Spirit Stories Page 6

It was 9:30pm Thursday August 29th 1968 and Nazz opened up. Later Spirit

came on and it was explosive. At the end I was able to get on stage and

get Ed "s autograph. It was on a brown paper bag saying Weldon   Peace

always Cass . He was the greatest and I will never forget it. Since then

I had met Iron Butterfly in March  of 69, Jimi Hendrix April of 69 ,

Frank Zappa  July of 69 and Blind Faith  in August of 69 to mention a

few. I guess you could say the Spirit had given me there  blessing on

meeting great musicans. Thanks Ed........... May the Spirit always be

with you........

Weldon Countryman

i would have been 15 years old. it was the reading rock festival, where

spirit were second billing to status quo until a one hit wonder band,

the motors were stuck into second spot due to their massive hit at the

time. so randy, ed and larry knight ended up playing at about 7pm. it

was a beautiful summers night, dusk, light but dark enough to enjoy the

light show.  quo at the time had a massive rock following 

(now a massive coffee table 40-somethings following) 

and had a particular live favorite which the quo fans 

sang through the first one and a half spirit songs....

until the band kicked some serious ass west 

coast style. i was a fan since the early days as my brother had everything 

possible by the band but i was just coming to that independent

 rebellious stage and where i wanted to find my own way with music....however the 

band destroyed me, they were just so cool it wasn't true…

they won the audience over (50,000 were talking) 

and held them.....they broke the encore record at the rainbow 

theatre that year and it was no surprise to me 

that they got encores at the festival...

i later found out this wasn't the done thing....

what did they play???? natures way, watchtower, the rest is just a blur....

but a memory of randy's horseman guitar panning 

around the campsite will live with me forever......

i went on to see randy play quite a few times but never saw the line up

as spirit again ……r.i.p. randy

Murray Fenton

I would like to talk about Cass, 

I understand that this is his nickname, but really 

I am very happy to have the opportunity to write some lines 

to the best drummer in the world. Let me 

explain you that the first time that I knew about 

you was in 1968 in a picture in a Long Play

 edited in Mexico with several groups of that time, 

I am talking about Spirit of course.

Since that time I had had the idea to know you but I never had the

opportunity, but now with this tool at least 

I can write these words (sorry for my english). 

I am 43 years old, Lilia is my wife and we

have 2 boys, Octavio of 10 years old and Leonardo of 8 years old.

Leonardo is beginning to play drums and I promise to give him a pair of

sticks signed by you, because every day he hears your music (you most to

know that I have a big collection of Spirit cds) and I explained

him there is a Web Page from you and  that it makes possible to obtain the sticks.

Thanks in advance.

G. Zapata

The first Spirit song I remember, and heard

Was Mechanical World. I was sound asleep

About 3:00 Am the song was so different than

anything I had ever heard My subconscious

Woke Me up and said , hey listen to this.

Since then still now , always the Spirit Fan.

Thanks for the opportunity to write.

Best to the band 

Fish Trip Hog

My friends and I were Spirit addicts in 68, 69,70. 

Listening to the line "someone tell my mother

 that I died" still sends shivers up my back. Spirit 

defined all that was cool about the late sixties,

 without the silly hype and excess of so many other bands of the time. 

Hendrix was cool, but the members 

of Spirit all blended into one 

much cooler concept in our minds. I'll be 47 soon,

 and have a huge collection of vinyl... some of my most prized pieces of vinyl are 

of course the first four Spirit albums. NOTHING ever came 

close to these masterpieces of recorded music.

 I always regretted never seeing them live.

 Thanks for creating a body of work that's truly 

timeless in quality, coolness, and production.

John Dickey

In Spokane WA around 1975? There was a trippy head shop, coffee shop,

hang out, drug haven for hippies. I remember 2 things about that place,

big barrels of peanuts placed around the room & a glass showcase that

had on display several SPIRIT albums. I got turned on to SPIRIT &

thought they were the greatest & I still do. I never understood why

people don't know more about them...I guess they were too esoteric for

mainstreamers. Mores the pity. We know a good thing when we hear it!

Later Eskimo.

Morgan McNeely

I just got my first computer and looked up spirit.

 So sorry to hear about randy. i've been listening to spirit 

since late 60's and have seen spirit 4 

times in philly/nj area. often listen to best of and rapture in the chamber 

while delivering pizza on my part time job...in s. carolina now. 

i've seen alot of good drummers (joe morello, buddy rich, ian  wallace, bruford, etc.), 

but cass' solo on "it's all 

the same" was the best i've heard. that was when spirit played at the

 spectrum's 20th anniversary concert in philly

 back in mid-80's. also on that bill was spenser davis group, 

iron butterfly, and chambers bros. cass' solo

 blew me away. also, can't understand why rapture

 in the chamber didn't get the attention and play it deserved. 

it's right up there..excellent album..every song. well, 

i just wanted to say hi to the band that's 

been with me for a few decades..

keep it going strong and nice as usual....

Rich  Slater

So passionate was his playing, so deft, so subtle, that he and he

alone could emulate the great style of Hendrix without making it sound

forced. I know it doesn't sound like a lasting tribute, but no one else could do it. 

Randy could fool my friends into thinking 

Kaptain Kopter was Hendrix, but the rest of the imitators were merely playing pastiche,

broken riffs bludgeoned into over stylized muck. Yes, Randy also wrote

great songs: the list is too long for this story. 

What he did, sacrificing his own life for his son's, well, 

that says it all. He went from playing the cliche "guitar hero" 

to paying the price of true heroism, paying the ultimate price. 

 Randy, I'll listen to you again.

Peter X

Living in southwest Kansas, 

I had few opportunities to see San-Francisco-based Spirit play live, 

but I always wanted to see Randy California 

(One of the main reasons I got 'into' playing guitar)

 I did get to see Jay Ferguson live while in college

(Still my all-time favorite concert!!) 

and he did a medley 

of Spirit and Jo Jo Gunne(Where the !#*&@$ are the CD re-issues of their catalog??)

 songs that were an incredible rush to such an irrationally addicted fan.  

Still, I knew that Randy California 

and Ed Cassidy still toured with Spirit, albeit far, far from Kansas.  

Then, one day I found out that 

Spirit was going to appear at an 'oldies' show at Wichita---only 250 miles away!! 

They were keeping rather

 unusual company-appearing at the bottom of a bill with 

The Grassroots and Gary Puckett and the Union Gap-----

strange bedfellows for such a cutting-edge psychedelic era band--

but by god, it was a glorious show! Randy was 

incredible and Ed Cassidy completely blew me away---

seeing two of the best people who ever played their instruments was awe-inspiring!

 After the performance, I got an unexpected treat--The band signed 

autographs! I got to meet and shake hands 

with Randy and Ed, and I tried to stutter out how much their 

music meant to me, and how long I'd wanted to see them. 

This was about 6 months before Randy's death. 

In a weird way, it's comforting that one of

 my biggest musical heroes died a true hero's death--

saving his child in the process! 

I assume that the Jay Ferguson whose name

 I keep seeing pop up on TV and movie credits is the same Jay Ferguson from the band,

 although I haven't read anything to that effect.

 I wish that some enterprising music company (Rhino?) 

would re-release the Jo Jo Gunne catalog or do a Jay Ferguson compilation retrospective. 

There was a lot of great music there!! 'Love these guys! Godspeed Ed Cassidy!!!

Greg Williams, Liberal Kansas

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