Blue Cheer, a Bay Area power trio led by bassist/vocalist Dickie Peterson and featuring guitarist Leigh Stephens and drummer Paul Whaley, were managed by Allen “Gut” Terk, an inactive member of the Hell’s Angels. This 32-minute debut album opens with a completely blown-out version of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues”; they also cover B.B. King’s “Rock Me Baby” and Mose Allison’s “Parchman Farm” (here retitled “Parchment Farm”). The music is recorded with breathtaking crudity — Whaley’s drums sound like they’re coming through a staticky phone connection, and Stephens’ guitar is so distorted it’ll make your eyes tear up, while Peterson’s bass is a massive boom, his vocals raw but earnest. The nearly eight-minute “Doctor Please” is pure biker-rock ecstasy, the band speeding down the highway in a cloud of black smoke and blown-out roar.

Named after a type of LSD, Blue Cheer sound like a bad trip on their debut. Presumably somebody produced this, but the title eruption may as well refer to this bombastic blues band blowing out their Marshall stacks. These “Summertime Blues” ain’t from the summer of love, the drugs they’re asking for on “Doctor Please” come from WAY under the counter, and picking cotton on this “Parchment Farm” seems like a real bad way to spend the rest of your life. Not only a major influence on heavy metal but stoner rock started here.