(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)

Iron Butterfly, formed by organist Doug Ingle in 1966 in San Diego, acted as a link between the garage rock of bands such as Blue Cheer and the acid rock of bands such as the Doors. They ended up being more influential as precursors of heavy metal, while retaining the virulence of garage rock and the transcendence of acid rock.

The first album, Heavy (Atlantic, 1967), above all displayed an unusual grit for psychedelic rock.

Their second album, In A Gadda Da Vida (Atco, 1968), whose titled stands for "In the Garden of Eden", following a lineup change (with guitarist Erik Braunn replacing Danny Weis, who had moved on to the Rhinoceros), became one of the best-selling albums of all time. Iron Butterfly Theme, which blared across the West Coast beaches in 1968, is the track that sealed their popular success, the most taut and darting Californian vibrations of the era. Dominating the record is a seventeen-minute suite, In A Gadda Da Vida, an exciting cauldron of quotations: an opening riff in the style of Cream with guitar-led collective thematic improvisation; a mile-long, geometrically proto-disco drum solo over which is superimposed an ecclesiastical organ litany with variations reminiscent of a “Bachian” partita; and at the center the crackling, supersonic guitar work with dissonant elephantine blares, culminating in the incandescent return of the leitmotif. That long piece offered a synthesis of African tribalisms and Eastern melodies that degenerated into a distorted blues-rock jam. It was the first platinum album in the history of rock, with over three million copies sold.