Were I not going to be suffering under the deliriously hot Van Nuys sun playing baseball all Saturday, chances are I’d be at the Where the Action Was Rock Tour hosted by the very fine rock writer, Kim Cooper. Yeah, I get nerdy like that. What’s it to you? The moral of this ramble is simple (for once): free ticket to anyone who can tell me what 33 1/3 book that Kim Cooper wrote? Leave the answer in the comments section. More information about the tour is below.
Where the Action Was is Esotouric’s Hollywood and West Hollywood rock and roll history tour, co-hosted by pop music historians Kim Cooper and Gene Sculatti, and departing from Amoeba Music. Every passenger goes home with an Amoeba swag bag (including stickers, buttons, music, special promo items and more).
In the mid-1960s, the Sunset Strip and Hollywood were ground zero for musical teen youth culture, with scores of great clubs, music shops, recording studios, boutiques, hipster hangouts, radio stations, record stores, and film and TV studios. On the Esotouric bus, you’ll travel back in time to map the musical history of Hollywood and West Hollywood, from Beatlemania and folk rock, glitter rock through punk. Along the way you’ll follow the career highs and lows of a selection of fascinating LA artists: Bobby Fuller (was it murder or suicide?), Phil Spector, Arthur Lee & Love and the Byrds.
From the teen riots over the closing of Pandora’s Box (inspiration for the Buffalo Springfield hit “For What It’s Worth”) to the late night Canter’s Deli scene, from adolescent groupies holding court at Rodney’s English Disco to the wild dances invented at Ciro’s, and so much between, Where The Action Was is a high-energy voyage to a time when music was thrilling, immediate and deeply rooted to the city of LA.
