When I was growing up, there were a few albums that my parents played so often that they eventually wore out the vinyl. The 1975 Country Joe McDonald record pictured here, Paradise with an Ocean View, is one of them.
I remember liking to look at the gatefold cover when I was very little because of the McDonald's sign you can make out amidst the destruction on the left-hand side. (I had a romantic attachment to this restaurant thanks to the fact that my parents permitted us to frequent it about as often as I was allowed to have sweetened cereal or soda, which is to say, never. Obviously, I was not equipped back then to appreciate the irony of the message being conveyed by the cover artwork, which to me symbolized nothing more weighty than the forbidden pleasure of the Happy Meal.)
But artwork aside, the second side of this record is one that I came to love, and after I moved away to college and didn't have access to my parents' record collection anymore, I picked up my own used copy. It still sounds good – like childhood, only better, because now I can buy my own Big Macs. Here's my favorite cut, the final one on the record:Country Joe McDonald Breakfast for Two mp3
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