Records I'd Forgotten Existed, Let Alone Loved: An Occasional Feature (Special "Snoopy -- the Comic Strip Dog, Not the Rapper -- Would Have Flipped For This One" Edition)

From late 1966, and the B-side to their deserved hit single "Hello, Hello," please enjoy the vastly underrated Sopwith Camel and "Treadin'," one of the great lost folk-rock records of all time. Sort of a cross between the original Byrds and middle-period Zombies.

Don't get me started on the Camel; those guys were historically important for being the first of the Fillmore era hippie San Francisco bands to score a hit single, and their album pictured above -- which didn't come out for a year or so after their breakthough success for reasons that have been murky ever since -- is an utter masterpiece. God knows it's vastly superior on every level to both the debut LPs by their contemporaries the Grateful Dead and the Jefferson Airplane.

I should add that it was produced, brilliantly, by Erik Jacobsen (who helmed the records of the Lovin' Spoonful, Norman Greenbaum and Chris Isaak) and that to the best of my knowledge "Treadin'" did not appear on any actual version of the Camel album back in the day, nor was it available in a stereo mix previously. Discovering this version has been one of the biggest surprises I've had since I woke up in 2016 and learned that a mediocre James Bond Villain had mysteriously become president of these United States.