WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.200 Welcome in. We are so incredibly thrilled to 00:00:03.200 --> 00:00:05.259 have you here with us today. Whether you're commuting, 00:00:05.280 --> 00:00:07.740 taking a walk, or just hanging out, we've put 00:00:07.740 --> 00:00:10.960 together a deep dive today that is, well, it's 00:00:10.960 --> 00:00:12.800 going to take you down one of the most unexpected 00:00:12.800 --> 00:00:15.339 historical rabbit holes we have ever come across. 00:00:15.539 --> 00:00:17.719 Yeah, it really is. We are looking at a stack 00:00:17.719 --> 00:00:20.960 of notes, a few articles, and the Wikipedia page 00:00:20.960 --> 00:00:23.640 for a song that was released way back in 1968. 00:00:23.879 --> 00:00:26.760 Right. It's a track called My Name is Jack, performed 00:00:26.760 --> 00:00:29.960 by the British group Manford Man. And on the 00:00:29.960 --> 00:00:33.420 surface, taking the time to dissect a 2 minute 00:00:33.420 --> 00:00:36.079 and 50 second pop song from over half a century 00:00:36.079 --> 00:00:38.670 ago might seem like a little... a little niche 00:00:38.670 --> 00:00:41.750 a bit overly specific yeah exactly but the entire 00:00:41.750 --> 00:00:44.289 mission of today's deep dive is to show you how 00:00:44.289 --> 00:00:47.649 a seemingly simple almost forgotten piece of 00:00:47.649 --> 00:00:50.969 bouncy psychedelic pop actually functions as 00:00:50.969 --> 00:00:54.490 a bizarre incredibly dense historical time capsule 00:00:54.490 --> 00:00:56.909 it really is it's the perfect illustration of 00:00:56.909 --> 00:00:59.070 how much cultural weight can be hidden inside 00:00:59.070 --> 00:01:02.109 just a few minutes of audio when you start pulling 00:01:02.109 --> 00:01:05.109 at the threads of the single piece of media you 00:01:05.109 --> 00:01:07.870 uncover a web of connections that spans continents 00:01:07.870 --> 00:01:11.069 and decades, you find all these completely distinct 00:01:11.069 --> 00:01:13.650 eras and events woven together in a way that 00:01:13.650 --> 00:01:15.629 feels, I mean, it feels almost like fiction. 00:01:15.769 --> 00:01:18.069 Yeah. Before we wrap up this discussion, we are 00:01:18.069 --> 00:01:21.230 going to connect a cult 1960s film, a legendary 00:01:21.230 --> 00:01:24.310 London recording studio, the censorship of the 00:01:24.310 --> 00:01:26.370 Haight -Ashbury drug scene in San Francisco, 00:01:26.390 --> 00:01:30.069 and a deeply affecting moment in Japanese American 00:01:30.069 --> 00:01:32.870 history. All of that. All of that dense human 00:01:32.870 --> 00:01:36.370 history is quite literally encoded into the DNA 00:01:36.370 --> 00:01:39.409 of this one short track. Okay, let's unpack this. 00:01:39.590 --> 00:01:41.150 We should probably establish the foundational 00:01:41.150 --> 00:01:43.170 facts of the record to ground the conversation. 00:01:43.469 --> 00:01:45.750 Good idea. So this specific version of My Name 00:01:45.750 --> 00:01:49.829 is Jack was released on June 7, 1968 by Fontana 00:01:49.829 --> 00:01:52.010 Records. And it was a massive smash hit internationally. 00:01:52.390 --> 00:01:54.909 We're talking about a major success story across 00:01:54.909 --> 00:01:57.629 the globe. It reached number eight on the UK 00:01:57.629 --> 00:01:59.930 singles chart. It went all the way to number 00:01:59.930 --> 00:02:02.500 one in Austria. Yeah. And it was a top 10 hit 00:02:02.500 --> 00:02:05.939 in Australia, Germany and New Zealand. It even 00:02:05.939 --> 00:02:08.259 performed really solidly in Ireland and the Netherlands. 00:02:08.479 --> 00:02:10.719 Right. But the wild part of its chart history 00:02:10.719 --> 00:02:13.800 is that despite doing incredibly well almost 00:02:13.800 --> 00:02:17.039 everywhere else in the world, it completely flopped 00:02:17.039 --> 00:02:19.860 in the United States. Totally tanked. It stalled 00:02:19.860 --> 00:02:23.099 out at number 104 on the Billboard bubbling under 00:02:23.099 --> 00:02:25.860 chart. Which being at number 104 is essentially 00:02:25.860 --> 00:02:28.400 being invisible in the American market. It barely 00:02:28.400 --> 00:02:31.780 made a dent. Yeah. And that lack of American 00:02:31.780 --> 00:02:35.080 success is deeply ironic considering the actual 00:02:35.080 --> 00:02:37.819 origins of the track. Right, because Manfred 00:02:37.819 --> 00:02:39.680 Mann, being a British group, didn't write this 00:02:39.680 --> 00:02:41.979 song. No, they didn't. It was penned by an American. 00:02:42.120 --> 00:02:44.800 The original author was an American record producer 00:02:44.800 --> 00:02:47.240 named John Simon. Which completely shifts the 00:02:47.240 --> 00:02:50.680 context. A British band taking an American song 00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:52.759 to the top of the charts in Europe while America 00:02:52.759 --> 00:02:55.479 just ignores it. Exactly. And the song itself 00:02:55.479 --> 00:02:58.740 has this entire cinematic origin story before 00:02:58.740 --> 00:03:00.800 Manfred. Stanford man ever even touched it. Yeah. 00:03:00.860 --> 00:03:02.639 John Simon wrote the music and the lyrics, and 00:03:02.639 --> 00:03:04.659 he actually recorded his own original version 00:03:04.659 --> 00:03:07.319 first. That version was included on the soundtrack 00:03:07.319 --> 00:03:10.539 of a film from 1968 called You Are What You Eat. 00:03:10.719 --> 00:03:13.360 Such a great title. It is. And it's a film that 00:03:13.360 --> 00:03:17.280 is deeply, heavily embedded in the 1960s counterculture. 00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:22.099 It captures that very specific, chaotic, vibrant 00:03:22.099 --> 00:03:24.919 energy of the era perfectly. And that counterculture 00:03:24.919 --> 00:03:27.439 vibe is completely baked into the lyrical premise 00:03:27.439 --> 00:03:30.590 of the song, too. The lyrics tell the story of 00:03:30.590 --> 00:03:32.770 a resident living at a place called the Greta 00:03:32.770 --> 00:03:35.310 Garbo Home for wayward boys and girls. Right. 00:03:35.430 --> 00:03:38.629 Hearing that, you naturally assume it's a fantastical, 00:03:38.650 --> 00:03:42.530 purely imaginary place invented for a psychedelic 00:03:42.530 --> 00:03:44.360 pop song. I mean, it sounds like something out 00:03:44.360 --> 00:03:46.560 of a quirky fairy tale. What's fascinating here 00:03:46.560 --> 00:03:49.000 is that wasn't a fictional place at all. The 00:03:49.000 --> 00:03:51.719 Greta Garbo Home for Wayward Boys and Girls was 00:03:51.719 --> 00:03:55.159 the colloquial nickname for a very real physical 00:03:55.159 --> 00:03:58.159 hostel in San Francisco. Yeah. It was officially 00:03:58.159 --> 00:04:00.620 called the Kirkland Hotel, and it was located 00:04:00.620 --> 00:04:02.719 right in the heart of the city's counterculture 00:04:02.719 --> 00:04:05.659 scene. It was a major hub for the people flowing 00:04:05.659 --> 00:04:07.939 into the city during that era. And it was actually 00:04:07.939 --> 00:04:10.479 the specific location where a portion of the 00:04:10.479 --> 00:04:12.819 movie You Are What You Eat was filmed. Think 00:04:12.819 --> 00:04:15.039 about the journey of that one highly localized 00:04:15.039 --> 00:04:18.279 joke. A hyper -specific San Francisco nickname, 00:04:18.600 --> 00:04:21.279 basically an inside joke among the local counterculture, 00:04:21.439 --> 00:04:24.139 ends up being sung by a British pop rock band 00:04:24.139 --> 00:04:26.680 and hitting number one in Austria. It's absurd. 00:04:27.120 --> 00:04:29.439 People in Vienna were humming along to a song 00:04:29.439 --> 00:04:32.389 about a San Francisco hostel. Right. But to truly 00:04:32.389 --> 00:04:34.230 understand the gravity of this site, we have 00:04:34.230 --> 00:04:37.730 to look past the psychedelic 1960s. We had to 00:04:37.730 --> 00:04:39.329 peel back the layers of the building itself, 00:04:39.509 --> 00:04:41.910 which was located at 1701 Laguna Street. Yes. 00:04:42.209 --> 00:04:44.389 We need to leave the summer of love behind and 00:04:44.389 --> 00:04:47.569 travel back in time to the 1940s. The story of 00:04:47.569 --> 00:04:50.730 that physical space takes a deep, profound historical 00:04:50.730 --> 00:04:54.259 pivot here. Long before the building at 1701, 00:04:54.519 --> 00:04:56.379 Laguna Street was known as the Kirkland Hotel. 00:04:56.600 --> 00:04:59.319 And decades before anyone jokingly referred to 00:04:59.319 --> 00:05:01.959 it as the Greta Garbo home, it was known as the 00:05:01.959 --> 00:05:05.100 Kashu Hotel. The Kashu Hotel. Right. And during 00:05:05.100 --> 00:05:07.300 that era, the Kashu Hotel was owned and operated 00:05:07.300 --> 00:05:10.040 by a Japanese -American man named Sakutaro Nakano. 00:05:10.160 --> 00:05:13.079 The sources give us an incredibly poignant detail 00:05:13.079 --> 00:05:16.399 about Sakutaro Nakano and his livelihood at that 00:05:16.399 --> 00:05:20.259 location. In April of 1942, the legendary documentary 00:05:20.259 --> 00:05:23.019 photographer Dorothea Lange took a picture at 00:05:23.019 --> 00:05:25.620 this exact building. Yes. She was documenting 00:05:25.620 --> 00:05:28.740 the era, and she captured a photograph of a sign 00:05:28.740 --> 00:05:31.720 sitting in the window of the Kashu Hotel. It's 00:05:31.720 --> 00:05:34.639 a heartbreaking image. It really is. At this 00:05:34.639 --> 00:05:37.720 point in history, the owner, like so many Japanese 00:05:37.720 --> 00:05:39.980 Americans living on the West Coast, had been 00:05:39.980 --> 00:05:42.459 officially ordered to evacuate. He was being 00:05:42.459 --> 00:05:44.800 sent to a war relocation authority center for 00:05:44.800 --> 00:05:46.779 the duration of World War II. He had to pack 00:05:46.779 --> 00:05:48.899 up his entire life. Leave his business behind 00:05:48.899 --> 00:05:52.519 and face a completely uncertain future. And the 00:05:52.519 --> 00:05:54.660 sign that Dorothea Lange photographed in his 00:05:54.660 --> 00:05:57.439 window amidst all of that upheaval, it was a 00:05:57.439 --> 00:06:00.399 simple offer to give away his kittens. Wow. When 00:06:00.399 --> 00:06:03.120 you study the broad sweeping historical narrative 00:06:03.120 --> 00:06:05.459 of the Japanese -American wartime relocation, 00:06:05.560 --> 00:06:08.100 the sheer scale of the displacement can sometimes 00:06:08.100 --> 00:06:10.560 feel abstract. Yeah, it's just numbers on a page. 00:06:10.970 --> 00:06:13.410 We read the numbers in textbooks and it is difficult 00:06:13.410 --> 00:06:16.089 to wrap our minds around the individual lives 00:06:16.089 --> 00:06:19.009 affected. But a handwritten sign in a window 00:06:19.009 --> 00:06:21.889 trying to find a home for kittens because the 00:06:21.889 --> 00:06:23.829 business owner is being forced out of his community 00:06:23.829 --> 00:06:27.170 by the government. That strips away the abstraction. 00:06:27.509 --> 00:06:29.889 Completely. It makes the history immediate and 00:06:29.889 --> 00:06:32.310 profoundly human. You look at that single plot 00:06:32.310 --> 00:06:34.930 of land in San Francisco and the contrast is 00:06:34.930 --> 00:06:38.209 just massive. In 1942, it's the site of this 00:06:38.209 --> 00:06:41.250 profound historical displacement and personal 00:06:41.250 --> 00:06:43.810 loss. Yeah. The end of a man's livelihood and 00:06:43.810 --> 00:06:45.790 his life as he knew it. Right. Then the calendar 00:06:45.790 --> 00:06:48.730 turns. Decades pass. The culture shifts entirely. 00:06:49.050 --> 00:06:52.050 And that exact same building transforms into 00:06:52.050 --> 00:06:55.699 a quirky, whimsical pop. culture reference point 00:06:55.699 --> 00:06:59.560 in a bouncy 1968 pop song. It forces you to realize 00:06:59.560 --> 00:07:02.199 how physical spaces are constantly being rewritten 00:07:02.199 --> 00:07:04.980 over time. The building absorbs the air as it 00:07:04.980 --> 00:07:07.800 survives. And the story of 1701 Laguna Street 00:07:07.800 --> 00:07:10.639 continued to evolve long after the 1960s faded. 00:07:10.819 --> 00:07:12.500 It didn't stop there. No, the building eventually 00:07:12.500 --> 00:07:14.500 became dilapidated as the neighborhood changed 00:07:14.500 --> 00:07:17.160 yet again. It was ultimately completely demolished. 00:07:17.220 --> 00:07:20.240 The physical structure where Sakura Nakano ran 00:07:20.240 --> 00:07:22.800 his hotel, where Dorothea Lange took that photograph, 00:07:23.040 --> 00:07:25.240 and where the counterculture figures of the 60s 00:07:25.240 --> 00:07:29.399 gathered. It was torn down. In 1975, the Christ 00:07:29.399 --> 00:07:31.920 United Presbyterian Church was built and opened 00:07:31.920 --> 00:07:34.699 on that exact site. A Japanese -American hotel, 00:07:34.980 --> 00:07:38.480 a counterculture hostel, and a church. Three 00:07:38.480 --> 00:07:41.459 entirely distinct eras all stacked on top of 00:07:41.459 --> 00:07:43.639 the same plot of land. Yeah. And one of those 00:07:43.639 --> 00:07:45.680 middle eras just happened to be captured forever 00:07:45.680 --> 00:07:48.639 in a pop song. But digging back into the lyrics 00:07:48.639 --> 00:07:51.160 of that song, the Greta Garbo home wasn't the 00:07:51.160 --> 00:07:53.740 only real -life San Francisco reference they 00:07:53.740 --> 00:07:56.170 included. Here's where it gets really interesting. 00:07:56.250 --> 00:07:58.730 Whoa, this part is wild. The song also originally 00:07:58.730 --> 00:08:01.050 contained a direct shout -out to the Haight -Ashbury 00:08:01.050 --> 00:08:03.509 drug scene. Yes, the lyrics make mention of a 00:08:03.509 --> 00:08:06.269 very real, notorious figure from that specific 00:08:06.269 --> 00:08:09.209 era. There was a well -known drug dealer operating 00:08:09.209 --> 00:08:11.410 in the Haight -Ashbury neighborhood who went 00:08:11.410 --> 00:08:13.750 by the street name Super Spade. Super Spade. 00:08:13.870 --> 00:08:16.230 Yeah, he was a fixture in that specific underground 00:08:16.230 --> 00:08:18.889 economy. And early versions of the Manfred Mann 00:08:18.889 --> 00:08:22.230 cover of My Name is Jack stayed completely faithful 00:08:22.230 --> 00:08:24.930 to John Simon's original lyrics. Right. They 00:08:24.930 --> 00:08:26.850 didn't change a thing at first. That meant the 00:08:26.850 --> 00:08:30.029 band explicitly sang the name Superspade on the 00:08:30.029 --> 00:08:33.590 track. In the hyperlocal context of San Francisco, 00:08:33.809 --> 00:08:36.330 it was just the established nickname of a local 00:08:36.330 --> 00:08:39.570 figure. Right. But once the song was being prepped 00:08:39.570 --> 00:08:43.450 for mass distribution, that specific word created 00:08:43.450 --> 00:08:46.830 a significant conflict. A massive conflict. And 00:08:46.830 --> 00:08:49.389 it stems entirely from the dual nature of the 00:08:49.389 --> 00:08:52.269 word itself. Inside the Haight -Ashbury bubble, 00:08:52.429 --> 00:08:55.669 it was just a street name. However, outside of 00:08:55.669 --> 00:08:58.149 that specific geographic and cultural bubble, 00:08:58.330 --> 00:09:01.570 the word itself is a well -known, highly offensive 00:09:01.570 --> 00:09:04.710 racial slur. And corporate intervention enters 00:09:04.710 --> 00:09:07.710 the story at this exact point. The band's distributor 00:09:07.710 --> 00:09:10.289 in the United States was Mercury Records. When 00:09:10.289 --> 00:09:12.750 the executives at Mercury reviewed the lyrics 00:09:12.750 --> 00:09:15.409 for the upcoming release, they immediately flagged 00:09:15.409 --> 00:09:17.809 it. They formally requested that the band change 00:09:17.809 --> 00:09:20.120 the lyric. Looking objectively at the corporate 00:09:20.120 --> 00:09:22.559 censorship taking place, the label saw a word 00:09:22.559 --> 00:09:24.940 they deemed unacceptable and risky for the broader 00:09:24.940 --> 00:09:27.220 American consumer market. Right. Regardless of 00:09:27.220 --> 00:09:29.919 its local San Francisco context. Exactly. They 00:09:29.919 --> 00:09:32.120 weren't concerned with the local context. They 00:09:32.120 --> 00:09:34.259 just demanded a fix before they would push the 00:09:34.259 --> 00:09:36.610 record. So to satisfy the demands of their U 00:09:36.610 --> 00:09:38.970 .S. distributor, Manfred Mann actually had to 00:09:38.970 --> 00:09:41.029 go back to the drawing board. They physically 00:09:41.029 --> 00:09:43.690 returned to the studio. Yeah, they had to re 00:09:43.690 --> 00:09:46.029 -record the vocal track. They swapped out the 00:09:46.029 --> 00:09:48.590 controversial specific reference to super spade 00:09:48.590 --> 00:09:51.950 and replaced it with a much safer, universally 00:09:51.950 --> 00:09:54.429 familiar word that happened to fit the exact 00:09:54.429 --> 00:09:57.110 same melody and syllable count. A Superman. Superman. 00:09:57.649 --> 00:09:59.850 It's a fascinating glimpse into the mechanics 00:09:59.850 --> 00:10:03.450 of the music industry in the late 1960s. You 00:10:03.450 --> 00:10:05.950 have a British band covering an American song 00:10:05.950 --> 00:10:09.549 about a specific San Francisco hostel and then 00:10:09.549 --> 00:10:12.149 having to alter the local street slang to appease 00:10:12.149 --> 00:10:14.190 an American corporate distributor. Completely 00:10:14.190 --> 00:10:16.610 changing the meaning of the lyric from a gritty 00:10:16.610 --> 00:10:19.809 local drug dealer to a literal comic book superhero 00:10:19.809 --> 00:10:22.559 in the process. Yeah. But talking about them 00:10:22.559 --> 00:10:25.419 going back into the studio to make that fix brings 00:10:25.419 --> 00:10:27.679 us to the actual musical recording of the cover 00:10:27.679 --> 00:10:30.179 itself. We have the personnel list for this session, 00:10:30.299 --> 00:10:32.620 and it is quite a lineup of musicians in the 00:10:32.620 --> 00:10:35.919 room. Oh, it's a remarkable group of talent assembling 00:10:35.919 --> 00:10:38.860 for a pop single. You have Mike Diabo handling 00:10:38.860 --> 00:10:41.080 the lead vocals and playing the piano. Right. 00:10:41.159 --> 00:10:43.519 You have Manfred Mann himself on the keyboards. 00:10:43.820 --> 00:10:46.580 Tom McGinnis is playing the guitar. Klaus Vorman 00:10:46.580 --> 00:10:49.379 is on the bass guitar. And anyone familiar with 00:10:49.379 --> 00:10:52.230 rock history? knows his pedigree. Oh, absolutely. 00:10:52.350 --> 00:10:56.049 From his ties to the Beatles in Hamburg to designing 00:10:56.049 --> 00:10:58.750 the cover of Revolver. Yeah. And then you have 00:10:58.750 --> 00:11:01.029 my hug holding it down on the drums. Thinking 00:11:01.029 --> 00:11:03.330 about those specific guys getting together in 00:11:03.330 --> 00:11:06.210 a room to track this song is one thing. But where 00:11:06.210 --> 00:11:09.529 they recorded this 1968 track is a piece of history 00:11:09.529 --> 00:11:12.409 all on its own. They recorded My Name is Jack. 00:11:12.889 --> 00:11:15.730 at Trident Studios in London. Trident? Yeah. 00:11:15.809 --> 00:11:18.669 In March of 1968, Trident was a newly constructed 00:11:18.669 --> 00:11:21.350 state -of -the -art facility. If we connect this 00:11:21.350 --> 00:11:23.149 to the bigger picture, the fact that they are 00:11:23.149 --> 00:11:25.570 recording at Trident Studios in March of 1968 00:11:25.570 --> 00:11:28.990 is a monumental detail for music history buffs. 00:11:29.190 --> 00:11:31.970 It really is. My name is Jack. It wasn't just 00:11:31.970 --> 00:11:34.110 another session on the books. It was actually 00:11:34.110 --> 00:11:36.750 one of the very first high -profile recording 00:11:36.750 --> 00:11:39.990 sessions to ever take place at the newly built 00:11:39.990 --> 00:11:42.370 Trident Studios. They were essentially testing 00:11:42.370 --> 00:11:44.769 out the room. And Trident Studios would go on 00:11:44.769 --> 00:11:47.269 to become one of the most renowned, legendary 00:11:47.269 --> 00:11:49.629 recording spaces in the entire world. Without 00:11:49.629 --> 00:11:51.649 a doubt. This is the room that would eventually 00:11:51.649 --> 00:11:54.210 host artists like the Beatles when they recorded 00:11:54.210 --> 00:11:57.009 Hey Jude. Yeah. It's the room where David Bowie 00:11:57.009 --> 00:11:59.389 would record The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust. 00:11:59.769 --> 00:12:01.909 It's the room where Queen would lay down the 00:12:01.909 --> 00:12:04.429 tracks for their early albums. Just massive, 00:12:04.450 --> 00:12:06.950 iconic records. Some of the most important rock 00:12:06.950 --> 00:12:09.570 and pop music of the 20th century was crafted 00:12:09.570 --> 00:12:12.490 in that exact space. And here's Manfred Mann, 00:12:12.730 --> 00:12:15.110 right at the dawn of the studio's existence, 00:12:15.450 --> 00:12:17.909 surrounded by fresh paint and new equipment, 00:12:18.009 --> 00:12:20.730 laying down a track about a San Francisco hostel. 00:12:21.129 --> 00:12:23.629 It highlights the interconnected nature of popular 00:12:23.629 --> 00:12:26.450 music so perfectly. The origins of Trident's 00:12:26.450 --> 00:12:28.929 massive legacy share a tiny, quirky footnote 00:12:28.929 --> 00:12:31.129 with a song about a building on Laguna Street 00:12:31.129 --> 00:12:34.649 in California. So what does this all mean? When 00:12:34.649 --> 00:12:36.629 we step back and look at the entire life cycle 00:12:36.629 --> 00:12:39.669 of My Name is Jack, from a San Francisco inside 00:12:39.669 --> 00:12:42.529 joke to a London recording studio. What is the 00:12:42.529 --> 00:12:44.629 ultimate takeaway for you listening to this? 00:12:44.750 --> 00:12:46.850 I think the most compelling element of this entire 00:12:46.850 --> 00:12:50.250 story is the song's incredibly unusual, contradictory 00:12:50.250 --> 00:12:53.830 global footprint. Yeah. We have spent this deep 00:12:53.830 --> 00:12:57.549 dive tracing the hyper -local San Francisco roots 00:12:57.549 --> 00:13:00.450 of the lyrics. It is a song explicitly about 00:13:00.450 --> 00:13:02.789 American culture, American locations, and American 00:13:02.789 --> 00:13:04.730 street figures. Through and through. Yet the 00:13:04.730 --> 00:13:06.669 song utterly failed to connect with the audience 00:13:06.669 --> 00:13:10.129 in the United States, peaking at 104. But globally, 00:13:10.250 --> 00:13:13.240 in Europe and Oceania, it thrived. It resonated 00:13:13.240 --> 00:13:15.580 with people who likely had absolutely no idea 00:13:15.580 --> 00:13:17.779 what the Greta Garbo home was. And its afterlife 00:13:17.779 --> 00:13:20.100 in the decades that followed is even more unexpected. 00:13:20.460 --> 00:13:22.539 The song didn't just disappear into the archives 00:13:22.539 --> 00:13:25.779 after 1968. It found a completely new, surprising 00:13:25.779 --> 00:13:28.919 legacy, specifically in Japan. There are two 00:13:28.919 --> 00:13:32.159 prominent, documented cover versions of the song 00:13:32.159 --> 00:13:36.679 by Japanese groups. In 1978, the Japanese group 00:13:36.679 --> 00:13:39.360 Moonriders covered it on their album Nouvelle 00:13:39.360 --> 00:13:42.919 Vagues. And then in 1994, the Japanese group 00:13:42.919 --> 00:13:45.220 Pizzicato 5 recorded their own version for the 00:13:45.220 --> 00:13:47.440 album Great White Wonder. That brings a strange 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:49.960 poetic full circle to the narrative. It really 00:13:49.960 --> 00:13:52.500 does. A physical building in California that 00:13:52.500 --> 00:13:55.200 was originally a Japanese -American hotel whose 00:13:55.200 --> 00:13:57.220 owner was tragically displaced during the war 00:13:57.220 --> 00:14:00.159 eventually inspires a pop song that finds lasting 00:14:00.159 --> 00:14:02.299 cultural resonance with the Japanese artists 00:14:02.299 --> 00:14:04.940 decades later. Yeah. When you synthesize all 00:14:04.940 --> 00:14:06.639 of this information, it is truly remarkable. 00:14:06.980 --> 00:14:11.080 This single piece of 1968 pop rock media somehow 00:14:11.080 --> 00:14:13.279 managed to intersect with Japanese -American 00:14:13.279 --> 00:14:16.240 wartime relocation, the gritty reality of San 00:14:16.240 --> 00:14:18.840 Francisco's drug scene, mechanics of corporate 00:14:18.840 --> 00:14:21.820 lyric censorship. and the very dawn of a legendary 00:14:21.820 --> 00:14:24.519 British recording studio. It absolutely proves 00:14:24.519 --> 00:14:26.200 the point we set out to make at the beginning 00:14:26.200 --> 00:14:28.480 of this Deep Dives. It shows you exactly how 00:14:28.480 --> 00:14:30.840 much dense, fascinating, and sometimes heartbreaking 00:14:30.840 --> 00:14:33.279 human history can be packed into a track that 00:14:33.279 --> 00:14:35.460 is less than three minutes long. It makes you 00:14:35.460 --> 00:14:37.779 realize that every single piece of media you 00:14:37.779 --> 00:14:40.519 consume, every song you hear, every movie you 00:14:40.519 --> 00:14:42.980 watch, might have these invisible historical 00:14:42.980 --> 00:14:45.820 roots trailing behind it, tying together people 00:14:45.820 --> 00:14:48.659 and events that seem completely unrelated. This 00:14:48.659 --> 00:14:51.320 raises an important question. Think about the 00:14:51.320 --> 00:14:53.980 physical spaces you walk past every single day 00:14:53.980 --> 00:14:56.220 in your own neighborhood, just like that church 00:14:56.220 --> 00:14:58.279 standing on Laguna Street in San Francisco right 00:14:58.279 --> 00:15:01.740 now. If a single demolished hotel can hold layers 00:15:01.740 --> 00:15:04.259 of history ranging from heartbreaking wartime 00:15:04.259 --> 00:15:07.539 tragedy to psychedelic pop culture fame, how 00:15:07.539 --> 00:15:09.980 many forgotten stories and contrasting eras of 00:15:09.980 --> 00:15:12.320 history are buried right under our feet, just 00:15:12.320 --> 00:15:14.000 waiting for someone to do a deep dive?