Al Kooper and Stephen Stills – "Season of the Witch" (1968)

When I look over my shoulder,

What do you think I see?

Some other cat looking over

His shoulder at me

[NOTE: Most eleven-minute-long rock records could be improved by cutting them in half.  But the Al Kooper-Stephen Stills cover of Donovan’s “Season of the Witch” – which clocks in at 11:07 – is a Goldilocks track: it’s not too long, it’s not too short, it’s just right . . . which is one of the reasons I’m including it in this year’s class of the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” ALBUM TRACKS HALL OF FAME.  I originally wrote about “Season of the Witch” on October 29, 2010 . . . and then again (inadvertently) on February 8 of the following year.  What follows is an edited version of my original 2010 post.]

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“Season of the Witch,” which was written and originally recorded by Donovan Leitch  in 1966, is a perfect song for paranoiacs.  Donovan had good reason to be paranoid – just a few months before his Sunshine Superman album was released, he became the first big British rock star to be busted for marijuana possession.  

Julie Driscoll and Brian Auger covered the song in 1967.  (I only recently became familiar with their version, which is very good.)  

Vanilla Fudge's version of the song was released as a single in 1968 and made it to #65 on the Billboard “Hot 100” chart.  

The legendary supergroup, the Masked Marauders, included it on their one and only LP in 1969.  (You’ve never heard of the Masked Marauders?  Really?)

Others to record the song included Sam Gopal, Pesky Gee!, Suck, Hole, Luna, Dr. John, Joan Jett, Richard Thompson (his version is on the “Crossing Jordan” soundtrack album), and . . . Lou Rawls? 

Al Kooper (circa 1968)

But the version of “Season of the Witch” I remember best is the Al Kooper-Stephen Stills version that was included on the 1968 Super Session album. 

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Super Session was Al Kooper’s brainchild.  

Kooper was sort of a rock music Renaissance man – he did everything and did everything well.  

When he was 14, he was playing guitar for the band that recorded “Short Shorts.”  

When he was 16, he co-wrote “This Diamond Ring” for Gary Lewis & the Playboys.  (I believe this puts Kooper within two degrees of Leon Russell, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they had a one-degree connection somewhere down the road.)  

And when he was 21, Kooper famously talked his way into playing the organ on Bob Dylan's “Like a Rolling Stone.”

A few years later, Kooper formed Blood, Sweat & Tears, but left after their first album, Child Is Father to the Man (which is an absolutely brilliant piece of work).  

He discovered Lynyrd Skynyrd, and produced their first three albums.  He produced the first Tubes album.  He was the musical director for the mid-1980s Michael Mann television series, “Crime Story,” which starred one of my favorite character actors, Dennis Farina.  And this barely scratches the surface of Kooper's musical accomplishments.  

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Super Session features Kooper and guitarists Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills, but Bloomfield and Stills never play together on the record.  (It's Bloomfield on side one, and Stills on side two.)   Here's the story behind that.

Kooper decided to do Super Session shortly after leaving Blood, Sweat & Tears.  He was working as an A&R man for Columbia Records at the time.  (A&R stands for "artists and repertoire" – in essence, Kooper was a talent scout).  Bloomfield was about to leave Electric Flag, so Kooper called to see if he was free to come down to the studio and jam.

Kooper booked two days of studio time and recruited keyboardist Barry Goldberg and bassist Harvey Brooks (both were old pals of Bloomfield's from the Electric Flag), along with session drummer "Fast" Eddie Hoh, who by coincidence had played drums on Donovan's recording of "Season of the Witch."  The first day, the group recorded mostly blues-based instrumental tracks.

When Kooper returned to the studio for a second day of recording, Bloomfield was nowhere to be found.  The desperate Kooper was able to reach Stephen Stills, who was in the process of leaving Buffalo Springfield and who agreed to drop by the studio and help out.

That day, Kooper's merry little band recorded mostly vocal tracks, including Bob Dylan's “It Takes A Lot to Laugh, It Takes A Train to Cry” and a leisurely, eleven-minutes-and-seven-seconds long version of “Season of the Witch.”

The album, which eventually went gold, cost just $13,000 to make.  It was The Blair Witch Project of rock albums, and helped inspire a whole series of “supergroup” collaborations — including Blind Faith and Crosby, Stills & Nash.  

Kooper forgave Bloomfield for bailing out on Super Session, and the two of them made several concert appearances after the album was released.  A three-night gig at the Fillmore in the fall of 1968 was turned into a two-record album titled The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper.   (The cover of that album was a painting of Kooper and Bloomfield by . . . are you sitting down? . . . Norman Rockwell.)

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Click here to listen to the Kooper/Stills version of “Season of the Witch.”