playing the backward guitar intro and Mike Deasy providing various psychedelic sounds. It became a hit early in 1968, climbing to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. Terry Williams played the solo that later led Jimi Hendrix to tell Rogers that it was his favorite record. The group's next three single releases failed commercially, as did their second album. The 1968 release "But You Know I Love You" (composed by Settle) possessed a distinctive brass-tinged country-folk sound, broadening their fan base. In the group's rendition on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour that aired on 8 December 1968, the audience was unwittingly fooled into applauding too soon, right after the false ending but well before the real ending. The record peaked at No. 19 on the Hot 100 just under a year after "Just Dropped In" was at its Billboard summit. According to Mickey Jones' book That Would Be Me, Thelma was fired from the group in late 1968 (soon after the release of "But You Know I Love You" and the aforementioned Smothers Brothers television appearance, but before the record would chart on the Hot 100), after missing too many gigs and rehearsals. For her part Thelma did not see it the same way. She has stated that while she always loved being with them in the studio, the road was too hard on her from a health and personal standpoint. Slowly growing apart from the others, Camacho began to feel restricted by the band in a number of ways. All agreed that the situation could not continue, and she was replaced by her roommate, Mary Arnold, an Iowa-born singer who beat out newcomer Karen Carpenter for the job. Thelma appears on the first three LPs plus half of the fourth album. Arnold made her debut on "Reuben James". By the end of the decade Rogers had long brown hair, an earring, and pink sunglasses. Known affectionately in retrospect as "Hippie Kenny", Rogers had a notably smoother vocal style at the time. During mid-1969 the band scored another Top Ten hit with Mel Tillis' "Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town". The song was the global hit and established the First Edition's longevity in the business. Mickey's drumming was part of the hook. At Rogers' shows the song was often clapped along to, or joked around with, but it was meant seriously at the time. Telling the graphic story