"San Francisco" Scott McKenzie

Friday, August 13, 2010

"San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" is a 1967 megahit song by Scott McKenzie.  After 7-million copies sold, the generational anthem still plays and still sells.

It is one of music's hottest singles of all time.

Written and produced by The Mamas and The Papas founder John Phillips, "San Francisco" is the song that drew thousands of flower children, peaceniks and hippies westward to California in the late '60s.

Sung by the innocently beautiful, impeccably melodic voice of Scott McKenzie, the song is a pop masterpiece with a slightly 'hip' psychedelic appeal.

McKenzie's symmetrically attractive face helped to visually sell the song's call to "a whole generation with a new explanation".  On TV, the singer looked like a clean-cut, respectable, sensitive, non-threatening hippie.

"San Francisco" spoke directly to its target audience of young, discontented seekers in a language which the Love Generation easily understood and totally 'dug'.

A groovy love-in, with gentle people, in the streets, in a California paradise, with flowers everywhere, and in the summertime when it's vacation season anyway?  Hey, I know where I'd be headed off to, man.

"San Francisco" by Scott McKenzie is, without a doubt, one of the grooviest California songs of all time.