Let’s get weird.

(Unsurprisingly, this involves taking a trip back to the 1960s.)

If a young person today tried to learn about the 60s by watching a few documentaries, they would assume that all teenagers back then spent their time protesting, smoking dope, and dressing in outrageous clothes. But the majority of kids didn’t get too far out. It’s simply that the most rebellious 10% receives 90% of the attention.

What did get far out and change dramatically in just about every way was the music. The records of the late 60s couldn’t have been imagined ten, or even five, years prior. You could easily find many examples of this radical transformation in the catalogs of the rock legends, but let’s look at some average teens of the time and see what the changing times wrought.

Around 1964, six high school students formed The Sedate Sunshine Colony in Kingsburg, CA, just down the highway from Fresno in the center of the state. Leader Craig Anderson had played in a folk group with Pat and Jonnie Sue, but after hearing the clarion call of rock & roll, drafted his brother Jeff and a couple of guys named Woody and Chuck from another local group in order to start up an electric folk-rock band.

Like any high school band, The Sedate Sunshine Colony played mostly covers of popular songs by such artists as Bob Dylan, The Byrds, and The Stones, but after a couple of years added edgier, moodier tracks by The Doors and Jefferson Airplane. They also weren’t afraid to throw in a few originals and more obscure songs. But even as the music started to sound more unusual, the band still looked like clean-cut kids from the California suburbs with short hair (on the boys), tucked in button-down shirts, and conservative length skirts.

Unfortunately, despite playing at every venue they could (including a brief TV appearance), The Sedate Sunshine Company never managed to shake their amateur status and broke up in 1968 as most of the members went off to college. Craig was already in college, and after completing a degree in music in 1969, drove down to Los Angeles to seek his fortune. He convinced long-time bandmates Pat and Jonnie Sue to join him, and together they scored a shot to record a single with a producer from RCA — but only if the A-side was a song written by the producer. Not the greatest situation, but not uncommon, and this was still an opportunity to get their foot in the door, so they agreed.

The single was released in 1970 under the name Bentley Road, with a B-side written by Craig that sharply contrasted not only with the bubblegum pop A-side, but with the music he had initially performed with The Sedate Sunshine Company. “Kill The Cobra” was pretty dramatic psych-folk, even for the time, and certainly would have left audiences in 1964-65 dumbfounded. The single went nowhere, and after attempting to make it as a quartet called Anderson (under the management of Steppenwolf’s bassist), everybody quietly went their own way.

We’ve still got “Kill The Cobra,” though. The everyday humdrum fades quickly, but weird lives forever.