With such an array of talent and artistry, Alvin admits to an initial difficulty in “Considering who to choose for the CD, from the famous and obscure deserving songwriters.” As a prime example of modern-day liner note writing, wherein the artist — not the promo copywriter — is free to introduce and expand upon how they decided what they decided, West's commentary alludes to Alvin's painstaking and fascinating methodology to such free-rein musical madness, while at the same time touching upon his vast knowledge of musical Californiana and arcana.
The choice of "California Bloodlines," the first song on West, was no-brainer, though: "One afternoon in 1969, my mother and I were eating lunch at the kitchen table and watching a local L.A. daytime talk show on our black and white TV,” Alvin begins. “The host introduced a young singer/songwriter named John Stewart…” Alvin, in his "infinite 13-year old wisdom," fakes indifference to the Monkees' Stewart-penned “Daydream Believer,” but he really takes notice in a couple other songs:
- But then he did 'July, you're a Woman' and he sang the line, 'I have not been known as the Saint of San Joaquin.' My mother smiled and said, 'He's singing about where I'm from, the San Joaquin Valley. Then I paid closer attention. The TV host asked Stewart questions about songwriting, his time in The Kingston Trio and about growing up in California. I don't remember his answers but when he sang 'California Bloodlines' at the end of the show, I do remember my mother telling me, 'That's what you have, just like him, you've got California bloodlines.' Maybe that was when the idea for this CD first entered my mind."
Most of the other selections were filtered from a lifetime of diverse musical saturation and the encyclopedic knowledge garnered throughout his career with the roots and rockabilly-centered Blasters, a brief stint with punk upstarts X and Alvin's solo work. Indeed, the writers he’d been drawn to have “helped me define myself as a songwriter and as a Californian. I first heard their songs on jukeboxes and Top 40 AM Radio when I was a kid and on folk and underground radio as a teenager while others I heard sung live in smoky bars as an adult.”
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