Beverly Bivens - Knowledge (XXG)

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words, "an instinctive caution innate either to Beverly or to young women generally whose ties to social tradition were all about to unravel". The official website of the latter-day We Five explained that "Beverly turned her back on stardom to marry ... explore experimental music, and become a mom". A year before her marriage, she had described touring without her boyfriend as "a big drag" and has since reflected that, by the time of the split, she was "kinda dancing" and that her husband was having an influence on her. However, there have been suggestions that differences within the group and aspects of its management were also factors. Bivens was not the only member of We Five who abandoned a performing career prematurely. Peter Fullerton left the music business altogether around 1970 to work with homeless people in the Bay Area and much later put out two albums of mostly religious music to benefit his charity, the "Truck of Love."

795:, together with the information that Bivens had attended junior college. There were other mild hints of condescension: the same sleeve notes recognised that Bivens' "unusual brilliance and vocal range is the basis of our sound" and that she was "the spark of the group", but referred also to her "genuine involvement in singing and desire to learn", while, many years later, the We Five website referred to Stewart and Burgan's having added "the sound of a female voice that was eventually to be made famous by Beverly Bivens". (This is perhaps consistent with another sleeve reference to Bivens' instrument as her throat, although it may allude also to the Ridgerunners' original female singer, 1095:. It is clear from this that Bivens has remained very circumspect about her life since We Five, and apart from her appearance in 2009, has resisted attempts to encourage her to sing again. Even when she and Burgan visited Bob Jones during his final illness in 2013, she was unwilling to sing "High Flying Bird", which the men strummed on their guitars, an omission for which, according to Burgan, she expressed regret during the return journey. The three were, however, photographed together. Burgan died in March 2021, and Pete Fullerton in September 2021, leaving Bivens as the sole surviving member of the original We Five. 1088:, released in May 2009. The sleeve notes for Big Beat's retrospective CD of We Five's recordings, released in 2009, contained several reminiscences by Bivens and, on September 24 of that year, she sang "High Flying Bird" at the opening of an exhibition, mounted by the Performing Arts Library & Museum in San Francisco, of the rock scene in the Bay area in the mid-1960s to early 1970s. Asked by an ABC reporter if the latter appearance marked a resumption of her singing career, she remarked teasingly "God, I hope so. That would be awesome". 382:. Released early in 1966, its "twangy-oriental sound", with Bivens "really put her voice in front of the others and set the tempo for the remainder of the group" represented a significant departure of style that in various ways was to be adopted by other bands in the coming year. However, it had limited public impact, a fate shared in May 1966 by a further single, 883:. Because of her short period of contemporaneous fame, Bivens has remained a rather elusive figure, but one whose voice has plainly been cherished by many who heard her in the mid-1960s. Although Mike Stewart appears to have been the "engine" of We Five, putting in extra hours to attend to arrangements of the group's material, George Yanok's notes for 168: 824:. In a 2002 Jerry Burgan attributed the band's collapse in part to the band's management, reflecting that "the dissolution was rooted in unfocused management that permitted a very young group to have too much autonomy. We factionalized into a blues contingent, a pop contingent, and an 'I'm out of here' contingent." 33: 1071:

referred to Bivens' still living in Berkeley and to his having had another partner of long standing. However, it appears that, when Marshall fell ill, Bivens stepped in to care for him. In the mid 1990s Bivens was said by Burgan to be doing up an old house. This was subsequently sold and, when Burgan

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Bivens' career after leaving We Five is not well documented and, until Jerry Burgan published a memoir of the early folk-rock scene in 2014, sketchy information was derived mainly from recollections posted on the internet. Various rumours that she had died persisted for many years. These seem to have

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Using rear projection to flood a wide screen with essentially liquid images, and large speakers to project highly amplified jazz-electronic improvisations, the LSD. is an intensely dedicated, highly gifted group of light artists and musicians who carry abstract light-sound art to perhaps its ultimate

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were perhaps revealing in that they concentrated on Bivens' centrality to We Five virtually to the exclusion of the other members: according to Yanok, she was "totally honest, gifted and possessed". Yanok also observed that We Five's music was about "fun" and that it was "unfortunate that that 'fun',

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In 2014 Joshi, who has a son, Elijah Cole, with wife Leah, recalled an unorthodox childhood which was dominated by his parents' passion for music: "Everything was about music and art. It was like, you sleep here and you sleep there, and you have to be part of our trip ... But I wouldn't trade it for

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Bivens' documented recording career lasted less than two years and extended to little more than two dozen tracks. Bivens, "the miniskirt-wearing, free spirit of the band", was (like Bob Jones, who was also not part of the reformed We Five) "making individual plans of own". She herself has said that

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in 1969. Jerry Burgan spoke more kindly of the band's management in 2007, recalling that Werber "had an ability to encourage creativity and the musical process without having to direct it. While encouraging us to write, to sing, and to play, he surrounded us with a team that shaped all of the other

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from 1965 to 1967. Since 2021 she has been the original band's last surviving member. After her marriage to jazz musician Fred Marshall and the break-up of We Five, she sang for a while with the experimental Light Sound Dimension, but by the late 1960s Bivens had largely left the music scene. After

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The precise reasons for the break-up of the original group remain unclear, although speculation has tended to focus on Bivens. Jerry Burgan recalled that, among a number of complicating factors, some of band members, notably Mike Stewart, were "frankly in love" with her and has referred to, in his

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purportedly from Bob Jones of the original We Five. Though dating the split of the group to 1969 (which must surely be a mistake), Jones noted, among other things, that "Bev went on to sing "free jazz" with her husband" and that Jerry Burgan obtained the rights to the name of We Five from Bivens,

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Despite her undoubted magnetism and the powerful effect she seems to have had on her colleagues, Bivens was, in some respects, an "outsider". She was the only female member of We Five, while the four men all went to college together: Stewart, Jones and Burgan were graduates of the

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Ancestry.com. California Marriage Index, 1960–1985 . Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 2007. Original data: State of California. California Marriage Index, 1960–1985. Microfiche. Center for Health Statistics, California Department of Health Services, Sacramento,

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anything, there was so much love". An earlier publicity biography of Joshi stated that, while still at Berkeley High School in the latter half of the 1980s, he would "play in and host sessions with his mother ... and many notable jazz musicians which included saxophonist

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or arcane about We 5's music". However, various elements of the music of the psychedelic era, notably Bivens' vocal delivery, which Yanok described as "a major reason for this special something", were plainly discernible in We Five's output (for example, on

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As both Mike Stewart's brother and a member of the Werber stable, Stewart was an influence on the development of We Five, a factor recalled by Jerry Burgan following John Stewart's death on January 19, 2008. Stewart had left the Cumberland Three to replace

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Bivens' voice gave We Five its distinctive and memorable sound. Almost operatic in quality, its range was described as low tenor to high soprano. Bob Jones has recalled that "Bev had this husky kind of voice, and somehow there's this old soul in there".

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The original We Five, and Bivens in particular, did not fulfill their potential during their rather short career. They were managed by Frank Werber, and the production of their recordings was handled by Werber's own company, Trident, rather than by

939:" era of the 1950s and became a feature of many late 1960s rock concerts. Together with Jerry Granelli, who, in addition to playing on We Five's first album, had also worked with Guaraldi and been a close associate of the songwriter and producer 851:

elements which led to our success". However, there may be a certain implication in Burgan's further observation that "we were too young to see it at the time, but I later learned to appreciate the impact he had on my life". The 2009 compilation,

1872:. Bivens appears to have adopted a bob, then extremely fashionable in England, at some point in 1965. Some photographs from that year, including one by Lisa Law, reveal a slightly longer style, parted in the middle. Photographs on the sleeve of 1429:

recalled that, in the early days of Ian & Sylvia, Sylvia Tyson's abilities as a songwriter were not acknowledged as people "just assumed that Ian was the writer and that she was there to look lovely and sing beautifully" (Rotolo (2008)

835:. The band's success was greatly hindered by the fact that their second album, with Bivens as the lead singer, was not released until late 1967, over a year after it was recorded and six months after the band's final concert in May 1967 in 711:

Graf, who sang with a group called the Legendaires and had sometimes worked with the Ridgerunners (as they then were), took over from Bivens as lead vocalist. A group known as We Five was still performing forty years later.

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King recalled that "the light shows were best appreciated under the influence of the omnipresent pot smoke at the Fillmore, where contact was high and unavoidable unless you literally didn't inhale": Carole King (2012)

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Stewart and himself. There was perhaps a hint of discord in Jones' recollection of the re-formed group that "except for an unfortunate gig we did together in the North Bay later, I was never involved in any of that"

601:, who also had a bob. Bivens' relatively brief career covered a period in which she was one of a fairly small number of female rock musicians: her classic style, at least until 1966, was in contrast to the more 563:

In 1965 Bivens' personal interests were said to be fashions, Chinese food and freedom. As regards fashion, photographs show her wearing dresses whose hemlines were well above the knee in 1965, at a time when the

894:"A&M called, they wanted me, but I think my husband insisted he produce the records ... I'd been working hard for a long time and just thought I'd take a break – turned out to be a couple of decades!" 1109:

The tracks shown in italics were solo (S) or largely solo performances by Beverly Bivens. However, her voice dominated virtually all recordings by We Five and some others (SF) contained marked solo flourishes.

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of the Grateful Dead, performed at the Matrix in San Francisco. A surviving tape reveals that they invited on stage to sing with them a lady introduced as “Bev”, who is assumed to have been Beverly Bivens.

953:), an "audio visual multi media group" combining lighting technology and experimental music. The LSD, which continued into the 1990s, established itself at various West Coast venues, including the 1955:

in The Kingston Trio, which, unlike many other folk groups of the late 1950s and early 1960s, eschewed politics and wore matching short sleeved shirts and short haircuts (Donald Clarke (1995)

985:'s. A photograph taken backstage in 1968 at the LSD's own theater in San Francisco (which ran for about 18 months from January 1968) shows Bivens and Marshall with Ham, Granelli, saxophonist 839:. In 1968 We Five were among a number of A&M's artists included in an injunction by a Los Angeles court prohibiting the "pirating" of their recordings by a company named Superba Tapes. 691:: she was once admitted to hospital on tour with second degree burns after Burgan, who had been called to her room, found her in considerable pain, wearing only the lower half of a bikini. 1447:(ed. Charlie Gillett & Simon Frith, 1976). He disliked the song and his recording achieved chart success only after prolonged plugging by his record company, Decca: Brian Matthew, 511:, who made their names in England in the early to mid-1960s as the lead singers of folk-oriented groups. Others whose vocal delivery has borne comparison have included in the 1960s 1091:

A memoir by Burgan, touching on Bivens' years in the Ridgerunners/We Five, her impact on the early folk-rock scene and subsequent 40-year seclusion, was published in April 2014 by

446:, who was already well established on San Francisco's jazz and folk scene before joining the Airplane, originally a folk-rock band, in 1965. It may be no coincidence either that 2639: 2577: 2458: 2395: 2299: 2146: 2006:

In the early days of We Five there was only a cluster of bands in San Francisco, but by December 1966 there were some 1,500 flourishing in the Bay Area: Myra Friedman (1973)

651:, a leading San Francisco radio station, used a large photographic portrait of Bivens to draw attention to its inaugural International Pop Music Awards (with the caption, " 229:, the new group, initially called the Ridgerunners and for a while the Mike Stewart Quintet, became known as We Five. They recorded their first album, the highly eclectic 644:, whose apparent lack of self-control was criticized by other members of We Five, pointing out that he was only seventeen and was not in her view being managed properly. 1963:

recalled that she, Bob Dylan and Ian and Sylvia Tyson had scorned the cover of a Kingston Trio album "because the trio looked so collegiate and square in the photo" (

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and that the female voice was that of another artist. However, most sources, including We Five's Jerry Burgan in his 2014 memoir, have rejected this suggestion.

1750: 620:, "... which is fairly obvious. I haven't really heard any that I really like besides the Beatles". Many years later, she recalled that when We Five played in 1764:

described Deschanel's songwriting as "steeped in sublime West Coast harmonies and references to the classic folk-pop of the 1960s and 1970s" (Hardeep Phull,

935:(William Gatewood Ham, born September 26, 1932), who is generally credited with creating the first psychedelic light show, a concept that originated in the " 699:

We Five were in the vanguard of the San Francisco bands, including Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead, that reached international prominence in the "

2231: 1723:, October 2010 regarding the Bells' being "aligned" with Fairport Convention and "ending up today as a band with a palpable crush on Jefferson Airplane". 1334: 576:

has described her as "a petite powerhouse with demurely attractive looks a penchant for European style". Surviving television clips capture her rather

906:(Frederick Calvin Marshall, October 4, 1938 – November 14, 2001). Marshall had worked with a number of West Coast rock bands and been a member of the 663:

given to her by the group's manager and producer Frank Werber (1929–2007), who also managed The Kingston Trio. We Five sometimes used Werber's home at

721:(1967), released after they had split (an episode that later give rise to unfounded rumours that Bivens had been killed in a road accident), satirist 998:

Less prosaically, Jewkes recalled the LSD as "far out ... It was a mind opening experience. We were on the cutting edge, you might say, back then".

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During the 1970s, Bivens appears to have done some session recording, as well as making occasional appearances on television and recording radio

2277: 297:" at its height, We Five's recording had only limited international success, having been covered reluctantly though successfully in Britain by 246: 1707:. Burgan has observed of Springfield that "her epic bluesiness ... was something only another woman – only a Beverly – might really grasp": 3099: 495:

had a similar atmospheric quality, although Bivens' was the more commanding. In the latter respect. There was also a similarity with both

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A&M continued over the years to have an instinct for spotting striking female talent. A more recent example was their signing of the

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in San Francisco on the same bill as Jefferson Airplane on the night in October 1966 that Grace Slick first sang as their lead vocalist.

855:, to which all the surviving members of the original We Five contributed recollections, was dedicated to "the late, great Frank Werber". 2995: 1308: 1189: 966: 1280:

California Birth Index, 1905-1995. Sacramento, CA, USA: State of California Department of Health Services, Center for Health Statistics

2895: 2163:(2009). Jerry Burgan recalled that Davies "started singing along, and Michael locked onto the sound that you could get from a girl" ( 1170: 954: 885: 717: 2113: 572:, had yet to make a wide impact in America. Bivens was then 5 foot 3 inches tall, with brown hair and hazel eyes. Musicologist 2822: 175:

With the encouragement of her mother, Bivens had developed her singing voice as a child. Around 1963–4, she began performing with

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many years of relative seclusion, she sang at the opening of an exhibition in San Francisco in 2009. Her son is the saxophonist

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Jerry Burgan reported that, when he spoke to Bivens in 1999, she was not singing professionally. After Fred Marshall died in

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In the late 1950s, Dusty Springfield, then known by her birth name of Mary O'Brien, had been a member of group called the

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After leaving We Five, Beverly Bivens sang for a while with the LSD, her work including vocal experimentation paralleling

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when she had tried to introduce herself. Jerry Burgan recalled that she was shunned also by Jagger's fellow band-member

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A compilation of 22 tracks by We Five, including two from 1969 by the post-Bivens incarnation of the band and takes of

2888: 1913:), have described the inception of folk-rock as essentially a fusion of folk music and the Beatles, epitomised by the 780: 192: 2555: 2373: 868: 846:", although they actually had two charting singles and were the highest charting 1960s band from San Francisco until 2527: 2246:" (1968). By the mid-1960s albums were seen increasingly as more significant, especially artistically, than singles. 729:"We 5 was the first "electric band" to come out of San Francisco. It predated the entire present "happening" in the 285:

in California. One consequence of We Five's success was that Tyson's song, which until then had been unavailable in

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as "the Seekers, but with balls" and drawn attention to similar harmonization on that recording and the Seekers'

1129: 932: 32: 1002: 2243: 1616:, as "beautifully focused, but the kind of steely edge to it that forbids prettiness" (sleeve notes to CBS LP 827:

Despite Herb Alpert's own recording success, A&M was a rather small record label compared (for example) to

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Though the titles were given in Spanish, all four songs on the EP were the English versions from the album

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caused much controversy by wearing a shift dress four inches above the knee at Derby Day, first day of the

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One of the We Five"). Other photographs of Bivens included those of We Five taken by Lisa Bachelis (later

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and in concert largely foreshadowed a female vocal style that by 1967 was associated with, among others,

2981: 1125: 1044: 492: 463: 131: 73: 277:"Hot 100" in August 1965. Tyson (then Sylvia Fricker) says that she was unaware that her song had been 796: 322:. Video footage of this performance survives, as does that of appearances around the same time on the 3084: 1756: 1073: 1028: 488: 332: 314: 290: 273: 1612:

Grace Slick's delivery was rather more "edgy", being described by James Goodfriend, Music Editor of

226: 2928: 1145: 1133: 704: 641: 520: 516: 443: 415: 298: 268: 180: 3002: 1922: 1686: 1668: 989:(born June 18, 1940) and Ham's assistant Robert (Bob) Fine. One observer wrote at the time that: 986: 832: 427: 1910: 398:). Pete Fullerton felt that with both these recordings "there was always that edge of whining". 293:

of New York with a photograph of Bivens and We Five on the cover. However, with the so-called "

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Beverly Bivens attended Santa Ana High School, where she was a direct contemporary of actress

1312: 2988: 2808: 1185: 580: 524: 508: 388: 294: 88: 450:, who like Bivens had a fine vocal range, was signed by Alpert to A&M with her brother 336:. There have been some claims that Bivens did not sing on the original studio recording of 3034: 1352: 1197: 1040: 958: 808: 804: 569: 536: 532: 483: 481:(1966) by the seemingly imitative British band, Just Five. In 2002, the British newspaper 447: 394: 361: 200: 871:

in 1996 and a further compilation, with some previously unreleased recordings, including

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Several of the tracks on We Five's two albums were released as 45 inch singles or

1184:" 2. "High Flying Bird (S)" 3. "Make Someone Happy" 4. "Five Will Get You Ten" 5. " 1032: 917: 910:

Trio which famously recorded the incidental music for television specials based on the

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in 2022, "a time when it was extremely hard for women to be taken seriously in rock".

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Bivens' influence was apparent too in recordings by some male bands: for example, the

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A compact disc, combining these albums, was released by PolyGram (DPSM 5172) in 1996.

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whom the other members had met at Claremont High.) More generally, it was, as critic

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Joshi Marshall recorded "special thanks" to his mother in connection with his album

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advertisements recorded in 1965, was released by Big Beat (CDWIKD 286) in 2009 as

544: 2414: 2234:" reached number five in 1967), while the Grateful Dead never had a top 20 hit. 1960: 1426: 1384: 1027:. Until Bivens and Marshall divorced in 1978, the couple raised two children in 962: 828: 759: 664: 637: 633: 629: 606: 588: 500: 458: 431: 419: 286: 238: 213: 1072:

saw her in 2013, she was living in "a warehouse district" between Berkeley and

943:, they formed the Light Sound Dimension (which, as with the Beatles' 1967 song 2949: 2789: 2771: 2724: 2664: 1952: 1745: 1460: 1397: 1355: 1255: 965:, became known for its psychedelic posters), and appeared with, among others, 800: 688: 684: 621: 573: 512: 323: 184: 791:. The academic background of each was recorded prominently on the sleeve of 1918: 1914: 1422: 1209: 940: 876: 597: 565: 528: 374:, was trailed by A&M as a "3rd We Five smash in a row" on the back of a 135: 84: 271:". It became one of the first folk-rock hits, reaching number three in the 2694: 2230:

By comparison, Jefferson Airplane had only two top 20 hits (the highest, "

1814:. The mini-skirt really only took off internationally after British model 1035:, who was born in Berkeley in 1971, and a daughter, Zoe Terry Marguerite. 924:

of the hungry i club and Marshall's own band, the Ensemble, played at the

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in this age , has become equated with frivolity and dismissed as trivia".

683:, accompanied by her male colleagues, all fully shod and wearing matching 442:. Bivens was said to have inspired Jefferson Airplane's original vocalist 1068: 982: 936: 656: 648: 468: 327: 242: 187:

duo at high school and branched out into electronic music with guitarist

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was included on the first disc ("Seismic Rumbles") of a 4-CD boxed set

1064: 1024: 912: 872: 617: 584: 540: 139: 2108: 1985:'s Presidential campaign. Burgan has described Stewart as his mentor. 1443:

St. Peters reached number two in the British charts in January 1966:

668: 375: 263:, from their debut album of the same name, was a reworked version of 203:, who was then the boyfriend of her sister Barbara. In 1963, she and 902:

On February 13, 1966, at the age of 19, Bivens married jazz bassist

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Review by Kathi Koscki (1966), reproduced with sleeve notes for CD

1477:"The Hollywood Palace: Host: Fred Astaire / We Five / Jackie Mason" 1289:

Jonathan Moor (1990) Diane Keaton: The Story of the Real Annie Hall

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to rehearse; one photograph taken there shows Bivens barefoot in a

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show her with the bob, the style seen also in October 1965 on the

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The two albums featuring Bivens were re-released as a compilation

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until she heard We Five's version on a car radio while driving on

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had several hits in the UK, including a posthumous number one ("

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Carnival in Australia on October 30, 1965: see Shrimpton (1990)

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Jerry Burgan has described We Five's approach to Sylvia Tyson's

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In 1966, Marshall began to collaborate with lighting technician

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A&M publicity material reproduced with sleeve notes for CD

515:(the original lead singer of England's premier folk-rock band, 2030: 2028: 1971:). Shortly before leaving the Trio in 1967, Stewart wrote the 1051:

be fuelled in part by confusion with Nansi Nevins of the band

950: 2528:"Fred Calvin Marshall (1938–2001) - Encyclopedia of Arkansas" 2489: 2045: 2043: 783:, and Fullerton knew Stewart and Burgan from their days at a 1905:. Others, including Michelle Phillips (Mamas and Papas) and 1383:. This was A&M's first hit record that was not made by 1257:"High Flying Bird" in San Francisco in 2009 has been posted 491:

and the Mamas and Papas; indeed, Bivens' voice and that of

2800: 2278:"10 Years After, Local Sinatra Fans Assess Frank's Career" 1055:, who was critically injured in a motor accident in 1969. 957:

and the Fillmore Auditorium (which, with its "omnipresent

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Times Saturday Review, December 3, 2022. Mcvie, later of

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Love Is the Song We Sing: San Francisco Nuggets 1965–1970

1152:" 9. "Small World" 10. "I Got Plenty O' Nuttin'" 11. " 2666:

We Five – You Were On My Mind (Live On Hollywood Palace)

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Late 1960s: Fred Marshall and the Light Sound Dimension

134:) is the American former lead singer of the West Coast 487:

described We Five as having "bridged the gap" between

2593:"Joshi Marshall: A child of Berkeley is back in town" 766:, which she has described as "like her heart song"). 1870: