After the original Animals fell apart in late 1966, Eric Burdon recorded this track with session musicians just before moving to San Francisco (via Trans-Love Airways, no doubt). Ostensibly a solo track, “Help Me Girl” peaked at # 29 in the U.S. on New Year’s Eve ‘66. Eric would soon after assemble some new Animals and make such classics as “San Franciscan Nights,” “Monterey” & “Sky Pilot.” By 1969 all the Peace & Love had worn thin and Eric would soon set his sights on War. Odd, really.

Recommended by: Steve Woolard

Happy Holidays!  For your musical pleasure, Damn Fine Day is featuring a week’s worth of holiday gems, and to kick things off here is a tasty rendition of “Merry Christmas Baby” by Booker T. & The MG’s.  A number of artists from Bruce Springsteen to Otis Redding have covered this song, but only Booker T. & the MG’s do the track justice without singing a word.  This song is off In The  Christmas Spirit, an album chock-full of sultry renditions of holiday standards. If you liked “Green Onions” give this album a spin and you’ll realize that the Memphis legends can bring the house down any time of year.

Recommended by: Damn Fine Day

Celebrating his 70th birthday this August 19, Ginger Baker showcases two stellar tracks on the band’s 1966 debut, Fresh Cream. While some fans might point to his earliest rock drum solo on “Toad” as his album highlight, it’s Ginger’s “Sweet Wine” that deserves the DFD spotlight. This great pop song is an example of what the three members of Cream did best—and all in just over three minutes. The simple intro lyrics of the ba- ba-ba’s might recall what other mod bands like the Small Faces and The Who were doing around this time, but it is the bluesy psychedelic center, delivered with Clapton’s guitar, that changes the song’s playing field and takes the listener on a wild ride.

Recommended by: Jay Coyle

Like his musical hero Buddy Holly, Bobby Fuller hailed from Texas, and there’s a little Lone Star rockabilly in many of his best songs. But even if Fuller is better remembered for raucous rave-ups than for ballads, he could croon a love song convincingly when called upon. “Don’t Ever Let Me Know” was the flipside of Bobby’s follow-up to the classic “I Fought The Law,” and it works much better than it ought to, as pensive piano work frames Bobby’s echoing vocals while handclaps keep the time. Sadly, Fuller only managed to release two more singles before his mysterious death in 1966—cut down in his twenties just like Buddy Holly.

Recommended by: John Hagelston

Carla Thomas’ winsome 1961 smash “Gee Whiz (Look At His Eyes)” helped cement the relationship between Memphis-based Stax Records, then known as Satellite, and Atlantic. By 1966 Carla—daughter of ebullient deejay/Stax hitmaker Rufus Thomas—was no longer in her teens. The seductive soulstress was the undisputed Queen of Stax, and her string of hits included several duets with her proud papa. Carla had the songwriting and production team of Isaac Hayes and David Porter in her corner for the saucy “Let Me Be Good To You,” her biggest seller since she’d answered Sam Cooke with “I’ll Bring It Home To You” almost four years earlier. Duck Dunn’s supple bass leads into Carla’s understated yet irresistible offer to be good to some lucky stiff. Not a screamer, Carla stylishly entices as the MG’s and Stax’s in-house horns bring it up to a full-throttle boil on the crackling vamp out.

Recommended by: Bill Dahl

The opening track on Otis Redding’s finest hour, Otis Blue: Otis Redding Sings Soul, sets the tone of despair with a classic Steve Cropper guitar riff: two emphatic hits giving way to a slinkier groove that sounds like something Jimi Hendrix would have studied. Then the Memphis horns come sobbing in to underscore the sadness of the riff. But it’s when Redding’s melancholy vocal makes its entrance, urging Ole Man Trouble to “go find you someone else to pick on,” that this B-Side starts to feel more like an A-side—although, to be fair, the A-side was “Respect.” But this is just as timeless, boasting one of Redding’s most emotional performances, with every nuance the essence of soul. The album is packed with examples of Redding’s interpretive prowess, but this heartbreaking Redding original more than holds its own in such rarefied company.

Recommended by: Ed Masley

“Fourth Time Around” is the only real masterpiece on the second disc of Blonde On Blonde, Bob Dylan’s 1966 magnum opus. It begins with some beautiful south-of-the-border guitar-picking (which carries the rhythm as ably as any drum work could) before Bob’s harmonica cautiously peeks its head out. When he starts to sing—in that stretched-out nasal tone so beloved of parodists over the years—he’s like a bird swooping up and down above the melody. Of course, the lyrics are marvelous, with odd moments of humor and a closing aphorism that ranks with Dylan’s all-time best. But people spend way too much time dissecting the guy’s words—this track’s proof that what makes Bob a god is the overall sound he creates.

Recommended by: John Hagelston

I loved all kinds of music growing up in the 50s and 60s, but the sound that really got me was a seemingly odd mix of rural southern fiddle and steel guitars playing jazz that became known as Western Swing. This is the music that Willie Nelson grew up on. People think of Willie as a country singer but he had jazz in his background, such as this cut (”Columbus Stockade Blues”), which features him in the early 1960s with his ex-wife Shirley Collie. She was a fine singer and slappin’ bass player and her duets with Willie are really great - this one especially! Such recordings inspired bands like Asleep at the Wheel to get into this music…and now all these years later, we’re the ones getting to make records with Willie (as with the 2009 release “Willie and the Wheel”). How lucky are we?

Recommended by: Ray Benson of Asleep At The Wheel

The Yardbirds earned their spot in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame as much for their illustrious alumni (Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page have all taken turns as the band’s lead guitarist) as for their British-Invasion-era hits    which, as dynamic and innovative as they were, sort of left the ’birds pigeonholed as a singles band. That’s not an unfair description since the group only managed to issue one proper studio album in their native England    but what an album it is! Nicknamed Roger The Engineer for the caricature that bassist Chris Dreja drew on the cover, the 1966 long-player is a heady mix of the band’s blues-wailin’ roots and the psychedelic excursions of the day, and features Beck at his absolute zenith. Among the highlights, “Turn Into Earth” puts the Gregorian chanting of the group’s old hit “Still I’m Sad” behind Keith Relf’s plaintive vocals as Beck’s slithering fuzz guitar weaves in and out of the mix.

Recommended by: John Hagelston

Here we have a rollicking, crackling track from The Lovin’ Spoonful, which, in itself, is a rather redundant statement. A heapin’ helpin’ of this group’s work carries lilting grooves that underscore finely crafted, infectious-as-hell tunage. The only politics discussed are those of the heart and the art. With “Good Time Music,” The Spoonful outline their mission statement, in a paean to the changes The Beatles brought to the popular musical landscape in ’64, and as Dylan went electric and kids galore formed combos with an eye toward the real rockin’ deal. It was a good scene, man. The Spoonful scored hit after hit and became one of the best bands in the land. “Good Time Music” was basically an underground cut on What’s Shakin’, an eclectic Elektra various artists compilation in 1966. It was never a single. ’Til now.

Recommended by: Dennis Diken