Country Joe & The Fish – The Life and Times of Country Joe & The Fish

Vanguard put out a Country Joe and the Fish Greatest Hits album in 1969, but following the group’s final album (for a while, anyway), they put out a very nice two-disc compilation, The Life and Times of Country Joe and the Fish From Haight-Ashbury to Woodstock. This is a great little compilation, and while I can’t say it contains everything I would want to hear from the band, it does a really nice job of surveying their career. It’s also a great mix and sound quality.

Really, I’m pretty talked out about this band. We’ve had this record since about 1979. My kid has a copy, too, and got it for free. We were in the local record store (Deep Groove Records in Phoenixville, PA) one day, and as the owner was going through a pile of new acquisitions, my kid noticed him flip past it and said something that made it clear that the least likely thing in the world was happening — there was a 20-year-old in 2016 who recognized a Country Joe and the Fish album on sight. The owner handed it to them then and there, no charge. He wanted to see it go to a good home.