“Summertime Blues”, Blue Cheer

This way: Summertime Blues

Blue Cheer was an American rock band that initially performed and recorded in the late 1960s and early 1970s and was sporadically active until 2009. Based in San Francisco, Blue Cheer played in a psychedelic blues rock or acid rock style, and are also credited as being some of the earliest pioneers of heavy metal, with their cover of "Summertime Blues" sometimes cited as the first in the genre. They have also been noted as influential in the development of genres as disparate as punk rock, stoner rock, doom metal, experimental rock, and grunge. 

Blue Cheer were formed in 1966 by Dickie Peterson. Peterson had previously been with the Davis-based band Andrew Staples & The Oxford Circle along with future Blue Cheer members Paul Whaley and Gary Lee Yoder. The original Blue Cheer personnel were singer/bassist Peterson, guitarist Leigh Stephens and Eric Albronda as drummer. Albronda was later replaced by Whaley, who was joined by Peterson's brother Jerre (guitar), Vale Hamanaka (keyboards), and Jere Whiting (vocals, harmonica). Albronda continued his association with Blue Cheer as a member of Blue Cheer management, as well as being the producer or co-producer of five Blue Cheer albums.

The band was managed by an inactive member of the Hells Angels named Allen "Gut" Terk. Early on, it was decided that the line-up should be trimmed down. Hamanaka and Whiting were asked to leave. Jerre Peterson did not want to remain in the group without them, so he departed as well, leaving Peterson, Stephens and Whaley as a trio.

Their first hit was a cover version of Eddie Cochran's "Summertime Blues" from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum (1968). The single peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, their only such hit, and the album peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard 200 chart. In Canada, the song peaked at No. 3 on the RPM Magazine chart. This from 1968.

[Spotify] Summertime Blues

[Original, Cochran] Summertime Blues