Curious that two mid-'60s Bay Area groups should share the same handle -- yet this Sacramento-based outfit existed simultaneously with an identically named Marin County combo -- the latter group eventually spawning the Sons of Champlin. The Sacramento band first formed in 1965 as the surf-rocking Avengers and included Ed Dunk (vocals), Don Wright and Hal Hanefield (rhythm guitars), Larry McGlade (lead guitar), Brent MacIntosh (bass), and Jack Androvich (drums). The name Opposite Six, Wright explained, was a spin-off from an earlier (scrapped) moniker -- Six and the Single Girl -- an homage to an El Camino High singing Jezebel the lads briefly fancied an association with. The Six's sole release, Wright's I'll Be Gone (Spectre, January 1966), was cut at local media personality Bill Rase's primitive studio. Acknowledging the Kinks as having inspired the tune's "gronky" chords, Wright's shuffling rhythm (reminiscent of a Turtles' 1965 B-side, Almost There) was grafted to a loping guitar riff and a stuffy head cold vocal. The resultant proto-punk rave sits somewhere between the Castaways and the Sonics. A huge local favorite, it became the Six's signature song. With high school graduation, the Opposite Six went their separate ways. Wright subsequently cut Why Did You Lie? b/w Draft Dodger Blues (Spectre, Fall 1966) with former bandmates MacIntosh and Androvich as Don Wright and the Head Set. Lie, a folky 12-string jangle, had been the B-side to the original Opposite Six single. Its remake, and I'll Be Gone, appear on the various-artists compilation Nuggets From the Golden State -- The Sound of Young Sacramento (Big Beat CDWIKD). ~ Stansted Montfichet, Rovi