummer Jerry Edmonton moved into a place a few minutes away. The three of us were trying to figure out our next move.

Then a girlfriend of Jutta’s from Toronto moved in next door with her new husband, Gabriel Mekler, who happened to be a producer at ABC/Dunhill Records.

Gabriel urged me to contact Goldy and Jerry and to get a bass player and lead guitarist from local sources. He said if I did, Dunhill would likely pay for some demos.

Goldy and Jerry were all for re-forming. I called Michael Monarch, the 17-year-old guitarist who had sat in with us at clubs on the Sunset Strip. He came aboard.

For a bassist, we posted a notice on a bulletin board at a record store. Rushton Moreve responded. He looked like a hippie, but he was a natural-born bass player. He understood instinctively the concept of grooves and melodic content, not just droning away on the root note of a chord.

We started rehearsing in the garage below my apartment. Every so often, Gabriel would stick his head in to give us input. At some point, Gabriel said we were ready to cut the demos. So we went into a studio and cut everything on a two-track recorder.

At the end of the session, a guy in the booth asked us the band’s name. Gabriel told me he had just read Hermann Hesse’s “Steppenwolf,” which was popular on college campuses. Gabriel said he liked the sound of the title, so we told the guy “Steppenwolf.”

Comments:

Robyn Sheppard

I'll never get tired of saying this: We may be old, but we had the BEST BANDS EVER!

David RAy

I'm 64 and I listen to this amazing music all the time. It keeps me young at heart.

By the way this kicks the shit out of 99.99 % of the music of today!

Tom K

And not a single computer involved. Music made by musicians and their instruments!

hasslefree

Sow hen you listen to the classic rock songs over and over again you come to realize that there is no one else that could have sung that particular songs as perfect as the person who originally sang the song..... as his voice is perfect for the song.Not worth listening to any one else trying to copy and or mimic the mans voice because it will never be as perfect as the sound of the original voice.

Ranger

I graduated from High School in 1969. The music of the 60s was the only thing most of us had to be grateful for. And I still am to this day.

Geo Thomas

As a child of the 60's......Damn I miss this music.

Stephen Giles

Gawd how I miss the 60's and 70's

bonnie peterson

4 weeks ago

You'll never outdo the late 60s early 70s, when people didn't have there undies in a bundie!✌

Max lynette

I played this song after I got home from Afghanistan in my new Challenger, cannot tell you how much of a rush it was, yeah

nostalgiclady86

3 years ago

With music like this euphoria sets in and that's enough natural high.  Music lifts spirits.  No drug needed.  That is the "Magic Carpet Ride."

sic762

The singer had one of the best rock voices of all time...under respected.

Ron D

This IS IT: My favorite Steppenwolf song!  I never saw this video before and its imagery is as psychedelic as it should be ;-)

'Video Producer : Staff-Editor-02

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