PENNY ARKADE, "The Penny Arkade" [imagined LP]

Penny Arkade

THE PENNY ARKADE   (1969)   

Isha*     [Ah Feel Like Ahcid! - 30 American Psychedelic Artefacts From The EMI Vaults]
No Rhyme or Reason
Sick and Tired
(She Brought Me) Something Beautiful**   [Swim Through the Darkness: Unreleased Songs]
I Need You*     [Book A Trip: The Psych Pop Sounds of Capitol Records]
Split Decisions
Our Love Has Come**   [Swim Through the Darkness: Unreleased Songs]
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Woodstock Fireplace
Sparkle & Shine
I Can't Go On*   [Book A Trip 2:More Psych Pop Sounds of Capitol Records]
Face in the Crowd
Year of the Monkey
Give Our Love (To All the People)

 Special thanks for the unreleased music to Feral House

All other tracks taken from the Sundazed re-issue of Not the Freeze

Chris Ducey met Craig Smith while auditioning and landing starring roles along with Suzannah Jordan in a series pilot

called The Happeners about a Greenwich Village folk trio. They performed their own original songs, and there was an appearance by the Dave Clark Five. ABC never picked up the series, and the pilot itself seems to have aired only once and is currently lost. Craig Smith had been in the Good Time Singers for their two albums on Capitol in 1964. Together Chris and Craig made the pop-psych gem “Isha”, released by Capitol in July of 1966, with “I Need You” on the flip.

They spent nearly a year rehearsing their originals with musicians including Don Glut on bass and Mort Marker on lead guitar. They cut a demo, now seemingly lost, “Rhyme or Reason” (written by Chris) and “(She Brought Me) Something Beautiful” (written by Craig) with John London of the Louis and Clark Expedition.

In 1967, they formed the Penny Arkade with Don “Marvel” Glut on bass and Bobby Donaho on drums. Michael Nesmith backed them with equipment and rehearsal space and they started playing live shows. Nesmith brought them into TTJ studios in Hollywood and Wally Heider’s studio. Late in 1967 they went into RCA studios to record songs for what they anticipated would be their first album, including the twelve-minute “Not the Freeze”.

Also at the end of 1967 the Monkees used a Craig Smith composition, “Salesman” as the opening song for their album Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd.. Smith placed other songs, such as “Country Girl” with Glen Campbell, and “Holly” with Andy Williams. He co-produced with Bob Thiele a single for Heather MacRae, his girlfriend at the time, writing both songs “Hands of the Clock” / “Lazy Summer Day”, and with the Penny Arkade providing the music.

Enriched by his songwriting royalties, Craig Smith decided to leave the Penny Arkade to travel in South America and Asia. He returned around 1970 a changed man. Monkees producer Chip Douglas ran into Craig in 1971. “He was spaced out and had come back from Peru and had an album he was selling hand to hand. He had a spider tattooed in the middle of his forehead. He was just a nice kid, a nice American boy. To see him years later it was pretty bizarre. He said ‘Remember me. I used to be Craig Smith'”.

Without Craig, the Penny Arkade recorded four more songs, “Woodstock Fireplace,” “Sparkle and Shine,” “Face in the Crowd” and “Year of the Monkey”, and then added a new lead guitarist, Dave Turner. Turner left and they added David Price on rhythm, John Andrews on lead guitar and Bob Arthur, and rechristened the band Armadillo for another year or so of live shows. Craig utilized half a dozen Penny Arkade songs on his early ’70s solo albums, Apache and Inca under his new name, Maitreya Kali. The rest of the Penny Arkade tracks were not released until Sundazed collected what could be found on Not the Freeze, though many other recordings including their masters seem to have been lost. Craig Smith passed away in 2012.