''USA Union'' is a 1970 album by blues musician John Mayall, featuring

Harvey Mandel Harvey Mandel (born March 11, 1945) is an American guitarist best known as a member of Canned Heat. He also played with Charlie Musselwhite and John Mayall as well as maintaining a solo career. Early life Mandel was born in Detroit, Michigan, ...

on guitar,

Larry Taylor Samuel Lawrence Taylor (June 26, 1942 – August 19, 2019) was an American bass guitarist, best known for his work as a member of Canned Heat from 1967. Before joining Canned Heat he had been a session bassist for The Monkees and Jerry Lee L ...

on bass and

Don "Sugarcane" Harris Don Francis Bowman "Sugarcane" Harris (June 18, 1938 – November 30, 1999) was an American blues and rock and roll violinist and guitarist. He is considered a pioneer in the amplification of the violin. Career Harris was born and raised in P ...

on violin. The album was recorded on July 27 & 28th, 1970 at Larrabee Studios in LA and released by

Polydor Polydor Records Ltd. is a German-British record label that operates as part of Universal Music Group. It has a close relationship with Universal's Interscope Geffen A&M Records label, which distributes Polydor's releases in the United States ...

later in the same yea
John Mayall - Discography
At the end of the sixties John Mayall was residing in

Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles, California Laurel Canyon is a mountainous neighborhood in the Hollywood Hills region of the Santa Monica Mountains, within the Hollywood Hills West district of Los Angeles, California. The main thoroughfare of Laurel Canyon Boulevard connects the neighb ...

and had developed connections with local musicians, befriending Harvey Mandel and Larry Taylor, who had both just departed

Canned Heat Canned Heat is an American band formed in Los Angeles, California, in 1965. The group is noted for its efforts to promote interest in blues music and its original artists and rock music. It was founded by two blues enthusiasts Alan Wilson and Bob ...

. Taylor had appeared on one track of Mayall's previous album, '' Empty Rooms'', the only studio recordings of his "Turning Point" band, and stayed on to replace Stephen Thompson (with whom he duetted on "To a Princess"); Mandel essentially replaced acoustic guitar specialist

Jon Mark Jon Mark (born John Michael Burchell; 8 May 1943 – 10 February 2021) was an English singer-songwriter and guitarist, best known for his recordings with Marianne Faithfull, Sweet Thursday, John Mayall and Mark-Almond. Mark, who received a ...

, and electric violinist Harris replaced saxophonist

Johnny Almond Johnny Almond (20 July 1946 – 18 November 2009) was a British saxophonist, who is best known for his recordings with the Alan Price Set, Fleetwood Mac, John Mayall and Mark-Almond. Biography Johnny Almond was born in Enfield, Middlesex, Engla ...

. In the ''USA Union'' liner notes, Mayall noted that, after the Turning Point band broke up, he'd played a British music festival with an all-star lineup and then needed to form a new band swiftly when Polydor Records pressed him for a new album. With his new all-American line up, Mayall pursued the jazzy blues experiment documented on his live album '' The Turning Point''. This unusual format (electric guitars by Mayall and Mandel, Mayall playing piano and harmonica as well, Harris's electric violin, Taylor's acoustic and electric bass, and no drums) the band created a unique sound and recorded this series of songs mostly chronicling Mayall's then-romance with Nancy Throckmorton (a theme he first visited on ''Empty Rooms''), who provided some photography for the album jacket. "Nature's Disappearing," the album's opening song, dealt with environmental issues, the only song on the album that didn't address Mayall's romance. On tour the band was joined by drummer Paul Lagos from

Kaleidoscope A kaleidoscope () is an optical instrument with two or more reflecting surfaces (or mirrors) tilted to each other at an angle, so that one or more (parts of) objects on one end of these mirrors are shown as a regular symmetrical pattern when v ...

. Jazz critic

Leonard Feather Leonard Geoffrey Feather (13 September 1914 – 22 September 1994) was a British-born jazz pianist, composer, and producer, who was best known for his music journalism and other writing. Biography Feather was born in London, England, into an u ...

wrote liner notes for the back of the album; inside the gatefold jacket, Mayall gave advice on preserving nature. The ''USA Union'' lineup would appear as some of the core of Mayall's ''Back to the Roots'' set, which featured several notable Mayall alumni including Eric Clapton,

John McVie John Graham McVie (born 26 November 1945) is a British bass guitarist. He is best known as a member of the rock bands John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers from 1964 to 1967 and Fleetwood Mac since 1967. His surname, combined with that of Mick Fle ...

Mick Taylor Michael Kevin Taylor (born 17 January 1949) is an English guitarist, best known as a former member of John Mayall's Bluesbreakers (1967–1969) and the Rolling Stones (1969–1974). As a member of the Stones, he appeared on: ''Let It Bleed'' ...

, Stephen Thompson and previous drummers

Keef Hartley Keith "Keef" Hartley (8 April 1944 – 26 November 2011)
was an English drummer and bandleader. He fronted his own band ...

and Aynsley Dunbar. Mayall would keep the drumless format for just one more album, ''Memories'', where Jerry McGee replaced Harvey Mandel as guitarist.

Track listing

All compositions by John Mayall #"Nature's Disappearing" – 5:58 #"You Must Be Crazy" – 3:58 #"Night Flyer" – 5:36 #"Off the Road" – 2:51 #"Possessive Emotions" – 5:22 #"Where Did My Legs Go" – 3:48 #"Took the Car" – 4:11 #"Crying" – 6:30 #"My Pretty Girl" – 4:24 #"Deep Blue Sea" – 5:06 "Nature's Disappearing" reappeared in a new version on the album ''Wake up Call'' (1993); it can be heard as played in concert on the album ''Live from Austin, TX'' (2007; recorded September 1993). On Polydor LP STEREO 2425 020 the tracks "You Must Be Crazy" and "Took the Car" have changed places, though the cover lists the tracks as above.

Personnel

–

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

–

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

* John Mayall – guitar, harmonica, keyboards,

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

– bass guitar

Production

– liner notes * Charles Fulcher – composer * Bob Gordon – photography * John Judnich – engineer *

Tapani Tapanainen Tapani Talo (born Tapani Tapanainen in 1950) is a Finnish-American architect, who has also worked as an audio engineer. He is best known from Rolling Stones Mobile studio technician in early and mid 1970s. Career Born in Lahti, Finland in 1950, ...

– photography * Nancy Throckmorton – photography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Usa Union 1970 albums John Mayall albums Albums produced by John Mayall Polydor Records albums