Nuggets II: I’m Your Witchdoctor by Chants R&B

Credits

PERSONNEL/MIKE RUDD: vocal, harmonica, rhythm guitar * MAX KELLY (aka MATT CROKE): lead guitar * MARTIN FORRER: bass * TREVOR COURTNEY: drums
Produced by JAMES R. TOMLIN
Recorded in Wellington, New Zealand
Action single #AC-1012 (1966) [New Zealand]

Chants R&B

The Chants were a four-piece band, formed in Christchurch, New Zealand. They were influenced by The Animals, the Rolling Stones, Them, and the Pretty Things.

The Chants won the 1964 Battle of the Bands at the Addington Showgrounds, their debut performance. They played every Friday and Saturday at the Stage Door, a basement club in Hereford Lane. Their sound was wild, and they found fresh material, importing rare R&B records from overseas.

New Zealand does a great job of archiving its music history. Audioculture has extensive coverage of Chants R&B, while there’s an hour-long documentary at NZ On Screen.

I’m Your Witchdoctor

‘I’m Your Witchdoctor’ was originally recorded by John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, written by Mayall and produced by Jimmy Page. At this point, Mayall’s band included Eric Clapton and future Fleetwood Mac bassist John McVie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvCnxNRlPUw

Here’s the Chants R&B version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ-ahSY_Tq4

The verdict

Chants R&B cover of ‘I’m Your Witchdoctor’ raises the intensity from the original. It’s so unhinged that it’s compelling. Vocalist Mike Rudd is charismatic, and the record is spooky.

Formed in Christchurch in 1964, The Chants R&B’s uncontrollable, deviant, sometimes moody rhythm and blues sound owed a debt to The Pretty Things and Them, but they always added a distinctly weird bent of their own. They didn’t so much cover John Mayall’s “I’m Your Witchdoctor” as inhabit it–in much the same way an evil spirit might take possession of a helpless body, sending it into a dancing ecstasy of guttural shouts and wild paroxysms. 

Mike Stax, Nuggets II liner notes

The band never delivered on their potential. Complicating matters, Max Kelly, the lead guitarist on ‘I’m Your Witchdoctor’, was a deserter from the Australian Air Force. He was tracked down and deported.

The band later moved to Australia after Rudd inherited some money, but struggled to find an audience.

When we arrived there, we found that the Chants’ biggest problem was our selection was too eclectic, too broad a range of stuff and when we struck the clubs here, the bands were very directional. We had to make a choice between the blues and Tamla and that knocked us out and sowed the seeds of dissension.

Michael Rudd later led the Australian progressive rock bands Spectrum and Ariel 

Read More

• Nuggets Song by Song
• 1960s Album Reviews