“Pushin’ Too Hard”
by The Seeds
1965 song
"Pushin' Too Hard" is patient zero of The Seeds’ legend. It’s usually the first song that fans hear of, and thus for casual fans may be the only Seeds song they know. It was recorded in late 1965 and released not only on their debut album The Seeds but as a single, twice. The second time, it entered the US Top 40, becoming what history would remember as The Seeds’ biggest hit.
On the seminal 1972 garage-psych LP Nuggets "Pushin' Too Hard" was included, which helped cement its status as a – many say the – quintessential 1960s punk song. The music shoots by furiously on two chords and two chords only. Most famously, Sky Saxon’s odd growl bellows out the aggrieved words of a man fed up, throwing crazy loops into his sub-melodic rant. “You’re pushing too HAWWWD!”
The band originally recorded just two takes of "Pushin' Too Hard"; take 1 was abandoned in favor of the second. A verse was excised from Take 2 and it was given a fadeout. In this guise it was released in November 1965 on a GNP Crescendo single as “You’re Pushing Too Hard” b/w "Out Of The Question". Outside of a few local Los Angeles fans, it didn’t sell well.
When it was included in the debut album the following summer it was renamed "Pushin' Too Hard". The record company still believed the song had potential and re-released it, with its new title, and backed it with another failed former A-side, "Try To Understand". This time they hit pay dirt.
With a big hit on their hands, GNP Crescendo started licensing both sides of their new single to labels around the world, generating a large number of collectible records for patient Seeds fanatics. Other labels bootlegged the song for their own purposes. There were several Seeds releases in the 1960s in a variety of formats that used "Pushin' Too Hard" as one of its songs.
In 2012 Big Beat laid bare the "Pushin' Too Hard" vaults: the unissued Take 1 was added to an expanded CD version of The Seeds, and the complete Take 2 with the missing verse and the full ending was put on a limited vinyl single. The latter too was eventually digitized, appearing on the 2014 Singles As & Bs 1965-1970 CD.
Other versions of “Pushin’ Too Hard”
On February 20, 1968 The Seeds recorded a live-in-the-studio “concert” which they intended to pass off as an actual live album; "Pushin' Too Hard" was among the songs. Most of the session wasn’t used but the version of their most famous song recorded on this day was added to the 1977 outtakes LP Fallin' Off The Edge, and later to the 2014 Big Beat version of Raw & Alive in a “new mix”.
On April 9, 1968 The Seeds tried to record their fake live album again and once more "Pushin' Too Hard" was included. This was the one issued on Raw & Alive with fake crowd screams dubbed onto it. This take was in turn released without crowd noises on the 2014 double CD.
Seeds CD compilation named for the song.
Sky Saxon and “Pushin’ Too Hard” after The Seeds
After The Seeds’ demise Sky Saxon frequently re-recorded "Pushin' Too Hard", sometimes altering the title and lyrics, throughout the rest of his career.
In 1977 Sky and guitarist Rainbow Neal released the live album Heavenly Earth featuring "Pushin' Too Fast" – “we had to change the title,” explains mumblin’ Sky in the intro.
In 1987 Sky Saxon was involved in a weird LP full of new recordings and low-fi old recordings called Takes & Glories, a white vinyl German-only release. With an unknown band, possibly SS-20, he did "Pushin' Too Far Too Hard", expanding the title into unwieldiness.
The 1990 Dragonslayers CD Breakin' Through The Doors featured a completely retitled take of the song, "Don't Push Your Wars On Me".
In the early 1990s a CD version of the European quasi-legal Sky Saxon comp Bad Part Of Town was released featuring several low-fi live tracks from the mid 1980s; among these was "Pushin' Too Hard Too Far". This CD was reissued as a mini-LP replica in 2008.
Sky’s band Fast Planet issued a rare live cassette in 1995 called Rockin' The Croc/West Coast that featured a lengthy version of "Pushin' Too Hard".
In 2007 Sky did yet another studio version, with its original title, and released it on a pink vinyl 7″ with its own picture sleeve. This version was also included in the 2008 covers album The King Of Garage Rock.
Furthermore, any bootleg live Seeds or Sky Saxon show you may possess also likely contains a version of "Pushin' Too Hard", with or without a new set of lyrics and/or melody. Finally, in 2007 a nice double-CD best-of was issued titled (you guessed it) Pushin’ Too Hard.
The song is dirty, angry, ugly, and crude. And scrappy. Any band can play it and make it sound great. There’s versatility in its simplicity, strength in its pride, fearsomeness in its punk attitude. It’s no wonder that "Pushin' Too Hard" is The Seeds’ most famous moment and garage rock’s most glorious middle finger.
