Most Baby Boomers either loved it or hated it. Whichever, In-a-Gadda-da-Vida occupied (and still does on Flashback Lane) a unique place in rockology. Maybe I knew what the song was about at some hazy point in time, but these days I had to go to the web to look for answers. I found the following on the Phrasefinder bulletin boards. (By the way a great site when you have to know what...well...in a gadda da vida means.)
"As I remember, the phrase means,
In The Garden of Eden
Don't you know that I love you
He wrote it In A Gadda Da Vida because it was easier to sing, and it allowed him to be covertly religious, rather than overt about it. A lot of Rock and Role has obscure religious overtones. REM has the song, "Losing My Religion" which
gives an obscure but obvious religious message. "Stairway To Heaven" does the same thing.
In A Gadda Da Vida allowed Iron Butterfly to talk about the perfected paradise where they would meet the most beautiful woman in creation, but they would also have no moral or ethical responsibility to live a good and holy life."
Erik Braunn, Iron Butterfly Guitarist, Dies at 52
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
LOS ANGELES, July 29 - Erik Braunn, the Iron Butterfly guitarist who played one of rock's most recognizable riffs in the 17-minute anthem "In-a-Gadda-da-Vida," died here on Friday. He was 52.
The cause was cardiac arrest, his family said.
Mr. Braunn, who was born in Pekin, Ill., and raised in Los Angeles, was a violin prodigy who began his musical career at 4. He joined the heavy-metal band Iron Butterfly when he was 16 and toured with it from 1967 to 1969, when the group was enjoying its greatest success.
Mr. Braunn, Doug Ingle, Ron Bushy and Lee Dorman left their mark on musical history with the psychedelic "In-a-Gadda-da-Vida," released in 1968.
It went platinum and stayed on the national sales chart for two years; a three-minute version became a Top 40 radio hit.
Mr. Braunn occasionally reunited with the band for performances and worked as a songwriter, musician and producer until his death.
During a 1988 reunion he told The Los Angeles Times about his experience with stardom decades earlier: "My first vacation I bought a car, a Jaguar, and parked it outside the hospital where I spent two weeks for ulcers and gastroenteritis."
Guitar tab does exist for In-a-gadda-da-vida. Good luck.
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