Still lovin’ you: Charting the Lovin’ Spoonful’s hit singles and essential songs

The Lovin’ Spoonful featuring singer-songwriter John Sebastian dexterously synthesized pop, rock, folk, country, blues, and jug band music during the swingin’ sixties on Kama Sutra Records. Stick around as discographical data, photos, and videos chart their essential recordings. Circa September 1967 in Long Island, New York, mustachioed drummer Joe Butler, replacement lead guitarist Jerry Yester, Sebastian, and bassist Steve Boone sport mod style threads. Peering out of the vintage barn doors in the background, founding lead guitarist Zal Yanovsky was busted on a marijuana possession and named his supplier because he feared he would be forcibly sent back to his native Canada and refused re-entry to the USA. Also dismayed at Sebastian’s burgeoning introspective lyrics and the band’s more mainstream pop rock direction, Yanovsky resigned from the band amid counterculture pressure. Photography by Henry Diltz / Corbis via Getty Images

The Lovin’ Spoonful, led by singer-songwriter John Sebastian, dexterously synthesized pop, rock, folk, country, blues, and jug band music into a unique hybrid purely their own during the swingin’ sixties. Their singles mostly encapsulated sunny, good time odes filled with catchy melodies.

The band entered the spotlight when their first hit single, “Do You Believe in Magic,” came crashing onto the charts back in July 1965. Featuring Sebastian — one of the first rock artists to give the autoharp a prominent role — lead guitarist Zal Yanovsky, bassist-songwriter Steve Boone, and drummer-sometime singer Joe Butler, the band had its origins in the early 1960s folk scene in Greenwich Village, New York.

Joe Butler and Steve Boone look back on an amazing Lovin’ Spoonful legacy

The Spoonful was a talented multi-instrumentalist band with a commercial songwriter and distinctive, honey-rich voice in Sebastian, although all the members were capable of lyrical contributions. With the British Invasion at full throttle in the mid ’60s, the Spoonful proved that the USA was still a force to be reckoned with.