Harvey "The Snake" Mandel (born March 11, 1945)[1] 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.
His first recording was the album Stand Back! Here Comes Charley Musselwhite's Southside Band in 1966 with Charlie Musselwhite.[2] Described in Legends of Rock Guitar (1997) as a "legendary" album, it was influential in bridging the gap between blues and rock and roll, with Mandel's "relentless fuzztone, feedback-edged solos, and unusual syncopated phrasing."[3] He relocated to the San Francisco Bay area, performing often at The Matrix, a club where local favorites like Jerry Garcia or Elvin Bishop would sit in and jam. He then met the pioneering San Francisco disc jockey and producer Abe "Voco" Kesh (Abe Keshishian), who signed Mandel to Philips Records and produced his first solo album, Cristo Redentor, in 1968.[2] Mandel recorded with Barry Goldberg on a bootleg from Cherry Records and recorded with Graham Bond. He cut two more solo LPs for Philips, Righteous (1969) and Games Guitars Play (1970), followed by four more solo albums for the independent record label Janus in the early 1970s, which included Baby Batter.[2]
On the night that Henry Vestine quit Canned Heat, Mandel was in the band's dressing room at the Fillmore West. Mike Bloomfield joined them for the first set, and Mandel came in for the second set. His third performance with the band was the Woodstock Festival in 1969.[citation needed] During this period, with Canned Heat bandmates Larry Taylor and Fito de la Parra, Mandel contributed to the 'Music from Free Creek' super session project. Mandel stayed with Canned Heat for a year, touring and recording material which appeared on three albums. "Let's Work Together", a song by Wilbert Harrison which was included in the album Future Blues became an international hit. He is also on the Live in Europe album recorded prior to the death of Alan Wilson.[2]
With Canned Heat bassist Larry Taylor, Mandel joined John Mayall's band for the next two years.[2] He is heard playing on the two albums from that period USA Union and Back to the Roots. In 1972, he teamed up with Don "Sugarcane" Harris, Randy Resnick on guitar, Victor Conte on bass, and Paul Lagos on drums to form the band Pure Food and Drug Act, which released one album, Choice Cuts.[2] During the 1970s Mandel released the albums Baby Batter (1970), The Snake (1972), Feel the Sound of Harvey Mandel (1974) and Shangrenade (1973),[2] in the latter employing the technique of two-handed tapping. He also released an instructional video, Harvey Mandel: Blues Guitar & Beyond.
When Rolling Stones guitarist Mick Taylor left the band, Mandel was given an audition as his replacement.[2] He recorded two tracks with the Stones for their 1976 album Black and Blue: "Hot Stuff" (providing the lead guitar solo throughout) and "Memory Motel".
Mandel acted in the film Chalk, which was directed by Rob Nilsson.
In 2009, Mandel and Larry Taylor reunited with Fito de la Parra and the rest of the current Canned Heat lineup to perform certain shows on the Canned Heat tour. Taylor, Mandel and de la Parra had all been part of the 1969 Woodstock Festival lineup. Mandel rejoined Canned Heat permanently in 2010.
In 2014, Harvey collaborated with the herbalist Ron Teeguarden on an album titled Dragons at Play, which consisted of nine tracks.
In 2015, Cleopatra Records issued a six-disc retrospective of Harvey's career featuring the first five of Harvey's solo albums, and a sixth disc containing a live performance from the Matrix Club in San Francisco, on December 24, 1968. The performance included Jerry Garcia, and Elvin Bishop.
In 2016, Harvey, along with Ryley Walker's backing band,[4] entered the recording studios at Fantasy Records, Berkeley, for two days of live studio recording, which resulted in the eight self-composed tracks which made up the album Snake Pit.
In 2017, Harvey released the 10 track album Snake Attack. According to Harvey, "I wrote all the songs, performed all the instruments and mixed and mastered all the songs myself. Working in my own home studio allowed me to do all sorts of great guitar overdubs that I'd never have been able to do in a regular studio."[citation needed]
Canned Heat is an American blues and rock band that was formed in Los Angeles in 1965. The group has been noted for its efforts to promote interest in blues music and its original artists. It was launched by two blues enthusiasts Alan Wilson and Bob Hite, who took the name from Tommy Johnson's 1928 "Canned Heat Blues", a song about an alcoholic who had desperately turned to drinking Sterno, generically called "canned heat". After appearances at the Monterey and Woodstock festivals at the end of the 1960s, the band acquired worldwide fame with a lineup of Hite (vocals), Wilson, Henry Vestine and later Harvey Mandel, Larry Taylor (bass), and Adolfo de la Parra (drums).
Barry Joseph Goldberg is an American blues and rock keyboardist, songwriter, and record producer. Goldberg has co-produced albums by Percy Sledge, Charlie Musselwhite, James Cotton, and the Textones, plus Bob Dylan's version of Curtis Mayfield's "People Get Ready".
Alan Christie Wilson, nicknamed "Blind Owl", was an American musician, best known as the co-founder, leader, co-lead singer, and primary composer of the blues band Canned Heat. He sang and played harmonica and guitar with the group, live and on recordings. Wilson was the lead singer for the group's two biggest U.S. hit singles: "On the Road Again" and "Going Up the Country".
"On the Road Again" is a song recorded by the American blues rock group Canned Heat in 1967. A driving blues rock boogie, it was adapted from earlier blues songs and includes mid-1960s psychedelic rock elements. Unlike most of Canned Heat's songs from the period which were sung by Bob Hite, second guitarist and harmonica player Alan Wilson provides the distinctive high pitched vocal, sometimes described as a falsetto.
Pure Food and Drug Act (listed in The All Music Guide to the Blues, the Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music ) was an American blues rock band that was formed in the early 1970s by Don "Sugarcane" Harris. The band began with Paul Lagos on drums, Larry Taylor on bass and Randy Resnick on guitar. Resnick was at that time experimenting with a one and two handed tapping technique which later became a standard guitarist's tool. The group played small rooms in the Los Angeles area, such as the Troubadour and the Ash Grove, for several months.
Future Blues is the fifth album by American blues and rock band Canned Heat, released in 1970. It was the last to feature the band's classic lineup, as Larry Taylor and Harvey Mandel had both departed by July 1970, prior to its release to record with John Mayall and songwriter Alan Wilson died shortly after on September 3, 1970. It was also the only classic-era Canned Heat studio album to feature Mandel, as Henry Vestine had been the lead guitarist on the previous albums. Their cover of "Let's Work Together" by Wilbert Harrison became a hit. "London Blues" features Dr. John. It was re-released on CD in 2002 by MAM productions with five bonus tracks.
Hallelujah is the fourth album by Canned Heat, released in 1969. It was re-released on CD in 2001 by MAM productions with four bonus tracks. It was the last album to feature classic lineup mark 1, as Vestine left the band prior to Future Blues.
Randy Resnick is an American guitarist, songwriter and saxophonist who has played with many prominent blues and jazz musicians, such as Don "Sugarcane" Harris, John Lee Hooker, John Mayall, Canned Heat and Freddie King. He was developing both one- and two-handed tapping style in the early 1970s. He published a CD of his own music in 1995, "To Love" under the name Randy Rare. There is an example of his tapping work in the recording from that CD below. In 2020, he began publishing new music, much of it on saxophone, on the streaming platforms like Spotify, Tidal (service) and iTunes under his own Each Hit label.
Samuel Lawrence "Larry" Taylor was an American bass guitarist, best known for his work as a member of Canned Heat. Before joining Canned Heat he had been a session bassist for The Monkees and Jerry Lee Lewis. He was the younger brother of Mel Taylor, long-time drummer of The Ventures.
Reheated is the twelfth album by Canned Heat, released in 1988. It features two members of the band's classic lineup, Fito de la Parra and Larry Taylor. Among the titles, "Bullfrog Blues" was originally on the B-side of the first single recorded by Canned Heat in 1967; "Built for Comfort" by Willie Dixon was popularized by Howlin' Wolf; "Take Me to the River" is a R&B/soul song which has been recorded by artists such as Al Green and Talking Heads.
Canned Heat '70 Concert Recorded Live in Europe is a 1970 live album by Canned Heat. The album is taken from various locations on live concert European tour right before Alan Wilson's death and is the band's first officially released live album.
Live at Topanga Corral is a 1971 live album by Canned Heat. The album is taken from a 1968 concert at the Kaleidoscope in Hollywood, California and not at the Topanga Corral as the title suggests. Canned Heat was under contract to Liberty Records at the time and Liberty did not want to do a live album, so manager Skip Taylor told Liberty that the album had been recorded in 1966 & 1967 at the Topanga Corral and released the record with Wand Records to avoid legal complications. The record has been bootlegged and reissued countless times, and is also known as Live at the Kaleidoscope.
Stand Back! Here Comes Charley Musselwhite's South Side Band is the 1967 debut album of American blues-harp musician Charlie Musselwhite, leading Charlie Musselwhite's Southside Band. The Vanguard Records release brought Musselwhite to notability among blues musicians and also helped bridge the gap between blues and rock and roll, musically and in marketing. With rough vocals and notable performances on harmonica, guitar and bass guitar, the album was critically well received. It introduced Musselwhite's signature song, his cover of Duke Pearson's "Cristo Redemptor".
Adolfo "Fito" de la Parra is a Mexican-born musician who is best known for his work as the drummer of the American blues rock band Canned Heat, which he joined in 1967.
Music from Free Creek is an album from a series of 1969 "super session" recordings by Free Creek, a group composed of a number of internationally renowned musical artists of the time, including Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Keith Emerson, Buzz Feiten, Mitch Mitchell and Linda Ronstadt. Joe Viglione from www.allmusic.com has stated that "Music from Free Creek is a super session album, where the musicians are playing for the fun of it, and that comes across. The material doesn't get bogged down in 'names'; it just flows."
Bluesberry Jam was a blues rock band active in the 1960s. They were for a time geographically as well as chronologically similar to Pacific Gas & Electric and Canned Heat. Their musical styles were also similar.
Walter de Paduwa is a Belgian radio DJ, musician and rock'n'roll historian best known for his association with Canned Heat.
Dale Spalding is an American singer, harmonicist, guitarist and bassist, best known for his works with Poncho Sanchez and Canned Heat.
Cristo Redentor is the debut album by Harvey Mandel. Richie Unterberger of AllMusic writes that "Mandel's debut remains his best early work." John Tobler wrote in the liner notes of the CD that Mandel "was good enough to be invited to audition for The Rolling Stones and he worked with John Mayall and Canned Heat - but it is for this Cristo Redentor album, and particularly for the utterly classic Wade in the Water that he will be remembered." This album is completely instrumental with the exception of the title track where soprano Jacqueline May Allen, joined by Carolyn Willis, Edna Wright and Julia Tillman Waters, blend their wordless voices as if another instrument.
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