"The first so-called black hippie."

Arthur Lee died of leukemia, aged 61. His band was called Love, and if you remember one record, it's probably "My Little Red Book." (A song written by Hal David and Burt Bacharach.)

Black hippies... an interesting subject. We usually think of Jimi Hendrix. Here's an Amazon listmania list of black hippie music to remind you of some of the others.

Maybe you think of what Alice Walker wrote (back in 1967):

I think there are so few Negro hippies because middle-class Negroes, although well fed, are not careless. They are required by the treacherous world they live in to be clearly aware of whoever or whatever might be trying to do them in.

There were so many reason to decline to be a hippie, and some of these reasons must have been especially appealing to black people. But there were -- are? -- also some reasons to want to be a hippie, especially in the context of late 60s/early 70s music. Thank God for the music of the black hippies!