Canned Heat was formed in Los Angeles in 1965 by Alan Wilson and Bob Hite, dedicated blues aficionados and record collectors whose knowledge of the history of the blues was at least equal to any distinguished blues scholar of their day. The band’s name, a euphemism for Sterno, was taken from a 1928 blues standard by Tommy Johnson about an alcoholic who had turned to drinking the cooking fuel during the prohibition era.
Wilson started out singing country blues in Cambridge, Massachusetts coffee houses, then moved to Los Angeles where he met would‑be disc jockey Bob ‘The Bear’ Hite who hailed from Torrance, California.
Wilson, on vocals and harmonica, and Hite, on lead vocals, were initially joined by Mike Perlowin on guitar, Stu Brotman on bass, and Keith Sawyer on drums. Their original bass player was Stuart Brotman who later emerged in the US band Kaleidoscope alongside David Lindley. He was soon replaced in Canned Heat by Mark Andes, who later co-founded Spirit, before New Yorker Samuel Larry Taylor came in as permanent bassist.
Early Lineup Changes and the "Classic Era"
Canned Heat’s lineup was solidified in early 1966 when they were joined by Henry Vestine, who was cultivating a deserved reputation as one of the best blues guitarists in Los Angeles. Vestine was fresh off a brief tenure with Frank Zappa’s Mothers Of Invention, at the end of which he was fired because he had no feel for Zappa’s more complex material (and because he enjoyed his drugs a bit too much for Zappa’s liking). Completing this lineup was Frank Cook, an accomplished drummer whose resume included work with jazz legends Chet Baker and Charlie Haden.
After Kenny Edwards dropped out in mid-1966, the five-piece Canned Heat lineup recorded its first album, which would remain unreleased until 1970 when it was issued as Vintage Heat. Stu Brotman left Canned Heat following the recording sessions for Vintage Heat; he was initially replaced on bass by Mark Andes, but he too would depart shortly after joining to co-found the legendary band Spirit. March 1967 saw Canned Heat find a permanent replacement for their bass position in the form of Larry Taylor, a head-banging session bassist whose pedigree included work on hits by The Monkees, as well as stints backing rock legends Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis.
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After the band was busted for drug possession while on tour in Denver, Colorado, Frank Cook dropped out of the band. He was replaced by Mexican drummer Adolfo de la Parra, whose arrival moved Canned Heat into what became known as their “classic era.” During this period, wherein the band was going from strength to strength, the band members adopted the nicknames they would become very well-known for. Bob Hite’s husky physique earned him the nickname “The Bear,” while “The Blind Owl” was a fitting reference to Alan Wilson’s nearsightedness.
Breakthrough Success and Hit Singles
This lineup recorded their first released album, Canned Heat, in the summer of 1967. In July that year, they released a self-titled album that made No. 76 on the US album chart, following it with 1968’s Boogie With Canned Heat, which spent three months on the Billboard chart. The album saw some chart action in the United States, and the band was given another boost that year when they played the Monterey International Pop festival.
One of the songs from their Monterey Pop performance was included in D.A. Pennebaker’s Monterey Pop film. This included the band’s first single, a cover of Floyd Jones’ “On The Road Again,” cleverly arranged by Wilson to open and close with the drone of an Indian instrument, the tambura. ‘On The Road Again’ went to No.16 in the USA in the late summer of 1968, while AI Wilson’s ‘Going Up The Country’ peaked at No. 11 in the US early in 1969. In the spring of that year, ‘Time Was’ went to No.67 on the Billboard charts.
Instantly, Canned Heat became major players on the American music scene, and their success was furthered by the release of their third album, Living The Blues, in November of 1968. This double album included solo spots for each of the band members, a 41-minute take on “Fried Hockey Boogie” from their second album, and another huge hit single with “Going Up The Country,” their reworking of an obscure 1928 Henry Thomas blues side.
The latter song’s use in the Woodstock movie, coupled with ‘On The Road Again,’ which the band played as an encore, helped catapult them to even greater recognition.
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Woodstock and Beyond
Canned Heat continued to roll through the first half of 1969, recording a fourth studio album, Hallelujah. Unfortunately, a relentless touring schedule and inner turmoil (exacerbated by the group’s legendary appetite for drugs) took its toll in July 1969 when Henry Vestine was ousted after a dispute with Larry Taylor. Vestine’s replacement was L.A. blues guitar wizard Harvey Mandel, who was given the nickname “The Snake” for, among other things, his slithering soloing style.
Two weeks after Mandel joined Canned Heat, the group found itself in White Lake, New York for a set at Woodstock. But it was a matter of luck that they even made the festival stage, let alone that their classic ‘Going Up The Country’ was used to great effect on the opening credits of the Woodstock movie. Harvey Mandel was drafted into the band, only to find that drummer Adolfo ‘Fito’ de la Parra felt they didn’t have sufficient time to rehearse for Woodstock, so he also left. Their manager got into the reluctant drummer’s room, where he had locked himself in, and talked him into changing his mind and they flew to Woodstock by helicopter, arriving in the nick of time. It was Mandel’s third gig with the band.
Following an enthusiastic intro from Chip Monck, Bob “The Bear” Hite informed the audience that “we’re just gonna play a little blues!” before launching into “I’m Her Man,” a Bob Hite song recently released on their album Hallelujah. This was followed by a chugging blues, featuring The Bear pulling lyrics from a number of classic blues tunes including Robert Johnson’s “Crossroads” and “When You Got A Good Friend” as well as touching on a bit of Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come.” During this song, while Michael Wadleigh moved his camera between the musicians as they rocked out, an audience member managed to make it onto the stage to hit up Bob Hite for a cigarette.
At this point, it was time to bring the boogie to the people. The band struck up the riff to their “Fried Hockey Boogie” from the 1968 Boogie With Canned Heat album (and also “Refried Boogie” from Living The Blues), Bob Hite improvising lyrics as it went along. This number stretched out to a mammoth 30 minutes, including a stunning slide guitar intro from Alan Wilson, a lengthy bass solo from Larry Taylor and an equally lengthy drum solo from Fito de la Parra as well as some blistering guitar solos from Harvey Mandel. Upon its release on the 1971 Woodstock Two album, this improvisation would be titled “Woodstock Boogie” by producer Eric Blackstead.
An encore was demanded, and Canned Heat brought it with an all-out version of their hit “On The Road Again” (again from Boogie With Canned Heat), featuring some deep and intense guitar solos from both Alan Wilson and Harvey Mandel as well as some killer harp courtesy of Bob Hite. This brought the house down, and with the sun now down for the night, the amped-up crowd was fully fired up.
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Canned Heat On the Road Again Live at Woodstock
Tragedy and Later Years
The “Woodstock lineup” of Canned Heat would last for most of the next year, recording the band’s fifth studio album, Future Blues. This included what would turn out to be their final hit single, a cover of Wilbert Harrison’s “Let’s Work Together” that was very much in keeping with the “we are one” spirit of Woodstock. The following month ‘Let’s Work Together,’ from Hallelujah, reached No.26 on the US chart and became their last single of any note; it reached No. 2 in the UK.
In the spring of 1970, Harvel Mandel and Larry Taylor left Canned Heat to join the latest incarnation of British blues ace John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. This set the stage the return of Henry Vestine and the recruitment of a friend of Fito de la Parra’s, Antonio de la Barreda, on bass.
Unfortunately, this marked the start of a sad slide for the kings of the boogie. Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson died in September 1970 under suspicious circumstances in the woods behind Bob Hite’s Topanga Canyon home, becoming the first of the Woodstock performers to “leave the stage” permanently. Born on 4 July 1943, two years after America entered World War II, Alan Christie Wilson died on 3 September 1970. He thus became another member of the infamous ‘27 Club’ of artists who passed away at that tender age.
A year after their Woodstock appearance, Al Wilson was found dead from a barbiturates overdose in Bob Hite’s Topanga Canyon garden. He had suffered from depression and his death robbed the world of “the most gifted harmonica player I’ve ever heard,” as John Lee Hooker described him. The band had been working with the blues legend on an album that became Hooker ‘N’ Heat.
Stunned, the band stumbled through the 1970s with a variety of lineups but without ever truly recovering from Wilson’s death. Erratic, drug-fueled behavior made them unpredictable for concert promoters and by the end of the decade, they were reduced to playing small biker bars for whatever money they could get. By the mid 1970s only Vestine, who had returned to the fold, and Hite remained of the original lineup.
On April 5, 1981, in between sets at the Palomino Club in Los Angeles, Bob Hite mistakenly ingested a massive amount of heroin, mistaking it for cocaine. The 21-stone Hite died on 5 April 1981, ending that chapter in the band’s history.
Legacy and Reunions
Of the remaining original members, only drummer Fito de la Parra has remained with the group since he joined in 1967, although he also indulged in occasional side gigs with the likes of Big Joe Turner, T-Bone Walker, Albert Collins, and George “Harmonica” Smith. Bassist Larry Taylor has had a long and varied career, playing with John Mayall, Tom Waits, Albert King, and others, and founding a long-running music festival in Texas. Harvey Mandel, having stayed with Canned Heat only a year, eventually struck out on his own, working with various other artists.
Vestine died in October 1997 in a hotel outside Paris from heart and respiratory failure. By the time the band featured on Hooker’s highly successful album The Healer in 1989, Vestine had rejoined yet again.
Mandel, Taylor, and de la Parra reunited in 2009 for a series of Woodstock 40th anniversary appearances, and this lineup lasted for a few years until Mandel again dropped out due to health issues.
Some of Canned Heat’s longevity can be put down to their material regularly being featured in advertising campaigns on both sides of the Atlantic, such as those for General Motors, Miller Beer, Levi’s, Pepsi and 7Up.
They somehow carried on with Taylor and de la Parra, guitarist Junior Watson (late of the Mighty Flyers), and Walter Trout. “Technically, Vestine and Wilson are quite possibly the best two guitar team in the world,” wrote Downbeat magazine following their Monterey appearance”, and Wilson has certainly become our finest white blues harmonica man. In 1968 Cook had been replaced by de la Parra, who was born in Mexico City, and it was soon after the band began to have hits with their unique blues sound.
But there is no getting away from it: their music and their love for the blues is beguiling. They were, for many young fans, their first exposure to country blues and much of the credit for that lies with ‘Blind Owl’ Wilson, who managed to take the ethos of pre-war country blues and place it in a modern setting. Just listen to the start of ‘On the Road Again’.
| Member Name | Instrument | Years Active |
|---|---|---|
| Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson | Vocals, Harmonica, Guitar | 1965-1970 |
| Bob "The Bear" Hite | Vocals | 1965-1981 |
| Adolfo "Fito" de la Parra | Drums | 1967-Present |
| Henry Vestine | Guitar | 1966-1969, 1970s-1997 |
| Larry Taylor | Bass | 1967-1970, 1980s-? |
| Harvey Mandel | Guitar | 1969-1970 |