"Going Up the Country" (also "Goin' Up the Country") is a song adapted and recorded by American blues rock band Canned Heat. Called a "rural hippie anthem",[2] it became one of the band's biggest hits and best-known songs.[3] As with their previous single, "On the Road Again", the song was adapted from a 1920s blues song and sung by Alan Wilson.
| "Going Up the Country" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 US single picture sleeve | ||||
| Single by Canned Heat | ||||
| from the album Living the Blues | ||||
| B-side | "One Kind Favor" | |||
| Released | November 22, 1968 | |||
| Recorded | August 6–7, 1968 | |||
| Studio | I.D. Sound Recorders, Hollywood, California | |||
| Genre | Blues rock[1] | |||
| Length | 2:50 | |||
| Label | Liberty | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Alan Wilson (see text) | |||
| Producer(s) | Canned Heat, Skip Taylor | |||
| Canned Heat singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
Background and composition
Canned Heat, who were early blues enthusiasts, based "Going Up the Country" on "Bull Doze Blues", recorded in 1928 by Texas bluesman Henry Thomas.[4] Thomas was from the songster tradition and had a unique sound,[5] sometimes accompanying himself on quills, an early Afro-American wind instrument similar to panpipes. He recorded "Bull Doze Blues" in Chicago on June 13, 1928, for Vocalion Records.[6]
For "Going Up the Country", Canned Heat's Wilson used Thomas' melody on the quills and his basic rhythm, but arranged it for a rock setting and rewrote the lyrics. In addition to the bass and drum rhythm section, Henry Vestine supplied a "light electric rhythm guitar"[4] and multi-instrumentalist Jim Horn reproduced Thomas' quill parts on the flute.[7]
Although linked to the counterculture of the 1960s' back-to-the-land movement, Wilson's lyrics are ambiguous, leading some to suggest they were about evading the draft during the Vietnam War by moving to Canada:[8]
Now, baby, pack your leaving trunk, you know we've got to leave today
Just exactly where we're going, I cannot say, but we might even leave the U.S.A.
'Cause there's a brand new game that I don't wanna play
Releases and charts
In October 1968, Liberty Records first released "Going Up the Country" on Canned Heat's third album, Living the Blues, and followed it with a single on November 22, 1968.[9] The single peaked at number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart on January 25, 1969, making it the band's best showing on the main U.S. chart.[10] On January 6, 1969, the song reached number 5 on the Canadian RPM charts,[11] and on January 7, 1969, the song peaked at number 19 on the UK Singles Chart.[12]
The song appears on several Canned Heat compilation albums, including Canned Heat Cookbook, Let's Work Together: The Best of Canned Heat (1989) and Uncanned! The Best of Canned Heat (1994).[9] The group performed "Going Up the Country" at the Woodstock music festival in August 1969 and the song is used in the Woodstock film[2] and appears on the original soundtrack album.[13]