No Filler Music Podcast - Sidetrack: The Mamas & The Papas - Mansions

Episode Date: February 27, 2018

On this week's Sidetrack we take a closer look at Cass Elliot of The Mamas & The Papas, and her drug-fueled relationship with David Crosby. We listen to one of Q's favorite songs of theirs, "Mansions", which appears on their 4th studio album The Papas & The Mamas. For more info, check out the shown notes: https://www.nofillerpodcast.com/episode/ep-6-crosby-stills-nash-s-t#sidetrack Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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From festive and cozy fashion to lux beauty and fragrance sets Our special selection has something for every style and price point Visit our Holtz holiday shop and store or online at Holtrenfrew.com And this is our sidetrack episode for the week This is no filler my name's Quentin Got my brother Travis with me as always Last week we talked about Crosby Stills and Nash and their self-titled debut album that came out in 1969.

And we kind of touched briefly on this in that episode. They spent a lot of time in Laurel Canyon, which was just outside of L.A. It was kind of a music collective in the 60s. And they were good friends with Cass Elliott, aka Mama Cass, one of the singers in the Mamas and the Pappas. And that's what this episode's going to be all about. Travis, how much about the Mamas and the Pappas do you know?

I know a few of their songs. Yeah. I know now after doing research on Crosby Stills and Nash that Mama Cass is largely responsible for getting those three dudes together. Yeah. Other than that, that's all I really know. Yeah, so they had a good four years of being in the spot. spotlight before Cass Elliott kind of started to go south with her health and her drug addictions.

Yeah, it was a flame that lit bright for a very short amount of time. The song that everyone in their dog knows, I assume, is California Dreaming, which was on their first album that came out in 1966 called If You Can Believe Your Ears. Well, what about, I think everybody knows Monday Monday. Oh, that's true. At least that's the one that I, I think that was the first, okay, dude, you remember this, it was a cassette tape that had a bunch of hits on it. You remember that?

Yes. I don't know, I don't know, I mean, I guess it was probably one of our parents. It had to be. I remember hearing Monday Monday on that record. I'm sorry, on that tape, on that cassette tape. Yeah. Yeah. You know what, dude?

I remember those two. I feel like it was like I mean, this shows how young we are to people that were of the right age to actually purchase and listen to cassette tapes. I mean, was each side one song? Is that how it worked? No, they had full albums on cassette.

No, but this was like a mixed. This was a mixtape, this was a mixtape, you know. What else was on there? Do you remember? So it wasn't all Mamas and the Pappas. I don't remember, dude. but for some reason that's the one that's that that are that I remember listening to yeah so Monday Monday another great song that was that was a single on the same album which was their

debut so they had Monday Monday and California Dream on their debut album but this sidetrack is going to be mainly about I guess the the fall of the Mamas and the Pappas it's going to get a little dark um so the intro I played a little clip from one of the songs off the album that we covered last week. Crosby, Seals, and Nash, they're self-titled. The song is called Pre-Rode Downs. And as you heard in that clip, according to David Crosby, Cass Elliott is featured in that song. Her vocals are.

And he really doesn't give enough information. He's kind of like purposely not telling you. Like, if you know, you know, but otherwise, like, she's not credited in the album, but she does show up on one of the songs in the album. And so I did a little quick research, and as much as I can trust this message board, just a random message board, someone had posted like, hey, I watched this documentary about Cass Elliott, and David Crosby was interviewed, talking about her showing up on the debut album. Which song is it?

And someone comments it. It's pre-road downs. Check it out. And other people confirm it. It seems kind of like that's what everyone's saying. So I just went and listened to that song and just kind of listened for what I thought may have been Cass Elliott doing backing vocals. And it seems like she pops up in that chorus there. I don't know. Could you hear her?

Yeah, we'll have to hear it again, dude. That's not our sidetrack episode. No, no, no, no. No, I mean, I guess that's the thing, though. like I I assume that these are the only three singers on the sound like I didn't so right and that's so is it only in that one part of the song I mean that's if you listen to the song all the way through it only seems obvious during that chorus part oh I can hear it dude I'm hearing yeah I can hear it you can hear a female you can hear a female vocal track yeah and it's not

just a female vocal track it's cast Elliott dude you're sure to be her yeah sure of course yeah yeah yeah yeah um so let's dive into the album that our sidetrack appears on so i started collecting vinyl right out of high school i moved out to austin which is a great place to start getting into vinyl collecting there's a lot of unbelievable record stores out there and i picked up this album by the mamas and the papas called the papas and the mamas and it is their fourth studio album. It was released in 1968 and I kind of did a little research into it. Turns out this was their first album that wasn't recorded in a proper studio. Members of the band John and Michelle Phillips

had just built a home out in Bel Air and they transformed their attic into a recording studio. So on the one hand, they mentioned it being nice because they could kind of take their time. The way he put it, you know, I could be high all the time and record my stuff and not have any pressure. But what ended up happening is they kind of went a little obsessive over it. John Phillips is kind of the leader of the band and he was kind of a perfectionist. So apparently they spent one whole month doing just a. the vocals on one song, which is a song called The Love of Ivy, which is one of the singles on the album. So they weren't having a good time.

And they actually ended up, the mama's and the papas split during the process of making this album. Before they even release it, they split. So this was the last album of theirs for a while because they split up. A lot of them were kind of going through their own stuff. Cass Elliott in particular was getting quite depressed. So to tie it back to Crosby Stills and Nash one more time here, Cass Elliott apparently did a lot of drugs with Crosby. There was a quote here in a memoir that he published in 1988.

It talks about his heroin use with Elliot. He says, me and Cass Elliott were closet junk takers and used to get loaded with with each other quite a bit. We loved London because there was pharmaceutical heroin available in drugstores there. Me and Cass used to just mash them up and snort the powder. Cass took lots of pills, usually from the opiate family, downers of all sorts, and we did a lot of coke together. So that's got to be a shitty thing on his conscious, dude,

because her drug use and her health basically is pretty much what ended her life. This is a dark episode, brother. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, man. I'm sorry, man. I'm sorry, man. I'm kidding. So this was their last album.

And the only reason they ended up actually completing the album and releasing it was just out of pressure from their contracts that they had with their record label. And the song that I picked, this is the only song from the album that I actually remember. It's track six called Mansions. And it's kind of about, well, let me just play the song. And we'll kind of get into the lyrics behind it and everything. Sitting in our mansion, guarded by expansion, questioning our expansion, questioning our mansion. motives and our means wondering why this isn't like the tree.

I like that song, man. That's cool. Yeah, really cool. So I've never heard that song. Yeah. What did you like about it? I don't know. I guess the, you know, it's, it's, it's, I feel like I, I feel like I have a small collection of words that I use over and over again to describe things, but like it's, it's, yeah, I don't want to say dark. dude but it's dark i okay the reason i like it i feel like the mood that the song kind of brings when you listen to it matches the lyrics quite well the lyrics sitting in our mansion guarded by expansion questioning our motives and our means wondering why this isn't like the dream so right off the bat interesting so dude that almost sounds like they're saying hey i you know

You have all this money, but it's not what you... It's not like you imagined it would be. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, that's... I mean, I think we've all heard that a billion. You know, grass is always greener kind of thing. I've always felt that money is the root of all evil, right? I mean, that's an age old saying.

Are you trying to wage class warfare right now, dude? I am. No, I know there's studies done that, like, at a certain point, you reach a certain amount of money that you're making. every year or whatever. If you make any more than that, your happiness is not going to increase with the amount of money that you make at a certain point.

Yeah, that's like the law of diminishing returns or whatever, you know. We're getting real on this episode. Hey, it's just a little sidetrack, man. No one listens to these, right? No one cares about the side tracks. How dare you? Questioning our motives and our means, right? Like, yeah, we've got all this,

but I'm kind of questioning everything that led to us making this money. So is that what the song is about? Like, does, I couldn't, I wasn't really following along with the lyrics. Like, yeah, does it follow along on that vein? Like, it's just, this is, from the perspective of a wealthy person who, yes, who is, like, questioning all of it. Yeah. A few lines down.

A gentle Spanish lady cooks our meals, but we never ask her how she feels. Interesting. Okay. Limousines and laughter parties ever after. If you play the game, you pay the price. Purchasing a Piece of Paradise. I love it, dude. This song has stuck with me since I heard it.

So it's a dark episode, but, you know, Mama Cass can get credit for maybe bringing these three guys, Crosby Stills and Nash, together. But her relationship with Crosby was one of a lot of drug abuse. And that's, that is dark, but, I mean, that's kind of the reality of it. She had a great voice. Mamas and the Pappas had some great songs and this album is great. I'm glad that they finally finished it and that it's actually released.

I recommend listening to it. There's quite a few great songs that I really like. Mansions is the one that sticks out for me. But one of the other singles for The Love of Ivy is a great song. There's another song called Safe in My Garden that's really good. Yeah, definitely worth checking out. So that is our side.

track for the week. Just a brief look at the Mamas and the Pappas. Cass Elliott and her relationship with Crosby Stills and Nash. And next week, we're going to be covering one of our favorite folk duos, Kings of Convenience. We're going to talk about their first album, Quiet as the New Loud. I'm so excited to talk about that, dude. It's a good, it's a good follow-up to to the Grosby's Tales and Nash episode because it's kings of convenience they are sort of a modern day Simon and Garfunkel you know yeah I think we said that we said that on the last episode but like yeah it'll be a good follow-up to see kind of what I think they're one of the best folk duos to come out ever so I mean I agree it'll be good to yeah yeah it's good to to kind of see like where they

picked up you know where right how they picked up where guys like Crosby Stills and Nash and Simon and Garfunkel where they left off, you know? Because you know they were influenced heavily by Simon and Garfunkel. Absolutely.

And it's probably safe to say a little bit of CSN as well, yeah. For sure. For sure. That's right. All right. So, yeah, we're just going to close out this album. I'm going to fade it in

and we're going to just kind of finish off the song. There's a really cool line at the end and they kind of repeat it over and over. The end of the song ends with them basically saying, please, please, live your life and live it as you please. Live your life just as you please. That's how the song ends. So, yeah, it's a heavy song.

So again, this is a track off of the Mamas and the Pappas' fourth studio album that came out in 1968 called The Pappas and the Mamas. and check back in a few days. We're going to have our next episode up. And be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes, rate us and review us if you like what you hear. If you don't like what you hear, write us and review us. We want to hear from you.

We want to hear your questions, your comments, your concerns. And check us out on SoundCloud as well at soundcloud.com slash no-filler podcast. You can stream our app from there as well. and yeah we will see you soon and by see you i mean we'll be uh entering your cochleas i think that's how you pronounce it cochlea uh your eardrums in a few days my name's Quinn i'm Travis all right take care