Iron Butterfly made its New York City debut at the Fillmore East in the spring of 1968, recording all four shows from April 26 and 27. The tapes reveal the Los Angeles quartet - singer/organist Doug Ingle, bassist Lee Dorman, guitarist Erik Brann (just 17 at the time) and drummer Ron Bushy - on the verge of its defining success, mixing tracks from its first album HEAVY, with songs that would appear two months later on the band's multi-platinum magnum opus, IN-A-GADDA-DA-VIDA. Rhino Handmade unearths Iron Butterfly's ascension to the pantheon of heavy rock with FILLMORE EAST 1968, a double disc set of previously unreleased performances.


Meticulously restored from the original 1/2" four-track recorder tapes run at 15 ips, the well-defined sound, according to veteran music journalist and liner note author David Fricke, "is the sound of hard-rock immortality in the making." For the performances, Iron Butterfly drew material primarily from the just-released HEAVY, playing the tough yet nimble “Unconscious Power” in the early show both nights, and closing all four sets with the potent one-two punch of “So-Lo” and “Iron Butterfly Theme.” They also used the Fillmore concerts to showcase three songs from what would become Iron Butterfly's second album, including “Are You Happy,” “My Mirage” and its title track, “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” which the group deployed to great effect in the second set both nights.

As Fricke writes: “... these recordings, from that spring weekend in 1968, catch Iron Butterfly – and “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” – at a transformative point and ferocious pitch: a great acid-garage band with sharp pop instincts, hardened and tightened by long service on the Sunset Strip, about to establish a lasting definition of heavy rock.”

Due mid-October, the double CD is now available for pre-order exclusively at Rhino.com. The first 1,000 pre-orders placed before 11:59 p.m. PST on 10/17/11 will receive a free Iron-on Butterfly transfer.

I was just about to start a thread on this when i saw yours. I have a real problem with the price ($40 + s/h for a 2 cd set), but this is SOOOOOOO tempting. IMO, IB Live is by far their best.

http://www.rhino.com/shop/product/iron- ... eordertext

Sorry about the formatting on the following, this is how it cut & pastes from Hand Made.

1
Fields Of Sun (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

4:01


2
You Can't Win (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

3:13


3
Unconscious Power (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

3:04


4
Are You Happy (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

4:14


5
So-Lo (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

4:02


6
Theme (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

4:26


7
Stamped Ideas (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

3:11


8
In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th]

17:11


9
So-Lo (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th Second Show]

4:00


10
Iron Butterfly Theme (Fillmore East 1968) [Friday April 26th Second Show]

5:00


1
Are You Happy (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:27


2
Unconscious Power (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

2:29


3
My Mirage (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:31


4
So-Lo (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

3:35


5
Theme [Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:35


6
Possession (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

5:29


7
My Mirage (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:34


8
Are You Happy (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:17


9
Her Favorite Style [Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

2:29


10
In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

15:20


11
So-Lo (Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

4:26


12
Iron Butterfly Theme [Fillmore East 1968) [Saturday April 27th]

5:20

I'm curious, do people really care about Iron Butterfly enough to warrant this reissue?

That's probably why it's being done by hand made in a very small quantity & at a high price.

I don't normally do this...... but I think I'll make an exception and order it. I started out by listening to Iron Butterfly, Cream, Hendrix, Led Zep, Vanilla Fudge, and more when I was hating high school...... everybody else listened to The Supremes, Temptations, Four Tops, etc. Most of my current collection is this time frame and just blooms with Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver, Tull, Janis, Doors,........... You had to live it to still want it.

jim (roxanne #2)

I hope Rhino puts some samples up soon.

I am very tempted but the price plus Rhino's postage costs to overseas makes it impossible to consider buying.

I'm getting this just for the iron on.

I ordered it.

I like a man who knows what he wants.

This should be well worth the money as i've been waiting for years for them to put out a legit concert of Iron Butt shows from this time period...i actually have some shows on Sugar Megs site that i taped myself in Baltimore back in the day when i went to see them around this time and they were excellent in concert so it will be good to hear them recorded proffesionally and hear a good quality show for a change. They were a great live band and sounded as good as their albums and always gave a hundred percent all the time. I saw them live many times during this time and they were great. Very excited about this one. Glad to see it making the light of day. Yes, forty dollars is a lot to ask but i hope it will be worth it...like everything else in the music biz these days they ask a lot of the fans but i've got to spring for this one as there hasn't been a lot from this group in the last few years to get so I've go to go for it....hopefully it will be worth it.

I'd like to see an expanded concert of the period the official "Live" album was taken from.

Yes, i would like to see a full concert of the original LIVE album as well...the editing and production of that album is terrible and really needs to be updated anyway. Not sure if the other songs weren't any good to use or whoever did the editing just didn't take the time to do it well, but seems like they could have done a much better job and surely they could still have some songs in the can to use...IB were a great live band and i would think that they might have recorded them live at other shows as well even sound board would be good to use if it's good quality...better then nothing...would love to hear something from the BALL period as well...i have a live Baltimore show on Sugar Megs as well from 69 that had some Ball stuff on it and they were really good during that period. Atco and Atlantic never really got serious about IB. It's a same because they had so much potential.

I just listen to the samples of the Rhino site for this project and i sure hope its not the the actual recordings as what they have on there is sounding like it's missing most of the vocals on all of the songs. Really poor quality...surely this is not the actual recording tracks they will be putting out...i hope this is a mistake and they will fix it soon...I've already ordered it though and if this is really how it will sound, i'll want a refund...very poor sound.

Thanks for the warning.

It figures if I pre-ordered this, it might suck......just like with the Chicago 1975 concert.

I'm glad I held off ordering this. My feeling is they should have made this a one disc release. So-Lo 4 times? The Theme 4 times? Are You Happy 3 times? Almost 33 minutes of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida??? There's 11 unique titles. I listened to the samples and they sound okay, but they are from '68 and I take recording capabilities into consideration. All In All, I don't care how historic it is.......... I pass.

Maybe my connection was just bad but it sounded like the voices weren't there almost like there was a chennel missing so i'll hold off verdict on this untill i get my copy in...i just hope it's better then what i'm hearing on the site as the forty dollar price is way too much i think. I agree that they didn't need to repeat the same songs here as well...whats the point in that....why not put some of the other songs from the shows, unless of course unless they didn't have anything of quality to work with and thought they'd throw some extra repeat songs on...who knows...would be nice if they explain why they did what they did and maybe they will in the set booklet...hope so.

I just went & listened to a few of the streams. On 2 the vocals were a little low, possibly to cover up bad singing? On the rest that I heard the vocals were plenty loud in the mix. I would say the group was not yet at their peak here, Based on the short snippets my impression is that the official IB Live is MUCH better.

It's 4 complete shows (minus 2 songs from the 4/26 late show)...which would explain the repeats.

I got this yesterday, and am listening to disc 1 right now. It sounds a little rough around the edges, but it's pretty solid. So far, the vocals come in pretty well.

Performancewise, I like what I'm hearing, but I have nothing to compare it to (don't have the above mentioned live album).

This probably wasn't worth $40, but it doesn't suck.

I also don't know how long these live versions of In A Gadda Da Vida predate the studio version.....but they have already have all of the instrumental passages/riffs in place.

Charles, if you like this one, get the official live. It is SO good!