Barry McGuire

...

I remember, I remember a guy, there was a guy, uh, I was doing a show, uh, doing a series of, uh, concert shows with a guy named Barry McGuire.

Oh, sure.

And Barry had written "Need the Destruction" and famous singer back in the day-

He, he felt his whole brain was scrambled, and it was literally the, the enemy was really trying to stop him coming.

And, uh, but when he stood up, he, he stood up together with a guy called Barry McGuire.

Now, Barry McGuire had come straight out of the Jesus Revolution in the States.

He was one of the leaders.

Ah.

You might r- have heard of that.

But, um, really, the wave of revival that was in the Jesus Revolution was coming into Cambridge at that time.

And I think the two of them together, with Barry McGuire, uh, with his sort of open sandals and his guitar and, and then this very conservative, uh, vicar standing together, it kind of opened up all the students, and they were able to, to really focus o- on w- what God was saying to them.

Song 1800, Rock On by David Essex.

Song 1700, Eve of Destruction by Barry McGuire.

Song 1600, Neutron Dance by the Pointer Sisters.

And song 1500, If You Wanna Be Happy by Jimmy Soul.

Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction.

Recorded by Barry McGuire, this song reads almost like a checklist of the anxieties in 1965.

The Cold War, the draft, Vietnam, the civil rights struggle, all delivered through McGuire's gravelly, almost exhausted voice.

It hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100, which tells you something.

It was towards the end of 1965 that The Mamas and Papas would record our song of the day.

What's interesting is this song was originally supposed to be sung by Barry McGuire, with The Mamas and the Papas backing him up.

McGuire was a friend of the group, having introduced them to their producer Lou Adler, but Adler really liked their sound and instead had Denny Daugherty take lead vocals on the final cut.

But here's what's weird.

The song itself never references that club, but it references plenty of people in the LA music-making scene.

There's Zalionovsky and John Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful, who we talked about a couple episodes ago.

They reference Roger McGuinn of the Birds, and of course their old pal Barry McGuire, too.

John and Michelle basically wrote this song to tell who was who in the band's history.

Anthony, what do you got?

Eve of Destruction by Barry McGuire.

Yo.

Hello.

They hear again and again that they are alone on this planet and good luck with it.

They are orphans, as Barry McGuire, an old singer, sang years ago, orphans in an age of no tomorrows.

And these generations need to know that God is not far from them.

You know...

yeah um is it the vinyl has a picture of a bunch of guys in suits and sunglasses so this is very promising but it could be scar so

it's great it's very appropriate for these times what with uh trump you know everything up and whatnot and things that are going on around the world so called eve of destruction it's the pretty things it was um covered covering the song by um Barry McGuire, who did that in 1967 about the Vietnam War.

But it's appropriate still.

I feel like we've been touching on a little bit of that era's mood.