“Junior Cadillac” opens the album with a companion of sorts to War’s “Low Rider.” The song cruises along a mellow funk groove and is spiced with horns that were echoed by many of Daptone Records’ soul-revival productions circa the 2010s.
The buzzy psych-rock of the heaven-bound “Spirit in the Sky” follows. Its loping rhythm, gospel-harmony exhortations, and unforgettable distortion-dripping guitar riff do indeed still offer the pinnacle of slacker spirituals. The Jewish Greenbaum wrote the song in a 15-minute blur of inspiration after seeing Porter Wagoner perform the country gospel song “Pastor’s Absent on Vacation” on television, and also drew from Greenbaum’s love of Western films. The song’s trippy arrangement on album was radically different than Greenbaum’s original acoustic folk composition demoed for Reprise Records, ultimately becoming a chart-topping hit via Greenbaum’s fuzz-box guitar and collaboration with The Lovin’ Spoonful producer Erik Jacobsen.
The rootsy jangle and bubbling bass of “Skyline” split the difference between Canned Heat and late ‘60s Kinks, except Greenbaum pines to return to the excitement of the city instead of seeking the nostalgia of the village green.
“Jubilee” sounds like a souped-up and soulful take on familiar folk melodies like “Shortnin’ Bread.” Greenbaum describes a typically bucolic day on the homestead, with family members out pulling weeds or indoors cooking up a storm. For her part, Grandma is in the basement making moonshine, while the boyhood reflection of Greenbaum is on the roof playing Superman. Hopefully, he’s got a soft spot to land.
The show-tuney “Alice Bodine” finds Greenbaum pining for an old flame, in a song incorporating what were in 1969 cutting-edge analog synthesizers (a la the Beatles’ Abbey Road album cut “Because”). “Tars of India” is a peppy blues boogie not unlike the Grateful Dead’s “Truckin’,” released the following month on American Beauty. The song describes a child with dreams of rock and roll stardom. “The Power” is a brass-fueled southern R&B groover a la “Polk Salad Annie” that describes boys who possess the quality that girls want, and pities those who don’t. “You either got it or you don’t,” sings Greenbaum. “Good Lookin’ Woman” is somewhat more overtly sexist, in which Greenbaum sings as a character who claims to be a “big-time spender” looking for a companion with the right superficial assets. “Milk Cow” reflects a relaxed and simple life of dairy farming, a career to which Greenbaum would return following his third solo album Petaluma (1972). “Marcy” is a final psychedelic space-pop production courtesy of Jacobsen, full of treated guitars and sci-fi analog synth.
Greenbaum had other charting singles including 1966’s “The Eggplant that Ate Chicago” with Dr. West’s Medicine Show and Junk Band and later solo fare including 1970’s “Canned Ham.” None, however, rivaled the success of the two million selling #1 single “Spirit in the Sky.” Greenbaum’s musical career may have amounted to a one-hit wonder, but that one hit has been indelibly inked into the rock and roll history books.
For those willing to travel back in time to 1969 and dig a little bit deeper, Spirit in the Sky breezes by in 33 minutes and remains an engaging listen in spite of some antiquated attitudes. After languishing for years out of print in the vinyl format, the reissued LP of “celestial riffs and soulful grooves” is meticulously pressed from lacquers cut directly from the original master tapes.
Find the Spirit in the Sky LP at Craft Recordings.
