If you wanted to bring a big name rock n’ roll concert to central New York in the 60s and 70s, and you expected to draw 1000s of fans, you booked the Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium in Syracuse, NY. The Carrier Dome did not exist until 1980 and the next closest place was the Utica Memorial Auditorium that held about half as many people. I attended many concerts at the OC War Memorial.
One of the most incredible shows, with one of the most enthusiastic audiences I remember was the 1970 appearance of Mountain with opening act Black Sabbath. Mountain was one of the top rock bands in the world at that time having appeared at Woodstock and having a hit single in the Billboard Hot 100 and a top-20 album, Mountain Climbing. Black Sabbath was a very hungry young band from Great Britain with their self-titled album getting tremendous airplay on FM radio. Both bands featured outstanding guitar players, Leslie West (Mountain) and Tony Iommi (Black Sabbath).
About six of us piled into my car to attend the show together. I don’t remember the exact date but it was probably November or December 1970. We had heard some of the Black Sabbath album on the radio but we were knocked out by their live performance. Iommi was amazing on guitar and Ozzy Osbourne had one of the grittiest, most recognizable voices in rock of all time. Their music came screaming off the stage and grabbed the sudience. I’m not sure everyone was fully prepared for a band like that, but. they were called back for at least one encore.
I had been a fan of Leslie West since he was with The Vagrants. I used to go to Times Square to watch him play at one of the bars there. He was imposing at well over six feet tall and well over 300 pounds. Plus he could play guitar like few other artists of the time. When he teamed up with Felix Pappalardi, another of my music heroes, I expected great things and I wasn’t disappointed. Their first album was released as a Leslie West solo album but the sound was heavily influenced by Felix.
Black Sabbath was exciting but Mountain deserved the top billing. There were only a few other bands of that era that had the combination of musicianship and charisma that Mountain had. They had specific songs that people wanted to hear but when they jammed there wasn’t a bone in anyone’s body in the audience that wasn’t electrified. I was taken over completely by the sound.
They opened with Blood of the Sun and jammed on it for about 7 or 8 minutes. Leslie West got sounds out of the guitar that were totally unique and Felix played his Gibson EB-3 bass with a pick to get the edgy sound out of the instrument that enhanced the heavy blues sound from Leslie’s Gibson Les Paul Jr. The LP Jr was an interesting choice for a man who could play a double bass and make it look tiny. He was a mountain of a man and that little guitar made him look like a giant on stage.
Some of the stuff they played was familiar and some of it was just jamming on riffs that would turn up on the live side of Flowers of Evil. It was one of those shows that you don’t want to end. They played two encores. My date, Debra, was still screaming after the band left the stage. We were knocked off our feet and had to sit for a while before we could leave the Aud at the behest of a very kind, very patient security guard.