Quicksilver Messenger Service
 One of the first West Coast groups, Quicksilver Messenger
Service formed in San Francisco in 1965 and built up a big
reputation in that area from their free concerts.
The original line-up comprised John Cipollina, Jim Murray, Gary
Duncan, Greg Elmore and Dave Freiberg (who would go on to join
Jefferson Airplane).
Jim Murray left the group not long after they performed at the
Monterey International Pop Festival in June 1967.
The band then began a period of heavy touring on the West Coast
of the US where they featured many times at both the Avalon
Ballroom and the Fillmore West
Of all the great bands in San Francisco's cosmic hall of fame,
QMS were the last to sign a record deal. Tired of waiting for
singer Dino Valenti to get out of Folsom prison following a drug
bust, they signed without him in late 1967 and recorded a decent
but strangely subdued self-titled debut that only hinted at the
majesty of the dual guitar work conjured by John Cipollina and
Gary Duncan at their live shows.
The band decided to record the follow-up LP live at Bill
Graham's Fillmore West in San Francisco (although Capitol also
recorded gigs at the Fillmore East). Half a dozen
performances recorded in November 1968 at both venues provided the
spine of the album that became Happy Trails.
At the time, QMS were living across the Golden Gate Bridge on a
ranch in Mill Valley, where they staged acid-fuelled 'cowboys and
indians' fights with The Grateful Dead.
These shoot-outs inspired the artwork for the album and George
Hunter of The Charlatans came up with perfect image of the Old
West for the front cover. The back featured pen-and-ink cowboy
portraits of the band, like extras from a Wild West show.
Naming the LP after the Roy Rogers theme tune, they tricked
drummer Greg Elmore into singing it in a cowboy drawl. Yet what
preceded this campfire coda couldn't have been more different.
Side one featured a 20-minute psychedelic work-out on Bo
Diddley's
Who Do you Love? spliced together from different live
shows, with two free-flowing guitars cross-stitching soaring
arpeggios and stinging feedback.
Side two offered more of the same, opening with a tumultuous
version of Diddley's Mona, while the screaming lead
guitar lines on the album's only studio cut, Calvary,
represented the band's interpretation of the crucifixion. The
track ends with the coming of the angels, before the spirit of Roy
Rogers takes over. "We were really swacked out when we
conceived that one," Cipollina later confessed.
Duncan left the group not long after Happy Trails - largely
because of his escalating drug problems. For their 1969
album, Shady Grove, QMS were augmented by renowned
English session keyboardist Nicky Hopkins.
Guitarist John Cipollina left in the early 1970's, going on to
lead the group Copperhead, and later playing in a variety of
outfits, from the Welsh band Man to San
Francisco's Dinosaurs. He
passed away on 29 May 1989 of complications from a respiratory
ailment. He was 45.
Dino Valenti died in November 1994.
In recent years, original members Gary Duncan and Dave Freiberg
have been touring as the Quicksilver Messenger Service, using
different musicians to back them up.
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