Hammer was an American hard-rock band from San Francisco that released a 1971 self-titled album on Atlantic.
Members: John DeRoberts (vocals), Jack O’Brien (guitar), Richie McBride (bass), Norman Landsberg (keyboards), John Guerin (drums), Andy Newmark (drums)
Background
Hammer formed in 1969 under the guidance of Fillmore promoter Bill Graham, who placed the band on bills at both Fillmore East and West and secured them a contract with Atlantic via his San Francisco imprint. They featured singer John DeRoberts, guitarist Jack O’Brien, teenage bassist Richie McBride (b. 1952, Queens), and two seasons players: keyboardist Norman Landsberg and drummer John Guerin.
Landsberg played on Mountain, the 1969 debut solo album by ex-Vagrants guitarist Leslie West.
Guerin, born in Hawaii and raised in San Diego, was already an in-demand session player by the time Hammer formed—his credits included Frank Zappa’s Lumpy Gravy, Hot Rats, and Chunga’s Revenge, as well as sides by Peggy Lee, Tom Scott, Bud Shank, Blue Mitchell, Priscilla Paris, and the Mystic Moods Orchestra.
Hammer (1971)
Hammer released their self-titled album in 1971 on Atlantic. The album veers between organ-driven hard rock, jazzy instrumentals, and singer-songwriter introspection.
Hammer builds tension from the contrast between Landsberg’s dense keyboard arrangements and O’Brien’s concise guitar-driven tracks. Songs shift between abrupt rhythmic pivots, brass-like keyboard stabs, and blues motifs hardened into rigid, mechanistic forms. Vocals from John DeRoberts rise to strained upper registers that alternate between declarative force and theatrical falsetto. The instrumentals “Tuane” and “Death to a King” push furthest from blues structure, leaning into West Coast jazz phrasings and asymmetrical layering. Elsewhere, Hammer interrupts straight meter with sharp breaks and sudden tempo recalibrations.
A1. “Something Easy” (2:50) – Tight jazz-rock phrasing over clustered organ figures and brittle guitar accents; DeRoberts scat-sings in upper falsetto with sudden leaps and tonal shifts.
A2. “Hot and Cold” (3:00) – Waltz-based meter with smoothed-over chord patterns; O’Brien cuts in with a clean, high-register guitar solo shaped in slow arcs.
A3. “Tuane” (3:10) – Wordless vocal lines drift over clipped Latin percussion and fused jazz-funk pacing; Landsberg and O’Brien alternate in abrupt, percussive solos.
A4. “You May Never Wake Up (Apologies to Auden & Frost)” (3:24) – Airy rhythm track with open-spaced instrumentation; vocal phrases snake upward in narrow intervals, then collapse in soft cadence.
A5. “Hangover Horns” (3:15) – Aggressive, clipped riff cycles and rapid drum figures; guitar solo bends through ascending runs before dropping into double-stop punctuation.
B1. “Charity Taylor” (3:29) – Electric organ and reverbed guitar shape a short soul prelude that breaks into halting stop-start patterns midway; ends on a return to its slow pulse.
B2. “Sad Song, Happy Song” (2:59) – Light, swaying keyboard theme morphs into a tumbling rhythmic flow with clipped cymbal accents and staggered vocal delivery.
B3. “Sweet Sunday Morning” (2:18) – Sparse ballad with subtle jazz phrasing; Landsberg’s keyboard lines move in stepwise descent under restrained vocals.
B4. “Pains and Tears” (3:28) – Stiff boogie figure in unison guitar and organ; extended midsection trades between circular soloing and blunt chord reassertion.
B5. “Death to a King” (5:38) – Long-form instrumental built on dark minor progressions and layered piano runs; shifts in tempo mark sectional transitions, ending in a slow fade over clustered keyboard tones.
O’Brien co-wrote three songs (A4, A5, B2) with outside lyricist Tom Kennedy. Sessions occurred at Pacific Recording Studio (San Mateo) and Coast Recorders (San Francisco) with engineer Fred Catero. Mixed at Wally Heider Studios by producer David Rubinson. Released on the San Francisco label (distributed by Atlantic) with cover art by Jim Visconti (Haystacks Balboa) and photography by David Hoff.
The piano theme of “Death to a King” possibly inspired “Metamorfosi,” an epic by Banco del Mutuo Soccorso on their 1972 debut album.
Aftermath
Despite their Fillmore-circuit presence and well-received debut, Hammer folded in 1971 after the cancellation of their second album.
John Guerin co-founded LA Express, the jazz-rock backing band on mid-Seventies albums by Joni Mitchell and Tom Scott.
Norman Landsberg became a key studio collaborator with Leslie West and arranged the first two albums by The Pointer Sisters.
Jack O’Brien later worked as a sideman for jazz-pop vocalist Laura Yager before his death in 1988 at age 36.
John DeRoberts resurfaced on American Heartbeat, the 1977 Sire release by Martha Velez.
Discography:
- Hammer (1971)
Sources:
Artist/Album Pages:
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