Aack, now I remember why I don't remember, lol. None of those are the brother I was talking about. None of their names are even familiar to me.
I was not into psychedelic anything at that time in my life and knew nothing about drugs or druggies. I did, much later, but not then - and had nothing to do with the people who did. In fact, they scared me. Billy did not look like that then, BTW - but I still heard stories that would curl your hair.
Don't know why the guy I'm thinking of said he played with them. He gave me, or tried to give me, bumper stickers and posters, all the time of his group - but it meant nothing to me at all because I thought they were all so strange. I found him in google and he's an artist elsewhere.
I have another friend who can refresh my memory about it, if I ever think to ask him about it. He sat in a lot with some of the people mentioned - Neal Ford and the Fanatics. Dean Scott, Roy Head, the Traits. Lol, some of them lived with my BF back then. I just wasn't into any of that and pretty much ignored them.
Another later BF had a recording studio and I met a lot of locals, many of whom I've run into over the years - one couple lives down the street from me now. *Oh well - "just not my scene, man."* My musical tastes are 30s and 40s.
Billy is second from the left in that publicity shot.
They had a minor "hit" with "99th Floor", on which Billy sang and flashed a little bit of string.