The Nick Gravenites & John Cipollina Band – Monkey Medicine (1982)

Two great musicians:

Nick Gravenites (born October 2, 1938) is an American blues, rock and folk singer, songwriter, and guitarist, best known for his work with Electric Flag (as their lead singer), Janis Joplin, Mike Bloomfield and several influential bands and individuals of the generation springing from the 1960s and 1970s. He has sometimes performed under the stage names Nick “The Greek” Gravenites and Gravy.

In the early 1980s, Gravenites performed and recorded with a revolving group of San Francisco Bay area rock, blues, and soul musicians called the Usual Suspects. Their first album, The Usual Suspects, was released in 1981.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Gravenites played with Cipollina as Thunder and Lightning. Gravenites and Sears played together in front of 100,000 people on Earth Day 1990 at Crissy Field, San Francisco. Sears also joined him for a tour of Greece. Gravenites still performs live in northern California. Gravenites’ song “Born in Chicago” was honored by the Blues Hall of Fame in 2003. He has toured with the Chicago Blues Reunion and a new Electric Flag Band.

John Cipollina (August 24, 1943 – May 29, 1989) was a guitarist best known for his role as a founder and the lead guitarist of the prominent San Francisco rock band Quicksilver Messenger Service. After leaving Quicksilver he formed the band Copperhead, was a member of the San Francisco All Stars and later played with numerous other bands.

Cipollina died on May 29, 1989, at age 45. His cause of death was alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, which he suffered from most of his life and which is exacerbated by smoking.

In 2003, Rolling Stone Magazine ranked Cipollina 32nd on their list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. (wikipedia)

The short-lived * The Nick Gravenites-John Cipollina Band * originated in Nick Gravenite’s 1980 solo album * Blue Star *. The musicians Nick Gravenites (vocals, guitar), Al Staehely (bass, vocals), Marcus David (drums) and Quicksilver messenger service legend John Cipollina came together and went on tour together. After the tour ended, they went to the studio in Hamburg to record the only studio disc * Monkey Medicine *.

The music is based on the blues rock of the late 70s. The sound is combined with country and folk influences. Since the songs on the previous tour had already been presented to the audience live, it was easy to capture the live feeling in the studio. The songs were mainly written by Nick Gravenites (pronounced Gr-ä-ven-ei-tiss-). His whiskey-soaked, powerful voice has a lot of blues. Bassist Al Staehely is included as a composer and singer on three songs and offers a very good opposite pole with his bright, clear voice. The characteristically scratchy game by John Cipollina, which is not named as the author, but with his game contributes a lot to the soul of the songs.

As playing tips you can confidently name * Blues In The Bottle *, * Trust Me *, * Buried Alive In The Blues *, * Bad Luck Baby * and * Signs Of Live *. As a surprise and as one of the highlights, the CD offers a new recording of * Pride Of Man * by Hamilton Camp, the Quicksilver Messenger Service, which was already published in the late 60s and which can probably also be seen as a contribution by Cipollina to songwriting. Another highlight is * Small-Walk In Box *, a song on which only the two guitars sing, rock each other and Gravenites, and Cipollina present all their skills in a beautiful melody (by Markus Schmidl)

The German edition:

This album was first released in Germany on the legendary Line Records label.

And here is the french edition with 2 bonus tracks !

Personnel:
John Cipollina (guitar)
Marcus David (drums)
Nick Gravenites (guitar, vocals)
Al Staehely (bass, vocals)

Tracklist:
01. Blues In The Bottle (Hopkins) 4.06
02. Six Weeks In Reno (Gravenites) 4.31
03. I’ll Pull The Trigger (Gravenites) 3.34
04. Trust Me (Staehely) 3.50
05. Buried Alive In The Blues (Gravenites) 5.16
06. Bad Luck Baby (Gravenites) 7.35
07. Signs Of Life (Staehely) 3.50
08. Pride Of Man (Camp) 3.52
09. Hot Rods And Cool Women (Staehely) 3.33
+
10. Small Walk-In Box (Staehely) 7.44
11. Born In Chicago (Gravenites) 4.10

*
**

The German CD edition:

More from Nick Gravenites in this blog:

More from John Cipollina in this blog:

Nick Gravenites And John Cipollina – Live In Athens At The Rodon (1991)

Two great musicians:

Nicholas George Gravenites, sometimes performing under the stage names Nick “The Greek” Gravenites and Gravy, is a blues, rock and folk singer and songwriter, best known for his work with Janis Joplin, Mike Bloomfield and several influential bands and individuals of the generation springing from the 1960s and 1970s.

Gravenites is credited as a “musical handyman”, helping such San Francisco bands as Quicksilver Messenger Service and Janis Joplin’s first solo group, the Kosmic Blues Band.

He wrote several songs for Joplin, including her Woodstock hit “Work Me, Lord” and the unfinished instrumental track “Buried Alive in the Blues”. He also worked extensively with John Cipollina after producing the first album by Quicksilver Messenger Service. He and Cipollina formed the Nick Gravenites–John Cipollina Band, which toured throughout Europe.

Gravenites was the lead singer in the re-formed Big Brother and the Holding Company (without Joplin) from 1969 to 1972. He was a songwriter with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band; the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015. In 1967 he formed the Electric Flag with Bloomfield. Gravenites also wrote the score for the film The Trip and produced the music for the film Steelyard Blues. (wikipedia)

John Cipollina (August 24, 1943 – May 29, 1989) was a guitarist best known for his role as a founder and the lead guitarist of the prominent San Francisco rock band Quicksilver Messenger Service. After leaving Quicksilver he formed the band Copperhead, was a member of the San Francisco All Stars and later played with numerous other bands.

During the 1980s, Cipollina performed with a number of bands, including Fish & Chips, Thunder and Lightning, the Dinosaurs and Problem Child.

He was a founding member of Zero and its rhythm guitarist until his death. Most often these bands played club gigs in the San Francisco Bay Area, where Cipollina was well-known.

Cipollina died on May 29, 1989, at age 45. His cause of death was alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, which he suffered from most of his life and which is exacerbated by smoking. (wikipedia)

Nick Gravenites (the name is of Greek origin) presents to the greek audience John Cippolina as “O Giannis Cipollina”, translating John as Giannis (in Greek, this is it). Before the second song, he turns to the audience the phrase “Imaste oli edo gia kalo kairo”, an attempt to translate in Greek the “We are all here for a good time” phrase. He continued to spread greek phrases and regards all around, showing that he had good use of the language.

The event took place on New Year’s Eve of 1987 (31 Dec 1987) in the legendary live club “Rodon” (meaning: “Rose”) of Athens, Greece. I didn’t attend the concert, I was too young and had never heard of them both legends. Anyway, I had heard some sayings years later that the concert actually went on for hours, after the turn of the year, until the early morning hours of the first day of 1988 (actually, in 23:51 NG says to the audience “Don’t worry, we’ve got a long night ahead…we’re gonna go everywhere”). In the end, only a handful of people had stayed as the audience and the group joined them off stage. It is a saying and maybe a story of fantasy…but if anyone is able to corroborate this, I’d be extremely happy! (by Dr Rayman)

Personnel:
John Cipollina (leadguitar, vocals)
Nick Gravenites (vocals, guitar)
Tony Johnson (drums)
Doug Kilmer (bass, background vocals)

CD frontcover (discover the difference):

Tracklist:
01. Walkin’ Blues (Johnson) 6.45
02. Funky News (Gravenites) 4.23
03. Anna (Gravenites) – band introduction  6.27
04. Get Together (Powers) 6.08
05. Born In Chicago (Gravenites) 5.13
06. Small Walk-In Box (Gravenites) 9.54
07. Four Floors Or Forty (Gravenites) 5.28
08. You Can’t Hurt Me No More (Gravenites) 3.53

*
**

The official Nick Gravenites website:

John Cipollina – Nick Gravenites Band – At Rockpalast (2009)

On November 28, 1980, guitarist John Cipollina and singer/guitarist Nick Gravenites performed together at the Kleine Westfalenhalle in Dortmund, Germany; the four-man band they co-led was billed as the John Cipollina/Nick Gravenites Band and also included Al Staehely on bass and Marcus David on drums. It isn’t hard to understand why Cipollina and Gravenites got along well musically. Both had been part of the dynamic Bay Area rock scene of the 1960s, although Gravenites was originally from Chicago; Cipollina was a founding member of Quicksilver Messenger Service, whose self-titled debut album was produced by Gravenites in 1968. Cipollina and Gravenites had blues-rock credentials as well as hard rock credentials, and both blues-rock and hard rock (along with some psychedelic rock) are important parts of the equation on this 73-minute CD (which focuses on the November 28, 1980 show in Germany).

Cipollina and Gravenites’ compatibility is never in question in Dortmund, where they clearly enjoy a strong rapport on smokers like “Southside,” “My Party,” “Hot Rods and Cool Women,” and “Bad Luck Baby.” Cipollina sounds inspired by Gravenites’ lead vocals, and Gravenites sounds inspired by Cipollina’s electric guitar playing. That is not to say that Gravenites sings lead on all of the material; “Small Walking Box” is an instrumental, but even when Gravenites doesn’t sing, Cipollina is obviously enjoying his guitar playing. This CD is a lively example of the sort of excitement that can come about when musicians who have a lot of common ground get together. (by Alex Henderson)

In other words: A hell of a record and these guys really knew how to party …

Recorded live at the Westfalenhalle, Dortmund/Germany
November 28, 1980

Personnel:
John Cippollina (guitar)
Marcus David (drums)
Nick Gravenites (vocals, guitar)
Al Staehely (bass, vocals)

Tracklist:
01. Rockpalast Intro (Mayfield) 0.15
02. Southside (Gravenites) 2.53
03. Junkyard In Malibu 7:45
04. Signs Of Life (Staehely) 4.11
05. My Party (Gravenites) 4:07
06. Small Walking Box (Gravenites) 10.16
07. Pride Of Man (Cipollina) 4.39
08. Bad Luck Baby (Gravenites) 7:09
09. Hot Rods And Cool Women (Staehely) 4.11
10. I’ll Pull The Trigger (Gravenites) 3.52
11. Keep On Running (Edwards) 4.28
12. Buried Alive In The Blues (Gravenites) 8.14
13. Who Do You Love (McDaniels) 11.26

*
**

John Cipollina (August 24, 1943 – May 29, 1989)