Found this while fruitlessly searching. No dates, but at least Boone discusses the situation...
Some might say the band's popularity began to fade as early as 1966. In May of that year, Yanovsky and Boone were arrested in Berkeley<http://www.miaminewtimes.com/related/to/Berkeley/>for possession of a small amount of marijuana. They were at a party hosted by someone Boone identifies only as a "friend" with ties to the music business. Yanovksy was on shaky ground with the police: Not only was he a Canadian citizen, he also was the most outspokenly political member of the band, and his father was known to hold communist views. According to Boone, the police made the two musicians an offer they couldn't refuse: Turn in the friend who sold them drugs or Yanovsky would be deported to Canada. "And that kind of choice is really no choice at all," Boone sighs. The music press reported that Boone and Yanovsky set up a meeting between their drug contact and an undercover narcotics agent, but Boone claims they only revealed to police the name of their contact (who was arrested but never went to jail). The episode became a blotch on the band's sunny image. Antiestablishment sentiment ran high in 1966, and the Lovin' Spoonful was branded as a group of finks in the music press. Only Ralph Gleason<http://www.miaminewtimes.com/related/to/Ralph+Gleason/>, the legendary pop critic for the San Francisco Chronicle<http://www.miaminewtimes.com/related/to/San+Francisco+Chronicle/>, defended their actions. To this day Boone wonders if the fallout from the drug bust has prevented the Lovin' Spoonful from being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame<http://www.miaminewtimes.com/related/to/Rock+and+Roll+Hall+of+Fame+and+Museum/> . "It was a situation none of us was proud of," Boone says frankly. "By the time it got into general circulation the story had ballooned to proportions that were just unimaginable. So the only thing you could say was nothing. You just made it worse by commenting. I think Zally felt really bad, and I know I felt bad. When I look back at it, it was just a minor blip on the radar screen, but people chose to make it otherwise." Boone began to feel increasingly estranged from the hippie movement. The underground press at the time -- mostly upstart publications like the Berkeley Barb and the L.A. Free Press -- was stridently left-wing and vehemently antiwar. "I was very turned off by what appeared to me to be a very rigid culture of idealism," Boone recalls. "I thought, 'This is music, guys, this ain't politics.' I got into this because I like to dance, I like to write songs about going out with girls and having fun, and stuff like that. I didn't get into this because I'm a political commentator." http://www.miaminewtimes.com/1998-05-14/music/do-you-believe-in-retro/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Diamond Headz" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
