One of the most revered rock albums of all time, Love's Forever Changes has been the desert-island disc of more than a few critics since its release more than 42 years ago. The third album by the multiracial group led by singer-songwriter Arthur Lee was widely expected to match or transcend the success of such mid '60s Sunset Strip peers as the Byrds and the Doors. The album sold poorly at the time, yet it has aged better than most other artifacts from the '60s: "Sgt. Pepper" sounds like yesterday; "Forever Changes" still sounds like tomorrow.

Opener "Alone Again Or" (written and sung by rhythm guitarist Bryan Maclean) sets the tone, with a surge of strings, peppy Mexicali brass — mescaline mariachi — and Spanish-tinged acoustic guitar flowing alongside, and then across, hotwired electric guitar and pounding snare drum. The innovative interweaving of acoustic and electric, of soft and loud, was later integrated by everyone from Led Zeppelin (Robert Plant may be this album's greatest booster) to Alejandro Escovedo and Calexico. Lee's endearingly trippy poetic lyrics were tough for some to grasp: After all these years, one still does double-takes when Lee sings, with bewitching sincerity, "Oh the… read more »