“Dog’s Cruisin’/Wild Child”
by The Happy Hour Band
2002 song
"Dog's Cruisin'/Wild Child" is the first track on the 2002 CD Happy Now by The Happy Hour Band — i.e., Sky Saxon, his old Source Family friend Djin Aquarian, and two others.
"Dog's Cruisin'/Wild Child" is a lengthy and engrossing psychedelic jam on a single chord, strummed rapidly with an insistent beat pulsing underneath. Sky Saxon ad libs in his usual free-form, cosmic way. This time, he manages to cover an impressive array of subjects over the song’s twelve minutes: him and his dog needing shelter; the “Mary Had A Little Lamb” rhyme; a near-segue into The Seeds’ "Fallin'"; and the beauty of women.
The performance itself, with its acoustic guitar and muddy, low-fi sound quality, is at times frightening, in a good (psych) way. Sky does take breaks from time to time, letting the band improvise and explore its uncharted territory.
Although the music itself is rather different, "Dog's Cruisin'/Wild Child" finds Sky for one eerily similar to how he was on the Yodship sessions that were recorded in 1973-4 and released in 1977. The tone of his voice, the pace, and the alternating weariness and fire in his singing make it sound like just a few months have elapsed, rather than the 25+ years — the track was likely recorded in late 1999.
