The Way They Were
Do you ever wonder what musicians whose work you’ve come to know were doing before you ever heard of them? Well, here’s a chance to find out something about the Doobies’ own John McFee, and his former band mate Huey Lewis.
Sonic Past Music, a company that specializes in releasing just such products - for example, Richie Sambora’s pre-Bon Jovi work, or Randy Meisner’s non-Eagles material - has unearthed some “lost” recordings by the group Clover. As some of you may know, John and Huey, as well as “News” keyboard player Sean Hopper, were members of this group. On this set of recordings, you will also hear a young, pre-Toto Jeff Porcaro playing drums on several tracks. Additionally, the group features one Alex Call, who has written songs recorded by Pat Benatar, Huey, and others, including a huge hit for Tommy Tutone - “Jenny/867-5309″.
The recordings represented here were recorded at the famous Sound City Studios back in the early to mid seventies, with a number of the tracks produced by Keith Olsen - right around the time he produced Fleetwood Mac’s huge self-titled breakout album - the one with “Rhiannon”, “Over My Head”, “Say You Love Me”, and so forth.
Subsequent to these recordings, Clover went on to release two albums of their own that they recorded in Britain with producer Robert John “Mutt” Lange, and were Elvis Costello’s band for his award winning debut album My Aim Is True.
Some of us around here may be slightly prejudiced, but there is some cool stuff here - check it out.
Comments
Comment from Nicolò
Time: February 6, 2008, 4:46 am
They are the best!!!




Comment from Andrew Campbell
Time: October 26, 2007, 1:25 pm
I was very fortunate to have been able to hook up with Tom , Pat ,and John this past July at the show in Niagara Falls. In speaking with John i was blowen away at how many bands he has played with and i’m talking top shelf groups all of these guys are extreamly talented and for those that have caught them in concert i’m sure would agree with me. Like a good bottle of whisky they only get better with time.