It Came from the British Invasion: “Itchycoo Park,” the Summer of Love Smash from Small Faces

When we think about the British Invasion, we often do so in terms of how it impacted America. Small Faces scored hits again and again in their native UK, but struggled to do so in the U.S. They only did so when a song was released as a single they might have preferred to stay in the background.

That song was “Itchycoo Park,” a track whose laid-back vibes and psychedelic sound made it ideal for release in August 1967, smack-dab in the middle of the Summer of Love. Here’s how Small Faces finally struck gold in America.

Faces in the Crowd

By the time they released “Itchycoo Park,” Small Faces had already delivered six Top-15 hits in the United Kingdom in a span of barely two years. For whatever reason, they couldn’t translate that success to America, as none of those songs made it over to the U.S. charts.

The band was formed in 1965, with original members Steve Marriott, Ronnie Lane, Jimmy Winston, and Kenney Jones. Marriott helped the band gain early attention, as he had already by that time found success as both an actor and a singer, even though he was only 18. Winston was replaced by Ian McLagan about a year into the band’s career.

Their early work was largely influenced by American soul and R&B. It wasn’t long before they progressed to more of a harder-edged psychedelic sound. That’s part of the reason why they weren’t keen on releasing “Itchycoo Park,” since they thought that it was a little soft for the image they wanted to promote. Luckily, their label had other ideas.

“Park” Life

It was Andrew Loog Oldham, who had once managed and produced The Rolling Stones and signed Small Faces to his new label Immediate, who rooted around the group’s tapes while they were touring Germany and found “Itchycoo Park”. The band had no idea it was being released as a single, finding out only after it was a done deal.

Marriott and Lane wrote the song together. The title refers to the plants in the parks frequented by the group’s members, some of which were nettles that tended to sting the skin. Although the song was a bit slower than the group’s usual fare, it still possessed a psychedelic edge, thanks to the innovative use of phasing in the middle section of the song.

Small Faces would go on to create one of the first concept albums (Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake) in 1968. That would be their swan song until a late ’70s reunion, as Marriott left to form Humble Pie. The remaining three members did all right, though: They brought aboard Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood, renamed the group Faces, and enjoyed a great deal of success in the early ’70s as a blues-rock hybrid.

Behind the Meaning of “Itchycoo Park“

“Itchycoo Park” works a paean to an idyllic day, but is also clearly meant to promote recreational drugs as an antidote to the strictures of staid society. The descriptions go a bit beyond what you might actually see in a typical park, as if given a special glow by some mind-altering substances: Over bridge of sighs / To rest my eyes in fields of green / Under dreaming spires.

I got high, the narrator explains, and then Marriott enters into a neat little call and response with his bandmates: (What did you feel there?) well, I cried/ (By why the rears there?) I’ll tell you why / It’s all too beautiful. In the bridge, with vocals altered by the phasing effect, Marriott sings of his communion with the ducks in the park while tripping: I feel inclined to blow my mind.

He then reaches out to a companion, suggesting a day spent that way is far better than anything else: You can miss out school (won’t that be cool?) why go to learn the words of fools? Small Faces make a dreamy case for a day away from it all—including reality—on “Itchycoo Park,” the one time they enchanted American audiences just as much as those in their home country.

Photo by Ivan Keeman/Redferns