The Mystery Trend - San Francisco Museum of Modern Art - December 2, 1965

The Mystery Trend are rightly recognized for their importance as one of the earliest first-wave underground bands from 1960s San Francisco who emerged around the same time as other trailblazing groups such as the Charlatans and the Great Society. I regret not liking these guys more than I do, although it's not for lack of trying. At one time, their So Glad I Found You CD was part of my music collection, but it so underwhelmed me that I included it as a throw-in as part of a trade with a fellow collector several years ago.

THE MYSTERY TREND, LATE 1965 - L TO R: BOB CUFF, RON
NAGLE, LARRY WEST, JOHN LUBY, & LARRY BENNETT

While musical iconoclasts are usually right up my alley, the Mystery Trend's unique characteristics unfortunately worked against them in regard to their Bay Area contemporaries. The "San Francisco Sound" remains difficult, if not impossible, to define in a technical sense, although two of its most important components, folk rock and psychedelia, essentially remained absent from the list of ingredients that contributed to this band's stylistic approach. Indeed, other writers have pointed out that the Trend possessed an oeuvre that was instead primarily influenced by the British Invasion, R&B, and contemporary pop music as filtered through a sensibility that can best be described as equal parts garage band-ish and art student-esque. Folk rock and psych have consistently appealed to me more than 1960s proto-punk throughout my time as a record collector, so that probably explains why I've always had more respect than love for this particular aggregation.

PERFORMING AT THE STUDIO OF CERAMICIST PETER VOULKOS ON NOV. 27,
1965, JUST A FEW DAYS BEFORE THEIR GIG AT THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART

That said, I figured that somewhere there had to be some in-concert material that presented the Mystery Trend in a better light than what's currently available in an official capacity. Sure enough, something eventually turned up among my network of bootleg traders. Although its total running time spans only 26 minutes, this live set recorded at San Francisco's Museum of Modern Art on December 2, 1965 goes a long way to show why some people hold this band in such high regard. The sound quality is pretty good all things considered, and the general rawness of the performances adds to their appeal as far as I'm concerned. At this point in their history, the Trend still featured a five-man lineup, with Ron Nagle on keyboards/vocals, Larry West on lead guitar, Bob Cuff on rhythm guitar/vocals, Larry Bennett on bass, and John Luby on drums. Things start off with a ten-minute question-and-answer session with the audience in which the group talks about the origin of their name, how they write their songs, their disdain of folk rock, and other pertinent matters. In the accompanying notes, the trader who originally converted his tape of this concert to digital format points out, "At the end of the Q&A sessions, the moderator announces they are going to close the talk with a song by the band, at which point you can hear the band discussing the fact they thought they would get to play a set." As things turned out, the Museum did allow them to perform several titles (all of which seem to be unique to this recording), although the five pieces included here might be only a partial representation of what the group presented to the audience on that evening. In his authoritative article on the Trend in the first issue of Cream Puff War magazine, the esteemed Bay Area music historian Alec Palao describes "Love Moves Around" and "Never" (which unfortunately cuts out before it reaches its conclusion) as "rip-roaring garage blasts with great lead work from Larry West." I'd say that this assessment could also apply to the similar "Do I." Concerning the remaining material, Palao states, "Concurrent with the Great Society, the Trend seemed to have absorbed an experimental, easternish feel to their songwriting by late 1965. Both 'I Wish I Knew' and 'Casbah' reflect this, with droning guitars and sighing harmonies, not unlike some of the Velvet Underground's early stuff; not as noisy or distorted as that band but with similar crescendos of sound." I couldn't have said it better myself.

**Once again, I am indebted to ARK for making yet another musical obscurity available to me. Thanks, man.


1. Question and Answer Session
2. Band Introduction
3. Love Moves Around
4. Do I
5. I Wish I Knew
6. Casbah
7. Never