Vanilla Fudge

Vanilla Fudge came roaring out of New York in 1966 with a simple, wicked idea: take somebody else's pop song and rebuild it as heavy hard rock, buried under an avalanche of organ and drums. Mark Stein sang and played organ, Tim Bogert handled bass and vocals, Vince Martell played guitar, and Carmine Appice pounded the kit, and all four of them sang, a lineup that held steady from 1967 to 1970. They had started out as the Pigeons before renaming themselves.

Their calling card was "You Keep Me Hangin' On", the Supremes' Motown hit turned into a heavy, churning psychedelic epic that became a hit single of their own in 1968. The band gets cited as a rare American stepping-stone from the psychedelic era toward the heavy metal that followed, and as early prog too. Atco put out their records, and five albums came out before they split in 1970.

The Fudge never quite stayed buried. They reunited now and then through the 1980s and early 1990s, making the album Rock & Roll with "Good Good Livin'", and got back together full time in 1999. Bogert retired from live work in 2010, with Pete Bremy taking over on bass, and died of cancer in 2021.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.