Jerry McGeorge, George Edwards, Michael Tegza, Tony Cavallari and Dave Michaels.

Their exotic name seemed rather fitting for the times. Taken from the deceased, cult gothic fantasy/horror writer of the early 20th century, Howard Phillips Lovecraft, Chicago’s finest exponents of folk-rock are best remembered for their haunting musical tribute to the author’s novella, the White Ship, the centrepiece on their brilliant debut album, released in late 1967. Like Lovecraft’s writings, the group’s music had a dream-like quality, encapsulating perfectly the peace-love vibe of the West Coast hippie scene.

Helmed by aspiring folk singer/songwriter, George Edwards, and classically trained keyboard player/singer, Dave Michaels, H.P. Lovecraft were a motley crew of talented musicians, formed in the spring of 1967. Yet, it was this diversity of musical backgrounds that also shaped the band’s unique sound and set it apart from its contemporaries. In just a little under a year, H.P. Lovecraft produced two remarkable albums of musical ingenuity that stand as some of the finest pieces of music to emerge during the late 1960s acid-rock era. Sadly, H.P. Lovecraft never fulfilled their undoubted promise; the band’s career derailed prematurely through a combination of poor management, internal frictions, exhaustion and substance abuse.

H.P. Lovecraft’s founding member George Edwards (b. Charles Ethan Kenning, August 19, 1943, Chicago, Illinois, US) was a former acoustic musician who’d been active on the local and national folk scenes since 1962.

Initially working as a solo performer in the folk and blues clubs in his native Chicago and the Midwest, Edwards later took off for California and Coconut Grove, Florida, where he rubbed shoulders with his mentor, Fred Neil.

Neil’s influence on the Chicago musician was considerable; Edwards would later hand pick Neil’s ‘That’s the Bag I’m In’ for inclusion on H.P. Lovecraft’s debut album, together with two further Neil compositions - ‘Bleecker & MacDougal’ and ‘Country Boy’, melded together under the title, ‘Country Boy and Bleecker Street’.

It was also during this pre-electric folk-rock period that Edwards befriended fellow Chicago folk musician, Terry Callier with whom he would strike up a lasting friendship. “We came up on the Chicago folk scene at around the same time,” recalls Edwards. “We became good friends and were playing all the same clubs around the Midwest.”

When Edwards met him, Callier was performing a mixture of folk covers and original compositions, most of which would appear on his excellent debut album, The New Folk Sound of Terry Callier, issued on the Prestige label in 1964. Edwards was particularly taken by two of Callier’s compositions - ‘Spin, Spin, Spin’ and ‘It’s About Time’ and years later, he introduced both songs (after adding additional lyrics) into H.P. Lovecraft’s repertoire.

It was also during this period that Edwards ran into future Byrds guitarist/vocalist David Crosby, who had recently moved to Chicago to play the local folk circuit. It was through Crosby that Edwards (and Callier) learnt Travis Edmunson’s ‘the Drifter’, another song destined for H.P. Lovecraft’s stage set.

As well as working as a solo performer, Edwards also acted as an accompanist for a number of artists during this period, playing upright bass, banjo and guitar. Travelling to New York in early 1963, he joined the Village Singers with whom he remained for two years, touring the national folk circuit and recording an obscure album for Elektra Records.

When work with the Village Singers dried up, Edwards joined little known folk duo, Len and Judy. Playing 12-string guitar and acoustic bass, Edwards accompanied the pair on another rare album, this time released on Prestige. While copies of the record are almost impossible to find now, a couple of tracks are still available on a Prestige/Folklore compilation CD entitled All Kinds of Folks.

Sometime around the summer of 1965, Edwards returned home to Chicago and resumed his solo career on the folk and blues circuit. Soon afterwards, he chanced upon a meeting with future H.P. Lovecraft manager and producer, George Badonsky, an Atlantic Records’ promo man, who’d just relocated from the East Coast to the Midwest. Badonsky took Edwards under his wing and encouraged him to start writing original material.

A fervent reader of H.P. Lovecraft’s literary works, Badonsky had befriended another Lovecraft fan, local musician, music business attorney and producer, Bill Traut and together they had formed the production company, Dunwich (named after H.P. Lovecraft’s short story the Dunwich Horror). Traut had an office near Universal Recording Studios on Rush Street, and this arrangement enabled him to book studio time for the partners’ growing roster of local signings, bands like garage punk legends, the Shadows of Knight and (later) folk-rockers, Saturday’s Children.

Edwards was added to the Dunwich stable and within a matter of months had penned a slew of folk-rock flavoured compositions, including the marvellously titled, ‘Never Mind, I’m Freezing’. A number of studio sessions were booked around November to lay down around eight tracks.

“There were a whole series of recordings that were done during that time, all as demos,” says Edwards of his brief solo career. “We were looking around for a sound for me, something that reflected the folk-rock that I was doing but had a unique twist to it. We did a whole bunch of recordings with this in mind.”

For these sessions, Badonsky brought in several members of another Dunwich employee, the Rovin’ Kind to back Edwards on a few tracks. On others he was supported by a stellar cast of studio musicians, people like drummer Maurice McKinley, bass player Richard Evans and jazz pianist (and co-founder of Dunwich) Eddie Higgins.

One of the tracks recorded with this line up was a stunning version of Bob Dylan’s ‘Quit Your Low Down Ways’, which was inexplicably shelved at the time, only to be picked up years later for the obscure Happy Tiger Records compilation album, Early Chicago, released in 1972. (Listeners might be interested to know that the exceptional slide work is by a young Steve Miller.)

Higgins was also on hand to add some wonderful harpsichord passages to Edwards’ tasteful version of ‘Norwegian Wood’, recorded at a later session in early 1966. The Beatles cover was subsequently issued as the a-side of Edwards’ debut single, released on the Dunwich label in March 1966 and backed by ‘Never Mind, I’m Freezing’. Gaining regional TV exposure in Chicago, Detroit and Cleveland, the single became a modest hit in the Midwest but never made any real headway nationally.  

Aside from his own recordings, Edwards also guested on label mates, the Shadows of Knight’s second a-side, ‘Oh Yeah’, which was cut in the studio session immediately after the recording of ‘Norwegian Wood’. Shadows’ rhythm guitarist Jerry McGeorge remembers Badonsky bringing Edwards in to the session to “beef up” the track’s backing vocal.

Badonsky was also responsible for hiring Edwards’ services for a another session, held that summer, this time for the Saturday’s Children’s debut recordings. Operating out of the Arlington Heights club, the Cellar, where they were the house band, Saturday’s Children had a huge teen following and would go on to cut a string of prime Beatlesque folk-rock songs during 1966-1967. Edwards was already relatively familiar with the group, having known its bass player and lead singer, Jeff Boyan (aka Geoff Bryan), since the early 1960s.

“I had met Jeff during the folk music era,” says Edwards. “Jeff was with a group called Ron, Geoff and I… and we began running into each other on the folk circuit in the Midwest. I always admired Jeff. I thought he was a great singer and a really good writer.”

Having renewed his friendship with Boyan during early 1966, Edwards joined his band on stage on several occasions. “When I started to make the transition from the folk music scene to an electric focus, I was invited to come out and play at the Cellar, which I did as a single and I also sat in several times with Jeff’s group, Saturday’s Children,” remembers Edwards.

Besides his solo work, Edwards also made a living working in the folk/jazz outfit, the Will Mercier Trio, where he was employed to play a Mexican six string bass guitar called the guitaron. It was in this formation that he first met future H.P. Lovecraft keyboard player/singer Dave Michaels (b. Dave Miotke, December 15, 1944, Chicago, Illinois, US), who at the time was in his senior year of a full scholarship to the Northwestern School of Music to study classical music.

More than any other H.P. Lovecraft member, Michaels would be instrumental in shaping the group’s unique sound, due in a large part to his three-octave vocal range, superb arrangement skills and dextrous keyboard work. His importance to the band would become painfully obvious in later years, as his departure effectively led to the band’s premature demise. Prior to joining the Will Mercier Trio, Michaels had been working in a university trio with none other than future jazz sax player, David Sanborn.

“Dave Sanborn and I were classmates at the Northwestern School of Music,” says Michaels. “At the end of my junior year, the summer of 1965, we were asked by another classmate, drummer Terry Applebaum, if we’d like to work a six-day-a-week summer trio at Fiddleman’s resort just outside of Benton Harbor, Michigan.”

Michaels describes Fiddleman’s resort as a mid-western version of the Catskills where Jewish families would go in droves from Chicago, Detroit and other surrounding areas. “Irving and Sheila Fiddleman booked acts, mostly comedians on weekends,” explains Michaels. “The entertainers were without exception pleasantly surprised to find musicians as adept as we were playing the place. Dave Sanborn was and is a virtuoso. I, of course, was on piano and sang quite a bit. Terry Applebaum, a wonderful drummer and great guy, got the job through his elder brother, who had led a trio there in past summers.”

When the project folded that autumn, Michaels served as chairman/composer/piano accompanist and singer in the yearly Northwestern musical reviews, the Waa-Mu Show. Soon afterwards, he found a further outlet in the Will Mercier Trio, which gave him the opportunity to showcase his skills on the accordion.

Singing three-part harmonies, Edwards, Mercier and Michaels strolled from table to table in the revolving Pinnacle Room high atop the brand new Holiday Inn on Lake Shore Drive. Says Michaels of the engagement: “I remember the friendly manager of the hotel after a few too many, always asking us to do ‘People’, [Barbra] Streisand’s current hit. I think he needed people right then himself.”

While the Holiday Inn engagement was obviously a good earner, neither Edwards nor Michaels saw much future in the Will Mercier Trio, and after a couple of hopelessly obscure local singles, Edwards decided it was time to re-launch his solo career. With Badonsky’s backing, a studio session was booked for February 16, 1967 to record new material for a second George Edwards single. As events would transpire, the recording would mark the beginning of H.P. Lovecraft.

According to Edwards, it was Badonsky and Bill Traut’s idea to record a cover of Chip Taylor’s ‘Anyway That You Want Me’ (a recent UK hit for the Troggs) as the single’s prospective a-side. Edwards says he initially had doubts over the song’s potential but agreed to record it nonetheless, and a supporting cast of musicians was drafted in from the Rovin’ Kind, including guitarist Kal David.

Later, when the recording was complete, Edwards listened to the finished tape and felt that something was missing. What the track lacked in his opinion was a harmony vocal part. Realising that Michaels’ higher register was perfect for the part, Edwards recruited his colleague to add the harmony and the track was readied for release. Backed by an Edwards outtake from the late 1965 sessions, the Byrds flavoured ‘It’s All Over For You’, the single was released that spring on Mercury Records’ subsidiary label, Philips. However, rather than appearing as a George Edwards solo release, the single was attributed to H.P. Lovecraft.

Edwards explains, “The decision to release ‘Anyway That You Want Me’ [as H.P. Lovecraft] was made by Bill Traut, George Badonsky and myself. It was part of the idea of forming a permanent group as opposed to what we had been doing with hired sidemen.”

Dave Michaels recalls how the unusual name came about. “I remember being with George Badonsky, Bill Traut and George Edwards in Badonsky’s apartment above the club Mother Blues. The record company had sent the producers a list of possible group names…We were all groaning at how none of the names fit us [and] then started talking about other things. The name of Badonsky’s dog (a Yorkshire terrier called Yuggoth) came up, along with the name H.P. Lovecraft. We all leaped at the idea of naming the group after the author. Who the first one was to suggest H.P. Lovecraft is anyone’s guess [but] all our minds clicked on it right away. The fact that it was unusual, catchy, and had the word ‘love’ in it, sealed our collective fate.”

In an incredible stroke of luck, Traut knew August Derleth, who administered the H.P. Lovecraft estate. Traut called Derleth to ask if the group could use the name and Derleth duly gave his consent. Edwards and Michaels then set about recruiting musicians.

The nucleus of H.P. Lovecraft was formed that March after auditions were held at the city’s famous folk and blues venue, Mother Blues in Chicago’s old town. Edwards, who frequently played at the club, persuaded its owners to let him and Michaels use Mother Blues during the day.

One of the first people to audition was a young guitarist named Tony Cavallari (b. 1948, Chicago, Illinois, US), who had first started playing music when he was nine. “He had been playing in some groups in Indiana,” says Edwards. “He was a rock player, but he was really steeped in the blues. Tony loved the blues. He had learned a lot of blues licks, which really appealed to me. He came and auditioned and we hit it off.”

Getting together at Edwards’ apartment, the trio immediately began rehearsing and writing material. “It was around that time that we actually bought amplifiers,” remembers Edwards. “Prior to that, everything we had done, we had done acoustically. At that point, we started to invest in some equipment, realising that in fact we were forming a band. Things were starting to gel; material was coming together and ideas for arrangements and that sort of thing, so we expanded. We got a rehearsal hall in downtown Chicago and began holding auditions in earnest and we had a whole bunch of people come through there.”

Within days, the band found the perfect drummer in Michael Tegza (b. 1949, Chicago, Illinois, US). Having previously played in various polka and wedding groups, and his first professional group, The Debonairs, who recorded a home demo, Tegza was brought to the rehearsal hall by George Badonsky when an audition with the Shadows of Knight failed to work out. A local bass player named Tom Skidmore completed H.P. Lovecraft’s line up a few weeks later.

With the group now complete, Edwards and Michaels resumed rehearsals. However, due to their commitment with the Will Mercier Trio, which involved playing evenings, the band was often unable to practise until the early hours of the morning as Edwards explained in an interview with UK magazine, Ptolemaic Terrascope, in 1991. “We’d get off [the Mercier job] at about 1.30 in the morning and go over to our rehearsal room…on an upper floor of an office building…We’d get on the elevator and go up there in the middle of the night…and start rehearsing very loud Lovecraft material. And of course the police would regularly come up and shut us down!”

Despite the police interference, the group soon developed a highly original sound, centred on Edwards and Michaels’ contrasting yet complementary vocal styles. Edwards as the band’s principal songwriter was instrumental in choosing the material and borrowed heavily from his folk background. High on his list for source material was his mentor, Fred Neil. Other favourites included Dino Valente’s ‘Get Together’ and a couple of early Randy Newman songs: ‘I’ve Been Wrong Before’ and ‘Tickle Me’. Edwards also introduced Travis Edmunson’s ‘the Drifter’, which he’d learnt from David Crosby and the folk standard, ‘Wayfaring Stranger’, a song that he’d first heard on a Bob Gibson album. With Michaels’ assistance, Edwards worked out new arrangements that lent the songs a haunting feel.

Interestingly, for a band that has come to be seen as being synonymous with the psychedelic scene, the group dabbled very little with drugs during these early days. Nevertheless, for Dave Michaels, in particular, the consumption of mind-altering substances proved to be a less than satisfying experience and ultimately was instrumental in his decision to leave the band at the height of its success. Michaels singles out a particular drug-related experience that took place that spring. “Someone said, ‘hey, let’s all take some LSD, it’ll be great’. Being young and naive, [and] while ignoring my dad’s advice over the years to stay away from all that ’stuff’… that ‘musicians do’, I went along with it.”

The incident, as Michaels vividly recounts, took place at Edwards’ apartment. “After the initial taking of the drug, I remember putting on a recording of Charles Ives’ ‘Central Park in the Dark,’ a modern classical orchestral work,” says Michaels. “This was too much for the rest of the crowd and they turned it off. After a while I realised that I couldn’t turn the drug off, but instead would have to endure it, not knowing how long it would take to wear off. I wanted to go outside for some fresh air, but George and the others thought I should just stay inside. A few hours later I did drive home, feeling totally lousy for having taken not a consciousness increasing substance, but instead a delusion producing drug, which didn’t give any ‘answers,’ but which only gave temporary hallucinatory experiences of a dubious nature.”

Michaels remained wary of the group’s drug taking but decided to stay with H.P. Lovecraft, as he explains. “I went on with the group despite these total misgivings about the drug use, which thankfully was not much at the time. While our work contained ‘psychedelic’ musical effects, we were not taking drugs other than the occasional joint and when someone passed the thing around I found myself merely taking it and giving to the next person.”

Having spent several months rehearsing intensively, H.P. Lovecraft began to gig throughout the Chicago area but it soon became apparent that Tom Skidmore wasn’t going to stay the course. Edwards began to cast his eye around for a suitable replacement and in late July he turned to a familiar face, former Shadows of Knight rhythm guitarist and feedback expert Jerry McGeorge (b. 22 October, 1945, Cincinnati, Ohio, US).

Says McGeorge of the decision to recruit him: “I heard them several times at the Cellar and thought they were interesting, but with some fairly obvious weaknesses. George mentioned they weren’t happy with Tom [Skidmore] and I suggested Jeff Boyan as a potential replacement. However, despite his talent, early on George was reluctant to bring [Boyan] into the band for reasons of immaturity and potential creative conflicts.

“Not long after that, I arranged to meet Berry Oakley (later the Allman Brothers’ original bass player) at the Cellar, ironically on a night when Lovecraft was playing, to discuss the possibility of him joining the Shadows of Knight. Berry arrived and was concerned his bass might be stolen out of his rental car, so I put it in the Cellar dressing room. He and I talked for some time and decided the idea of him in the Shadows of Knight wouldn’t work out. He stayed and hung out at the place for the rest of the evening. Meanwhile, my girlfriend and I ended up in the dressing room talking with Lovecraft. I decided to check out Berry’s cool, black Rickenbacker bass, and started plunking away on it while talking to George. All of a sudden George blurts out: ‘Jerry, I really wish you’d join our group!’”

Edwards’ offer took McGeorge by surprise. “Although I’d played bass with the Shadows of Knight on some tunes in order to allow [Dave] Hawk Wolinski to switch over to keyboards, I really didn’t feel like much of a bass player,” admits McGeorge. “I told them I’d think on it a bit and a few days later decided it would be a good move, all things considered. Tom Skidmore was subsequently let go and I immediately started rehearsing with them, learning their songs and the bass at the same time.”

From the outset, it was clear that H.P. Lovecraft was a vehicle for Edwards and Michaels. “The most identifiable aspect of the band, indeed, the cornerstone of its style, was the duo of David and George on lead vocals,” says McGeorge. “It was well accepted amongst us that on any new tune, one or the other, or both, would sing lead.

“Tony and I primarily sang inner voices for the harmonies, which David worked out for us,” continues McGeorge. “He’d hear the parts in his head, and then sing them to us until we caught on. Not having much formal music training at the time, I was astounded at his ability to hear stuff in his head and then write it all down. Along with perfect pitch, David had been a child prodigy…He was the first formally trained musician I’d ever been exposed to. I’ve always been surprised that someone with his enormous talent in that era ended up in a rock band!”

McGeorge’s first gig took place at a fashion show at a Chicago department store, where the group provided background music for the models. Then, within weeks of his joining, the former Shadows of Knight guitarist found himself at Universal Recording Studios participating in the recording of the band’s debut album. As he still didn’t own a bass, McGeorge says he used Tom Skidmore’s Hofner on most of the album.

The sessions, recorded virtually live on four-track, were completed fairly quickly, thanks in part to the assistance of engineer Jerry DeClerk who helped acquaint the band with the workings of the studio. The fact that the group had spent months getting “its act together” at the rehearsal hall also helped greatly. “We had a fairly good concept for the album and understood the key elements we wanted on it,” says McGeorge looking back.

While most of the songs featured on H.P. Lovecraft had been in the band’s live set since the late spring/early summer, several tracks - ‘the Time Machine’, a psychedelically enhanced vaudeville ditty, and ‘Gloria Patria’, a Gregorian chant, were added at the last minute.

“As I recall, George Edwards came up with this lyric for ‘the Time Machine,’ but it was kind of serious, too serious in fact,” says Michaels. “We all started kidding around, and soon I was over at this ‘barrel house’ type piano, changing it into this camp ditty. It had sort of a ’side show’ feeling and the bridge had that echo effect in contrast to the other sections. Tongue in cheek is good sometimes. Young fans loved it, as I recall.”

Edwards has a different take on events.  ”‘The Time Machine’ was written with tongue firmly planted in cheek as a response to a then-popular record called ‘Winchester Cathedral’,” he says. “I don’t know how David felt that there was any serious intent concerning this tune. Frankly, I was surprised and later embarrassed that we recorded it.”

As for ‘Gloria Patria’. “[That] was done at the end of the final session, a cappella,” says Michaels. “I took it straight out of this little book the Kyriale, which I had studied at Northwestern in my sophomore year. The guys did a great job. I rehearsed them in the ‘dying away’ effect at the end of phrases, trying to make it sound like the monks of Solemnes in France. I think it’s wonderful that the album ends with the sign of the cross in Latin - Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.”

With the tracks completed, H.P. Lovecraft resumed gigging around the local area. While the band was out on the road, Bill Traut decided to employ horns and reed embellishments on a couple of tracks, most notably on the group’s reading of Dino Valente’s ‘Let’s Get Together’ and the album’s centrepiece, ‘the White Ship’. Traut even made an appearance himself, supplying an 1811 ship’s bell to add to the latter’s eerie, ghost-like feel.

While Michaels was slightly concerned that the management hadn’t consulted the group on the decision, he says he was pleased with the results. “I love what Bill Traut (and Eddie Higgins) did. Our unembellished recording of ‘the White Ship’ and a couple of other songs left room for overdubbing. I approved it wholeheartedly. A classmate of mine at Northwestern, Paul Turvelt, is one of the horn players used on the session.”

According to Edwards, the band’s six-and-a-half-minute masterpiece, ‘the White Ship’ had been composed during a break in rehearsals earlier that spring. “That was a 15-minute song write,” he says. “I went out and sat in the hall on a bench and wrote ‘the White Ship’ in one pass.”

Continues Edwards: “I had this concept that we would be a communal group and that included the writing. So even though I was doing all the writing, I was crediting both David and Tony. What people would do is bring ideas. ‘That’s How Much I Love You (More or Less)’ came from an idea of Tony’s. I had been messing around with some chord changes and I liked his idea…so I wrote the lyrics using his idea.”

While Michaels agrees that the initial idea and melody for ‘the White Ship’ came from Edwards, he says the other members were instrumental in transforming the song into its final form. “We all agreed on the ‘communal’ sharing of the creative collaboration,” notes Michaels. “However, what George brought to us was instantly moulded into a new entity. By itself, the baritone melody and chords are merely a bare-bones beginning. Adding the harmonies, the feedback effects on lead guitar, and conceiving the ‘bolero’ rhythm all came into being in a group setting. Therefore, the piece known as ‘the White Ship’, along with ‘At the Mountains of Madness’ and ‘That’s How Much I Love You, Baby (More or Less)’ are collaborative efforts.”

The story behind the recording of ‘That’s How Much I Love You (More or Less)’ is an interesting one, claims McGeorge. “Because of the feel of that thing, George [Badonsky] wanted to bring in another drummer and a different bass player,” he says. “Michael and I didn’t like the idea, Michael more than me…but I kind of went along with this because at the time I wasn’t a jazz player at all. I listened to this groove that this one guy laid down, and I think Michael did too, and we kind of thought, ‘We can do this’. So, we went back and rehearsed it again one afternoon, we worked it out and went back into the studio and did it. Of course it came together really nice.”

Overall, H.P. Lovecraft stands up extremely well and is perhaps the group’s best work. Nevertheless, as McGeorge points out, by the time that the record reached the stores, the group had moved up several gears musically. “Once it was released the generally soft effect of the album was well received, but it became something of an anomaly. The band sound changed significantly over subsequent weeks, becoming much more powerful and focused.”

As the album was being readied for release that September, Philips issued ‘Wayfaring Stranger’ to stir up some interest. The single certainly did, and even led to several regional TV appearances, but ultimately did not chart nationally.

The following month, the fateful decision was made to oust Tony Cavallari, his place taken by former Shadows of Knight guitarist Joe Kelley. Within a week however, Cavallari was brought back in the fold as Edwards explains: “We felt Tony had gotten complacent and wasn’t working to become a better guitar player and we fired him. We got Joe to come in but within the chemistry of the group, immediately on firing Tony, we realised that was a huge mistake…that Tony was an integral part of the group, and lazy or not, he was the guitar player for the group and corrected our error.”

Michaels says he was never consulted on the decision to replace Cavallari and was surprised when Kelley turned up to a rehearsal one night. “Joe Kelley came to our rehearsal room in the wee hours of the morning,” remembers Michaels. “His volume almost blew the windows off the walls. A totally new dynamic was being introduced. I probably thought, ‘Who invited this guy?’ He could play, but Tony was our brother in this enterprise. A few floors below, a well-respected classical guitar teacher had his studio. Maybe he lived there too. At any rate, he called the cops. All of a sudden three or four plain clothed policemen entered our room. I could tell from their demeanour and movements [that] they were out to bust us. Thank God we were clean. All they could find was my pipe filled with Three-Star tobacco. They were definitely disappointed. We apologised for making too much noise, packed up and went home.”

McGeorge was equally puzzled by the decision to recruit his former band mate. “Whoever came up with that idea was just barmy because Joe’s just a monster blues player and [now] you’re going to put him in a group that needs somebody with melodic phrasing…somebody who’s gonna stand in the background primarily and Joe’s used to being up front.”

Although Cavallari was re-employed on the grounds that he was an “integral” member of the group, McGeorge feels that other factors forced Edwards’ hand. “Joe is just right up front, he’ll tell you what he thinks. George was very political and it drove him insane because Joe would challenge him if he said something that wasn’t true. Within four or five days, George called me up and said he wanted Tony back. I’m stuck between two friends here anyway…and I get the lacklustre job of taking [Joe] home.”

Continues McGeorge: “The reason he was brought in was Badonsky wanted a stronger guitar player before we went out west and so not only does Joe not get to play with the band, he doesn’t get to go play the Fillmore [Auditorium]. It was a really crummy deal.”

Shortly after Cavallari’s reinstatement, Philips issued H.P. Lovecraft to critical acclaim. Reviewing the album that November, Variety reported: “This is a highly talented new group with versatility of style and instrumentation, complemented by a memorable production. Some striking passages of psychedelic, oldtimey, folky and jazz music are woven together to produce highlights as ‘That’s How Much I Love You (More or Less)’, ‘That’s the Bag I’m In’, ‘the White Ship’ and ‘the Drifter’”.

Released to coincide with the album was a new single, ‘the White Ship’. With its sombre harmonies, droning feedback and baroque harpsichord passages, the album’s centrepiece was already popular with audiences and seemed an obvious choice. Initially, the single comprised an edited version on one side and a complete version on the other, but this original version was quickly withdrawn and replaced by an edited version featuring ‘I’ve Been Wrong Before’ on the flip side. The group’s cover of the Randy Newman song, which had already been a sizeable UK hit for Cilla Black two years earlier, was one of the album’s highlights. The track features Dave Michaels on a recorder that he had bought on the day of the session.

Though popular with fans, ‘the White Ship’ also failed to crack the national charts. Nevertheless, interest in the band’s work had already been kindled on the underground circuit and on the West Coast specifically. In November, Billboard magazine reported that H.P. Lovecraft had sold 1,100 copies “underground” in San Francisco even before any singles had been released to promote it.

The group’s strong fan base on the West Coast was probably due to a number of factors, not least the interest of legendary rock promoter Bill Graham, who McGeorge remembers raving about the album. “We were sitting in the dressing room at the Fillmore [Auditorium] and he wanted to come in and meet us before we played. He said: ‘You know how much music I listen to all day long?’ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘probably considerable’ and he said, ‘Someone brought that thing in and laid the needle down. By the time it was half way through the first cut I was on the phone to your booking agent’.”

Thanks to Graham’s persistence, H.P. Lovecraft were invited to perform at the bastion of hippie rock, the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco merely weeks after the release of H.P. Lovecraft. Opening for visiting English bands, Procol Harum and Pink Floyd on November 9, the group returned for the next two nights to provide a supporting role at San Francisco’s Winterland.
 
A week after the Fillmore and Winterland dates, the group headed down to Los Angeles to play at the Magic Mushroom on Hollywood Boulevard. Then it was back to San Francisco to support Scottish singer/songwriter Donovan, then making his Fillmore debut. A second string of dates, opening for Donovan at the Fillmore and Winterland (with Mother Earth also in support) took place later that month on November 23-25.

“I still remember Donovan in a flowing, multicoloured robe ascending to the stage, followed by his dad, also in a similar robe, carrying his son’s guitar,” says Michaels. “Donovan’s dad, however, still sported a slicked-down, parted down the middle, short haircut, typical of his generation. It was very charming.”

The group’s performances at the Fillmore were given considerable coverage in the local media. Philip Elwood, critic for the San Francisco Examiner, came backstage to meet the group after its Donovan gig and later wrote a beaming piece in which he heaped praise on H.P. Lovecraft who, he said, had stolen the show.

As far as McGeorge is concerned, the Procol Harum and Donovan shows represented the band at its very best. “That series of Fillmore performances was a Lovecraft highlight and the most enjoyable of my time with them. The band played and sang extremely well and the reviews were superb.”

The dates also gave McGeorge the rare opportunity to shine on the vocal front. “I did sing one song with them, a version of ‘Hey Joe’, which was never recorded and was simply a live performance time-filler. However, I was secretly tickled when the tune got a positive mention by one of the San Francisco papers.”

After making a lasting impression in San Francisco, H.P. Lovecraft were offered the opportunity to make a similar splash on the East Coast with a 12-day residence at Steve Paul’s The Scene in New York, opening on November 29.

The band’s performance garnered critical praise, not least from respected jazz magazine Downbeat. An Alfred G Aronowitz article, entitled, “A winter’s tale”, published the following March, described the band’s songs as those of the downtrodden. “H.P. Lovecraft make no claim on the razor-poor soul of the honky-tonks at 35th and Indiana, the Black Blues Belt of Chicago’s South Side,” wrote Aronowitz. “What they play comes out of the white commercial radio of immigrant Midwestern city cowboys…on stage at The Scene, they huddled around their music like railroad workers trying to start a fire against Lake Michigan’s wind.”

Returning to Chicago before Christmas, the band members came to the conclusion that relocating to San Francisco would greatly enhance their career opportunities and began making plans to leave Chicago in the spring. As McGeorge reveals however, the practicalities behind the move were not carefully thought through. “The move to San Francisco was really not well organised,” he says. “It was just a bunch of guys picking up, you know head west… without much of an idea where they were going to live, how they’re going to support themselves, so there was an awful lot of stress that came to bear on everyone.”

“The other issue too, was that we didn’t have much of a personal network with people out there,” adds McGeorge. “We were on great terms with Bill Graham…[in fact he] might have ended up managing the band because he really liked us. He made an awful lot of overtures.”

Looking back, McGeorge rues the band’s decision to turn down Bill Graham’s offer and remain with George Badonsky. “We really didn’t sign a contract with Badonsky until right before we ended up at the first gig at the Fillmore. We got overtures from Graham and George [Badonsky] got extremely nervous because that wasn’t someone he could compete with. We weren’t really sophisticated enough to know, ‘Hey, we might have a better horse to ride here’.”

Before the group relocated west that spring, it embarked on a string of dates on the East Coast, kicking off with a two-date stand at the Boston Tea Party on February 2-3, with local band Butter in support. “[The Boston Tea Party] was a second-rate Fillmore knock-off kind of place,” remembers McGeorge of the band’s eventful stay in Boston. “The Boston cops were none too happy with the goings on in the place, so what they decided to do was enforce the midnight curfew. At exactly 12 o’clock and one second after, a couple of the Boston bulls jumped on stage and said, ‘Stop the music’, so that was the end of the gig.”

After the police closed the show, right in the middle of the group’s last encore, Dave Michaels decided to take Mike Tegza to the city’s famous Old North Church where the old puritan Cotton Mather is buried. “The graveyard was pitch black and I remember taking some photos of Mike with his head on a tombstone or two,” recalls Michaels. “There were skulls on the tombstones. It was ‘creepily cool’.”

The next morning, Michaels took the rest of the group, dressed in stage costume, back to the church to take more pictures. “David was a history buff…and he said, ‘When we go to these places we need to go see some of the sights’, so we decided to go check out the Old North Church,” says McGeorge. “We were doing some home movie filming in the graveyard behind it when a few carloads of local goons decided to really hassle us.”

Michaels takes up the story. “A car filled with local gang members drove by and shouted some epithets. Tony, [who was] from a rough Indiana neighbourhood south east of Chicago, replied in kind and the car sped off. A boy of about 10 years of age witnessed the whole scene. He said to us: ‘You better get outta here if you don’t want to get killed’. Taking his word, we ran for our van and were pulling away just as two carloads of these toughs were screeching around the corner. Our assistant road manager dutifully stopped at the next stoplight! (Obey the traffic laws at all times, even though you and the two cars behind you are the only ones for miles).”
 
At this point, the locals jumped out of their cars and started to smash the windows of the van. Continues Michaels: “I yelled to the assistant roadie to get the hell out of there. He ran the next six or seven traffic lights. By now we had lost them and were in the suburb of Framingham. We went to the nearby police station and the scene was [like something] out of a Chaplin or Keystone Kops short. The cops were sitting with their feet up on the desks, drinking coffee, playing cards, eating doughnuts, etc.”

When the band finally got the police officers’ attention, they were told to go back and report the incident at the precinct where the incident had happened. Not wishing to run into the locals again, the band headed back to its motel. “We realised that we were hungry so we found a delicatessen owned by a couple of old Jewish guys who still had the tattoos on their arms from the concentration camps,” remembers Michaels.

After getting the van windows repaired, H.P. Lovecraft drove on to Philadelphia where they had a show at the Electric Factory the following week. Then it was another long drive to New York to provide support for Al Kooper’s jazz-rock ensemble, Blood, Sweat & Tears for a string of dates at the Café Au Go Go, kicking off on February 14.

As McGeorge explains, the mismatch of artists was just the beginning of the band’s problems. “The way the union contract would work in those days is…they’re supposed to give you half your money half way through. Our roadie [Patrick Hanks] goes to get paid and the guy says, ‘What you talking about? We’re not paying you!’ [Patrick] says, ‘Wait, I’ve got a union contract here’ and the guy, who was probably a mobster, looks at it and says, ‘No, I’ve got your union contract right here’.”

The group was forced to contact George Badonsky who flew in overnight from Chicago to try and smooth things over. The situation however, didn’t improve. Continues McGeorge: “We played the first set the next night…and the guy says, “No, I don’t pay for supporting bands, I don’t know who told you that’. He said, ‘I’ve got a contract here and I’m not going to pay you’. So, we basically stopped that third night, halfway through the gig, packed up and left and went back to Chicago.”   

Returning to the windy city to gather their things for the imminent move west, H.P. Lovecraft played a number of local gigs, including an appearance at the Cheetah (the old Aragon Ballroom) from March 1-3, with Sly and the Family Stone. “The Aragon was a stately old place and probably in the thirties and forties had society dances and things,” says McGeorge. “To turn it into the Cheetah, they just hung some sheets over the balcony areas and had disco balls…and the sound in the place, it was like playing at the bottom of a cave. In fact, I think the concert we played is probably still going on in there if the building still exists, bouncing around the rafters!”

Having honoured their local commitments, the group headed west, stopping off on the way to play the odd date, before settling into the tranquil surroundings of San Rafael, Marin County, just north of San Francisco. One of the group’s first major concert dates took place in mid-March, opening for Steve Winwood’s group, Traffic (with Blue Cheer, Mother Earth and Penny Nichols) at the Fillmore Auditorium and Winterland.

At this time, H.P. Lovecraft’s material was still largely drawn from the first album, although several new songs were beginning to be showcased, most notably, covers of Terry Callier’s ‘Spin, Spin, Spin’ and ‘It’s About Time’ (with additional lyrics by Edwards). No new original material was introduced during this period, apart from the previously recorded but subsequently shelved, ‘At the Mountains of Madness’.

With a frantic schedule, Edwards had found little time to compose material and the pressure of constant touring began to take its toll on the band’s fragile make up. Personal differences also ate away at the band’s cohesion.

“For what are to this day unknown reasons, there became increasing tension between George and me,” says McGeorge. “His overbearing nature and incessant criticism became extremely distracting, ultimately reaching a point where I was so paranoid I couldn’t perform.”

Barely a week after Martin Luther King’s assassination, H.P. Lovecraft travelled down to Los Angeles to play a string of dates, during which time a decision was made to fire McGeorge.

“We did a week at the Whisky [A Go Go],” says McGeorge, “and that’s when things came to ahead with me and George. I think Badonsky had kind of made the overture to Jeff [Boyan] and I was out the next week.”

Following an appearance at the Kaleidoscope (formerly the Hullabaloo) on April 12-14, on a bill featuring David Lindley’s group, Kaleidoscope and the Mint Tattoo, McGeorge handed over bass duties to his close friend Jeff Boyan (b. 1947, Hammond, Indiana, US), who had driven out from Chicago a few weeks earlier. (Boyan and McGeorge had played together in the pre-Saturday’s Children and Shadows of Knight band, the Blackstones).

While McGeorge admits that there were no hard feelings between the two friends, it obviously wasn’t easy being a witness to the change over. “We all lived together so I had to be around this whole thing,” says McGeorge. “I was 21 years old and I’d never been away from home before and suddenly I’m flat broke and I’ve got no gig.”

Says Edwards of the decision to bring Boyan in: “Jerry never really fit the group. He brought this energy, he was a great performer on stage…but we felt that Michael was just such an incredible drummer that we never felt like we had the bass player to really hold down the bottom of the group.”

Edwards also says that the band was looking for a stronger singer. “Jerry just wasn’t a very good singer. We were looking around and we heard through the grapevine that Saturday’s Children was experiencing some problems and might be breaking up. I had known Jeff [Boyan] for years…so we put out some feelers through our management to see if Jeff might be interested in joining. Lovecraft at that time was really rising up and doing better and better gigs, so we offered Jeff a chance and he came out and rehearsed with the group several times and joined the band.”     

Contrary to Edwards’ take on events, Michaels claims that no one else in the group was consulted on the decision to replace McGeorge. He also believes a compromise could have been found. “It was, I feel, similar, but even more grievous, to replacing Tony Cavallari months before,” he says. “It was cold. A business decision. I was not consulted. Jeff had a better voice. He still wasn’t part of our ‘musical family’. Jerry was and is a terrific guy who I had come to regard as a true friend. If we had had a meeting, perhaps we could have decided to move Jerry over to rhythm guitar. Again, the top down pecking was in operation, to the detriment of all. It, along with the continual pot usage, was indicative of where the group was headed.”

Edwards however, is adamant that the decision to oust McGeorge (as was the case with Cavallari months earlier) was made with everyone’s consent. “Lovecraft did things by committee,” he argues. “In both cases, a group vote was taken. This included the vote of David Michaels, who was most definitely a part of these decisions. Both firings had nothing to do with personalities and everything to do with music and musical contributions being made in the group.”

Reflecting on the decision to fire him, McGeorge remains philosophical. “You learn from stuff like that. I went home, took stock of myself and said, ‘No, I want to be a guitar player and I want to get a formal music education’ because I’d been so impressed with what David could do.”

As H.P. Lovecraft geared up to debut Boyan to its West Coast audience, McGeorge bid his friend goodbye and returned to Chicago. In the summer of 1969, he began a music degree at the Berklee School of Music in Boston, studying jazz guitar. Finishing his degree at the University of North Texas in 1978, McGeorge abandoned a career in music and went on to work in the auto industry, retiring as an executive with Ford Motor Company, Jaguar Cars Division in 2000.

H.P. Lovecraft resumed gigging, introducing Jeff Boyan at the Earl Warren Showgrounds in Santa Barbara on April 20. Returning to San Francisco shortly afterwards, the band rehearsed intensively in preparation for a headlining show at the Fillmore West (Carousel Ballroom) in early May, where the Crome Syrcus and the Loading Zone provided support. On the third and final night, the show was taped and later released in 1991 as H.P. Lovecraft Live by Tutman Records.

A few weeks later, the band was back at the Fillmore West to provide support to Big Brother & the Holding Company and the Clara Ward Singers. However, on this occasion, H.P. Lovecraft was forced to go on stage without George Edwards, who had an abscessed tooth and was in too much pain to perform. “Can you imagine a group known for it constant vocal duo harmonising to go on with only the top voice,” says Michaels. “My voice must have been all over the map, singing some of George’s [lines] and then ascending into my vocal area. We made it through the set or sets, and you know what? The crowd didn’t boo or object. They applauded.”

After seeing a dentist the next day, Edwards rejoined his colleagues and over the next couple of months, the band continued its punishing schedule, performing dates across the West Coast. “One of the problems of the group was that our management had us on the road constantly,” says Edwards. “I think out of a one-year period, we were on the road for 11 months. This was before bands were flying so we were driving everywhere. That’s really what was responsible for the demise of the group.”

Exhausted from the constant touring, the band was suddenly informed that a second album would have to be recorded pronto. In June 1968, the band entered the Beach Boys’ ID Sound Studio in Los Angeles, abetted by English engineer Chris Huston, who’d recently moved to the United States after years playing in the Liverpool group, the Undertakers.

Huston says he doesn’t remember how he got the project with H.P. Lovecraft because most of his work was by referral, word of mouth. Edwards confirms it was George Badonsky’s call, and as events transpired the decision proved to be a wise one. The young Englishman played a key role in the studio, greatly assisting the band in meeting its deadline.

As the musicians were “burnt out” from touring and didn’t have enough material to fill a long player, most of the album was improvisational and worked on in the studio, as Edwards explains. “I wrote most of the material either right in the sessions when we were recording, or the day before the sessions I’d be in the hotel putting together lyric fragments to try and make songs,” explains Edwards. “That’s how that album was cobbled together, with a wing and a prayer, because the record company was breathing down our necks for a record.”

One noticeable difference between H.P. Lovecraft 2 and its predecessor was the record’s “otherworldly” sounds, which were created by messing around with the studio’s keyboard. “It was a big Baldwin,” remembers Edwards. “It was almost like an organ that you would see in a church or cathedral, one of those multi-keyboards. Not your standard Hammond B3. It was just huge and it had all these sounds in it that were unusual.”

Chris Huston was instrumental in coming up with many of these sound effects, particularly on the Edwards/Michaels/Cavallari collaboration, ‘At the Mountains of Madness’, another tribute to the author, which had been recorded in an entirely different form for the debut album.

Huston explains how he came up with the unusual sounds. “What I did was, after recording the rhythm track with all the instruments, [I’d] turn the tape ‘over’ on the 16-track Ampex 1,000 tape machine. This meant that the music was now backwards. I re-recorded the organ onto another adjacent track while, at the same time, adding tape echo to it. When the tape was played in the correct direction [forward], the organ was now preceded by this wonderful, swirling echo effect. It was really a simple thing to do, but the effect gave the song a great feel. The whole project only took a couple of weeks, from tracks to mix.”

“Chris came up with a lot of very innovative techniques that prior to that record had not really been used,” says Edwards of Huston’s involvement. “He was way ahead of his time…and frankly we had no business being in the recording studio. We had no material, the band was totally fried and Chris helped us make a record. That record would never have happened without Chris.”

Perhaps the most unusual track to be recorded for H.P. Lovecraft 2 was the trippy ‘Nothing’s Boy’, created by Chicago word-jazzer Ken Nordine. Says Edwards of Nordine’s involvement: “George Badonsky introduced me to Ken when I was a youngster. He had a recording studio in his home that I used to use for independent production work. We were passing through [Chicago] on our way to play the Fillmore East [and] were doing some overdubs and Ken was wandering up and down the halls at Universal. I grabbed him…and we ad-libbed some stuff.”

Edwards remembers the L.A. sessions being memorable in other ways and recalls some “very weird energies going on” in the studio, thanks to the presence of Charles Manson, who attended some of the recording sessions with his friend, Beach Boy Dennis Wilson.

Michaels concurs with the “weird energies” but doesn’t recall any guests. “I was too much into cranking out sounds on the organ, piano and in the vocal booth to concern myself with guests,” says Michaels. “I do remember a lot of the guys sitting around ‘blowing smoke’ in the corners of the studio, and I thought to myself, ‘How are we going to get anything done here?’ Thank goodness, Mike Tegza kept going like the dynamo he was, greatly assisting the beautifully dissonant improvised effects coming out the organ, along with Chris Huston’s inspired dedication to helping us in every way possible.”

Two of the album’s strongest cuts featured new recruit Jeff Boyan on lead vocals. The folky ‘Blue Jack of Diamonds’, a Boyan composition, actually dated from his pre-Blackstones folk days and was written as far back as 1963. The group’s stunning version of Jesse Ed Wheeler’s ‘High Flying Bird’ meanwhile was taken from a Judy Henske album from the early 1960s and was another tune Boyan borrowed from his folk days.

‘High Flying Bird’ with its superb lead vocal should have been released as a single, but instead, Philips decided to go with the group’s rendition of Brewer & Shipley’s ‘Keeper of the Keys’. Despite a powerful lead vocal from Dave Michaels, the single failed to chart when it was issued later in the year.

Former member, Jerry McGeorge remembers rehearsing ‘Keeper of the Keys’ before his departure. “We got the demo on that. That was going to be our hit record. I kept going, ‘Hey, let’s do that tune’ and George kept saying, ‘No, I want the vibes to be just right’. What was really going on was they were working to bring someone else into the band and they didn’t want to do it with me and then relearn it with someone else.”

If the album’s music reflected a full-blown psychedelic experience, the jacket undoubtedly contributed to the overall ambience with its colourful illustrations and fragmented cover. The photography was provided by none other than Tom Gundelfinger, still a year or so away from photographing the famous jacket sleeve for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s Déjà Vu.

With the recordings wrapped up, the group travelled to New York to finish mixing the album and to support the Jefferson Airplane at the Fillmore East on July 19-20. The show proved to be one of the band’s best, despite the absence of Tony Cavallari who could not attend due to a draft physical in Chicago.

Reviewing the gig, Billboard remarked: “Organist Dave Michaels had good organ technique and displayed a strong voice. Guitarist George Edwards and bass guitarist Jerry McGeorge [sic] also sang and played well. And, in drummer Michael Tegza, the unit has an exceptional drummer.” The magazine singled out ‘Wayfaring Stranger’ and ‘the Drifter’ as two of the group’s best numbers. Variety also printed a positive review, claiming that H.P. Lovecraft’s had upstaged the headliners.

Back in California, the group resumed gigging, performing at the Sound Factory in Sacramento on August 24-25 alongside Kaleidoscope. Behind the scenes, however, the group was slowly unravelling. As the band’s long awaited second album reached the stores in mid-September Dave Michaels suddenly quit and returned to Chicago.

Looking back, Michaels says the seeds of his departure were sown during the album sessions: “I remember reading the Katzenzakis novel The Last Temptation of Christ while we were in Hollywood recording and being terribly taken with much of it. The question, ‘What is this all about?’ became a central feature in my thinking. ‘What am I doing here?’ Around this time I wrote a lyric called ‘Clear Sparrow of Night,’ and one day after the recording session finished, I decided to sound out the guys regarding what I had done.”

Michaels says the group’s immediate reaction was not what he was expecting. “It was dismissed out of hand, with no discussion or anything,” he says. “I believe they simply felt it wasn’t part of the current programme. ‘Clear Sparrow of Night’…came from some inner place, trying to make ’sense’ of it all… We were already well into finishing the second album and there was never any attempt to try to do anything with the lyric and its music. What got me some was that there was not even an attempt to acknowledge it or talk about its relative merits. I guess there wasn’t time. Things seemed to be moving very rapidly. It was all part of what I would call an unravelling.”

Michaels also singles out the absence of the group’s manager as a major factor: “I felt at the time that George Badonsky wasn’t offering much support, being content to get the ‘product’ out,” he says. “Maybe he thought everything was all right. I felt that the group was involved too much in recreational drug use and hedonistic activity, not ‘being there’ as they had been in the group’s early days. On the song ‘It’s About Time,’ I remember identifying with the powerful lyrics: It’s about time for the war to cease, and it’s about time for the dawn of peace. I felt that the group was getting away from that feeling, instead plunging into a more decadent, self abusive behavioural lifestyle. Sadly, I felt that my time was up. I determined that as soon as the album was completed, I would leave the group and go back to Chicago to finish up my degree in theory and composition at Northwestern University.”

Though the group’s second album had just been released, Michaels has no regrets about leaving at this critical moment: “Upon packing up my stuff and heading back to Chicago, I remember our wonderful lead guitarist, Tony Cavallari, saying something to the effect, ‘Dave, you’re throwing away a million dollars.’ I didn’t care and still don’t.”

Michaels feels the group had also begun to lose its way musically. “The magic that was Lovecraft involved a symbiotic relationship between the five original members,” he says. “With the dismissal of our original bass player, Jerry McGeorge that marked a beginning of the end for me. I felt we were becoming a commodity. George, Mike, Tony and Jeff Boyan had a right to their feelings and behaviour and I had a right to mine. It was simply time to end the relationship.”

Back home, Michaels re-did his senior year at Northwestern University, obtaining his bachelor’s degree in music theory and composition. “The school year from September 1968 to June 1969 was just the thing I needed,” he reflects. “I carried five courses instead of the usual four and ‘aced’ them all. While society was going to hell, what with the war in Vietnam, I needed to concentrate on the making of music free from what I considered ‘delusional crutches’.”

Former member Jerry McGeorge heard the news from a mutual friend in Chicago. “It was really bad timing,” he says, “the second album had just been released and they’d received a sizeable advance on their royalties. Once the record company realised what had happened they pulled the support on the album.”

Adds McGeorge: “It was really a shame what happened. Had [Michaels] stayed with them I’m confident that Lovecraft would be remembered today as one of the premier groups of the late 1960s.”

With Michaels out of the picture, the group looked for a replacement. A number of musicians were auditioned over the next month, including ex-Steve Miller Band keyboard player Jim Peterman, but no one fit the bill. Shortly afterwards, the group members went their separate ways, with most returning to Chicago.

From his vantage-point as a former member, McGeorge is not surprised that the group collapsed after Michaels left. “[David] sang tenor like a cantor and was a titanic keyboard player. Plus, it seemed that he could, almost at will, learn to play every conceivable oddball instrument needed for a stage performance. The guy was a genius… It would have been virtually impossible to replace him and keep the band’s identity and signature sound.”

Back in Chicago, Michael Tegza landed on his feet, replacing former Shadows of Knight drummer Tom Schiffour in jazz-rock outfit Bangor Flying Circus, alongside guitarist Alan De Carlo and keyboard player and singer Dave “Hawk” Wolinski. The group toured extensively during 1969 and signed a recording deal with Dunhill Records. In December of that year, the group’s lone eponymous album became a minor hit, peaking at US #190.

Tony Cavallari kept a much lower profile and gigged around Chicago before moving back to the West Coast. He then spent years working with the Grateful Dead, driving their tour equipment.

Jeff Boyan meanwhile, returned to his pre-Saturday Children’s roots and played the folk circuit. Speaking to Jeff Jarema in Here ‘Tis magazine in 1997, Boyan revealed his disappointment over H.P. Lovecraft’s premature demise: “I took an amplifier, went back to the same coffee houses and started singing as a ’single’. But I was just disgusted with driving up from Hammond to Chicago in freezing winter nights after being in Lovecraft, flying to New York and playing with Jefferson Airplane.”

Aside from working on the folk circuit, Boyan also became involved in an intriguing project known as Hezekiah. Joining forces with former Cryan Shames guitarist Jim Fairs in the summer of 1970, the group’s original line up also included singer/songwriter and guitarist Virginia Klemens.

“I had just finished a solo tour of Europe with the ‘Talented Teens’ foundation, when I first met Jim Fairs…in a Lyon-Healy music store in Oakbrook, Illinois,” says Klemens. “He told me he was looking for a female vocalist with guitar skills to enter a new band that he was presently forming with Jeff Boyan.”

“We started pulling together some tunes from Jeff’s last couple [of] albums, namely, ‘Blue Jack of Diamonds’ and ‘High Flying Bird’,” continues Klemens. “We also used ‘Hokey Throbmeat’ and ‘Dark Side of the Sun’ which Jeff wrote. Jim Fairs brought a couple of great tunes from the Band’s basement tapes [and] we added some great copy and some of my originals. Jeff’s harmony and bass guitar parts were absolutely wonderful!”

Around this time, the line up was expanded with the addition of keyboard player Jim Nyeholt from local group, Aorta. Says Klemens: “We rehearsed at his place for our first gig at a Chicago club called Beaver’s. My memory fails me about which drummers we auditioned and gigged with, but as I recall, we never got the position filled for any length of time. We put three sets together, and had sort of a ‘debut’, but the labels didn’t bite and the booking agents were elusive. We must have been together about one and a half to two years.”

After Hezekiah split, Boyan resumed his solo career on the folk circuit. He still performs around the Chicago area, and occasionally turns up at various Saturday’s Children reunions.

George Edwards, who remained in California when H.P. Lovecraft broke up, attempted to form a new group but was unable to find any suitable players for his project. Returning to Chicago, he found work for an agency promoting bands. In September 1969, he renewed his friendship with Terry Callier and co-produced six tracks for the singer/songwriter at Chicago’s Eight Trak Studios. The songs were later released on Callier’s CD First Light - Chicago 1969-1971.

But H.P. Lovecraft’s ghost continued to haunt and in late 1969, Edwards attempted to reform the band. Following his brief stint with Bangor Flying Circus, Michael Tegza agreed to participate in a new line up, which also included studio session guitarist Jim Donlinger (b. James Vincent Dondelinger, February 8, 1943, Chicago, Illinois, US) and bass player Michael Been (b. Oklahoma, US). At the time, both were members of Chicago band, Aorta and were brought into the new line up by former Lovecraft associate Bill Traut. More importantly, it looked like Dave Michaels would also rejoin the band on this occasion.

With Bill Graham handling H.P. Lovecraft’s affairs, Edwards and Traut flew down to Los Angeles to meet Mo Ostin, president of Reprise Records, a subsidiary of Warner Brothers. After negotiating a deal with the label, Edwards returned to Chicago to gather the musicians for the imminent move west, at which point it became clear that Michaels would not be a part of the project.

“I remember Jim Donlinger, one of the new Lovecraft guys, coming to my house so that we could head out to California,” says Michaels. “I couldn’t bring myself to answer the door. By then, I was continuing on what can only be described later as a ’spiritual search,’ one that didn’t include Lovecraft.”

With Michaels out of the picture, the group headed out to Kenwood, northern California to live in a communal Spanish-style mansion called “Goff House” in the Valley of the Moon. In early 1970, the group (now shortened to Lovecraft) expanded its line up by recruiting former Buckinghams’ keyboard player/singer Marty Grebb (b. September 2, 1946, Chicago, Illinois, US), who was brought up from Los Angeles. (Grebb had worked with Donlinger in the rock band, the Exceptions during the early 1960s).

Lovecraft began rehearsing, but after only a few days, Edwards dropped out of the group and subsequently moved out of the house with his family. He returned to his folk roots and began performing on the California folk circuit as a solo performer.

The loss of Lovecraft’s founding member could have spelt the end of the group, but the musicians convinced Bill Graham to see the project through. The truncated line up completed sessions for its lone album, appropriately titled, Valley of the Moon, that summer, but the music bore no resemblance to the band’s original work.

With the album recorded, Lovecraft hit the road, embarking on a tour of the Northwest, first with the Boz Scaggs Band and (later) with Leon Russell and Cold Blood.  By the time Valley of the Moon reached the stores in May 1971, the band’s members had gone their separate ways. It didn’t matter anyway; the album sank without a trace, as did the extracted single ‘We Can All Have It Together’.

“When I heard the Valley of the Moon album, I couldn’t believe it,” says Michaels. “‘What record company would put this out, duping the public to make a few bucks?’ I thought. It was sad. The guys on the album are all terrific. It’s just that it wasn’t Lovecraft.”

Marty Grebb had been the first to leave, joining forces with ex-Illinois Speed Press guitarist Kal David and former Electric Flag bass player Harvey Brooks in the Fabulous Rhinestones. From there, Grebb moved into session work and later became a longstanding member of Bonnie Raitt’s support group.

Michael Tegza was the next to leave, rejoining George Edwards in a new group called Elixir. Formed in early 1971, the band’s line up also included guitarist Paul Elliott, bass player Don Luther (later a member of the Ducks) and the late, keyboard player Ted Ashford, who went on to play on albums by Mike Bloomfield and Jesse Colin Young. Managed briefly by Bill Graham, Elixir played a handful of shows, including one at San Francisco’s Winterland on April 30, 1971, supporting Ten Years After, but never recorded. Soon afterwards, the group broke up.

As for the other Lovecraft members - Jim Donlinger went on to record a string of solo albums and has recently published his autobiography Space Traveller - a Musician’s Odyssey. Michael Been fronted the rock band the Call throughout the 1980s and starred in the movie, the Last Temptation of Christ. He also released a solo album, On the Verge of a Nervous Breakthrough in 1994.

Lovecraft should have ended there but Michael Tegza refused to abandon the name. In 1975, he assembled a new, funk band under the banner and recorded the critically panned We Love You Whoever You Are for Mercury Records.

“Mike Tegza called me back in 1975 to let me know about Lovecraft’s new album,” remembers Michaels. “He sent it to me and I was amazed. Seemingly everything the group did was in a polymetre time signature, 7/8, 11/8, 5/4, all strange time signatures. I asked Mike how he managed to play along with…that complex, constantly changing rhythmic stuff. He replied that he ‘didn’t know’. He just used his innate sense and tremendous ability to keep up with whatever the female singer and her backup wanted to do. He also told me that he and the group went to some concert venue in Chicago where Bill Graham was in attendance. They somewhat forcefully convinced him to come with them to their rehearsal hall to hear what they were doing. What Bill thought of all this I don’t know. It was probably a really low level kidnapping.”

Since the final Lovecraft album, Tegza’s whereabouts have been a mystery (it’s rumoured that he’s become a born-again Christian and lives in Texas). His former colleagues have likewise kept a low profile. During most of the 1980s and 1990s, George Edwards concentrated on production work. Setting up his own production company, Ad Songs, he kept busy making jingles for radio and television. Working with Brownie McGee and Sonny Terry, Doc Watson and Leon Redbone, he produced 14 tracks for the Levi 501 blues campaign, and has also provided music for various TV commercials, most notably, Chevrolet Trucks.

In the last few years, he has returned to the folk circuit performing under his real name Ethan Kenning and in December 2003 played at the San Carlos 1960s Music Festival in Sonora, Mexico to benefit the heroes of Hurricane Marty. Edwards has also got together with Dave Michaels on several occasions and the pair has recorded a few songs in Edwards’ home studio.

Dave Michaels worked for several years as a pianist/vocalist at Max’s Opera Café in San Francisco and also spends time working with the Tango/Cabaret Ensemble Bizou. In 2001, he issued his debut solo album, In Dust I Sing under his real name David Miotke. On the album, he sings and plays original compositions to the Ghazal lyrics of Francis Brabazon and Bhau Kalchuri.

Apart from Michaels, Edwards has only kept in contact with the group’s original guitarist, Tony Cavallari. A while back, Cavallari approached Edwards to produce a female singer/songwriter that he was working with, but the project was short lived. He currently runs a lumberyard in Willits, California.

Despite the group’s premature demise, interest in H.P. Lovecraft has grown steadily over the years. In 1988, UK collector’s label Edsel released the album At the Mountains of Madness, which included the group’s two albums alongside both sides of the ‘Anyway That You Want Me’ single.

In 1991, US indie label, Tutman Records produced a fabulous live recording of the group from the Fillmore West on May 11, 1968. The CD demonstrates how powerful and together the group was on stage. Both of the band’s two albums were issued again last year on CD by Collectors Choice Music, together with the ‘Anyway That You Want Me’ single.

Looking back, McGeorge has this to say: “It was a truly interesting mix of individuals…if they’d got as far as a third album that would have been one of the most remembered bands of the late 1960s.”

Many thanks to Ethan Kenning, Dave Miotke, Jerry McGeorge, Chris Huston, Jeff Jarema, Alfred G Aronowitz, Brian Hogg, Virginia Klemens, James Vincent, Ron Holder and Greg Shaw for their help. Special thanks to the Los Angeles Free Press for the use of the adverts from the L.A Free Press Archive.

Copyright © Nick Warburton, 2009, unless otherwise specified. All Rights Reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced or transmitted in any from or by any means, without prior permission from the author.

Please feel free to contact me with any further information or corrections at: nick_warburton@hotmail.com