Brandos friends and fans, a little something to distract us all: New single, WOODSTOCK GUITAR (Remix). Before last year's 50th anniversary of the Woodstock Music and Arts Fair (1969) completely fades from our rearview mirrors, I’d like to offer this song. It was written some years ago after a visit to the artist community of Woodstock, NY, discovering there a vintage guitar hanging in the window of a Buddhist shop run by an old hippie. He had an array of amazing vintage instruments in that window, all from his glory days in the ‘60s. I was particularly drawn to an old acoustic guitar, a 1965 Gibson L-G1 (now in the hands of my friend Jillis van Meeteren) that was fairly battered - It had been abused and suffered water damage - but I loved it; it just radiated a cool vibe. I played it for a while, it had such a great feel and tone to it, and it just seemed to conjure up the spirit of the era from which it came.

I couldn’t buy it right away, but would go back months later, and finding it still there, decided I had to get it. It needed a lot of repair to bring it back to life, and once I had it home, I found myself playing it a lot. It got me thinking about the Woodstock festival and the monumental impact it had on our culture, and more specifically about the massive impact the rock ’n roll concert event had on me and the musicians of my generation. I saw the film when it was released in 1970, and it left me dumbfounded. It set the bar for how live music should be played, and so many of those performances are still revered as iconic to this day. For my part, this meant Ritchie Havens, Joe Cocker & The Grease Band, Ten Years After, Crosby Still and Nash, Jimi Hendrix, and especially, Santana (Michael Shrieve) and The Who.

As I get older, I’m only more astounded by those performances, never tiring of them - their timeless greatness lives on. This song was released in a simpler version on the latest Brandos album, “Los Brandos” in 2017, but I never felt it was really properly finished. So, I spent the last few months giving it a makeover, reworking the arrangement and adding new guitars and vocals, Hammond organ and percussion, along with a major upgrade to the overall sound, mix and mastering. I’m very happy to be able to present it now in an upgraded, complete form, as this song is very personal and meaningful for me. I hope you all dig it and find it groovy as well. Peace and Love ☮, Dave Kincaid - The Brandos