replacements before the label found and instated singer Rob Grill, who had a voice that P.F. Sloan regarded as the perfect vehicle to convey his songs in a more commercially accessible manner than Sloan could with his own singing. Grill only played guitar, but had to quickly learn the rudiments of bass to fill that vacancy in the lineup. In 1967, the band was offered the choice to go with their own name or choose to adopt a name that had already been heard of nationwide. In the beginning, they were one of many U.S. guitar pop/rock bands, but with the help of Barri and their other producers, they developed a unique sound for which they drew as heavily on British beat as on soul music, rhythm and blues, and folk rock. Many of their recordings featured a brass section, which was a novelty in those days among American rock bands, with groups like Chicago just developing. The bulk of the band's material continued to be written by Dunhill Records staff (not only Sloan and Barri), and the LA studio musicians who were part of what became known as the Wrecking Crew played the music on most, but not all, of their hits. The Grass Roots also recorded songs written by the group's musicians, which appeared on their albums and the B-sides of many hit singles. As the Grass Roots, they had their first top-10 hit in the summer of 1967 with "Let's Live for Today", an English-language cover version of "Piangi con me", a 1966 hit for the Anglo-Italian quartet The Rokes. "Let's Live for Today" sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc. With Rob Grill as lead singer, they recorded a third version of "Where Were You When I Needed You". The band continued in a similar hit-making vein for the next five years (1967–1972). The Grass Roots played at the Fantasy Fair and Magic Mountain Music Festival on Sunday, June 11, 1967, in the Summer of Love as "Let's Live for Today" was at number 15 and climbing. In late 1967, the band recorded the album Feelings, which featured much heavier input in the songwriting and playing by the group members themselves, but its failure to sell prompted Barri to take full hold of the reins again, as he began to move the band in a more R&B, horn-punctuated direction. By this time,