“California Dreamin'” (The Mamas & The Papas)

Today’s classic song of the day is the truly classic “California Dreamin’,” by The Mamas & The Papas. This was the group’s first big hit, released in December of 1965. It went on to peak at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 the following year, sell more than a million copies, rank as the #10 song for all of 1966, and get inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

John Phillips and his wife Michelle wrote the tune during the winter of 1963. They were living in New York, maxing out John’s American Express card (and how did a proto-hippie folkster like John Phillips qualify for an American Express card in the first place?), and truly missing the warmth of California. The song described their loneliness and longing and the coldness (both actual and figurative) of New York City in the wintertime. “All the leaves are brown and the sky is grey” was descriptive of their plight.

Michelle Phillips was just 19 during that winter of 1963, newly married, and living in a dank and dreary hotel room in the city. John was almost a decade older, a veteran of the New York folk scene (he was a member of the Journeymen, along with Scott McKenzie and Dick Weissman), and heavy into drugs. Michelle was miserable and John (with Michelle’s help) channeled that misery into what became a classic song emblematic of that era’s burgeoning folk/rock/pop movement.

The song didn’t get recorded until nearly two years later. By then, John and Michelle had joined with two other mainstays of that era’s burgeoning folk scene, Cass Elliot and Denny Doherty, to form the group they called The Mamas & The Papas. Through the recommendation of yet another folkie friend, Barry McGuire (of New Christy Minstrels and “Eve of Destruction” fame), the group scored a recording contract with Dunhill Records, McGuire’s label and the home of the songwriting/producing team of Steve Barri and P.F. Sloan.

To thank his friend for getting them the record deal, John let Barry be the first to record the song he and Michelle had written two years prior. McGuire cut the track with the backing of the Wrecking Crew, including Larry Knechtel on keyboards, Joe Osborn on bass, and Hal Blaine on drums. P.F. Sloan played guitar; it’s his 12-string acoustic you hear in the song’s intro. That track featured a harmonica solo in the middle and The Mamas & The Papas doing backing vocals.

When Dunhill Records head and uber-producer Lou Adler heard McGuire’s version of the song, he realized he had something special on his hands—but that something wasn’t this version. McGuire’s gravelly vocals weren’t quite right for the song, although those backing vocals were choice. So Adler wiped McGuire’s vocals from the track (more or less) and had John, Denny, Cass, and Michelle re-record lead vocals over their original backing tracks. He also replaced the previous harmonica solo with an alto flute solo (played by Bud Shank) and the result was a ground-breaking and career-making piece of work.

If you listen closely to the Mamas & Papas’ version of the song you can still hear a little bit of Barry McGuire’s original lead vocals, notably in the left channel during the start of the first verse. You can also hear traces of a Mamas & Papas call-and-response on the first part of the second verse that was (wisely) wiped from that group’s version; it sounds cleaner with just Denny for that little section.

“California Dreamin'” was also notable for Hal Blaine’s powerful drumming; it’s always one of the first songs mentioned when people talk about Hal’s career and influence. It’s Hal’s rock-solid snare drum beat that propels the song ever forward, lending an intensity that underscored the lyrics’ general wistfulness.

The “California Dreamin'” session was also the very first that studio cats Knechtel, Osborn, and Blaine played on together. They went to record hundreds of hits for dozens of artists and become known as that subset of the Wrecking Crew called the Hollywood Golden Trio (HGT), for all the gold records they worked on together.

In an interview for my book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Playing Drums, Hal talked about working with The Mamas & the Papas.

“The Mamas & The Papas were a different story. They had lots of drugs. Coming out of The Mamas & The Papas, Michelle Phillips, who became quite a great actress — she does a lot of movies, she recently married an old buddy of mine who’s a plastic surgeon — she’s the only one, really, who didn’t do drugs. The rest of them, you know, Denny was always drunk, jumping out of windows and breaking his legs. John Phillips had a liver transplant, and now he’s drinking again. [NOTE: John Phillips died shortly after this interview.] Cass, of course, unfortunately passed away.”

In a further conversation, Hal made it clear to me how much he really liked Michelle and how nice she was to work with. She was one of his favorites and, based on other interviews with Michelle, I think that admiration was mutual.

The Mamas & The Papas, of course, had a short but stellar career, with hits like “Monday, Monday” (#1 in 1966), “I Saw Her Again” (#5 in 1966), “Words of Love” (#5 in 1966), “Dedicated to the One I Love” (#2 in 1967), “Creeque Alley” (#5 in 1967), “Twelve Thirty” (#20 in 1967), and “Dream a Little Dream of Me” (#12 in 1968). They broke up later in 1968.

Post-Mamas/Papas, Cass Elliot had the beginnings of a successful solo career, with hits like “It’s Getting Better” (#30 in 1969), “Make Your Own Kind of Music” (#36 in 1969), and “New World Coming” (#42 in 1970)—all written by the legendary team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, by the way. Unfortunately, Cass passed away in 1974 of a heart attack; she was just 32 years old.

Denny Doherty also launched a solo career but had less success. He did some recording, performing, and TV work, including acting in shows like Theodore Tugboat and Pit Pony. He lived a long (and, in his later years, sober) life, passing away in 2007 of kidney failure, aged 66.

John Phillips continued writing and performing on his own, but was hobbled by his continuing heroin addiction. He even did some jail time in 1981 for conspiring to distribute narcotics. He later reformed the group (with daughter Mackenzie Phillips, Elaine “Spanky” McFarlane, and old Papa Denny Doherty—later replaced by San Franciscan folkie Scott McKenzie) as the New Mamas & The Papas; this iteration continued, with various replacements, for several decades, even after John retired from touring in 1998. He died of heart failure in 2001, aged 65.

Michelle Phillips released one solo album then turned to acting, where she had notable success. She’s probably best known for her roles in the movies Dillinger, Valentino, and Joshua Tree and the TV series Hotel, Knots Landing, and Beverly Hills, 90210. She’s still alive today, aged 78.