The "Rampage years" trio you picked is my favorite. However, Jormas solo album Quah was my hook and worked my way back while going forward thru the rampage. Love it all.

I’ve seen Jorma and Tuna many times. Phosphorescent Rat is my favorite, as a great bridge between the laid back and the heavy stuff. (His 1974 solo album Quah is also a highlight of the catalog.)

Good call Pete. Had Double Dose since back in the day and love it. Recently been on the hunt for their 70s stuff on vinyl.

Thanks for the expansive and inclusive overview of Hot Tuna. I have always admired Jorma Kaukonen's guitar, but I think Jack Casady is one of the most underrated bass players of all time.

Thanks for the ranking, this one was a pleasant surprise. Jorma Kaukonen has always been one of my favorite guitarists. Such a versatile player, as equally adept at delicate blues and country picking as he is with heavy riffs and screaming electric leads. And Jack Casady`s solemn, rumbling bass is a perfect compliment. My ranking: 1. Americas Choice - Their heaviest almost "metal' album. 2. Yellow Fever 3. Burgers - Love the country fiddle playing of Papa John Creech on this one 4. Hoppkorv 5. The Phosphorescent Rat 6. First Pull Up Then Pull Down Apart from Americas Choice as #1, my ranking could be interchangeable from day to day.

Love the ranking and love the Blues Pills shirt!!

I’ve actually never heard of this band. Will give them a listen now for sure. You haven’t steered me wrong yet Pete😁

Jorma and Jack, what a team whether in the Airplane or in Tuna, excellent musicians. Thanks for the review.

One of my all time favorite groups, saw them a ton of times

looking forward to this!!!

Probably the band we saw most often in the seventies- mostly at college. One memorable show- Jorma, Jack, and Bob Steeler- 3 hours plus of jamming. 1975 I think. Loud, you bet. It was a kick to see Jack with the Starship a few years ago at The Stephen Talkhouse- about 10O folks there. We had a table up front- Paul Kantner right in front of me. Great night. I’ve been meaning to go to the guitar thing at Jormas ranch- maybe one day.

Burgers, America's Choice and the 1st Album, all very different but amazing albums in the own right.

Love love love this band! They were really big during my college days (in the Hudson Valley area-late 70's/early 80's) & that's when I got hooked. Some local bands covered some of their tunes too. Unique band in the way they balance the acoustic & electric sides of their music. Jorma's acoustic finger picking is great. Some may call his vocals an 'acquired taste' but if so I've been infected. Casady, besides having the best eyebrows in rock, is an excellent bassist... I own something like 21 Tuna albums & Pete's right, live albums are an integral part of their discography. In fact there are only 7 studio releases (over a 39 year span), there are 14 & 21-year droughts between some of them. You also have a bunch of 'solo' Jorma records starting with 1974's Quah (not counting Bear's Sonic Journals: Before We Were Them which I'm including in Tuna's discog below) - what a great album! I count about 11 of those...You also have his contributions to the Airplane of songs written/sung by Jorma - something like 13 tracks...And Jorma guesting on albums by Grace Slick, Papa John Creach, Paul Kantner, David Crosby, Starship, SVT (the Casady project), KBC Band, Phil Lesh and Friends, solo Casady, etc. So for Tuna I'll rank the 'major' albums & mention some others at the end: 1. The s/t debut - live album recorded in '69 & the reissue adds more tracks. All time classic, no bad/mediocre tracks. What a start to the band! All acoustic - Jorma lays it down. "Death Don't Have No Mercy" - yes sir! 2. Hoppkorv, The Phosphorescent Rat & Double Dose - two studio (1976/1973) & one live (1978). Great stuff here, 10 fantastic tracks each. Almost all electric 3. America's Choice - studio album from '75, just fantastic 4. Yellow Fever - more studio greatness from '73. Honestly could call it a tie with America's Choice and/or flip those two around 5. Burgers - studio from '72, a really fine album 6. Live At The Fillmore West 3rd July 1971 - electric album, 5 great tracks including a 7.5 minute "Uncle Sam's Blues" 7. Live At Sweetwater Music Hall Mill Valley (2015), First Pull Up Then Pull Down, And Furthurmore... - good/more recent live Tuna plus 'classic' 1971 live Tuna, then live recordings from the 1998 Furthur Festival tour 8. Lumping together the 3 Sweetwater live albums = Live at New Orleans House: Berkeley, CA 09/69, Live At Sweetwater & Live At Sweetwater 2 - various performances, the '69 recordings are essentially similar to the debut album but different versions from different shows. The Sweetwater stuff spans 1992-2004 9. Steady As She Goes & Pair A Dice Found - the last two studio releases, not up to the level of any earlier studio albums. A couple/three good tracks each Other releases that I own: Classic Hot Tuna Electric, Historic Live, Live In Japan: At Stove's Yokohoma City (1998), Splashdown/Splashdown Two (1975 tracks - live)...Special mention for the archival set called Bear's Sonic Journals: Before We Were Them consisting of early 1969 recordings by Kaukonen/Casady before Hot Tuna officially launched. A couple of covers including the traditional "Come Back Baby" truned into a 10+ minute jam & BB King's "Rock Me Baby" & 5 Kaukonen/Casady originals. Most everything here gets the 10+ minute jam treatment - a sign of things to come with live Tuna. If slotting this into the above rankings I'd probably put it at #7 with the Sweetwater/First Pull Up/Furthurmore albums. Interesting in its own right

Called perfectly Pete. Was lucky enough to see Tuna in their electric prime in the mid 70's. Jorma has always been one of my favourite guitarists, and love his laid back vocals too.

Great show Pete! Long overdue! Just saw them at the Capitol theatre. Love their entire catalog. 1. Americas Choice 2. Yellow Fever 3. First Pull up 4. Double dose 5. Phospherecent Rat 6. Burgers 7. Hot Tuna 8. Hoppkorv 9. Pair of Dice 10. Speed

Your nr.9 is my nr 1.

Nice to see this band mentioned.

Yellow Fever has always been my favorite. Great record.

I take great joy in Jorma and Jack acoustic duets which are all over YT.

My list, subject to change depending on mood... 1. The Phosphorescent Rat 2. Burgers 3. Hot Tuna 4. America's Choice 5. First Pull Up Then Pull Down 6. Hoppkorv 7. Double Dose 8. Yellow Fever 9. Steady As She Goes 10. Pair A Dice Found I may be forgetting a few live albums...they have a lot. Worth searching for, I think, are Splashdown and Live In Japan

Cool to see Hot tuna that's awesome Sad note at 71 we lost the last surviving member of Skynyrd original band Gary rossington has checked out. He underwent emergency heart surgery a year-and-a-half ago and what you call frail but kept on doing what he could do. Course he had a heart attack in 2015 and a lot of heart issues at sidelines I'm a lot from performing the last few years. One of the reasons why a lot of times when they would go out on tour he had so many hiatuses from the band

was lookin foreword to this, totally agree with the top 3.

Thanks for your insightful review. Personally, I like harmonica so I liked their debut album, Hot Tuna. I will check out all their other albums which I’m not yet familiar with…

Cool ! I don't know why I don't have any Hot Tuna, but I need to correct that!

I’ve always been curious about this band but I’ve never explored them. I think you mentioned another live album of theirs on a previous episode a few years ago. Was it live at Sweetwater? Thanks Pete!

Just wanted to mention that I just caught electric Hot Tuna at the Keswick Theatre in Glenside, Pennsylvania on their final electric tour and they were incredible.

I love Hot Tuna. I have loved them since the early 1980s when I first heard them. I agree I’m partial to the electric stuff too but when I’m in the mood for that sort of acoustic stuff nobody does it better. Jorma wrote an autobiography a few years back and it’s definitely worth checking out. PS - Song For The Fire Maiden is one of the best songs ever recorded imo. But you didn’t even mention it!

as a long time tuna fan, my favorite studio albums in order are Burgers, Phospherescent Rat, Hoppkorv, Yellow fever, Americas Choice.... all fantastic albums, just my take.

Didn't mention one of my favorites, Sunny Day Strut from Burgers. love the acoustic finger picking of the Rev. Gary Davis tracks, I am the Light of the World and I See the Light. Kinda wish he'd included Quah in the list.

Love Hot Tuna. Saw them a few times last year at Carnegie Hall and Capital Theatre Port Chester. 1. America's Choice 2. Burgers 3. Phosphorescent Rat 4. Yellow Fever 5. Hoppkorv 6. First Pull Up Then Pull Down 7. Hot Tuna 8. Steady As She Goes 9. Pair A Dice Found

Thanks for Hot Tuna show for turning me on to 3 electric albums.I think Peter grounded from recording on the weekends. There’s no updates on Gary Rossington and David Lindley hopefully will see tributes to them in the future thanks for all your shows

I like it when Hot Tuna's blues covers are more country, organic than heavy, so my ranking reflects that: 1. Burgers 2. America's Choice 3. The Phosphorescent Rat 4. Double Dose 5. Hot Tuna 6. Yellow Fever 7. First Pull Up, Then Pull Down 8. Hoppkorv

Can't really argue with your choices, Pete. Double Dose probably gets the most play in my world even though I agree that your top 3 are their best. Saw Jorma & Jack again last summer for a great acoustic show.

Hoppkorv was the first album I heard by the band, and was amazed. Still I agree it's their best, and agree more or less otherwise too, Phosphorescent Rat has grown for me later years, and I consider it equally good to the two 1975 albums now.

The Freebirds have all flown home. Gary Rossington dead at 71. RIP to America's Greatest Rock n' Roll Band

Wow! Thank you! I've been waiting a long time for this ranking. I saw them at Martyr's in Chicago about 15 years ago. They played an acoustic set and an electric set. Both sets were great! They still got it! Both Jorma and Jack are excellent musicians. Remember: If you don't know Jorma, you don't know Jack.

Quick ranking starts at 20:43

Bob Steeler is a friend of mine, good dude

I love this band to death!

As great of an album Double Dose is, it pales in comparison to what they were doing live back then. These are actually the shortest live versions of most of these songs. Unfortunately the bootlegs don't have greatest sound quality, but there are some great ones out there as examples of what a monsterous set they had. Check them out if you can find them! Funky #7 used to stretch for 25 - 30 minutes most nights, 42 on at least one occasion! Blistering 3+ hour sets! I would've flip flopped America's Choice for Hoppkorv on your list basically because the songs are such short versions...

My Uncle Johnny turned me onto them in my teens, and Jorma has since been one my favorite players.. 1. Phosphorescent Rat 2. Burgers 3. Hoppkorv 4. Hot tuna 5. America's choice 6. First pull up, then pull down 7. Yellow fever 8. Double dose 9. Steady as she goes 10. Pair a dice found

For me the Burgers album which I bought in 1972 still is the best album they made. Nr. 2: their debut album and nr. 3: The Phosphorescent Rat. Jorma’s Quah, I think, is the best solo album he ever recorded.

Psychotic waltz -would b a good idea -thank u!!!

Their first album was live and superb. How can he leave this out. Or, have I not listened carefully?

Double Dose ROCKS🤘

Hoppkorv can be translated to ”jumphotdog”. The story is thot Jorma bought a hotdog that he droped, and he said ”jävla hoppkorv” in swedish, that translate to ”f-ing jumphotdog”.

Well I've only got one album: Hoppkorv (1976) I came across it in a charity shop and thought I'd have a punt and see what it was like. It's pretty good, bit boarderline for me. I'll keep playing it and see if it sticks. EDIT: I think the vocals don't quite cut the mustard for me. Although give it 6 months and I'll probably love the bloody thing, lol

Rather see a live show than listen to any album! 20 minute jams without any vocals, beats all else! Watch DVD's now as all my vinyl discs are in my closet in boxes!

Great ranking. Growing up, I used to see albums by this band in record stores, but was never familiar with their music. They tend to get categorized with other old funnily named groups like Little Feat, Savoy Brown, and Canned Heat, but these guys had a few years of playing much heavier music and it was really good.

I agree, that I prefer electric Hot Tuna overall. 👍

Hoppkorv is a swedish word meaning, jumping sausage, i thought it meant hot tuna in swedish, but looked it up on google.

you did a great job. me personally rank #1 yellow fever #2 Double Dose #3 Americas Choice #4 Phos. Rat

🤩👍

Not a day goes by in 50 years I don’t listen the HFT or Jorma. Love them all equally,

10- Hot Tuna 9 - pair a dice 8- Steady as she goes 7- Hoppkorv 6- first pull up 5- yellow fever 4- DD 3- Burgess 2- The Rat 1- America’s Choice

I'm not going to include double dose as that's a traditional live album, but the other live albums are more like a studio release. 1. Burgers 2. Hoppkorv 3. Phosphorescent rat 4. America's choice 5. Hot tuna 6. First pull up 7. Yellow fever 8. Pair of dice found

we’ve been working with Bob Steeler on a possible documentary project

Love Hot Tuna. Papa John Creach Electric pschedelic garage rock blues Imagine "Pig Pen" on vocals and harmonica!!!!!?????

Hot Tuna can be an acquired taste. Due to Jorma’s style they were a must listen if you were a guitar student “back in the day”. His acoustic guitar playing often bordered on rag. Envision Scott Joplin on guitar. “Hot Tuna” and “Quah” where acoustic albums you “studied” rather than just listened to casually.

“If you don’t know Jorma…Ya don’t know Jack!”😅

Ode to Billy Jean?

They had 14 albums total so I'm going to go ahead and do them all. 14. And Furthermore 13. Live in Japan 12. Live at Sweetwater 11. Live at Sweetwater II 10. Steady as She Goes 9. The Phosphorescent Rat 8. First Pull Up, Then Pull Down 7. A Pair of Dice Found 6. Hot Tuna 5. America's Choice 4. Burgers 3. Hoppkorv 2. Yellow Fever 1. Double Dose

Not gonna lie PETE/ Hot 🥵 TUNA 🍣 in the past, not my cup of tea, however, I 💯respect your opinion, so I’ll give your. No 1 and 2 another listen / few spins Thx for your time once again PETE. 👍💯

pronounced Kah-Cone-In. Accent in middle "Cone". Thus, Your-mah Kah-COne-In. HOT TUNA! He is from Santa Clara, Ca,

1 burgers 2double dose 3yellow fever 4 americas choice 5 hoppkorv 6 phosphorescent rat 7 first pull up 8 first album 9 steady as she goes 10 paire a dice found

I find the first two albums rather haphazardly recorded. The audio fidelity is ok...but a little below standards of the time even for live recordings. I think the 3rd album is where they really put some money into it and produced a world class record. However the originality began from the first albums, and they contain many classic Hot Tuna songs. Jmho.

I prefer electric Hot Tuna avec Yellow fever 1 Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady are really excellent musicians

Thats why Time fades away should be ranked in Neil Youngs career ... What about the KBC Band?

Gospel covers were/ are a huge part of their repertoire, sooooo… you should probably mention that.

P RAT...is best..great writing n guitar...felix of mountain also w cream. yes cream. jk has a book..ive met jk..nice guy.

BURGERS, man. Come on.

I love Jorma but I don’t think you give Jack’s bass work enough attention. He is one of the greats.

I was first excited to see someone review Hot Tuna. Clearly you don't know the band. Jorma and Jack are master's of their craft, have played together over 50 years. Also, no mention of the harmonics of Jacks bass. In fact you mention Jack only once towards the end of the review. Your kidding. I'm guessing you have never seen them live and just gave a listen to their music. Thank you for trying. Hopakorv? Double Dose? I don't think so. You should give Burgers a few more spins, classic Tuna. Also and finally you stated their first album, is like a best of album. How can that be? Makes no sense. I'll end here like on that album and just say Mann's Fate.

Sorry to say that I don't buy the BTO similarities. I saw Hot Tuna three times and they are infinitely more innovative and progressive than BTO.. Can you cite what you believe to be similar, Pete? Talkin' Tunes with Dr. Tony

I've always found most of their music to be pretty bland, the name of the band isn't very good either.

This review really STINKS!!!