Earth Music

History

Similar to their first album, the songs were a mix of originals and covers, ballads and rockers. Jesse Colin Young wrote three of the songs alone, the ballad "All My Dreams Blue", the hard rocking "Long and Tall", and the humorous "The Wine Song". Jerry Corbitt contributed the ballad "Don't Play Games" which features a string section, and cowrote "Dreamer's Dream" with Banana. "Fool Me", written by Banana, is a bass-heavy song more similar to "garage rock" of the middle 1960s than the folkier material normally associated with the Youngbloods.

Cover songs on the album include "Euphoria", a song originally done by the Holy Modal Rounders and written by George "Robin" Remailly (who later became a member of the Rounders). Other covers included two fifties classics, Chuck Berry's "Too Much Monkey Business" and Chuck Willis's "I Can Tell". Tim Hardin's "Reason to Believe " was one of the earliest cover versions of the popular ballad. "Sugar Babe," erroneously credited to Young/ Lomax, is a folk song about gambling and drinking that had been printed in American Ballads and Folk Songs, by John A. Lomax and his son Alan Lomax, published in 1934. In a note below "Sugar Babe," the Lomax's state: "words and melody reprinted from the second volume of English Folk Songs of the Southern Appalachians, collected by Cecil Sharp, edited by Maud Karpeles." That book was published in 1932.

Reception

Writing for Allmusic, music critic Lindsay Planer called the album "a blend of captivating songwriting with an infectiously fun delivery" and wrote; "...there are a handful of equally definitive sides scattered throughout Earth Music."

Side one

1. "Euphoria" (George Remailly) – 2:15 (vocals by Jerry with Jesse)
2. "All My Dreams Blue" (Jesse Colin Young) – 3:17 (vocals by Jesse with Jerry and Banana)
3. "Monkey Business" (Chuck Berry) – 2:49 (vocals by Banana)
4. "Dreamer's Dream" (Jerry Corbitt, Lowell Levinger) – 3:35
5. "Sugar Babe" (Young, Lomax) – 2:08 (vocals by Jesse with Jerry)
6. "Long and Tall" (Young) 4:05 (vocals by Jesse)

Side two

7. "I Can Tell" (Chuck Willis) – 4:29 (vocals by Jesse)
8. "Don't Play Games" (Corbitt) – 2:12 (vocals by Jerry with Jesse)
9. "The Wine Song" (Young) – 2:24 (vocals by Jesse with Jerry and Banana)
10. "Fool Me" (Levinger) – 2:57 (vocals by Banana with Jesse)
11. "Reason to Believe" (Tim Hardin) – 2:25

Personnel

Additional personnel