I was looking for a video on YouTube and came across some old Smothers Brothers things from their 1960’s show. Time has kind of faded the notoriety they had at that time in America. Most people, especially those under 40, think of the Smothers Brothers and think of a couple of older, very straight looking guys in tuxes performing skits with the Boston Pops or Tommy Smothers doing his YoYo Man act. Hardly anything controversial there.
But in the late 60’s their Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour was a huge hit on CBS, bringing political irreverence and protest along with the best music of that era’s youth to a wide audience. They were cancelled at the peak of their popularity in 1969 in a dispute with CBS over censorship, an action that they later filed suit and won against CBS.
I loved the show when I was a kid. It was funny and smart and said the things that the news coverage of the time refused to say, particularly about the war in Viet Nam. You have to realize how much narrower the options were at that time for hearing something out of the mainstream.
I especially liked the music. Pete Townsend of the Who claims to have lost his hearing in one ear when Keith Moon exploded his drum set during a performance on the show. Pete Seeger had a famous appearance singing Waist Deep In the Big Muddy as a protest against the war. So much great stuff.
I happened across this segment featuring Kenny Rogers and the First Edition doing their hit Just Dropped In ( To See What Condition My Condition Was In), a song that most young people will no doubt associate with its part in The Big Lebowski‘s dream sequence with The Dude, as shown above. This video with Kenny Rogers in his pre-Gambler days has pretty much the same feel, in that 1960’s goofy TV psychedelic effect way. Take a look…
Redtree Times 