Courtesy Doug Ingle Jr.

“I can still rock,” according to Danny Weis, co-founder of Iron Butterfly. The guitarist, who lived in Canada at the time of the interview, spent the majority of his youth in El Cajon. The founding band members included Greg Willis and Jack Pinney, who like Weis came from a San Diego band called the Palace Pages. 

“I fondly remember the years I would go see my dad, Johnny Weis, play guitar, backing people from the Grand Ole Opry at Bostonia Ballroom in El Cajon,” says Weis. “I was age 9 to 12, and I used to stand right in front of the stage and lean on it with my elbows. I wasn’t too tall then, I guess. I remember Johnny Cash playing right in front of me with my dad backing him on guitar with the band. [Cash] always remembered me and would stoop right in front of me, saying, ‘Folsom Prison?’ I said yes, with joy.”  

Weis picked up a guitar at around age 12 and by 13 was playing with local bands. “I was always the youngest musician, as the others were all 18 to 21. I had trouble with club managers, as I looked so very young. They wanted me to dye my hair black and put on a fake mustache to look older. I didn’t.” 

Drummer Jack Pinney and bassist Greg Willis were Iron Butterfly’s first rhythm section, having played with Weis in the Palace Pages. Pinney was 18. At the time, Willis and Pinney (both had grown up in El Cajon) and Weis were still the Palace Pages, the house band at the long-defunct Palace, an all-ages club that once stood on the ground now occupied by the Home Depot near the Sports Arena. 

By 1966, the Pages were in turmoil: the older members wanted to style and play lounges. The younger members, including Pinney, Willis, and Weis, wanted to grow their hair long and play harder rock. The Pages split. The older guys (including Kerry Chater) went with Gary Puckett and started the Union Gap, and the younger guys formed Iron Butterfly.

According to Pinney, “The name came from San Francisco. We were playing a show with the Friendly Stranger and the Iron Butterfly, but the Iron Butterfly never showed. They broke up on the way down, and we thought it was a pretty good name.”

Says Weis, “We sought a band name that was heavy, so to speak, and also beautiful. Not long after, we all got into [the late] Darryl DeLoach’s…black hearse and moved to Hollywood.”

The band earned its bones by making frequent trips to L.A., to play at legendary Sunset Boulevard venues with other rising talents like Spirit, the Doors, Love, and Jefferson Airplane. Soon after relocating to L.A., they became the house band at Bido Lito's for several months, playing six nights a week (open 10pm nightly except Sundays), with three to four shows per night. 

Iron Butterfly’s artwork for the debut 1968 album Heavy stemmed from a photo shoot of group members shot at the Los Angeles Griffith Observatory with various poses, taken on the immediate hillside of parking area. These photos were then factored into the artwork as seen on the cover, with photography by Joe Ravetz and artwork by Armando Busick.

Jack Pinney found himself being phased out. “I went to Los Angeles with them for the first year. We played Art Laboe’s, Pandora’s Box, and the Hullabaloo Club with the big revolving stage. Ron Bushy was in a band that played the Hi Ho Club. It was called the Voxmen. We traded places.” 

Bushy ended up being the drummer whose infamous In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida drum solo helped Butterfly’s second album sell upwards of 20 million copies. Released in July of 1968, by the following year In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida had reached number four on the Billboard 200, becoming the first certified platinum album and charting for 140 weeks, half of them listing the LP in the top ten.    

When Iron Butterfly played the International (later San Diego) Sports Arena on March 7, 1969, the performance included a screening of the Beatles' film Magical Mystery Tour.

Legend has it that Iron Butterfly ALMOST played at the 1969 Woodstock music festival. According to festival co-creator Michael Lang in his 2009 book The Road to Woodstock:

“Iron Butterfly was booked for Sunday afternoon, but John Morris [production coordinator and stage MC] told me that their agent had called with a last-minute demand for a helicopter to pick them up...apparently, the agent had a real attitude, and we were up to our eyeballs in problems. So I told John to tell him to forget it; we had more important things to deal with.”

In Pete Fornatale’s 2009 book Back to the Garden, production coordinator and stage MC John Morris claimed that his telegram was only a conclusive response to the Butterfly people. “They sent me a telegram saying, ‘We will fly to LaGuardia. You will have helicopters pick us up. We will fly straight to the show. We will perform immediately, and then we will be flown out.’ And I picked up the phone…got a cooperative lady at Western Union…and said ‘F or reasons I can’t go into,
U ntil you are here,
C larifying your situation,
K nowing you are having problems,

Y ou will have to find,
O ther transportation,
U nless you plan not to come.’ ”

Danny Weis quit Iron Butterfly soon after recording their Heavy album. He went on to play with the Rascals, Lou Reed, Alice Cooper, and the Everly Brothers. “My early musical experiences in San Diego County would shape my entire career...there was a lot of jazz, country, and R&B.” As a founding member of Rhinoceros (which included his Butterfly bandmate Jerry Penrod), Weis co-wrote that band's only charting single, "Apricot Brandy." 

Jack Pinney spent the late 1960s drumming in the house band at the Cinnamon Cinder on El Cajon Boulevard, the La Mesa branch of a teen nightclub chain located in a former bowling alley near SDSU on El Cajon Boulevard. The no-liquor all-ages venue was in a building that previously hosted the Comanche Bowl, at the corner of Comanche Drive and El Cajon Boulevard. The locale would eventually also host the Straitahead Sound nightclub and recording studio. "Every group from the ’50s went through there," Jack Pinney told The Reader. "The Coasters, the Drifters, the Shirelles, every weekend, we backed up somebody.” 

Pinney also served as the longtime beatman for Modern Rhythm, a longstanding rock band at various times featured KGB-FM DJ Jim McInnes (Land Piranas) on guitar. Said Pinney, “When Jim McInnnes was with us, we did a lot of KGB events like the Sky Show. We warmed up for national acts, and we played at local clubs.” 

Greg Willis and Jack Pinney would later team up with Jerry Raney, to play in bands like Jerry Raney & the Shames. Raney and Pinney's group Blues Messenger ended up being the Glory band. Says Pinney, “We never played the Top 40 of anything. We were always digging up the flip sides of records.” Willis also played in the King Biscuit Blues band and in the Mississippi Mudsharks before delving into a career as a side man that saw his familiar overall-clad figure on stage with dozens of local artists. 

Among Pinney's collaborators was the late Buddy Blue, who had recently left the Beat Farmers and teamed up with Pinney to start a roots-rock band they called The Jacks. “I was the only Jack in the Jacks,” Pinney told The Reader in 2012. “I played in that band with Chris Sullivan, Buddy, and Mighty Joe Longa. We put out a couple of albums. Jacks are Wild was one of them. Buddy had more feeling than anyone I worked with.” Pinney also maintained a "real world" job in the tile and stone business for most of this period, taking a job with Arizona Tile in 1984. "I’ve always said that I’d play more music if I had more time," he told The Reader. "I’m going to make that happen. I think playing the drums is like dancing. I’ll never forget how, and I’ll always want to do it.”  

Guitarist Larry "Rhino" Reinhardt, who was with Iron Butterfly from 1970 through 1971, went on to the renowned prog rock band Captain Beyond, playing with them from 1971–1974, 1976–1978, and again in 1998–2002. Former Butterfly bassist Lee Dorman co-founded Captain Beyond, which also included onetime Deep Purple singer Rod Evans and percussionist Bobby Caldwell of Armageddon and Johnny Winter's band. The band is widely remembered for its innovative lenticular 3D cover artwork.    

The late eighties version of Iron Butterfly included Ron Bushy (drums, vocals), Doug Ingle (keyboards, vocals), Lee Dorman (bass, guitar, piano), and Erik Brann (guitar, vocals). I caught them when they played in San Diego at the Bacchanal on March 10, 1987, along with Savoy Brown. Several OG members were present including keyboardist Mike Pinera and drummer Ron Bushy, backed by Ace Baker (keyboards), Kelly Reubens (bass), and drummer Donny Vosburgh, who'd been in Thee Image with Pinera. They did Pinera’s big hit with Blues Image, “Ride Captain Ride.”

I think they closed with guests from one of the OG Butterfly lineups, including guitarist Larry "Rhino" Reinhardt, who did a couple of Butterfly tunes as well as a track from Captain Beyond. I could have sworn OG Butterfly bassist Lee Dorman was there too, he was also in Captain Beyond and I’m nearly certain I remember an introduction stating that two members of Captain Beyond were present. However, most online resources indicate Dorman was captaining a sea vessel at the time and did not appear on this spring tour. I think he probably did make this one appearance (perhaps his boat was right there in San Diego, so this is the only date of the tour to feature him?). I’m trying to remember stage banter from nearly 40 years ago, so I could be mistaken – I just remember how excited I was to hear a Captain Beyond song being played live, I loved that band and didn’t realize any members were present until the stage announcement.

The early nineties lineup usually featured Lee Dorman and Ron Bushy with either guitarist Larry Reinhardt, Doug Bossey, or Mike Pinera, keyboardists Burt Diaz, and singer Derek Hilland. By 1995, Doug Ingle was often back with the band as well. The late nineties incarnation was usually Lee Dorman, Ron Bushy, Doug Ingle, and Eric Barnett.  

On October 3, 2002, original guitarist/vocalist Darryl DeLoach died of liver cancer at the age of 56.

On July 31, 2003 Erik Brann died of cardiac failure at the age of 52. He was working on a new solo album at the time of his death. 

In 2004, the group was re-formed and touring with early members Ron Bushy and Lee Dorman. Weis’s solo album Sweet Spot was released in June, 2006. By that time, Iron Butterfly itself had weathered over fifty different lineups. That year's incarnation featured Ron Bushy now backed by guitarist Charlie Marinkovich, keyboardist/singer/violinist Martin Gerschwitz, and bassist Dave Meros. 

The band was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the September 2010 San Diego Music Awards ceremony, accepted by bassist Lee Dorman. Mayor Sanders and longtime local DJ Jim McInnes presented the Award. They embarked on a European tour September 22, 2010.

As of 2011, the son of Doug Ingle, Doug Ingle Jr. (Patrick Henry High class of 1982), was a musician and recording engineer based in Rancho Bernardo. That year, an archival recording of 1968 Butterfly concert at the Fillmore East was released.

The group made its New York City debut at the Fillmore East in the spring of 1968, recording all four shows from April 26 and 27. The tapes reveal the quartet (singer/organist Doug Ingle, bassist Lee Dorman, then 17 year-old guitarist Erik Brann, and drummer Ron Bushy) on the verge of its defining success, mixing tracks from its first album Heavy with songs that would appear two months later on the band's multi-platinum magnum opus, In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida. Rhino's limited edition label imprint Handmade released Fillmore East 1968 as a double-disc CD set with these previously unreleased performances. Restored from the original half-inch four-track recorder tapes (run at fifteen ips), music journalist and liner note author David Fricke describes the CD set as "the sound of hard-rock immortality in the making." 

For the performances, the band drew material primarily from the just-released Heavy album, playing the tough yet nimble “Unconscious Power” in the early show both nights, and closing all four sets with the potent one-two punch of “So-Lo” and “Iron Butterfly Theme.” They also used the Fillmore concerts to showcase three songs from what would become their second album, including “Are You Happy,” “My Mirage,” and title track “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” which the group deployed at length during the second set on both nights.

According to Fricke, “These recordings, from that spring weekend in 1968, catch Iron Butterfly and 'In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida' at a transformative point and ferocious pitch, a great acid-garage band with sharp pop instincts, hardened and tightened by long service on the Sunset Strip, about to establish a lasting definition of heavy rock.” 

Guitarist Larry Rhino Reinhardt died on January 2, 2012, at the age of 63, due to sclerosis of the liver. The band then embarked on a European tour, running through March 18.

Founding bassist Greg Willis was 63 in April 2012 when he suffered a stroke, most likely caused by high blood pressure. "I didn't have any idea I had high blood pressure," he said at the time. "I'm completely surprised." After the stroke happened in his sleep, "I couldn't stand up. I couldn't say words."

Patty Birchard, his girlfriend, tried to help. "He tried to get up and get dressed, and he couldn't." That's when she called her dad. He had a van. They would need to use it to get Willis to a hospital. Willis spent the next three days at Mercy Hospital in Hillcrest. After, he was transferred to a physical rehab center near Alvarado Hospital for another two weeks. Therapists there helped him to learn how to walk, talk, and dress himself all over again. 

A Halloween benefit show for Willis was staged on October 28, 2012, at the Moose Lodge in Spring Valley, featuring the Farmers, a Glory reunion, Joey Harris and the Mentals, the Swingin' Kings, and Modern Rhythm. Willis passed away November 11, 2016. A tribute concert was staged November 30 at Nicky Rotten's in El Cajon. 

Bassist Lee Dorman passed away at the age of 70 on December 21, 2012, due to natural causes related to heart issues. He was found in his car in Laguna Niguel, California, reportedly on his way to a doctor's appointment. 

Live in Texas, a concert album recorded in 1973 featuring Captain Beyond, co-founded by former Iron Butterfly guitarist Larry 'Rhino' Reinhardt and bassist Lee Dorman, dropped May 21, 2013, on CD and double-disc vinyl via Purple Pyramid Records.

In a 2013 Gibson.com interview, Boston bandleader Tom Scholz cited IB's Heavy among his 10 Essential Albums. “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida is hideous, but this album was really cool. The last cut was called the 'Iron Butterfly Theme.' It was an instrumental, in a very strange time signature. That was the song that got me interested in playing guitar.”

In late 2014, guitarist Mike Pinera reformed Iron Butterfly with original co-founding drummer Ron Bushy, along with 1982 Patrick Henry High grad Doug Ingle, Jr., son of original singer Doug Ingle.

Their early album Ball was reissued in June 2015 an expanded edition featuring two bonus singles and improved sound compared to previous reissues, plus new liner notes by Bill Kopp. They played the Fair in Del Mar on June 17 of that year.

2016 saw the UK release of a five CD set containing a quintet of albums housed in mini LP sleeves and packaged together in a slip case, including Heavy, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, Ball, Live, and Metamorphosis.

As of 2019, the lineup featured Ron Bushy backed by Michael Green (percussion, vocals), Dave Meros (bass, vocals), Eric Barnett (lead guitar, vocals), Martin Gerschwitz (keys, vocals), and Ray Weston (drums). Bushy passed away in August, 2021. Doug Ingle, the last surviving member of the band’s 1967–1969 lineup, passed away in May, 2024.

The 2026 version of Iron Butterfly features guitarist Eric Barnett, Jawn Star on keyboards, Dave Whiston on bass, and Bernie Pershey on drums. They're playing the Flower Power Cruise, happening March 28 through April 4.