Buffalo featuring Peter Vee – Born To Be Wild

The South African Rock Encyclopedia > Rock Legends > 1970s / 1980s > Buffalo featuring Peter Vee > Discography > Buffalo featuring Peter Vee – Born To Be Wild

Tracks

1. Born To Be Wild Medley (14:10)
   a) Gimme Gimme Good Loving (Joey Levine / Ritchie Cordell) Crazy Elephant cover
   b) Mony Mony (Bobby Bloom / Ritchie Cordell / Bo Gentry / Tommy James) Tommy James and The Shondells cover
   c) Born To Be Wild (Mars Bonfire) Steppenwolf cover
2. Witch Queen Of New Orleans (Pat Vegas / Lolly Vegas) (4:37) Redbone cover
3. We Gotta Get Out Of This Place (Barry Mann / Cynthia Weill) (4:38) The Animals cover
4. Crimson And Clover (Tommy James / Peter Lucia Jr.) (4:03) Tommy James and The Shondells cover

Produced by Peter Vee
Arranged by Malcolm Watson
Engineered by Greg Cutler
Recorded at Satbel Studios

Born To Be Wild (single edit)

Born To Be Wild (The Best Of Buffalo edit)

Musicians

• Peter Vee: Vocals
• Malcolm Watson: Guitars & Percussion
• Mike Pilot: Guitar
• Ashley Kelly: Bass
• Glyn Storm: Keyboards
• Tony Moore: Drums and percussion
• Costa Anadiotis: Synthesizers
• Julian Cohen: Percussion
• Peter Vee, Dennis East, Sue Smith, Malcolm Watson and Julian Cohen: Vocals

Release information

LP: 1978, Bullet, BU (L) 543
LP: 1990, Steel Street Records, Steel (O) 5
Cassette: 1990, Steel Street Records, L4 Steel (EO) 5

Comments

“Born To Be Wild” was written by Mars Bonfire (Dennis Edmonton, born: Dennis Eugene McCrohan), but only released by him in May 1968. Steppenwolf released the iconic version to an unsuspecting world on 29 January 1968. It become an instant classic after being featured in the 1969 film Easy Rider. The song has been covered by many, many artists over the years.

Brian Currin

Buffalo’s “Born To Be Wild” was originally part of a 14-minute-plus medley. It was released as a single in 1978 edited to just under 4 minutes. A different edit of 7:48 was released as a 12″ single, pressed on green vinyl. “The Best Of Buffalo” album featured a 5 minute edit from the medley.

Brian Currin

The “Born To Be Wild” medley starts off with Crazy Elephant’s ‘Gimme Gimme Good Lovin’’ moves into Tommy James & The Shondells’ ‘Mony Mony’, spends some time running through an instrumental tribute to The Kinks (‘All Day And All Of The Night’ and ‘You Really Got Me’) before finally easing into the old Steppenwolf classic.

John Samson, June 2016

Review

1001 South African Songs You Must Hear Before You Go Deaf

Born To Be Wild Medley – Buffalo (featuring Peter Vee)

By John Samson, 3 June 2016

There is something a little amusing that a song called ‘Born To Be Wild’ is covered by a band whose name is one of the Big 5 animals. But then again, the original was by SteppenWOLF. However, where the original was a rock song, Peter Vee and his band turned it into disco rock. The medley starts off with Crazy Elephant’s ‘Gimme Gimme Good Lovin’’ moves into Tommy James & The Shondells (Billy Idol’s version hadn’t been invented back then) ‘Mony Mony’, spends some time running through an instrumental tribute to The Kinks (‘All Day And All Of The Night’ and ‘You Really Got Me’) before finally easing into the old Steppenwolf classic.

Clocking in at just over 14 minutes, this would have been a DJ dream back in the late 70s early 80s. The mixing was already done, the songs were classics that everyone on the dancefloor could sing-a-long to, the beat was just right for the time, the guitars meant you could really crank the volume up and given the length of the track, you could just leave it playing while heading off to grab a drink, or chat up a girl.

Thanks to John Samson and Discogs for information.