Fooling Around at 50

A different bishop and his flock. . .

“Fooled Around And Fell in Love” first appeared on his Elvin Bishop’s Struttin’ My Stuff album, released 50 years ago in 1975. The following year the tune charted as a single, with Mickey Thomas on the vocal, and has since been discovered by generations since born.

Elvin Bishop 1966, and today

Check out the youthful Britt responding to a live performance of “Fooled Around,” with Bishop and Thomas in fine form. Thomas moved on to the Jefferson Starship but for many viewers this will be their first encounter with Elvin Bishop. He came up with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band and you can hear him sing on “Drunk Again,” more of a monologue, followed by a scorching solo. That is from the In My Own Dream album, with Gene Dinwiddie on tenor saxophone and the late David Sanborn on alto. In the title tune David shows his mastery of the soprano sax.

That same horn section backs Butterfield on The Resurrection of Pigboy Crabshaw album, also from 1968. By that time guitarist Mike Bloomfield had departed to form The Electric Flag. Hear Mike on “Killing Floor,” which cuts off a speech by Lyndon Johnson. Hear Bishop and Bloomfield on “East West,” a high point for both players. Bloomfield, the guitarist on Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone,” passed away in 1981 but at this writing Bishop is still strumming at 82. It’s possible that “Fooled Around” is autobiographical and many reactors seem to take it that way. At some point, love just got a hold on them.

Ten years earlier, the Righteous Brothers were telling a lady “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” supposedly the most played song of the twentieth century. Easy to find great reactions, such as this and this, from No Limit Twan. And check out the perceptive Britt reacting to the brothers on Willie Dixon’s “I Just Want to Make Love to You.” She gets it.

Some reactors wish they had lived through that time, which those who did can surely understand. In music, as in all of life, it’s all about memory against forgetting.