The Best Song Ever Performed By Dirty Mac
The (1960s) Rolling Stones Make DrHGuy’s (2008) Day
Yesterday, I logged into eMusic1 for my monthly cheap MP3 fix to discover a bevy of Rolling Stones albums had been added to the download lists. Like any red-blooded, testosterone-supersaturated American male who simultaneously endured both his adolescence and the 1960s in the heartland only through infusions of Rock and Roll delivered via a Sears “better” model Silvertone stereo phonograph purchased via the mail order catalog, I already owned a batch of tracks from the World’s Greatest Rock & Roll Band. But, knowing Mick and the boys to have been a prolific lot, I suspected - correctly - there would be beaucoup songs and versions awaiting only a click from the mouse to be delivered up for my enjoyment and edification.
A few of the Rolling Stones albums from eMusic I plundered
Within a few minutes, I had tracked down 30 or so songs to download, all of which turned out to be treasures.
But wait, there is more. Yes, I got all this - and a bonus.
The Rock and Roll Circus
It turns out that the Stones got together with a few of their friends in 1968 to put on a show that would be broadcast later on TV as Rock And Roll Circus. Partying down were their groupies, roadies, knife throwers, tigers, midgets, and a few musicians whose names you may have heard before: The Who, Jethro Tull, Taj Mahal and Marianne Faithful (AKA Mick Jagger’s girl friend, AKA “big titted angel”).
For the occasion, John Lennon2 put together a nifty group, The Dirty Mac,3 with Winston Leg-Thigh (Lennon), Eric Clapton, Mitch Mitchell (the drummer from The Jimi Hendrix Experience), and Keith Richards.
Dirty Mac performed “Yer Blues,” a song Lennon wrote for the Beatles White Album. Unfortunately, the only other work this especiallysupergroup found was backing up Yoko Ono and violinist Ivry Gitlis on a “Whole Lotta Yoko,” the name of which is its sole interesting aspect.
So, enjoy the best darn song Dirty Mac every performed in public.
Footnotes
- See previous Heck of a Guy post, eMusic : Get It While The Gettin’s Good ~back~
- Ominously, this was Lennon’s first professional appearance without the other Beatles. ~back~
- Lennon chose the name, “Dirty Mac,” as a play on “Fleetwood Mac,” a group enjoying popularity in England at the time ~back~
