The Days of Lore

Happy birthday to you, Arthur Lee

Saturday, March 7th, 2009 | musiX | 1 Comment

It’s common practice to honor the anniversary of someone’s death. Not me. I’ve decided to instead honor the birth of a musician I hold very dearly. It’s also my birthday (I have many, many years), so I’m going to celebrate it with Arthur Lee right here.

OK, a few other notable people born on this date: Dutch chemist Ernst J. Cohen, Japanese playwright Kobo Abe … Matt Frenette, drummer for Loverboy—all, of course, admirable in their accomplishments. But Arthur Lee fronted Love, a band whose influence would and should be part of every rock band.

Arthur Lee—a tall, slender black kid from a rough L.A. neighborhood—started playing music in the early-’60s with his first band The LAGs. He was obsessed with Booker T. & the MG’s. One of his earlier songs, “My Diary,” was recorded by R&B singer Rosa Lee Brooks and featured a young kid named Jimi Hendrix on guitar (Love would cover Hendrix’s “Hey Joe” on their debut).

Lee formed Love in 1965, and his R&B and folk influences were all over albums like 1967’s Da Capo and Forever Changes, the latter of which is considered his masterpiece. But Love made rock music, and was a welcome response to the flower-power movement. Although Lee did consider himself the first “black hippie,” Love’s music was always a little darker.

Arthur Lee has been through it all. In the ’80s he all but disappeared, taking care of his ailing father who was battling cancer. In 1996 he did a five-year stint in prison under California’s “Three Strikes” law for illegal possession of a firearm. During his time Lee rarely had contact to the outside world. Upon his release in 2001, Lee began playing and performing again until he succumbed to leukemia on Aug. 3, 2006.

But this is a happy post, a cause for celebration …

Over the past two months I haven’t been able to get enough of Love’s self-titled 1966 debut. It is rock ‘n’ roll—a true proto-punk garage rock classic, tempered with jangly guitars, distorted basslines and Lee’s soulful vocals. And I’ve been itching to write this for months. So here, on what would have been Lee’s 64th birthday, I give you my labor of love.

“My Flash On You” - Love

“No Matter What You Do” - Love

Tags: Arthur Lee, Booker T. & the MG's, Da Capo, Forever Changes, Jimi Hendrix, Love, The LAGs