‘"Amber Cascades." Perhaps one of America's most underrated songs, "Amber Cascades" had a peaceful, yet uptempo sound with harps, soft trombones, and breezy harmonies. Underneath the exterior, though, lay a more ominous current. As Dewey explained:
It's harder for me to write a good song about something that's just a good, groovy time; there's always a "minor," as in minor chord, that I like to write about. It's sure hard for me to write about "bounced the baby on my knee" or "these fun times," you know. That isn't enough to get me to write. I always like to throw in something, get something extra; the words, the images, the colors, like purple or whatever, that have that little tinge of possible terror -- I call it menacing, that's the word. A little menacing. Minor keys, minor choruses, as in "Sandman": "I understand you've been running from the man." Or in "Midnight" and even in "Amber Cascades": "stop all the slaughter in view" -- just a word like slaughter.
For all of its appeal, "Amber Cascades" was unable to rise past number 75 on the Billboard survey, and disappeared after just four weeks on the charts.’
‘"Amber Cascades." Perhaps one of America's most underrated songs, "Amber Cascades" had a peaceful, yet uptempo sound with harps, soft trombones, and breezy harmonies. Underneath the exterior, though, lay a more ominous current. As Dewey explained: It's harder for me to write a good song about something that's just a good, groovy time; there's always a "minor," as in minor chord, that I like to write about. It's sure hard for me to write about "bounced the baby on my knee" or "these fun times," you know. That isn't enough to get me to write. I always like to throw in something, get something extra; the words, the images, the colors, like purple or whatever, that have that little tinge of possible terror -- I call it menacing, that's the word. A little menacing. Minor keys, minor choruses, as in "Sandman": "I understand you've been running from the man." Or in "Midnight" and even in "Amber Cascades": "stop all the slaughter in view" -- just a word like slaughter. For all of its appeal, "Amber Cascades" was unable to rise past number 75 on the Billboard survey, and disappeared after just four weeks on the charts.’
Source: Comprehensive History: America Revisited http://www.accessbackstage.com/america/hist01.htm