Artist: It's A Beautiful Day
Author: Vince Wallace/David Laflamme
Label: CBS
Year: 1969

Author Vince Wallace (coauthor on the It's A Beautiful Day version) was a jazz sax player from Oakland, CA who claimed he wrote this piece all by himself in 1962, registrated in '66. The oriëntal atmosphere suited the dawning Haight-Ashbury hippie scene, with It's A Beautiful Day violinist David Laflamme right in the middle. He learned the piece from Wallace personally, keeping title and mood for his own interpretations. The oldest Bombay Calling surviving is a version from 1967 made by The Orkustra, featuring David Laflamme and Bobby Beausoleil (before he joined the Manson Family and got involved in the Sharon Tate killing) and released in 2006 on Swiss vinyl lp Light Shows For The Blind (RD Records). Unfortunately there's no evidence of an earlier Vince Wallace version. His oldest Bombay Calling surviving is on his AMP-lp Vince Wallace Plays Vince Wallace, with of course the Child In Time-link all over for anyone to hear. But it's not like he's forcing it or desperately tries to draw extra attention on it or anything. It even looks as if genuine jazzman Vince didn't even knew Deep Purple, let alone that they've been fooling around with his dear riff these last two years! Anyway, this of course is the main reason David Laflamme never sued Deep Purple decently, while our gentle Bay Area jazzman never made enough nickles & dimes to even consider legal action. According to Marra Wallace, Vince's daughter, the It's A Beautiful Day album with his Bombay Calling broke his heart.

David Laflamme remembers the first time It's A Beautiful Day headlined the Fillmore West (1968), Deep Purple was their supporting act. Both bands learned from each other that night: the riff of Wring That Neck (or Hard Road as it is called in puritan America) from Deep Purple's Book Of Taliesyn album (1969) ended up as Don & Dewey on It's A Beautiful Day's follow-up lp Marrying Maiden (1970). Is this probably an extra reason why It's A Beautiful Day never sued Deep Purple properly? Well aware of the link and assured of their untouchability, Deep Purple released a DVD with one of their 1995 Indian concerts under the Bombay Calling moniker, extended in '22 with the full show on 2CD/3LP.