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 For Da Capo, Love's second studio album, the band expanded from five members to seven in order to take on a more jazz-influenced style. Shortly after the album's release, however, bandleader Arthur Lee decided the experiment had run its course and fired drummer-turned-keyboardist Alban "Snoopy" Pfisterer and saxophonist and flautist Tjay Cantrelli. This left a lineup of Lee (lead vocals), Bryan MacLean (rhythm guitar), Johnny Echols (lead guitar), Ken Forssi (bass), and Michael Stuart (drums).By 1967, the band was facing major internal conflicts. The members were growing apart and, as a result, rehearsing and performing less. 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. The resulting May 1967 agreement required them to produce one more album. 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, who expressed a fear of leaving the band's home city, Los Angeles.
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. 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. In his 33 1/3 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". With the band in disarray, and increasingly concerned over his own mortality, Lee envisioned Forever Changes as a lament to his memory.
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. 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", 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. 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. 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."
Songs
Side one "Alone Again Or" was originally written by MacLean for inclusion on Love's first album, but he did not finish it properly until September 1967. It was originally titled "Alone Again", with Lee adding the "Or". Lee initially sang the harmony vocal part; however, his vocal was mixed louder than MacLean's in the final product, effectively becoming the new melody. MacLean was initially upset, but later said that he "wasn't that great of a singer at that point" and understood the change. MacLean later recorded a solo version of the song, and it was released in 1997 on his album Ifyoubelievein.
"A House Is Not a Motel", according to Ben Edmonds, "takes us straight into the heart of Arthur's darkness." The title is an allusion to the song "A House Is Not a Home", written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David for the 1964 film of the same name. The lyrics about blood turning gray when mixed with mud were inspired by a story Lee heard from a Vietnam veteran. Edmonds notes that it is one of the few songs on the album that does not have orchestration and one of only two that has electric lead guitar ("Live and Let Live" being the other). Echols's double-tracked soloing at the end of the song was intended to represent the chaos of war: "people dying, all the wailing, things blowing up [...] all that."
"Andmoreagain" is described by Phil Gallo as "one of the lushest songs on Forever Changes". The title is an allusion to "And More", a song from Love's debut album. Lee denied beliefs that it was an allusion to actress Ann Morgan Guilbert. He described the character Andmoreagain as "a creature", someone he saw in Los Angeles. Gallo also writes that the song shows Lee "embracing MacLean's Broadway influences."
"The Daily Planet" deals with repetition in daily life. Brooks describes it as "an ecological disaster song" and interprates dark themes in the lyrics, such as "accidences and ambulances", children playing with "warfare toys", melting ice caps, drug addiction, and drug dealers.
"Old Man" is the second and final MacLean song on the album. He described it as "simply my expression about a guy that had been told some things by this wise old man but he doesn't understand it until he falls in love with somebody." MacLean also said he was dissatisfied with the orchestration on the song, calling it "over-arranged" and explaining, "It was meant to be simple and direct, almost a folk song." A solo demo of the song was also included on Ifyoubelievein.
"The Red Telephone" begins with the lines, "Sitting on a hillside / Watching all the people die". Edmonds calls the song "a masterpiece of macabre" and writes that, "The harpsichord and strings, normally vessels of warmth in California pop music, instead carry an undertow of menace." David Janssen and Edward Whitelock note that it is "one of the most heavily orchestrated songs on the album" and agree that the harpsichord adds to the song's macabre feeling. At the end, a voice is heard saying, "We're all normal and we want our freedom"; Lee said that this was taken from Peter Weiss's play Marat/Sade. According to Barney Hoskyns, "Lee had seen the play six times", and Andrew Hultkrans, author of the 331⁄3 book on the album, writes that, "The themes of Marat/Sade resonate throughout Forever Changes."
Side two "Maybe the People Would Be the Times or Between Clark and Hilldale" originated in the jazz rock style of Da Capo. Echols said that they were attempting to continue in the style of "Stephanie Knows Who", a song from that album. The phrase "between Clark and Hilldale", according to Edmonds, "refers to the block of Sunset Boulevard containing the Whisky A Go Go". Love were frequent performers at the Whisky, which may be reflected in the lines, "Crowds of people standing everywhere ... And here they always play my song".
"Live and Let Live" was a song left unfinished from Da Capo's recording sessions. Echols said that it did not fit the style of the seven-piece lineup of that time. It is another song noted for its opening lines: "Oh the snot has caked against my pants / It has turned into crystal". Lee explained: "We were in the studio, and I passed out, slobbered on my pants, and woke up. It had crystallized. I wrote about it." The song ends with Echols's guitar solo, which Janssen and Whitelock describe as "anguished and abusive" and "the album's most electric moment."
"The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This" is another song that was worked on during the Da Capo sessions. Specifically, it was recorded as an instrumental demo during the time the band was taping the song "7 and 7 Is". This demo was given the name "Hummingbirds". The song has been described as "idyllic" and "sweet", containing themes of childhood; Lee said he wrote it while sitting outside his old high school, Susan Miller Dorsey High School. The song ends with an intentional "glitched" effect, sounding similar to record skipping.
"Bummer in the Summer" contains elements of country music. Lee said, "I took the riff from an Ike Turner song, and then I turned it into country." Echols also said the song was "kind of a Bo Diddley thing", and Gallo and Brooks draw comparisons to Bob Dylan. Brooks suggests that the title may have been inspired by Bobby Beausoleil, who was nicknamed "Bummer Bob". Beausoleil briefly played rhythm guitar for Love in 1965, when they were still called the Grass Roots. He later joined the Manson Family and was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the 1969 murder of Gary Hinman.
"You Set the Scene", nearly 7-minutes long, was pieced together from multiple unfinished songs. Forssi was reportedly instrumental in stitching the parts together, but did not receive songwriting credit. Lee's belief that he would die after the album was finished is especially apparent on the song, with lines such as: "I'll face each day with a smile / Because the time that I've been given is such a little while".
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