“You have to recognize your future when it comes at you. When the angels are talking to you, you have to pay attention,” says singer/songwriter Jesse Colin Young.
Jesse heard those angels many times in his life — they seem to like following him around — but here we’re focusing on one particular heavenly gift lovingly dropped into his lap by the angels: “Get Together,” on which he sang lead (that voice!) while fronting his group, The Youngbloods.
The song, a gentle plea for peace and brotherhood, became an anthem, and it still sounds as fresh and feels as relevant today as when it was first recorded in 1967. Uh, maybe even more so.
“I fell in love with that song, and that was to be my future,” he says. “It turned this angry kid from New York into a spirit seeker.”
As a folk singer, the Queens native was knocking around colleges and then Greenwich Village. One Sunday afternoon, he ducked into the Cafe A Go Go, thinking that maybe it would be a good time to rehearse his band, The Youngbloods. On stage, with practically no one in the room, a folksinger was singing the song that would change Jesse’s life.
“I just went backstage,” he recalls. “I had never done that before, and said, ‘I have to have the words to that.’ And he wrote the lyrics out for me, and I took it into rehearsal for The Youngbloods the next day.”
The song was written by Chet Powers (also known as Dino Valenti), who would later join the rock group Quicksilver Messenger Service. It had been performed as “Let’s Get Together” by The Kingston Trio. In 1965, The We Five covered it, but its time had not yet come.
Jesse’s group, The Youngbloods, recorded it in 1967, but again, the time for it was not yet right. The world still had a few more years of changing to do.
“We flew for the first time to San Francisco, to the Avalon Ballroom,” he says. “We had no idea what was going on. It was 1967, and San Francisco was two years ahead of the rest of the country. I mean, I’m born and raised in New York, but in San Francisco, all these people are smiling at me and they are looking in my eyes, and I’m thinking, what the fuck? All the people waving their arms and dancing in light shows. This was another world. It blew our minds.”
All the people now were smiling on their brother, and the song was taking on a Messianic essence, particularly due to the line when the One Who left us here, returns for us at last.
“It was a time when we were open, but none of us were devout religiously in any tradition,” he says. “I was brought up in a bunch of different Protestant churches. The whole Sixties was about the fact that life was beyond what was here, that there was a spirit world beyond and before and ahead. For a time, when I was 16, I was a Born-Again Christian, for a year. But when I sang it, I was not there – I was as much of a heathen as I could possibly get away with.”
By 1969, the zeitgeist was right. “Get Together” soared to the near-top of the charts and became one of the great themes of the Sixties, a song that is practically Morse Code for the era.
“Augie Bloom, the head of promotion at RCA, went to the president of the company,” Jesse says. “There were a lot of tough guys there, but Augie said, ‘I want this record [to be released as a single] again. This is the time for it. We’re doing it or I’m leaving the company.’ And he was just too valuable, so they let him put it out again. He realized that this was ‘Get Together’s’ time.”
The re-released record climbed as high as #5 on the Billboard charts during that tumultuous year, competing with other classics as “A Boy Named Sue” (Johnny Cash) and “Sugar, Sugar” (The Archies). It also managed to knock “Put A Little Love In Your Heart” (Jackie DeShannon) and “Sweet Caroline” (Neil Diamond) out of the top five.
“I realize that my whole career has been these serendipitous moments,” he says. “I was aware that I was able to take advantage of something that was given to me, like a gift.”
The song continued to weave itself into pop culture, as part of the soundtrack of Forrest Gump and appearances on The Simpsons, South Park and The Wonder Years. The chorus was chanted on Nirvana’s album Nevermind and was covered by this unlikely list: Andy Williams, Louis Armstrong, The Carpenters, The Staple Singers and The Indigo Girls.
It also accompanied Jesse into the Seventies, as he helped drive the No Nukes movement, along with Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young and Jackson Browne.
“Take a look at the concert in Battery Park [1979] on YouTube,” he suggests. (Seriously, do yourself a favor and check it out.) “That was the biggest No Nukes demonstration in the world [250,000 people — the largest anti-nuclear rally ever held]. How could they fit? That’s the biggest crowd I ever played to in my life. What a thrill.”
No Nukes accomplished a lot, but there is still much to do. Jesse now resides in Georgia, and the cause remains close to his heart, mostly due to proximity.
“They didn’t build a nuke in this country for 30 years,” he says, “and now they’re building two right across the river from me down here in Georgia. But I don’t think we are going to see a lot more of that. I’m still involved in the No Nukes movement. I’ve become re-involved down here, fifteen miles from what used to be called ‘The Bomb Plant,’ the Savannah River site. There is a lot of high-level waste down here. Here I am, in my golden years, back in the No Nukes movement on a community level. We have to stop the escalator. We live down here because my wife grew up here. And the nuclear waste is here, so what am I going to do? So I’m writing another chapter in the struggle for the environment.”
Life may be slow where Jesse resides, but the urgency is not just local — it’s global. The heat is on.
“To me, it’s like we’re in the garage, the car is running, and we are going to have to save ourselves,” he says. “In this garage, there are no windows we can open. And denial is rampant.”
Let’s hope the angels continue to follow Jesse and his crystal-clear voice. If so, maybe the Earth stands a chance.
He says, “Somehow, it seems to be love that drives everything.”
***
Jesse recently signed with the Audio Fidelity label to release his back catalog, which includes 180g vinyl and DVD recordings. Find out more here.
Find out more about Jesse here.
Come on, people now. Sing. Everybody get together. Yes, you too:
Love is but a song to sing
Fear’s the way we die
You can make the mountains ring
Or make the angels cry
Though the bird is on the wing
And you may not know why
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Some may come and some may go
We shall surely pass
When the one that left us here
Returns for us at last
We are but a moment’s sunlight
Fading in the grass
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
If you hear the song I sing
You will understand (listen!)
You hold the key to love and fear
All in your trembling hand
Just one key unlocks them both
It’s there at your command
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now
Right now
Right now