I love Quicksilver, and strongly prefer the era before Valenti re-joined the band.

This thread made my day, never see this group mentioned: Yes, Quicksilver Messenger Service was fantastic! Was fortunate to catch them at the rock era low-tide mark, Winterland in 1976 (?), with a little known group opening for them, that grabbed me right away: Little Feat! Funny, not knowing the band at all, it wasn't Lowell George that hooked me first, it was Paul Barrere's incredible guitar work. Great show. Quicksilver was literally smoking. John Cippolina, man, here comes treble! He had these huge silver treble horns coming out his stacks, just brutal! Ear Pain!

Factoid: Dino Valenti was the stage name of Chet Powers, who wrote the famous Youngbloods tune "Let's Get Together".

Have another HIT...

love, love, LOVE Cippolina and Quicksilver Messenger Service!!!!

Happy Trails is one of my 5 favorite albums by anyone

love QMS - first album is an absolute classic imho. i agree with all the sentiments about cippolina but let's not forget gary duncan who is also a badass guitarist.

Saw the Sino Silver in 73........... great show

Not Another Hit

Dino Silver

Great Band, still spinning them today!

I remember back in 1973, Good friend of mines Dad
was an auctioneer and owned an old auction barn,
we would load up our amps and guitars, I had a ford
Pinto and would load up a Peavey 100 watt Musician
Head and the cabinet, believe it had 4 10” speakers in
it, and a Hagstrom electric, took up the whole back of the
pinto,
John had the same amp and a 1957 Fender Duo Sonic electric
,he was driving an old Chevy el Comino.
About every weekend we would go out there and play.

Mona was a tune we worked up and played
it regularly on our trips out to the barn,
we would trade off playing rhythm and lead
, and vocal verses, one night my older brother
and another friend were out and sang vocals
on it, Great fun, from Mona we went into
“Who do You Love” and they both sang
vocals on it as well, Man those were the days,
gona have to go pull the tape, we recorded
most all of the time we went out there on small
cassette players/recorders , guess I will be going
through the old tapes!

Any suggestion for top 2 QMS albums to try out? I only know a few songs of theirs at best and would like to dig deeper.

Any suggestion for top 2 QMS albums to try out? I only know a few songs of theirs at best and would like to dig deeper.

Mileage may vary, but I'd 100% recommend Happy Trails, and would also suggest the self-titled debut.

Ditto for "Happy Trails"

Ditto for "Happy Trails"

Yep, anything before DV became the "leader"....also, seek out any work from "Copperhead" Cippolina's band after QMS....

Any suggestion for top 2 QMS albums to try out? I only know a few songs of theirs at best and would like to dig deeper.

Mileage may vary, but I'd 100% recommend Happy Trails, and would also suggest the self-titled debut.

Good advice.

Something else for QMS fans to note.

A few years back, a small record label started issuing authorized bootlegs for the band. Certainly not the kind of thing you'd pick up as an introduction, but they are nice to have if you love the band. Also, if you have Amazon Prime (or a Spotify subscription), most of those shows are available for streaming.

I am working my way through Happy Trails - while there are multiple tracks listed, it sounds like this is two long enjoyable jams!

Listening to Quicksilver Messenger Service always has fond memories. The first was playing "The Fool" from the debut album so much that my brother had me buy him a new album as I wore out the grooves on his copy. I learned to play much of the first part of that song but could never do the part with the wah wah pedal. My first "serious" guitar was a 1969 Gibson SG standard, my buying purchase influenced somewhat by John Cipollina's guitar. Playing in a band, we always did the QMS version of "Who Do you Love" and "Pride of Man".
Fast forward the years, when I visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, one of the highlights was to see John's guitar and amp. I took some photos but his one is much better.

http://www.johncipollina.com/rockAmpStack.htm

Finally, as you have heard on "Happy Trails", their best work was live. In fact QMS was initially formed in 1965 and did not release their first album until 1968. One of these early shows, I was fortunate enough to get sent a copy of a remaster done by Captain Skipper of the June 7, 1968 show at the Fillmore.

Let me also not forget the QMS shows and John Cipollina featured bands traded with Aekdbmoid. Each package the found "lost gold and silver" for both of us.

Aside from the first two albums, another interesting one is Unreleased Quicksilver: Lost Gold and Silver (yes another version of "The Fool" is on it.
Quicksilver Messenger Service - Great band - RIP John Cipollina and of course our wonderful Captain Skipper.

[Edited on 7/10/2016 by PhilBNY]

Saw QMS on a bill with Bonnie Raitt headlining. Must have been around '73 or '74. Good show at a small college. Listen to them a couple of times a year.

Found this clip of Winterland 1975-12-28, I was at this show

Have Another Hit... Of Fresh Air!

and for all you Dino-bashers, wait it out, Cippolina salvages the number nicely 😛

Best QSM to me was Happy Trails. Saw them in 1974 but by then they not what they use to be.

Listening to Quicksilver Messenger Service always has fond memories. The first was playing "The Fool" from the debut album so much that my brother had me buy him a new album as I wore out the grooves on his copy. I learned to play much of the first part of that song but could never do the part with the wah wah pedal. My first "serious" guitar was a 1969 Gibson SG standard, my buying purchase influenced somewhat by John Cipollina's guitar. Playing in a band, we always did the QMS version of "Who Do you Love" and "Pride of Man".
Fast forward the years, when I visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, one of the highlights was to see John's guitar and amp. I took some photos but his one is much better.

http://www.johncipollina.com/rockAmpStack.htm

Finally, as you have heard on "Happy Trails", their best work was live. In fact QMS was initially formed in 1965 and did not release their first album until 1968. One of these early shows, I was fortunate enough to get sent a copy of a remaster done by Captain Skipper of the June 7, 1968 show at the Fillmore.

Let me also not forget the QMS shows and John Cipollina featured bands traded with Aekdbmoid. Each package the found "lost gold and silver" for both of us.

Aside from the first two albums, another interesting one is Unreleased Quicksilver: Lost Gold and Silver (yes another version of "The Fool" is on it.
Quicksilver Messenger Service - Great band - RIP John Cipollina and of course our wonderful Captain Skipper.

[Edited on 7/10/2016 by PhilBNY]

Hey Phil, good to "see" you! It's been a while since I traded much, but still pull out some of those QMS shows that we collected. Those years sure were a fine time for Hittin' the Web and sharing good music.

Any suggestion for top 2 QMS albums to try out? I only know a few songs of theirs at best and would like to dig deeper.

I was going to mention the two albums which CanadianMule already brought up. I'd also like to recommend an album from Collector's Choice called "The Unreleased Quicksilver Messenger Service: Lost Gold And Silver" which was released as a double CD in 1999 and features unreleased live & studio cuts. Well worth a listen even for the live material alone.