Vanilla Fudge Gets Atco Box Set, ‘Where Is My Mind: 1967-1969’
by Best Classic Bands Staff
Vanilla Fudge are being celebrated with a box set comprising their complete output for Atlantic’s Atco label made between 1967 and 1969. Where Is My Mind? The Atco Recordings 1967-1969 arrived October 18, 2024, via Cherry Red Records’ Esoteric label. The collection, on 9-CDs, includes the albums Vanilla Fudge (mono and stereo versions), The Beat Goes On (mono and stereo versions), Renaissance, Near the Beginning, and Rock & Roll, along with a 2-CD live recording at the Fillmore West in 1969, as well as session outtakes and rare singles, all newly remastered from the original master tapes. It’s available in the U.S. here and in the U.K. here.
Featuring Mark Stein (vocals, organ), Vincent Martell (guitar, vocals), Tim Bogert (bass, vocals) and Carmine Appice (drums, vocals), the band were originally known as The Pigeons and gained attention thanks to their radical, slowed down and heavy interpretations of current hits. They signed to Atco Records, a division of Atlantic in April 1967 and changed their name to Vanilla Fudge at the insistence of Atlantic founder Ahmet Ertegun.
Their radical cover version of The Supremes’ hit “You Keep Me Hanging On” was issued as a single in June 1967. Dominated by the hard hitting approach of their rhythm section and the powerful Hammond organ playing of Stein, it became a U.S. top 10 hit.
This ad for the re-release of the single appeared in the July 13, 1968, issue of Record World. (Note the incorrect title for Cream’s single.)
The band’s self-titled debut album was released in August 1967 and was a psychedelic rock tour-de-force, featuring a seven-minute version of “You Keep Me Hanging On,” along with imaginative cover versions of compositions by The Beatles, The Zombies (“She’s Not There”) and Curtis Mayfield, among others. Over the next two years, Vanilla Fudge would record a series of albums that would evolve from psychedelic rock to heavy rock and influence many emerging bands, among them Deep Purple, before disbanding in 1970.
This congratulatory photo for a Gold Album appeared in the Dec. 7, 1968 issue of Record World
The set also features an illustrated booklet with new essay featuring exclusive interviews with Mark Stein and Carmine Appice.
Related: Our Album Rewind of Vanilla Fudge’s 1967 psychedelic debut
1 Comment so far
Jump into a conversationI remember back in my college days when I was in a rock band (that never got anywhere) and one day the guitarist came up with the notion that we should do something different like a heavy slow version of “She’s Not There”, whereupon the drummer put on the Vanilla Fudge recording to show that his idea was not at all original.