Back covers can often allow the band to display their influences and they don't come much more explicit that this. On their second album, released in 1967, Buffalo Springfield listed "friends, enemies and people we don't know from Adam for their influence and inspiration".
Jimmy McDonough's Shakey credits the hand-lettered illustration to
Henry Diltz, a musician (he was a founding member of the Modern Folk Quartet) and photographer. He was the official photographer for Woodstock and the Monterey Pop festivals and also co-founded
Morrison Hotel Galleries, specialising in fine art music photography. The album itself only credits Eve Babitz for the cover illustration (who also designed album covers for Linda Ronstadt and The Byrds) and album design to Loring Eutemey (who designed many of Atlantic's covers for the likes of Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane).
In a band with strong personalities and individual songwriters (Neil Young, Stephen Stills and Richie Furay), the back cover is careful to list out specific roles, reflecting growing tension within the band and that they were often working separately. It probably also reflects music company desire, post-Beatlemania, to promote the separate personalities of each group member in order to broaden their appeal.
The credits also make apparent the lack of a consistent bass player. The original bass player, Bruce Palmer, was often absent due to drug charges and ultimately deported back to Canada. As Neil Young's hand-written liner notes for Decade, his 1977 compilation album recall: "Mr Soul: recorded by the original Springfield at Atlantic's New York studios after a gig at "Ondine's". Shortly after this Bruce Palmer, bassist, was busted and deported to Canada. Eventually we got him back to U.S. but made many records without him. Broke [Stephen] Stills' heart and mine too that he wasn't on all our records".
The credits for Young's "Mr Soul" note that it is "[r]espectfully dedicated to the ladies of The Whiskey A Go Go and the woman of Hollywood". There has been much debate over the meaning of the song, but this seems to acknowledge that somewhere in there are Young’s frustrations at the price of fame and the hollow female attention that it can engender...maybe.
