The Other Side

An unusual multinational outfit called The Other Side issued a lone respectable garage rock 45, “Out My Light”/“Like a Rolling Stone,” while stationed in Sweden during 1966. Its A-side delivered a sturdy, blues-tinged original in the garage idiom, whereas the flip offered a weighty if somewhat ragged reading of the Bob Dylan standard. American Jack Downing handled lead vocals, a Swedish musician sat behind the drum kit, and the remaining trio hailed from the UK. The best-known of those British players was Mac MacLeod, who occasionally backed Donovan throughout the 1960s and released further obscure material both under his own name and with various psychedelic groups. Boz Scaggs, then resident in Sweden, sat in on bass from time to time. Both tracks appear on the Mac MacLeod anthology The Incredible Musical Odyssey of the Original Hurdy Gurdy Man. This Swedish-based Other Side must be distinguished from the unrelated California band of the same name whose membership at different stages included Skip Spence before his Jefferson Airplane period and several future Chocolate Watch Band members, and which released a scarce single in 1966.