Redirected from: Blue Chee

Blue Cheer

Play Radio
Listen to Blue Cheer Radio, featuring artists like Sir Lord Baltimore, Leaf Hound, Iron Butterfly, Cactus and more…

1,016,208 plays (127,820 listeners)

Shop now at Amazon | Send Blue Cheer Ringtones to Cell
Buy
Add to my Library

San Francisco, United States (1968 – 1971, 1988 – 2009)

Blue Cheer is an American group of the late 1960s and early 1970s, who helped to pioneer music. Based in San Francisco, original personnel were singer/bassist Dickie Peterson, guitarist Leigh Stephens, and drummer Paul Whaley. A power trio, the band was named after a variety of LSD promoted by underground chemist and Grateful Dead backer Owsley Stanley. This variety of LSD took its name from a popular laundry detergent. Their first hit was a cover version of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum (1968). The single peaked at #14 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, their only such hit, and the album peaked at #11 on the Billboard 200 chart.

The group’s sound was hard to categorize, but was definitely -based, , and very loud. The band has been subsequently acclaimed as an influence on , , heavy metal, and . Julian Cope has written, “In 1968, nothing but nothing in America and Britain sounded as brutal as Blue Cheer except for The Velvet Underground.”

The group underwent several personnel changes after the 1968 release of Outsideinside, and then through yet more changes during and after 1969’s New! Improved! Blue Cheer (different guitarists on side 1 and 2). After Leigh Stephens was replaced by Randy Holden, formerly of Los Angeles garage rock band The Other Half, in 1968, Blue Cheer’s style changed to a more commercial sound à la Steppenwolf or Iron Butterfly. For the fourth album Blue Cheer, Holden, who had left during the third album, was subsequently replaced by Bruce Stephens. Stephens later quit and was replaced by Gary Lee Yoder, who helped complete the album.
Read more… Edit bio

Popular tags: , , , ,  See more

Share this artist:

Top Albums

  • Vincebus Eruptum
    Blue Cheer Play
    Buy
  • Outsideinside
    Blue Cheer Play
    Buy
  • Good Times Are So Hard To Find
    Blue Cheer Play
    Buy
  • Blue Cheer
    Blue Cheer Play
    Buy
See more

Top Tracks

1
570
2
193
3
191
4
144
5
139
6
131
7
84
8
77
9
71
10
64
10
64
10
64
13
61
14
59
15
58
Buy all tracks at Amazon MP3
See more

Shoutbox

Leave a comment. Log in to Last.fm or sign up (it’s free).
See all 304 shouts

Videos

See more

Listening Now

Top Listeners

See more

More Information

Links
Band Members
Labels

Email Newsletter

Universal Music Group Get exclusive tour, release & promotion updates on Blue Cheer from Universal Music.