Before he became Patti Smith’s lead guitarist, Lenny Kaye compiled the 2 album set, Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era. Released in 1972, the two-LP set covered American garage rock and psychedelia from the years 1965-1968 and was a major influence on punk rock. Rhino Records reissued an expanded version of the set in 1998, with 118 tracks in total. I’m profiling and rating each of these 118 tracks, working backwards.
Track 21/118: Let’s Talk About Girls by The Chocolate Watchband
Release Year: 1967
From: Los Altos, California
Aphoristic Rating: 4/10
LET’S TALK ABOUT GIRLS – Chocolate Watch Band [2:41]
(Manny Freiser)
Personnel/[DON BENNETT: vocals] * MARK LOOMIS: lead guitar, vocals * SEAN TOLBY: guitar, vocals * BILL FLORES: bass * GARY ANDRIJASEVICH: drums
Produced by ED COBB
Recorded in Studio City, CA
From the album No Way Out, Tower #ST-5096 (9/67)
From Los Altos, California, The Chocolate Watchband have three songs on the Nuggets set. ‘Are You Gonna Be There (at the Love-In)’ opens the fourth disc, while ‘Sweet Young Thing‘ is on the second. The band was originally led by lead guitarist Mark Loomis, a constant in an ever-changing early lineup. They recruited David Aguilar, a biology student, as lead singer.
Their career is full of missed opportunities. They were offered a contract with Bill Graham to become a house band at Fillmore alongside The Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. Unfortunately, they had already signed with a small-scale producer a week earlier, and their distribution was limited.
‘Let’s Talk About Girls’ is an odd choice for Nuggets. It wasn’t a single, and it doesn’t feature the band’s usual vocalist David Aguilar. Instead, session musician Don Bennett fills in on lead vocals.
It’s hard for me to get excited about this song. There’s a much stronger cover by Irish punk-era band The Undertones. Hearing it indicates that the vocals are the biggest problem of the original. The Undertones’ Feargal Sharkey is a stronger, more expressive singer.
The Chocolate Watchband’s initial tenure ended messily in the late 1960s. Producer Ed Cobb considered the group’s musicianship too raw and often overdubbed them with other musicians, while Aguilar left before their final 1960s album, eventually becoming an astronomy professor.
The Chocolate Watchband reunited in 1999. 1960s members David Aguilar, drummer Gary Andrijasevich and guitarist Tim Abbott are still in the band. They released This Is My Voice in 2019.
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The song “Let’s Talk About Girls” isn’t bad, but I agree with you the rendition by The Undertones is better. I also think the two other songs by The Chocolate Watchband, which are on Nuggets, are more compelling.
Yup, my least favourite of the three Chocolate Watchband songs too.
I agree that the Undertones version is superior and their vocalist does a better job, but I think the more important difference is the how the performances were recorded and mixed. In the Chocolate version the drums, which are all muddy kick and floor tom, and the lead vocal, drown out everything else. The bassline is the best thing in the song and it’s too quiet and lacking in midrange to shine, and the guitar and backing vocals are almost entirely absent until the cool outro thing hits. I’d be interested to hear the original with some modern tech sonic reconstruction and a decent mix.
Yeah, you’re right – I don’t really think about the mixing much with Nuggets, as I don’t expect too much from a bunch of garage bands in 1960s. But this one is particularly egregious. I generally think there was a big jump in recording technology around 1969, which is why Abbey Road is a lot of people’s favourite Beatles album and the early Led Zeppelin albums still sound great.
I completely agree, especially with your point about Abbey Road. On the whole, I’m usually impressed with the recordings of the stuff on the Nuggets collection. They may have had limited tech, but they tended to know how to get the most of it. Plus it’s refreshing to listen to something that hasn’t been pro tools’d to within an inch of its life. Most of those old recordings have a vibe, which IMO is pretty rare since digital took over.
Now I’m going to go back to listening to ‘Don’t Look Back’ by the Remains over and over.
I agree with your assessment… I really like the other two songs they have on there…this one not so much. It’s not bad but not good either and doesn’t compare to the other two. I never heard of a session musician singing in place of your singer. Too bad they made the wrong moves…they were a good sounding band.
It’s pretty weird having a session guy cover the singer. Seems like drummers are normally the likely suspects for getting replaced by a session guy – happened on Crowded House’s debut.