Columbia 9720
Producer: James William Guercio
Track listing: Variations on a Theme by Eric Satie (1st and 2nd Movements) / Smiling Phases / Sometimes in Winter / More and More / And When I Die / God Bless the Child / Spinning Wheel / You’ve Made Me So Very Happy / Blues Part II / Variations on a Theme by Eric Satie (1st Movement)
March 29, 1969
7 weeks (nonconsecutive)
Blood, Sweat & Tears’ 1968 debut album, Child Is Father to the Man, was a hit with critics but a commercial disappointment. It stalled at number 47 as tensions were heating up within the band.
Al Kooper, formerly of the Blues Project, founded BS&T, but following the release of Child Is Father to the Man, his relationship with the band’s other members was beginning to deteriorate. “The view of the band at that time was that since Al Kooper had arranged most of the material, he was singing lead, that it was solely his invention. But that was not the case, it was combined effort,” says drummer Bobby Colomby.
In fact, the original line-up’s sound was equal parts Kooper’s keyboard, Steve Katz’s guitar, Jim Fielder’s bass, and Colomby’s drumming, combined with a horn section featuring Fred Lipsius, Jerry Weiss, and Randy Brecker.
“Al left the band acrimoniously,” says Colomby. “No one had a smile on their face. He felt that he had to be the lead singer, and many of us felt that he didn’t have enough power in his voice to carry what we had envisioned for the band.”
BS&T broke up after Kooper’s departure but reunited at the insistence of Columbia Records president Clive Davis. The band found its new lead singer at a small club in New York called Steve Paul’s Scene. “Steve and I were at this club. We weren’t paying attention to the stage, but we were sitting right under this large speaker. We heard this unbelievable voice coming out of it, like Ray Charles or Bobby Blue Bland. When I looked on the stage, it seemed as if the singer was lip-syncing, because he did not look like what I was hearing,” says Colomby. But Colomby and Katz remembered that voice. After initial auditions for a new lead singer left them empty-handed — and Colomby’s dream frontmen Stephen Stills and Stevie Wonder were unattainable — BS&T called on that voice from the club. It belonged to David Clayton-Thomas.
Kooper wasn’t the only original member to leave prior to the recording of Blood, Sweat & Tears. Horn players Brecker and Weiss also departed, and were replaced by Chuck Winfield, Lew Soloff, and Jerry Hymann. Kooper’s absence gave the group, now nine members strong, a newfound freedom, says Colomby. “We were allowed to express more of our individual qualities as players. We had some really excellent jazz musicians in the band.”
BS&T recorded its self-titled album at Columbia studios in New York with producer James William Guercio, who would soon rise to fame with his with Chicago.
The horn-based, big-band rock sound was the basis for BS&T’s musical approach, but its influences came across the board, as the material the band covered suggested. Blood, Sweat & Tears featured arrangements of material ranging from French composer Erik Satie and jazz great Billie Holiday to contemporary songwriters such as Laura Nyro and Steve Winwood.
Blood, Sweat & Tears contained three big hits — “You Made Me So Happy,” “And When I Die,” and “Spinning Wheel” — all of which climbed to number two and went gold, making Blood, Sweat & Tears the first album ever to spawn three gold singles. The album outdid the chart performance the singles, nailing down the top its ninth week on the chart.
THE TOP FIVE
Week of March 29, 1969
1 . Blood, Sweat & Tears, Blood, Sweat & Tears
2. Wichita Lineman, Glen Campbell
3. Goodbye Cream, Cream
4. Ball, Iron Butterfly
5. The Beatles, The Beatles