1505 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, CA: New Orleans House Performers List January-March 1967 ('67 Berkeley I)

A Berkeley Barb ad for a benefit (for the Barb) at New Orleans House in Berkeley on January 20 & 21, 1967. On stage were Notes From Underground plus Blackburn and Snow

In early 1966 the live rock concert market exploded in San Francisco, thanks to Bill Graham at the Fillmore Auditorium and Chet Helms at the nearby Avalon Ballroom. The city of Berkeley, and the University of California there, provided a significant number of the fans for the San Francisco ballrooms. It was no surprise that Berkeley rapidly had a live rock scene of its own. Throughout 1966 there had been various efforts to establish live rock venues in Berkeley, largely unsuccessful. In January of 1967, however, Berkeley had its first nightclub primarily devoted to live rock bands playing original music. 

The New Orleans House, in North Berkeley at 1505 San Pablo Avenue, between Jones and Hopkins Streets, only held about 200 patrons. But it served beer and wine, there was a dance floor and sometimes even a light show. So it was kind of like a miniature Avalon, if the Avalon had offered beer and dinner. There weren't yet that many rock bands in Berkeley, but there weren't really many places to play either. As part of my survey of 1967 rock music in Berkeley, I am going to look at every performer at the New Orleans House during that year. This initial post will look at New Orleans House performers from January to March 1967. If anyone has additional information, corrections, insights or recovered memories, please include them in the Comments. Flashbacks encouraged. 

A December 1966 ad for New Orleans House, when it was still booking New Orleans-style jazz

New Orleans House Backstory: June-December 1966
During World War 2, the West Coast throbbed with industrial activity. The Port Of Oakland was the hub of shipbuilding, particularly "Liberty Ships," economical transport ships built on a simple model. Oakland and Richmond were building ships 24/7, and numerous workers relocated to help build them. Berkeley, Oakland and the rest of the East Bay were full of transplants, black and white, men and women, working three shifts with money in their pocket. The main East Bay thoroughfare was San Pablo Avenue, then also known as US Highway 40, running from Richmond to Oakland. There were so many bars and dance halls presenting music that US40 became known as Music Row. Live music clubs declined after WW2, with the departure of the shipbuilders. The music itself lived on, however.

1505 San Pablo Avenue is just one block from the triple intersection where San Pablo meets both Hopkins and Cedar Streets. It is in North Berkeley, but in local parlance it is in the "Gilman Street" neighborhood. The odd street geography stems from the direction of the Key Route Streetcar system at the beginning of the 20th century (the Key Route lasted until the late 1950s). Today, the North Berkeley BART station is only a half-mile from 1505 San Pablo, but in 1967 the BART system was still in the planning phase.

The New Orleans House had opened in June 1966. As you might have expected, the original plan was to present a club for traditional New Orleans-style jazz, which still had some adherents in San Francisco. The jazz presentations flopped almost immediately. There was room in North Berkeley for a rock club, however, and by the end of ‘66 the New Orleans House was presenting local rock bands. There was a folk club in Berkeley, the Jabberwock, which hosted some rock bands, and shows at various veterans halls and college facilities, too. But all these were "Southside" in Berkeley (the South side of campus), and in a town where most people walked, hitchhiked or took the bus, Northside was a long ways away. So shows at the New Orleans House had a built-in clientele.

The Second Coming, the first rock band to play New Orleans House, played Tuesdays through Thursdays in December 1966 (the ad is from the December 9, 1966 Barb)

1505 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, CA: New Orleans House Performers List January-March 1967
By mid-'67, there would be bands from everywhere flocking to the Bay Area looking for gigs. Some of them were even good. They needed a place to start out. The only other rock club was The Matrix in San Francisco, where local bands and even some touring bands gigged regularly. The goal was to get enough attention to get booked at the Fillmore or Avalon, because anything could happen after that. 

By mid-January, rock bands were the main feature of New Orleans House. Only the name was retained from its previous incarnation, now detached from any jazz context. I'm not sure who the original operators of New Orleans House were, but the rock club was managed by Katharine "Kitty" Griffin. Griffin taught disabled children in the Contra Costa school district by day, and ran the club at night. She took over in early 1967. Previously, she had run a restaurant on College Avenue, over on Southside. 

1505 San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley, the site of New Orleans House, as it appeared in 2009. I know of no photos of the exterior, interior or stage of the club while it was open.

The first rock booking at New Orleans House seems to have been the band Second Coming, who played Tuesdays through Thursdays in December of 1966. Second Coming were one of the first underground rock bands (not counting High School bands) in Berkeley, following Country Joe & The Fish. The band was led by guitarist Vic Smith and organist Mike Lafferty. Also in the band at this time were guitarist David Lieberman, drummer Paul Tillman-Smith and bassist Lonnie Turner. Vic Smith would go on to lead the Berkeley bands Sky Blue, and Grootna. The Oakland-born Tillman-Smith would move to New York in 1967, playing with many jazz musicians and finding success as a producer. Lonnie Turner would join the Steve Miller Band in early 1967, and ultimately co-wrote Miller's massive hit single "Jungle Love" (with Greg Douglass).

Some years ago we looked at the performers at the New Orleans House from 1967 through 1969. It was a pretty thorough review based on what information was available. We have considerably more information now, so it's time to revisit the subject. Like baseball's minor league, or soccer's lower division, a lot of journeymen passed through, but they were mixed with some talent and even some stars.  The New Orleans House was pretty much Berkeley's only rock club for a few years, Northside or not, so it did alright. But rock was exploding, and things weren't going to stay that simple. 

January 11-12, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Thursday)
January 18-19-12, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Thursday)
The next regular rock booking at New Orleans House was Notes From Underground, who played there often throughout early 1967. The band played some weeknights and then a weekend (January 20-21).  I assume the house jazz band played the weekend shows in between. Notes From Underground were a Berkeley group whose sound fell between Country Joe & The Fish and The Loving Spoonful.  They featured Southern California high school friends Fred Sokolow and Mark Mandell on guitars and vocals, as well as an electric pianist (Jim Work) and a rhythm section (Mike O’Connor-bass and Peter Ostwald-drums). Ultimately they would release an album on Vanguard in 1968. The band was named for a Dostoievski novel, a reference that all of Berkeley would have recognized.

On Saturday, January 14, the Human Be-In was held at the Polo Grounds in San Francisco. 20,000 hippies discovered there were 20,000 hippies in the Bay Area. Bands played, people danced, amongst--as Paul Kantner put it--"acid, incense and balloons." The Be-In was designed as a merger of the Berkeley political scene and the San Francisco music scene, and it worked. Even in Berkeley, however, the musical, stoned part of the scene started to take precedence over the political one.

An ad for the Berkeley Barb benefits at New Orleans House on January 20-21, 1967. The design and title "MINITRIPTIC" is a reference to an American Automobile Association (AAA) travel service aid called a "Trip Tic," a customized map of your journey. Trip Tics were essential for long distance travel in the pre-Mapquest era of the 20th century,

January 20-21, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Notes From Underground/Blackburn and Snow (Friday-Saturday) Berkeley Barb Benefit
The Berkeley Barb had begun publication in 1965, and it was one of the first underground press outlets. It was sold on the streets for a dime, or available at record stores and the like. It was a critical source of political and cultural information, and certainly a boon to rock prosopography. The final page of the weekly Barb, called Scenedrome, listed all the events in Berkeley and San Francisco: concerts, dance, protests, poetry readings, you name it. There was advertising, too, that was critical to the hip community. The Barb often struggled financially, however, so Notes From Underground played a weekend benefit for the paper at New Orleans House.

Also on the bill were Jeff Blackburn and Sherri Snow. Blackburn and Snow had been part of the San Jose State folk scene since around 1964. They had formed a duo, and had been recording for Frank Werber (manager of The Kingston Trio). They had released a well-regarded, if obscure, single (“Stranger In A Strange Land”) in 1966, but their excellent work on an album did not see the light of day until 1999 (on a Sundazed CD of their unreleased studio work). They mostly played as a duo, but they sometimes had casual pick up bands of Berkeley musicians.

January 27, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA El Teatro Campesino (Friday) Delano Grape Strike Benefit
El Teatro Campesino (literally “The Farmworkers Theater”) was a political theater group founded by former SF Mime Troupe member Luis Valdez (who among many projects later made the film “Zoot Suit”). The United Farmworkers (led by Cesar Chavez) were striking against California Grape Growers in Delano, CA, and it was a significant political issue in California. 

A January ad in the Barb promoted "Happy Hour" at the New Orleans House. Beer was 75 cents a pitcher from 8:00-9:30, between the dinner rush and the start of the music.

January 28, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Notes From Underground (Saturday)
Berkeley's Northside niehgborhood always considered itself separate from the undergraduate cauldron of Southside. All the famous riots on Telegraph Avenue and People's Park were Southside. Northside was more for graduate students and Assistant Professors, hip but sedate. The Westbrae neighborhood, just above Hopkins street, featured small houses and was even less of an overt university neighborhood than Northside. "Northside" in Berkeley parlance, generally implies the hilly section directly North of campus (near Euclid and Hearst). Down on Hopkins Street, it is usually referred to as North Berkeley but not Northside, although I am shorthanding somewhat.

Music at the New Orleans House began at 9:30, which seems late. But the start-time tells us that New Orleans House was also a local dinner stop and watering hole for the 'hood. Lots of people might stop in for a beer or a bite, separate to some extent from those watching the music. An ad in the Barb (above) promoted "Happy Hour" from 8:00-9:30pm, with beer offered at 75 cents a pitcher. This implied that while dinner was over, since the music hadn't started, locals were encouraged to drop by. Due to its legacy as a streetcar neighborhood, Westbrae was a good Berkeley residence if you commuted to downtown San Francisco. Up until the 40s, the G-Westbrae shuttle connected to the H (Monterey Street) Transbay shuttle. In 1941, these streetcars were changed to buses, but AC Transit was still running them well into the '70s, so it was easy to get to the City from that part of Berkeley. A neighborhood full of City commuters was always going to be a little better off than others around it.

Country Joe & The Fish self-released EP. The band was still a six-piece in June 1966

January 29, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Country Joe & The Fish/The Loading Zone (Sunday) Delano Grape Strike Benefit
Berkeley's leading rock band came over to New Orleans House to headline another benefit for the Delano Grape Strikers, along with Oakland's Loading Zone.  

Joe McDonald and Barry Melton had formed a folksinging duo in the Fall of 1965. They had given themselves a clever name when they recorded a protest song called "Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-To-Die Rag" that year. It had been privately released, a peculiar innovation. In February 1966, the pair had seen the Butterfield Blues Band at the Fillmore, and decided to "go electric." After some experiments, they started to play around Berkeley as an electric combo. They had recorded a three-song EP, and released that themselves, too. It was mostly for sale at the popular Moe's Books, or by mail. But they sold 15,000 copies. For many people, and not just in Berkeley, the Country Joe & The Fish EP was the first self-proclaimed psychedelic music they had ever heard. When Joe sang "Hey partner, won't you pass that reefer around," it was a call heard around the world.

Country Joe & The Fish had signed with Vanguard Records in late 1966, and they were recording their debut album in January. As part of their deal with Vanguard, the band had to agree to withdraw any copies of their EP and to stop selling it. Still, the band had already played the Fillmore a number of times, and had been booked at the Avalon on New Year's Eve. Besides Joe and Barry on lead vocals, Barry on lead guitar and harmonica from Joe, David Cohen played organ and guitar, Bruce Barthol played bass and Gary "Chicken" Hirsch played drums. When Vanguard had signed the band, the producer took exception to original drummer John Francis Gunning's refusal to rehearse, and had forced him out of the band. 

Country Joe & The Fish were Berkeley's first, best and most archetypal 60s band, not least because political activism was at the absolute center of their being. If the Delano Grape Strikers needed support, Country Joe & The Fish were on board.

The Loading Zone, near 14th Street in Oakland in 1967

The Loading Zone was based on a house on West 7th Street in Oakland. Although intimately connected with the psychedelic ballroom scene, their sound was much closer to soul music. Yet they never managed to ride the wave of popularity that other groups did.  The Zone had grown out of a Berkeley group called The Marbles, who as a result of being managed by original Family Dog member Luria Castell, had played the very first Family Dog Dance at Longshoreman’s Hall (on October 1June 65).

The Marbles had disintegrated in late 1965, and guitarists Pete Shapiro and Steve Dowler had joined forces with organist and vocalist Paul Fauerso, whose jazz trio had just broken up.  Along with bassist Bob Kridle and drummer George Newcom, The Loading Zone played not only the burgeoning underground psychedelic scene but also soul clubs throughout the East Bay.

January 31, February 1-3, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Notes From Underground (Tuesday-Friday)
Notes From Underground were booked for the entire week. According to the Scenedrome listing in the Barb, Tuesday was "Ladies Night: Men $1, Girls Free." This sort of pricing was common at nightclubs at the time, particularly on weeknights. 

February 4, 1967 New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Mardi Gras Party with Notes From Underground (Saturday)
Today it is common for local bars all the country to have a Mardi Gras special, but in 1967 it was pretty rare outside of New Orleans. But Berkeley, for all we like to make fun of it--I never tire of making fun of it--had a much broader cultural universe long before other places. Berkeley knew what Mardi Gras was, at least enough to know it was a good excuse to celebrate. 

As a result of substantial migration in the 1940s to provide workers for the shipyards in the Bay Area during World War 2 (primarily in Oakland, Richmond, San Francisco and Vallejo) every area of the South and Southwest was represented in the region by many immigrants.  As a result, every imaginable style of blues, country and other forms of music (including Zydeco, Texas Swing and just about anything else) was well represented in the East Bay. Thus any celebrations that went with the music was established, too. I'm sure the Northside locals just showed up to dance and drink beer to Notes From Underground, but at least they knew it was a celebration. 

During February, 1967, Jefferson Airplane release Surrealistic Pillow, and “Somebody To Love” immediately climbed the charts. “White Rabbit” would hit in the summer.  The rest of the United States, and indeed the world, started to become aware of the San Francisco rock scene.

February 7, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA:  Motor (Tuesday)
Motor was a local group who played every Tuesday at New Orleans House for months, and occasionally other nights. Guitarist Bob Zuckerman explained the story to me (personal email):  

My old band Motor was formed in 1966 by myself on guitar and my friend Stu Feldman on bass.  Our original lead singer was Paul Wright, drummer was Ralph (can’t remember his last name right now) and Greg Turman on lead guitar.  Paul left the group, and we reverted to a 4 piece.  We wrote almost all of our own material, which was heavily sarcastic/humorous/political, as well as a few rock standards, blues, etc.  We  performed every Sunday for about two years at the so called Provo Park along with the Loading Zone, and many other groups.  Stu was the guy who did the bookings (bands, times, dates).  We played at all of the stop the draft week rallies, people’s park rallies, as well as local clubs.  The New Orleans House was one of our regulars. 

February 8-11, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Saturday)
From what information I can uncover, mainly from a 1971 Examiner article, this seems to be the weekend that Kitty Griffin officially took over New Orleans House. Saturday (February 11) was billed as a "Love Feast," presumably in honor of Valentine's Day.

The next week's ad in the Barb (below) included some details about the club, which suggests that it was then officially under new management.  The handwritten text said "Homespun Dinners 5-9pm, A la Carte Service 9pm-1am, Electric Dancing Tues thru Sat 9pm-2am, BEER + WINE. $1.50 couple, $1 single. Underneath, typeset letters say "*formerly Kitty's Restaurant, College Avenue, Berkeley." Since College Avenue was nowhere near San Pablo, I take that to have been a shout-out to Kitty Griffin's customers at her former business.

A Barb ad for the Steve Miller Blues Band at New Orleans House on February 17, 1967.

February 17, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Steve Miller Blues Band (Friday)
Friday night featured the Steve Miller Blues Band. Miller lived just off of College Avenue in Berkeley, and he had just formed his band in late November when he had arrived in town. By February, he had already played the Matrix and had opened at the Avalon.

Miller, a guitarist from Madison, Wisconsin, had been a successful musician in Texas and Chicago.  In Texas he had a band with one Boz Scaggs, and in Chicago he had a band with pianist Barry Goldberg, and had played with blues guitarist Buddy Guy. Guy advised Miller to name bands after himself. In late 1965 he had visited San Francisco and Berkeley, and hung out at the Jabberwock. He had found the scene fun but unprofessional, and figured a good blues band would do well. 

Miller moved to the Bay Area in October, jamming with his friends in the Butterfield Blues Band at the Fillmore on his first night in town. Initially living in his VW Microbus, he was joined by some friends from Madison to form the first Steve Miller Band. They had rehearsed in the basement of the still-under-construction Wurster Hall on campus (the Architecture building) over Thanksgiving 1966, and he quickly had a band that knew 25 tunes "in tune and tight," in Miller's own words. They started gigging in December, and had soon been invited to open for the Grateful Dead at the Avalon (December 23 &24).

The Steve Miller Blues Band at the New Orleans House was led by Miller on lead guitar, harmonica and lead vocals. James "Curley" Cooke also played guitar, Tim Davis played drums and sang, all from Madison. On bass was Californian Lonnie Turner, who Miller had met at the Jabberwock. Turner had left the Second Coming to join Miller.

February 18, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Motor (Saturday)

February 21, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Motor (Tuesday)

February 22-23, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Thursday)

February 24-25, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: The Only Alternative and His Other Possibilities (Friday-Saturday)
The intriguingly named Only Alternative And His Other Possibilities are familiar from many flyers at places like The Matrix in 1966 and '67. I don't actually know who was in the band, nor what they sounded like. Sometimes they performed with singer Mimi Farina, who was Joan Baez's sister. Since Farina was sort of well-known, she was usually advertised on flyers if she was going to play. Sometimes they used another female singer instead (Sunshine MacNichol), but I think she only appeared intermittently as well.

The Barb listing mentions "Lights provided by The Stella Birdhikers." Light show providers at the time saw themselves as artists, not just technicians.  In 1967 mentioning the light show by name was also an indication that it was a Fillmore-style environment, with loud music, no seats and dancing.

February 28, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Motor (Tuesday)

March 3-4, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: The Only Alternative and His Other Possibilities (Friday-Saturday)

March 10-11, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Notes From Underground (Friday-Saturday)

March 14, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Motor (Tuesday)

March 15-16, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Thursday)

Ulysses Crockett's 1968 45 "Funky Resurgence" (on Transverse Records) probably gives a fair idea of his sound. Crockett later was a lawyer in the Alameda County prosecutor's office.

March 17-19, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Ulysses S. Crockett and The Afro Blues Persuasion (Friday-Sunday)
Ulysses S. Crockett and The Afro Blues Persuasion were regular performers at local soul and blues clubs, particularly the Haight Level Lounge (on Haight and Ashbury) in San Francisco. Crockett was a vibraphone (vibes) player who would release two 1968 singles (“Funky Resurgence”, ’Tamura’s Theme” and “Sunshine Superman”) on the Transverse label, and they were recorded in a “soul-jazz” style. The combo probably featured Crockett on vibes and flute, John Richard Miller on piano, Bing Nathan on bass, Clark Miller on drums and Butch Haynes on congas.

In the subsequent decades Ulysses Crockett appears to have gone on to a distinguished career as a Law Professor. In this century, a limited edition LP of Ulysses Crockett playing at the Haight Level Lounge was released.

The Barb ad notes that while the Friday and Saturday shows will be from 9:30-1:30am, fairly typical hours, the Sunday night show (March 19) will be from 7pm-midnight, and have no light show. In later years, Sunday evening modern jazz bookings were a regular event at the New Orleans House, and this seems to have been the first hint of it. 

March 21, 1967 New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Motor (Tuesday)

The Steve Miller Blues Band, early '67. (L-R Curley Cooke, Miller, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner). [photog unknown, from the Berkeley Folk Music Festival]

March 24-26, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Steve Miller Blues Band (Friday-Sunday)

March 28, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: Motor (Tuesday)

March 29-30, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA Notes From Underground (Wednesday-Thursday)

Berkeley Barb ad, March 31, 1967

March 31-April 1, 1967: New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: New Delhi River Band (Friday-Saturday)
The New Delhi River Band was based in Palo Alto, and they were a very popular band on the South Bay underground psychedelic scene, such as it was. The group was more or less the house band at the Scotts Valley venue The Barn (just East of Santa Cruz), and regularly played gigs throughout Santa Clara County. They never managed to extend their fan base much beyond those counties, however. The New Delhi River Band played Chicago blues, more or less, in the style of the Butterfield Blues Band or John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. They were one of the first white blues bands in the South Bay, and the second psychedelic blues band from Palo Alto.

The band featured two former members of the South Bay band Bethlehem Exit (singer John Tomasi and guitarist Peter Schultbach), along with David Nelson, former bluegrass partner of Jerry Garcia, playing guitar in his first electric band. Nelson and NDRB bassist Dave Torbert went on to be in the New Riders of The Purple Sage, and Torbert and drummer Chris Herold were subsequently in the 70s band Kingfish.

The New Delhi River Band had a following in Santa Cruz and Santa Clara County, but they were trying to expand their footprint. In early 1967, they started playing gigs in Berkeley, playing for free in "Provo Park" (actually Constitution Park) in downtown Berkeley. They also played a show on campus with the Loading Zone at Pauley Ballroom. Their weekend appearance at New Orleans House was in hopes that they had established enough recognition to draw fans on their own.

The New Delhi River Band usually played with their own light show, an outfit called Magic Theater. The NDRB mostly lived in one house (on Channing Avenue in Palo Alto) and the Magic Theater lived a few doors away. At New Orleans House, however, the Barb reported that lights would be done by Scum Of The The Earth, who appeared to have been a local company.

Aftermath
In May 1967, Country Joe & The Fish would release Electric Music For The Mind and Body. Joe's reefer was passed around the world. Live rock music continued to thrive, not only in San Francisco and Berkeley, but everywhere. New Orleans House continued to thrive as well. 

For the next post in the '67 Berkeley series (March 25, 1967 Oakland Coliseum Arena: Eric Burdon and The Animals), see here.

For the Berkeley, Oakland and East Bay Rock History Navigation Tracker, see here

Chicken On A Unicycle