1960s – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

The Prisoner – Checkmate

November 24, 1967 Season 1 Episode 9

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

Hard to believe…we are over halfway through. Checkmate is one of my favorites. This episode drops Number Six into one of the Village’s more elaborate games, a human chess match where the residents are sorted into opposing sides. The setup looks like a harmless diversion, but the rules are social as much as they are strategic. People are pushed into roles, told who their allies are, and encouraged to treat the other side as the enemy. Number Six plays along long enough to understand the board, but he’s really watching how quickly the Village can turn a crowd into pieces.

It starts with a strange human chess game in the Village, where people stand in for the pieces and obey the moves given to them. Number Six notices that the “queen” seems different from the others; she still has some independent spirit. He later learns from the old chess master that in the Village, people can be divided into two groups: those who obey and those who command. Number Six thinks that idea might help him find allies for an escape.

He begins testing people to see who still has a will of their own. He gathers a small group, including the Rook and a few others, and they build a raft in secret. The plan is to slip away by sea, but the Village is always built on suspicion. The problem is not just the guards or Rover; it is trust. Number Six believes he has found the difference between prisoners and collaborators, but the Village turns that against him.

Number Six tries to break that rhythm of the village by talking to both sides, refusing to treat the other group as less human. He looks for weak points in the setup, not just to win the game, but to prove the whole thing can be disrupted if people stop obeying the script.

The rook and Number 6 devise an escape plan, and this time, the rook is not really a stooge of the village…but he was suspicious, just like Number 6, which didn’t help with the plan. The chessboard is a symbol, but the message is clear: keep people separated, keep them competing, and they won’t unite against the ones running the game. In the Village, even play is a trap, and every move is watched, but he keeps aiming for the one move they can’t plan for, refusing to be just another piece. Be Seeing You!

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International Submarine Band – Luxury Liner

It’s always great to hear Gram Parsons solo, with the Byrds, or with the Flying Burrito Brothers. I’ve heard of these guys but never listened to them. I’m happy I did now. It’s the so-called country rock, but with harmonizing that sounds great.

They were one of those bands that existed for only a short time but left a legacy. They formed in Los Angeles in 1966, and the band was built around singer, songwriter, and guitarist Gram Parsons. Parsons was interested in mixing traditional country music with rock, soul, and folk, long before the style had a name. At a time when psychedelic rock was dominating California, they were heading in the opposite direction. They were more toward pedal steel guitars and country storytelling.

The original lineup shifted a few times, but the best-known version included Parsons alongside bassist Chris Ethridge, guitarist John Nuese, and drummer Jon Corneal. The group played clubs around Los Angeles during a period when country music was still looked down on by much of the rock crowd. Parsons admired artists like George Jones and Merle Haggard, and he wanted to bring that sound into a younger rock audience. The band shared stages with folk-rock and psychedelic acts while carving out a different identity.

In 1968, the band released its only album, Safe at Home. Though it did not sell well at the time, the record later became recognized as an early blueprint for country rock. By the time the album arrived, Parsons had begun drifting toward The Byrds, where he would push country influences even further on Sweetheart of the Rodeo.

Years later, he revisited this song during his solo period, and it became one of the songs most tied to him. It also found new life when Emmylou Harris recorded it for her 1977 album Luxury Liner, helping introduce it to a wider audience.

Luxary Liner

Well a luxury liner, forty tons of steelIf I don’t find my baby now then I guess I never will

I’ve been a long lost soul for a long long timeI’ve been around, everybody ought to know what’s on my mindYou think I’m lonesome?So do I, so do I

Well I’m the kind of guy that likes to make a livin’ runnin’ ’roundAnd I don’t need a stranger to tell me that my baby’s let me downYou think I’m lonesome?So do I, so do I

Well a luxury liner, forty tons of steelNo one in this whole wide world can change the way I feel

I’ve been a long lost soul for a long long timeI’ve been around, everybody ought to know what’s on my mindYou think I’m lonesome?So do I, so do I

Patsy Cline – Crazy

I’ve heard and heard of Patsy Cline since I can remember. Where I live, she has never been forgotten. She was and still is a huge country star, but I never really considered a lot of her music pure country. I don’t mean that as a put-down, but it also had some jazz influence in there. One of the best voices in music, period.

She was born Virginia Patterson Hensley. Known in her youth as “Ginny,” she began to sing with local country bands while a teenager, sometimes accompanying herself on guitar. By the time she had reached her early 20s, Cline was promoting herself as “Patsy” and was on her way toward music stardom.

This song wasn’t a Patsy Cline-written song. It came from a young Willie Nelson, still trying to get a break in Nashville. He wrote it as a slow ballad, built around a melody that moved in ways most country songs at the time didn’t. Nelson pitched it around town, and it eventually reached producer Owen Bradley, who was creating what became known as the Nashville Sound: smoother arrangements, piano, light rhythm, and restrained backing vocals.

When Cline first heard it, she wasn’t much into it. The melody felt awkward, the phrasing didn’t land right, and it didn’t sit naturally in her voice on the first try. But Bradley heard something in it and pushed forward. The session took place at Bradley’s Quonset Hut studio in 1961. There was a problem from the start. Cline had recently been in a car accident and still had bruised ribs. That mattered because the song required long, controlled lines and soft phrasing, the kind that needs steady breath support.

The band included pianist Floyd Cramer, whose playing style gave the song its gentle feel. Cline struggled on the first attempts. The phrasing, especially the opening line, “Crazy, I’m crazy for feeling so lonely,” kept slipping out of place. They stopped the session and came back later. When she returned, she approached it differently by stretching the lines.

That second take is the one that stuck. The way she adapted it to her style because of the injuries ended up helping it. She doesn’t oversing it. She lets the pauses sit and it worked out beautifully. The song became one of Cline’s defining recordings and one of the most well-known songs in country and pop crossover history. It also helped establish Nelson as a songwriter to watch, even before his own recording career took off.

The song peaked at #9 on the Billboard 100, #2 on the Billboard Country Charts, and #8 in Canada in 1961.

Crazy

CrazyI’m crazy for feelin’ so lonely

I’m crazyCrazy for feelin’ so blue

I knewYou’d love me as long as you wantedAnd then somedayYou’d leave me for somebody new

WorryWhy do I let myself worry

Wonderin’What in the world did I do?

Oh… crazyFor thinking that my love could hold youI’m crazy for tryingAnd crazy for cryingAnd I’m crazy for loving youCrazyFor thinking that my love could hold youI’m crazy for tryingAnd crazy for cryingAnd I’m crazy for lovingYou

The Prisoner – Dance of the Dead

November 17, 1967 Season 1 Episode 8

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

The dance macabre, or the dance of death, was an allegorical motif in medieval art to remind us that death is everywhere and unexpected. In this one, we have Mary Morris playing Number 2. The Village is trying to extract information from Number 6, who is under electronic hypnosis. They have an older colleague (number 42) of Number 6 asking him for information, but it doesn’t work. Number 2 makes it clear she doesn’t want Number 6 broken, but for him to agree voluntarily. This episode feels like it should have been earlier in the series.

Following a seemingly impromptu yet half-hearted escape attempt that leaves him collapsed on the beach, Number Six awakes to find that a dead man has washed up on the shore. This Number Six uses some kind of radio on the body in an attempt to contact the outside world about his plight. Of course, though, the Village knows about it already.

While all of this is going on, preparations are underway for a strange Carnival celebration, complete with masks, costumes, and a sense that the entire Village is waiting for some kind of performance. The episode never fully explains every detail, which gives it a dreamlike quality, as though Number Six has stepped into a ritual that has happened many times before. Number 6 does some spy work before that, exploring some rooms. He finds the man who washed ashore, whose info the village has altered the dead man’s info so when he is “found,” they will think it’s Number 6.

As the celebration begins, the atmosphere turns darker. The Carnival becomes a public trial, with Number Six placed in front of the crowd and forced into a role he never agreed to play. The villagers act as spectators and participants at the same time, blurring the line between justice and entertainment. He does call his old friend (dressed as a court jester) as a witness, but the village has destroyed him completely. He looks more like a living dead man. Like many episodes of The Prisoner, this one is less about plot and more about mood, control, and the way the Village tries to rewrite a person’s sense of reality. Be Seeing You!

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The Prisoner – Many Happy Returns

November 10, 1967 Season 1 Episode 7

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

This episode is in my top 3 episodes. The beginning of this one surprised me. It opens with the Village feeling empty for once. Number Six wakes up, walks outside, and finds no guards, no announcements, no smiling faces watching him. For a moment, it looks like the whole place has shut down, and he finally has a clean path out. He takes supplies, follows the shoreline, and escapes by boat, pushing forward with the cautious hope that this time it’s real. This is what I have been waiting for through the series so far, and now he will get to leave.

He makes it back to London and walks into a world that should feel familiar, but doesn’t. His old life isn’t the same: his home, his friends, his old co-workers all seem slightly off. On top of that, a lady named Miss Butterworth is living in his home now and driving his car.

The people around him act like they know him, but they don’t react the way he expects, and he doesn’t get straight answers. The episode shows how hard it is for him to trust anything after the Village. Even freedom can feel staged when you’ve been trapped long enough.

The final segment drives home the episode’s point. The escape is part of the experiment, another method to test him, track him, and see what he’ll do when he thinks he’s safe. This one is less about action and more about doubt, how the Village follows him even when it isn’t there. Number Six ends up back where he started, not because he gives up, but because the trap is built to reset. The birthday greeting isn’t a joke; it’s a reminder that the system has patience and it can wait.

This episode was originally to be directed by Michael Truman (who fell ill); McGoohan took over directorial duties himself, crediting the result to ‘Joseph Serf’. Be Seeing You!

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The Prisoner – The General

November 3,1967 Season 1 Episode 6

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

On the surface, I thought what a great idea, but then, as the show progressed, I saw how evil it could be.

This one is one of The Prisoner episodes that looks simple on the surface, then keeps getting stranger the longer you sit with it. Number Six is dragged into the Village’s latest civic craze, a bright, friendly educational program called “Speed Learn.” It’s sold as progress, a way to teach people anything in 3 minutes, and the whole place treats it like the future has arrived. Number Six doesn’t buy it. He watches how quickly people accept it, how eager they are to be improved, and he starts asking the one question the Village never wants asked: who benefits?

The episode turns into a battle over information, and not in the usual spy-movie way. Speed Learn isn’t just about learning faster; it’s about removing the messy parts of thinking, doubt, and choice. The most important part is: what are they going to encode in the machine for you to learn? Number Six pushes back by doing what he always does…he refuses to play along. The deeper he digs, the clearer it becomes that the message is all about control. Either you think like everyone else, or you are out of bounds.

By the end, this episode feels like a warning. It’s not about technology being evil; it’s about how easily it becomes a shortcut to obedience when it’s run by the wrong hands. The episode keeps its tone light on purpose, but the point is blunt. A society that treats knowledge like a product can also treat people like human containers. Number Six’s resistance shows the one thing they can’t fully automate and control… a mind that won’t surrender.

I thought the ending could have been better with this one. That doesn’t mean I didn’t like it, though. This episode also urges caution regarding the up-and-coming computer age. I was thinking of TikTok while watching this episode. Be Seeing You!

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Delaney and Bonnie w/Eric Clapton – Comin’ Home

In the past few years, I’ve learned more about this group of musicians. The first time I noticed Delaney and Bonnie was in the great movie Vanishing Point.

There’s a carefree spirit to Comin’ Home that feels like a blend of Rock, Soul, and Blues. It was released in 1969 on On Tour with Eric Clapton, and after listening to the album…I wish I could have seen that tour. Delaney & Bonnie were leading a rotating group of talented players at the time, and you can hear that sense of a band finding its way together perfectly.

By this time, they had built a strong live band that mixed rock, gospel, and soul, and it caught the attention of Eric Clapton, who was looking for a way out of the pressure surrounding Blind Faith. Clapton joined their touring group, not as a headline name, but as part of the band. He also occasionally brought his friend George Harrison to join in.

Clapton’s guitar work sits along with his work with Blind Faith at the time. The sound tilts toward gospel and Southern soul, which makes for some great roots music. The tour itself ran through the UK in December 1969, with a lineup that was deep to say the least! The backing band featured Leon Russell, Delaney Bramlett, Bonnie Bramlett, Rita Coolidge, Dave Mason, Bobby Whitlock, Carl Radle, Jim Gordon, George Harrison (on some shows), Tex Johnson, Bobby Keys, and Jim Price.

If you wanted a big tour back then, you grabbed Leon Russell. He would soon be on the notorious Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour of Joe Cocker. The recordings were taken from shows in cities like London and Birmingham, captured on the fly rather than built in a studio. Producer credit went to Delaney Bramlett, and the goal was simple: to document the band as it sounded in the room.

What gets me is the looseness of the recordings. Songs like Things Get Better and Only You Know and I Know stretch out, driven by Russell’s piano, while Clapton adds fills and does his thing.

The album also mattered for what came next. Clapton carried this experience forward into Derek and the Dominos, both in personnel and in feel. The Dominos were all in this band except Duane Allman. The idea of a band built around feel and fluidity hit home for Clapton. He would not be the spotlight of that band, just a member. In that sense, On Tour with Eric Clapton works as a bridge record, a live document of one group, and the starting point for another.

You want to listen to a great live album that sounds like the musicians are in the room with you? Listen to this album and hear some of the greatest musicians of the era. The album peaked at #29 on the Billboard Album Charts and #12 in Canada in 1969. The single Comin’ Home peaked at #84 on the Billboard 100 and #55 in Canada.

Comin’ Home

Been out on the road ’bout six months too long.
I want you so bad, I can hardly stand it.
I’m so tired and I’m all alone.
We’ll soon be together and that’s it;
I’m comin’ home to your love.

Hitchhiking on the turnpike all day long.
Nobody seemed to notice, they just pass me on by.
To keep from going crazy, I got to sing my song.
Got a whole lot of loving and baby that’s why
I’m comin’ home to your love.

Coming home.
Coming home.
Coming home.
Coming home.

My Favorite Soul Songs… Part II

I love this genre…I made Part 1 a couple of years ago, but never followed up. Sometimes soul blends with pop and is closely related to R&B. Below are a few that I have always liked.

Freda Payne – Band Of Gold

I’ve always liked this song. It’s a bit of a soap opera but it’s a really good soul song. The song peaked at #3 on the Billboard 100 in 1970. The guitar had a rubberband-type effect that was used in this song.

Because of the subject matter, Freda Payne did not want to record this at first. She thought the song was about a woman who was a virgin or sexually naïve and felt it was more suitable for a teenager. When Payne objected to this song, Ron Dunbar (co-writer of the song) said to her, “Don’t worry. You don’t have to like them! Just sing it,” and she did. Little did she know that this song would become her biggest hit and would give her her first record of gold.

Aretha Franklin – Baby I Love You

This is my personal favorite song of Aretha Franklin…and she has a boatload of great songs to pick from. She could bring soul to You Light Up My Life and THAT is saying something. I’ve said this a lot but Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin are my top female singers.

This Aretha Franklin song was released in 1967 and it was on the Aretha Arrives album. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard 100, #3 in Canada, and #39 in the UK in 1967. Her sisters Carolyn and Erma provided backing vocals along with the Sweet Inspirations, an R&B girl group founded by Cissy Houston. Musicians who were featured on the track included engineer Tom Dowd and Muscle Shoals players Jimmy Johnson and Joe South on guitars, Tommy Cogbill on bass, Spooner Oldham on electric piano, and Roger Hawkins on drums. Truman Thomas also played the organ.

Franklin recorded this with Atlantic producer Jerry Wexler in New York City during the same session as Chain Of Fools. The song was written by Ronnie Shannon, who was also responsible for another hit for Aretha with I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You).

Temptations – I Wish It Would Rain

It sure got A LOT of play when I went through my first real hard breakup. You break up with someone…the Temptations have your back. Their greatest hits were more like advice than songs, which I loved.

David Ruffin sings this song, and you can feel the sadness and pain in his voice. The man had a tremendous voice. Naming my favorite Temptations song would be hard, but this one would be near the top.

The song has been covered by Gladys Knight and the Pips, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin and The Faces. This song was released right before the psychedelic soul hit Cloud Nine, and the band’s style began to change.

Stevie Wonder – I Was Made To Love Her

Of all Stevie Wonder songs…this one is at the top of the list for me.

Anything Stevie does, I like. Sometimes when I hear a song, it takes a few times for me to like it, but this one…hooked me the first time. This song peaked at #2 on the Billboard 100, #5 in Canada, and #5 in the UK Charts in 1967. The song was written by Wonder, Lula Mae Hardaway, Henry Cosby, and Sylvia Moy. Lula Mae Haraway was Stevie Wonder’s mother.

Jimmy Ruffin – What Becomes of the Broken Hearted

Jimmy Ruffin was the brother of then Temptation David Ruffin. This was written by Motown writers Jimmy Dean, Paul Riser, and William Witherspoon. They wrote it for The Detroit Spinners, but Ruffin convinced the Motown writers to let him try it, and they liked what they heard.

I think Motown has been the soundtrack to more breakups than anyone else. This song peaked at #7 in the Billboard 100 in 1966. The great Smokey Robinson produced this track. He worked on many Motown classics as an artist, writer, and producer. This would be Jimmy’s biggest hit of his career.

The Prisoner – The Schizoid Man

October 27, 1967 Season 1 Episode 5

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

I highly recommend this one. The episode is grounded in behavioral science, and there’s something very unsettling about this one. It’s a little too real. Number 6 awakens to discover he’s grown a mustache, his hair is darker, and he’s left-handed. Oh, and now he’s Number 12 (6+6 = 12). I like many of these episodes, but this might be my favorite episode. I do give some things away in this review; it’s hard not to with this one.

Having a character encounter their double is a common movie or television ploy (even two of the castaways on “Gilligan’s Island” met their doubles), but few examples are as effective as Number Six confronting his spitting, smirking image. It’s not just one of the best interrogation episodes but one of the best I’ve seen. Number 6 and Number 12 are going at it.

They try to break him by splitting his life in two. The Village creates a “new” Number Six who smiles, cooperates, and actually fits in, while the other one is treated like a problem. It’s about making Six doubt himself and making his resistance look like he’s insane.

Number Six wakes up after being drugged and tampered with. When he awakens, he is not in his usual dwelling, and when he looks in a mirror, he sees his appearance has been altered with darker hair and a mustache. At the Green Dome, Number Two addresses him as ‘Number Twelve’, and acts as though he is on his side. Number Six is given his ‘orders’ to break himself! After having his hair dyed back to its original colour and the moustache shaved, Number Six returns to his original dwelling. Who should be in residence but…Number Six! Confused? Of course, the Number Six coming back is actually Number Twelve.

As he is released back into the Village, officials test him by placing him in situations meant to trigger his old defiant behavior. Each time, he hesitates or reacts differently, which convinces them the procedure worked. They assign him a new job and surround him with friendly villagers who reinforce his new identity. Meanwhile, viewers see the Control Room watching every move, adjusting the experiment as they go.

Over time, cracks appear. Small details bring back flashes of who he really is, and he begins to suspect the whole transformation is an act forced onto him. When the Village authorities push him too hard, his old instincts return. He confronts the people manipulating him and exposes that the “new identity” was created through psychological conditioning rather than real memory loss.

What makes this episode work is how it turns identity into a weapon. Number Six fights with logic and willpower, but he’s also fighting a system that is against him. The episode keeps the pressure on, then ends with the Village still ready for the next move.

This one was very hard to write up. It’s best to see it, and I think you will enjoy it. Some have ranked this as the top episode or at least in the top 3. Be Seeing You!

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Connie Converse

I wrote this for Lisa’s WMM (Women Music March) as I have proudly done for the past few years in March. Lisa was one of the first followers I had when starting out, and she is one of the readers who helped build my site in a lot of ways. Please go see the original post and visit her site. Thanks, Lisa!

It’s a shame she is more remembered for what may or may not have happened to her than for her music. She has been hailed for being ahead of her time, and she was. I plead with everyone reading this, please look her up and read some things about her. I have barely scratched the surface with this post.

Connie Converse is one of the most unusual stories in folk music or music in general. She wrote quiet, thoughtful songs in the early 1950s. That was years before the folk revival made that style popular. At the time, almost no one outside a small circle of friends heard her music. Decades later, people realized she had been doing something new long before it became fashionable.

She was born Elizabeth Eaton Converse in 1924 in New Hampshire. She grew up in a strict Baptist family and showed an early interest in writing and music. After leaving college, she moved to New York City in the late 1940s. She went there hoping to find a place in the arts. Instead of the louder folk style that would come later, Converse wrote reflective songs that sounded closer to personal thoughts or even letters.

During the early 1950s, she performed occasionally in New York apartments and small gatherings. Her friend Gene Deitch, who later worked in animation, recorded many of her songs at home on a tape machine. In 1954, she appeared on The Morning Show on CBS, singing several of her compositions. The appearance did not lead to a recording contract, and by the end of the decade, she stepped away from performing.

In the early 1960s, Converse moved to Michigan and worked in publishing and writing. Music slowly faded from her life, and she became a huge activist on racism. On August 10, 1974, she wrote letters to friends and family and packed her belongings into a Volkswagen Beetle and drove away from her Ann Arbor, Michigan home. She was never heard from again, and her disappearance remains unexplained. She left letters indicating a desire to start a new life and instructed friends/family not to look for her. No traces of her or her car were ever found. There have been theories about her. While she may have started a new life, the most widely discussed theories include suicide (possibly by driving into a body of water) or death by misadventure.

Several years after she left, someone told her brother Philip that they had seen a phone book listing for “Elizabeth Converse” in either Kansas or Oklahoma, but he never pursued the lead. About ten years after she disappeared, the family hired a private investigator in hopes of finding her. The investigator told the family, however, that even if he did find her, it was her right to disappear, and he could not simply bring her back. After that, her family respected her decision to leave and ceased looking for her.

Her music might have stayed unknown if Gene Deitch had not preserved those early tapes. In 2009, the label Squirrel Thing Recordings released a collection of her recordings. For the first time, people heard the songs she had written more than fifty years earlier. Listeners were struck by how modern they sounded, both in their lyrics and their quiet delivery.

Today, Connie Converse is often mentioned as a lost pioneer of singer-songwriter music. She worked alone with a guitar, writing direct songs about daily life, loneliness, and independence, years before artists in the 1960s folk revival made that approach common.

What makes Connie Converse interesting is timing. She was writing personal, singer-songwriter-style material in the early 1950s, almost a decade before that approach became common. If these songs had been recorded during the 1960s folk revival, her story might look very different.

Connie Converse: “Human society fascinates me and awes me and fills me with grief and joy; I just can’t find my place to plug into it”

“I believe all true art is, in this sense, impersonal:
its value does not depend on knowing or thinking anything
about its maker. Art is not an extension of the artist’s personality,
but has its own life”

“The problem, or at least a problem, I’ve been told —
is that I am not very concerned about being missed
upon any of my exits, not the ones that are voluntary
nor the ones that swoop down without warning
to cover me in a quilt of dark feathers”.

The Prisoner – Free For All

October 20, 1967 Season 1 Episode 4

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

This episode can become confusing quickly if you don’t pay attention. The editing in parts of this is fast. This one shows off the Village really well with its pastel colors. Number 6 is tested more in this episode than in the other ones so far. You can tell in parts that they are getting to him mentally.

Number Six is suddenly treated less like a prisoner and more like a public figure when the Village announces an election for Number Two. He is encouraged to stand as a candidate himself. It sounds like a chance to speak out and maybe even expose the whole setup. He might be able to turn the Village’s own system against itself.

As the campaign gets going, it becomes clear that this election is not really about freedom, choice, or public debate. Number Six is coached and packaged for the crowd. The Village turns politics into another form of control. Rallies, speeches, and promises are all part of the performance. The people around him act like voters, but the whole thing has the feeling of a trap, with every move watched.

He tries to speak honestly, telling people not to trust the system, but the message gets twisted into the campaign. The more he resists, the more popular he becomes. It’s all about power and control. Number 6 can’t separate what’s real from what’s being done to him. By the end, the election was a way to break him down and test him. The campaign itself seems like just another prison. Be Seeing You!

The Prisoner – A. B. and C.

October 13, 1967 Season 1 Episode 3

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

This episode turns the Village into a lab. Number Six is drugged and pulled into a three-part dream program, each scenario designed to crack him open and find out why he resigned. The title is literal, three separate “tests,” and the method is modern for the late 60s, not fists threats, but psychology, repetition, and control of the setting. I love dream sequences in shows, so I’m really happy with this one.

The first sequence drops him into a rough version of his old life, with familiar faces and a push toward panic. The second shifts the tone, calmer on the surface and built to steer him into the same trap from a different angle. The third is the tightest and most direct. Number 2 is trying to guide him to a single answer through suggestion and pressure. He keeps fighting for any piece of truth he can find. Each segment feels like a different door leading to the same room.

What makes this one stick is how it shows the Village evolving. They are less interested in punishment and more interested in results. Number Two isn’t just managing the place; he’s running experiments and taking notes. He is trying to solve a human being. Number Six, even half-awake and off-balance, still won’t give them the one thing they want. The episode ends without any comfort at all. They can trap you, study you, and even rewrite your reality for an hour. But they still can’t own what you choose to keep. Another one where Number 6 turns the tables on Number 2. Be Seeing You!

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Wilson Pickett – In The Midnight Hour

This song has been in my head all week. A great classic soul song and a great song in general. The guitar riff is simple but perfect… it drives the song along with Pickett’s explosive voice. It has to be one of my all-time favorite songs to play on bass or guitar. It’s a sliding riff that stays in a perfect rhythm.

The song was recorded in 1965 at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals. Pickett worked with producer and songwriter Jerry Wexler and Steve Cropper. Cropper came up with the guitar riff while the band worked out the rhythm in the studio. Wexler encouraged the musicians to play slightly behind the beat, which gave the song its loose but powerful feel. That rhythm became one of the signatures of the Muscle Shoals sound.

The backing musicians included members of the studio band that would later be known as the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. Their playing is tight, but they left room for the song to breathe. Pickett’s voice sits right in the center, rough and urgent, especially when he shouts the title line. Al Jackson Jr. and Donald “Duck” Dunn from Booker T. & the MG’s played on this track with bandmate Cropper.

In the Midnight Hour” was recorded on May 12, 1965, with all musicians performing at once, in the repurposed movie theater that was the Stax recording studio, with absolutely no overdubs. The song peaked at #21 on the Billboard 100 and #1 on the R&B Chart in 1965.

In 2017, the song was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or artistically significant. It was written by Pickett and Steve Cropper.

In The Midnight Hour

I’m gonna wait ’till the midnight hour
That’s when my love come tumbling down
I’m gonna wait ’till the midnight hour
When there’ no one else around
I’m gonna take you, girl, and hold you
And do all things I told you, in the midnight hour

Yes I am, oh yes I am
One thing I just wanna say, right here

I’m gonna wait till the stars come out
And see that twinkle in your eyes
I’m gonna wait ’till the midnight hour
That’s when my love begins to shine

You’re the only girl I know
Can really love me so, in the midnight hour

Oh yeah, in the midnight hour
Yeah, all right, play it for me one time, now

I’m gonna wait ’till the midnight hour
That’s when my love come tumbling down
I’m gonna wait, way in the midnight hour
That’s when my love begin to shine, just you and I
Oh, baby, just you and I
Nobody around, baby, just you and I
Oh, right, you know what?
I’m gonna hold you in my arms, just you and I
Oh yeah, in the midnight hour
Oh, baby, in the midnight hour

The Prisoner – The Chimes of Big Ben

October 6, 1967 Season 1 Episode 2

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

Both sides are becoming identical. An International community, a perfect blueprint for world order….Number 2

The show has such a good premise. What does a super spy do when he/she retires? Most likely, they won’t be able to live their life in peace, but where do they go?

This was the 5th episode filmed, but it’s the second one aired. This explains the reason a few months have passed in time since he arrived. It’s one of my favorite episodes. The sugar cubes scene is very telling. They have it in his file how many cubes he uses in his tea. Just to mess with them, he changes the number he usually takes. Number 2 looks on in disbelief because Number 6 will not join quietly like some others did.

This episode really pushes the series into spy territory, playing with the idea that escape might be possible. Number Six encounters another prisoner who claims that she has outside contacts and a plan, and for the first time, the Village seems less sealed than it did in Arrival. She insists she knows a way to escape from the Village, and Number 6 builds a raft. After carefully planning their attempt, the two manage to leave the Village and drift out to sea. You think, hmmm, maybe he will break out of there…and he does, but then comes a twist.

The episode borrows the spy checklist… coded messages, double agents, and quiet deals, which suggests a more familiar path forward. You also see in what lengths the village will go to tame Number 6, and it’s out there. It also makes clear that intelligence work itself can be a trap. Trust becomes a liability, and the system Number Six once served is resembling the one now holding him.

It really drives home that escape is not just physical; it is psychological. It reinforces the idea that resistance is expected, managed, and often used against those who attempt it. It’s a great episode with who I think made the best Number 2, Leo McKern. He is one of the few who will return at the end. Be Seeing You!

…

Doors – Alabama Song (Whisky Bar)

In the 1980s, I went through my first Doors phase. Read every book and even bought an album called An American Prayer, full of Jim Morrison’s poems. I saw the Oliver Stone movie and many of the documentaries at the time. They came back in popularity big time in the 1980s with Morrison making the Rolling Stone cover with the headline “He’s Hot, He’s Sexy, and He’s Dead.” At the time…I thought…well, that is disturbing sounding.

When The Doors released their debut album, The Doors, in 1967, most listeners expected songs written by Jim Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger, and John Densmore. But tucked into the record was something unusual, “Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar).” It wasn’t written by the band at all. The song came from German theater, written by Bertolt Brecht with music by Kurt Weill for the 1927 stage production Little Mahagonny, later used in the opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.

They discovered the song through Manzarek, who had studied theater and classical music. The band kept the original English lyrics but changed the arrangement. Instead of an orchestra, they built it around Manzarek’s carnival organ. It stood out on the album, but it fit the band’s taste for the theatrical.

Manzarek’s keyboard carries the melody while Krieger adds small guitar lines. It circles around the refrain, “Show me the way to the next whiskey bar,” until it feels like something being shouted across a room. The structure is simple, but the mood is uneasy because of Manzarek and Morrison. You can hear a slight German polka sound in this.

The album peaked at #2 on the Billboard Album Charts, #42 in Canada, and #43 in the UK in 1967.

Alabama Song (Whisky Bar)

Well show me the wayTo the next whiskey barOh don’t ask whyOh don’t ask why

Show me the wayTo the next whiskey barOh don’t ask whyOh don’t ask why

For if we don’t findThe next whiskey barI tell you we must dieI tell you we must dieI tell you, I tell youI tell you we must die

Oh moon of AlabamaWe now, must say goodbyeWe’ve lost, our good old MamaAnd must have whiskeyOh, you know why

Oh, moon of AlabamaWe now must say goodbyeWe’ve lost, our good old MamaAnd must have whiskeyOh, you know why