Forever Changes

Forever Changes is the third studio album by the American rock band Love, released in November 1967 by Elektra Records. The album saw the group embrace a subtler folk-influenced sound based around acoustic guitars and orchestral arrangements, while primary songwriter Arthur Lee explored darker themes alluding to mortality and his growing disillusionment with the era's counterculture. It was the final album recorded by the original band lineup; after its completion, guitarist Bryan MacLean left the group acrimoniously, and Lee subsequently dismissed the other members.

Forever Changes had only moderate success on the album charts upon release, peaking at No. 154 in the US and No. 24 in the UK. In subsequent years, it has become recognized as an influential document of 1960s psychedelia and named among the greatest albums of all time by a variety of publications.

Background

File:Love (1966).png

Love in 1966; one year before the beginning of the album's recording.

Love released two albums in 1966: their self-titled debut and Da Capo. Both were moderately successful, as were the singles "My Little Red Book" and "7 and 7 Is".Template:Sfn However, the group's opportunity for major national success was hampered by bandleader Arthur Lee's unwillingness to tour.Template:Sfn Biographer Barney Hoskyns writes that Lee possessed a "lack of interest in life outside [the band's hometown] Los Angeles",Template:Sfn while Andrew Hultkrans characterizes his mindset by "near-agoraphobia, [a] fear of people, [and] self-imposed isolation".Template:Sfn

For Da Capo, Love had expanded from five members to seven in order to experiment with a more jazz-influenced style. However, shortly after the album released, Lee decided the experiment had run its course and fired saxophonist/flautist Tjay Cantrelli and drummer-turned-keyboardist Alban "Snoopy" Pfisterer.Template:Sfn The Forever Changes lineup of Love comprised Lee, Bryan MacLean (rhythm guitar), Johnny Echols (lead guitar), Ken Forssi (bass guitar), and Michael Stuart (drums).Template:Sfn

By 1967, the band was facing major internal conflicts.Template:Sfn Echols explained: "We were [before] totally united: living together,Template:Efn practicing together, and playing together. [...] But as more people started to recognize the group, there became these little factions. Arthur had his little clique, Bryan had his [...] They began to pull the group apart."Template:Sfn Lee's relationship with MacLean, Love's other songwriter, was deteriorating. In a 1992 interview, Lee spoke of him and MacLean "competing a bit like Lennon and McCartney to see who would come up with the better song. It was part of our charm. Everybody had different behaviour patterns. Eventually, the others couldn't cut it".

Love were also at odds with their label, Elektra Records. After recording Da Capo, the band attempted for a third time to sever their contract with the label.Template:Sfn The resulting May 1967 agreement required them to produce one more album.Template:Sfn Throughout 1967, Lee also grew envious of the success of fellow Elektra band the Doors, whom he had been integral in getting signed. However, it has been countered that the Doors were more willing to work on the road than Lee.Template:Sfn

Inspiration

Lee's material for Forever Changes was drawn from his lifestyle and environment, which contrasted greatly from the typical hippie culture of the time.Template:Sfn The songs reflected upon dark themes, such as paranoia, the Vietnam War, race issues in the US, societal breakdown, and the negative effects of drug use.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn In his 33⅓ book on the album, Andrew Hultkrans explained Lee's frame of mind at the time: "Arthur Lee was one member of the '60s counterculture who didn't buy flower-power wholesale, who intuitively understood that letting the sunshine in wouldn't instantly vaporize the world's (or his own) dark stuff".Template:Sfn With the band in disarray, and increasingly concerned over his own mortality, Lee envisioned Forever Changes as a lament to his memory.Template:Sfn

Recording and style

Having already engineered the group's first two albums, Bruce Botnick was enlisted to oversee the production of the third album along with Lee. Botnick, who had also worked with Buffalo Springfield, invited Neil Young to co-produce the album, but Young, after initially agreeing, excused himself from the project.Template:Sfn As Botnick recalled, "Neil really had the burning desire to go solo and realize his dream without being involved in another band". It was reported that Young arranged the song "The Daily Planet",Template:Sfn but he denied any involvement.

According to AllMusic, the band embraced "a more gentle, contemplative, and organic sound on Forever Changes," with much of the album "built around interwoven acoustic guitar textures and subtle orchestrations, with strings and horns both reinforcing and punctuating the melodies." Elektra Records founder Jac Holzman had suggested that Love "advance backwards" by embracing the more subtle approach of folk music, and Lee, while typically independent in his musical directions, accepted the suggestion. Stephen M. Deusner of Pitchfork stated that Lee paired his "dark, discomfiting lyrics" with music that draws from rock, psychedelia, folk, pop, classical, and mariachi influences without being reducible to any of those labels.

Love started recording Forever Changes in June 1967 at Sunset Sound Recorders. However, beginning with the early recording sessions, the band was plagued by internal conflicts and lack of preparation for Lee's intricate arrangements. Through Holzman's perspective, Botnick was an "album savior", guiding and motivating the musicians out of their trying period. To compel the band to refocus, Botnick and Lee enlisted Wrecking Crew session musicians Billy Strange (guitar), Don Randi (piano), Hal Blaine (drums), and Carol Kaye (bass guitar) to work with Lee, completing the rhythm tracks for "Andmoreagain" and "The Daily Planet" in a single three-hour session.Template:Sfn Shocked by the notion of losing their roles, the plan succeeded in motivating the other Love members to participate in recording the remaining material.

Lee spent three weeks with arranger David Angel, playing and singing the orchestral parts to him. Lee envisioned the horns and strings as part of the material from the beginning.Template:Sfn String and horn overdubs on September 18, followed by two more stereo mixing sessions, completed the sessions.

According to the staff of BrooklynVegan, the tensions between Arthur Lee and Bryan MacLean "made for a unique energy" present on the album, said to be "[running] electric." The site described the album's production as "sweeping [and] baroque." NME wrote that the album is "joyous, uplifting and sweet in parts, while at the same time menacing, introverted and paranoid."

Title and artwork

The title of the album came from a break-up Lee had with his girlfriend. She said, "But you said you would love me forever?" and he replied, "Yeah well, you know, forever changes." The album's title has also been interpreted as meaning Love Forever Changes.Template:Sfn

The album's front cover, designed by Bob Pepper, shows the faces of all five members of the band in the shape of a human heart. Fans have also seen it as the shape of Africa. The back cover photo was taken by the band's manager Ronnie Haran, at Lee's house after one of the rehearsals. While taking photos, Haran accidentally knocked over and broke a flower vase. Lee picked it up and is shown holding it in the final product. Some have interpreted the broken vase and dead flowers as symbolizing the "death of flower power", though Lee denied that it had any deeper meaning.Template:Sfn

Release, commercial performance, and aftermath

Released in November 1967, Forever Changes initially only achieved moderate commercial success. It peaked at number 154 in the US, the lowest showing of a Love album up to that point. However, it fared much better in the UK, where it reached number 24. Holzman partially attributed the album's small impact to the fact that it was released in November, only to be overshadowed by the Christmas market rush.Template:Sfn

The underwhelming reaction to Forever Changes from the general public further contributed to the band's state of disarray. Live performances became less and less frequent, and the members' addictions to heroin and cocaine worsened. This line-up of Love released one more single, "Your Mind and We Belong Together"/"Laughing Stock", in January 1968. It was later falsely rumored that these songs were meant to be the beginning of work on another album titled Gethsemane. Lee was also angered by the prospect of MacLean recording a solo album for Elektra.Template:Sfn By August 1968, Lee had replaced the members of Love with a new line-up that "hated Forever Changes" and took a more hard rock and blues rock direction.Template:Sfn

Critical reception

Contemporaneous reviews

File:Forever Changes - Billboard ad 1968.png

Billboard advertisement, January 27, 1968

Initial reviews were positive. Writing for Rolling Stone in 1968, Jim Bickhart regarded Forever Changes as Love's "most sophisticated album yet", applauding the orchestral arrangements and recording quality. In Esquire, Robert Christgau called it an elaboration on Love's original musical style and "a vast improvement" over their previous recordings, because "Lee has stopped trying to imitate Mick Jagger with his soft voice, and the lyrics, while still obscure, now have an interesting surface as well." Pete Johnson of the Los Angeles Times believed the album could "survive endless listening with no diminishing either of power or of freshness", adding that "parts of the album are beautiful; others are disturbingly ugly, reflections of the pop movement towards realism". Gene Youngblood of LA Free Express also praised the album, calling it "melancholy iconoclasm and tasteful romanticism."Template:Sfn Harvey Kubernik believed that the reaction to Forever Changes in Los Angeles was comparable to that of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in the UK.Template:Sfn

Retrospective acclaim

Template:Music ratings After the initial reactions to Forever Changes died down, the album maintained a cult following, with Richie Unterberger calling it "the biggest cult album of all time, its following just growing and growing through subsequent decades and generations."Template:Sfn Biographer John Einarson agrees, adding that "its reputation as one of the greatest albums of all time has been built almost exclusively by rediscovery and word of mouth."Template:Sfn In a retrospective review, AllMusic stated that the album "became recognized as one of the finest and most haunting albums to come out of the Summer of Love," calling it "an album that heralds the last days of a golden age and anticipates the growing ugliness that would dominate the counterculture in 1968 and 1969." The 1979 edition of The Rolling Stone Record Guide gave the album a rating of five stars (out of five). It also received five stars in the 1983 edition of the guide and in the 1992 guide four. In a special issue of Mojo magazine, Forever Changes was ranked the second greatest psychedelic album of all time. In the January 1996 issue, Mojo readers selected Forever Changes as number 11 on the "100 Greatest Albums Ever Made". In 2002, members of the UK Parliament signed a motion declaring Forever Changes "the greatest album of all time".

Reissues

Forever Changes was included in its entirety on the 2-CD retrospective Love compilation Love Story 1966–1972, released by Rhino Records in 1995. The album was re-released in an expanded single-CD version by Rhino in 2001, featuring alternate mixes, outtakes and the group's 1968 single, "Your Mind and We Belong Together"/"Laughing Stock", the final tracks ever to feature the Forever Changes line-up of Arthur Lee, Johnny Echols, Ken Forssi, Michael Stuart-Ware and Bryan MacLean (Forssi and MacLean both died in 1998).

The Forever Changes Concert was released on DVD in 2003 and marked the first time many of the songs had been performed live. The set features the entire album performed in its original running order, recorded in early 2003 during Lee's tour of England, in which he was backed by the band Baby Lemonade and members of the Stockholm Strings 'n' Horns ensemble. The DVD features the album concert, five bonus performances, documentary footage and an interview with Lee.

A double-CD "Collector's Edition" of the album was issued by Rhino Records on April 22, 2008. The first disc consists of a remastered version of the original 1967 album. The second disc contains a previously unissued alternate stereo mix of the album, plus ten bonus tracks.

A Super High Material CD (SHM-CD) version of Forever Changes was released by Warner Music Japan in 2009, and a 24 bit 192 kHz High Resolution version of the album was released by HDTracks in 2014, and in the same year a hybrid Super Audio CD (SACD) version of the album was released by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab.

A 50th anniversary deluxe edition box set was released by Rhino on April 6, 2018, featuring four CDs, a DVD and an LP. It contains remastered versions of the stereo, mono and alternate stereo mixes of the album, a disc of demos, outtakes, alternate mixes and non-album tracks, a DVD containing a 24/96 stereo mix of the album and a bonus music video, and a new LP remaster of the album, remastered by Bruce Botnick and cut from high resolution audio by Bernie Grundman.

Legacy

Forever Changes was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2008 and added to the National Recording Registry in 2011. Rolling Stone ranked it number 180 on its 2020 list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. The album was also included in Robert Christgau's "Basic Record Library" of 1950s and 1960s recordings, published in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981). It was voted number 12 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums 3rd Edition (2000). In 2013, NME ranked the album number 37 on their list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Publishers such as AllMusic and Slant Magazine have praised the album as well. In a 2005 survey held by British television's Channel 4, the album was ranked 83rd in the 100 greatest albums of all time. The album was included in the 2005 book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

According to the New Musical Express, the Stone Roses' relationship with their future producer John Leckie was settled when they all agreed that Forever Changes was the "best record ever". Robert Plant is an admirer of the album.

The staff of BrooklynVegan named the album as the best psychedelic rock album of the Summer of Love, and NME named the album as the greatest psychedelic album of all time.

Track listing

All songs written by Arthur Lee, except "Alone Again Or" and "Old Man" by Bryan MacLean. Details are taken from the 50th Anniversary Edition. Template:Track listing Template:Track listing

2001 Rhino bonus tracks

A single disc collection, presenting the original stereo album, remastered, plus the following bonus tracks: Template:Track listing

2008 Rhino "Collector's Edition" bonus tracks

A two-disc collection. Disc 1 presents the original stereo album, remastered, while disc 2 is a previously unreleased alternate stereo mix of the album, featuring the following bonus tracks: Template:Track listing

2018 "50th Anniversary Edition" bonus discs

A box set comprising four CDs, one LP and one DVD: disc 2 presents the original mono album, remastered; disc 3 is the alternate stereo mix; disc 4 is outtakes, single versions, demos, session highlights and non album tracks from the era; disc 5 is the original stereo album on vinyl, remastered and cut from high resolution audio; and disc 6 is a 24/96 stereo mix on DVD, featuring a bonus music video. Template:Track listing

Personnel

According to the 2001 reissue CD booklet.Template:Sfn

Love

• Arthur Lee – guitar, vocals
• Bryan MacLean – guitar, vocals
• Johnny Echols – guitar
• Ken Forssi – bass guitar
• Michael Stuart-Ware – drums, percussion

Additional musicians

• Carol Kaye – bass guitar on "Andmoreagain" and "The Daily Planet"
• Don Randi – keyboards on "Andmoreagain" and "The Daily Planet"; piano on "Old Man" and "Bummer in the Summer"; harpsichord on "The Red Telephone"
• Billy Strange – electric guitar on "Andmoreagain" and "The Daily Planet"
• Hal Blaine – drums on "Andmoreagain" and "The Daily Planet"
• Neil Young – arranger on "The Daily Planet"
• David Angel – arranger
• Robert Barene, Arnold Belnick, James Getzoff, Marshall Sosson, Darrel Terwilliger – violin
• Norman Botnick – viola
• Jesse Ehrlich – cello
• Chuck Berghofer – double bass
• Bud Brisbois, Roy Caton, Ollie Mitchell – trumpet
• Richard Leith – trombone

Production and design Template:Columns-list

See also

• Timeline of 1960s counterculture

External links

• Inside the National Recording Registry segment