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Today in Rock History – June 9

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1964, During an evening session Bob Dylan recorded “Mr. Tambourine Man” at Columbia Recording Studios in New York City. This was the first session for the album Another Side Of Bob Dylan, which saw Dylan recording fourteen original compositions that night.

1967, Pink Floyd played two gigs in one day, the first at the College of Commerce in Hull, and then the UFO at The Blarney Club, Tottenham Court Road, London, England.

1967, The Velvet Underground performed at Boston Tea Party in Boston, Massachusetts.

1967, The Monkees kicked off a North American summer tour at the Hollywood Bowl in California.

1968, Cream performed at the Grande Ballroom in Detroit, Michigan.

1969, The Rolling Stones announce that guitarist Brian Jones will be replaced by the John Mayall Band’s Mick Taylor.

1970, The Who appeared at the Fillmore Auditorium in Denver, Colorado.

1970, Jimi Hendrix played at the Mid-South Coliseum in Memphis, Tennessee.

1970, Princeton University gives Bob Dylan an honorary doctorate in music.

1972, The Allman Brothers Band performed at McFarlin Memorial Auditorium, Dallas, Texas.

1972, The Rolling Stones appeared at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles.

1972, Elvis Presley made entertainment history by performing four sold-out shows at New York’s Madison Square Garden. George Harrison, John Lennon David Bowie, Bob Dylan and Art Garfunkel were among music stars that attended the shows. The shows were recorded and became the album Elvis As Recorded At Madison Square Garden.

1972, Bruce Springsteen signed with Columbia Records and started to assemble the E Street Band from various Asbury Park ex-band mates.

1973, The Grateful Dead play the first of two nights at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C.

1974, Aerosmith played at the Mid-South Coliseum, Memphis, Tennessee.

1975, Windsor Davies and Don Estelle were at number one on the UK singles chart with “Whispering Grass.” It was a spin-off from the BBC TV sitcom It Ain’t Half Hot Mum. The song was originally recorded by The Ink Spots in 1940.

1975, Pink Floyd performs at the Capital Centre in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland. Tickets cost $7.50.

1976, Yes played at the Broome Country Veterans Memorial Arena, Binghamton, New York.

1977, George and Patti Harrison were officially divorced.

1978, The Rolling Stones released Some Girls, their first studio album recorded with Ronnie Wood as a full member. The album cover was designed by Peter Corriston and featured The Rolling Stones in garish drag alongside select female celebrities and lingerie ads. The cover immediately ran into trouble when Lucille Ball, Farrah Fawcett, Liza Minnelli, representing her mother Judy Garland, Raquel Welch, and the estate of Marilyn Monroe threatened legal action.

1978, Ian Dury and the Blockheads appeared at St George’s Hall, Bradford, England.

1979, Van Halen appeared at the Cotton Bowl, Dallas, Texas.

1980, Genesis performed at the Pine Knob Music Theatre, Clarkston, Michigan.

1981, Rush played at the San Diego Sports Arena, San Diego, California.

1983, David Bowie appeared at the Auteuil Hippodrome in Paris

1990, M.C. Hammer’s debut album started a record breaking 21-week stay at the top of the US album charts, making it the longest uninterrupted stay at the top since the album charts started.

1998, The Ronettes appeared in the Supreme Court of New York for their lawsuit against producer Phil Spector. The Ronettes, whose hits included “Be My Baby” and “Walking In The Rain,” claimed that Spector had breached the group’s 34-year-old contract by paying the members no royalties since 1963. Although The Ronettes went on to win the case, the New York State Court of Appeals overturned the decision in October, 2002, saying that the contract the Ronettes signed with Spector in 1963 was still binding.

Born on June 9: Cole Porter (1891);  Les Paul (1916);  Johnny Ace (1929); Jackie Wilson (1934); Jon Lord, Deep Purple (1941); George Bunnell, Strawberry Alarm Clock (1949); Trevor Boulder, bass, Spiders From Mars, Uriah Heep (1950); Dean Felber, bass, Hootie & The Blowfish (1967); Matthew Bellamy, Muse (1978)

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Today in Rock History – January 6

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elvis-on-ed-sullivan-19571957,  Elvis Presley makes his last appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, the variety program that helped launch him nationwide. He performs for over 20 minutes, singing “Hound Dog,” “Don’t Be Cruel,” “Love Me Tender,” “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Peace in the Valley,” “Too Much” and “When My Blue Moon Turns to Gold Again.”

1958,  Gibson guitars launched its “Flying V” electric guitar.

1962,  Elvis Presley had his third number one album with Blue Hawaii. It spent a total of 18 weeks at the top of the charts.

1964, The first night of a 14-date UK tour Group Scene 1964, featuring The Rolling Stones, The Ronettes, Marty Wilde, The Swinging Blue Jeans, and Dave Berry and The Cruisers, played at the Granada Theatre, Harrow on The Hill, Middlesex, England.

1967,  The Who played their first gig of this year when they appeared at Morecambe, Central Pier in England.

1967, Pink Floyd appeared at the UFO Club, 31 Tottenham Court Road, London.

beatles-magical-mystery-tour1968,  The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour started an eight week run at number one on the album chart, the group’s 11th US chart topper.

1968, The Who Sell Out first appears on Billboard‘s album charts. It had been released in America right after Christmas 1967. It peaks at #48.

1970,  Crosby Stills Nash & Young made their UK live debut at the Royal Albert Hall, London.

1972, Mahavishnu Orchestra performed at Symphony Hall in Boston.

1973, Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain,” with Mick Jagger on backing vocals, started a three week run at number one on the US singles chart.

1973, David Bowie appeared at the Empire Theatre, Edinburgh, Scotland.

1974, Hawkwind played at the New Theatre, Oxford, England.

1975, Pink Floyd started sessions start at Abbey Road Studios London for their next album Wish You Were Here.

 1975, The mayor of Boston cancelled a Led Zeppelin concert after more than 2,000 fans rioted trying to buy tickets. The fans caused an estimated $50,000 to $75,000 damage at Boston Garden. The gig during the band’s North American tour was rescheduled for Feb 4th.

1977, EMI Records dropped The Sex Pistols, giving the band $68,000 to release them from their contract.

1978, Rush played at the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago.

1979, The Bee Gees started a two week run at number one on the singles chart with “Too Much Heaven,” the group’s seventh chart topper.

1979, Boston performed at the Hollywood Sportatorium, Pembroke Pines, Florida.

1979, The Village People scored their only number one single with “Y.M.C.A.” At its peak the single was selling over 150,000 copies a day.

1980, The Allman Brothers Band performed at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, New York.

1987, Eric Clapton started what became an annual event by playing six shows at the Royal Albert Hall, London.

1989, Blue Oyster Cult appeared at The Ritz, in New York.

1993,  Jazz great Dizzy Gillespie dies in Englewood, N.J. The trumpeter was 75.

2001, Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour won the right to his dot com name. Dave took legal action in his battle to reclaim davidgilmour.com from Andrew Herman who had registered the URL and was selling Pink Floyd merchandise through the site.

2006, American soul, jazz, singer Lou Rawls died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. The 72-year-old, Grammy-winning artist had been battling lung cancer. Rawls had the 1976 US number two and  UK number ten single “You’ll Never Find Another Love Like Mine.”

2007, US country-rock steel guitar player “Sneaky” Pete Kleinow, died aged 72 from Alzheimer’s disease. He was one of the original members of the Flying Burrito Brothers with the Byrds’ Chris Hillman and Gram Parsons. He also worked with John Lennon and Joni Mitchell.

Born on this day: Earl Scruggs (1924); Van McCoy, singer, producer (1944); Syd Barrett, Pink Floyd (1946); Sandy Denny, Fairport Convention (1947); Kim Wilson, The Fabulous Thunderbirds (1951); Malcolm Young, guitar, AC/DC (1953); Kathy Sledge, singer, Sister Sledge (1959); Muzz Skillings, bass, Living Colour (1960); Mark O’Toole, bass, Frankie Goes To Hollywood (1964); Gary Wiseman, drummer, Bowling For Soup (1971);  Alex Turner, guitar, vocals, Arctic Monkeys (1986)

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Song Of The Day by Eric Berman – “Uptown” by The Crystals

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They had a string of hits in the early ‘60s written and produced by the best of what The Brill Building had to offer. There was “Uptown,” written by Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil, the somewhat ludicrous “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss), (Carole King and Gerry Goffin), “He’s A Rebel” (Gene Pitney), “Da Doo Ron Ron” and “And Then He Kissed Me” (Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich), to name but a few. Many of the aforementioned classics were produced by Phil Spector utilizing the Wrecking Crew session musicians on his over the top “Wall Of Sound” production. The seminal records they cut sounded best when emanating out of a mono car radio (preferably of early ‘60s vintage). But who were The Crystals…and were they the same group on all of their records? The original Crystals consisted of school friends Barbara Alston, Mary Thomas, Dolores “Dee Dee” Kenniebrew, Myrna Girard, Patricia “Patsy” Wright and Dolores “Lala” Brooks (who replaced the pregnant Girard after their first few hits). This was the group that gave us the hit “Uptown.” Soon thereafter, Spector began using whoever was available when he was ready to record resulting in Darlene Love and The Blossoms billed as The Crystals on several of their hits. A slightly different version of the original group was soon back on their records until jealousy began to bear its ugly head between them and Spector’s other main protégé’s The Ronettes. Things got so bad, that The Crystals finally dissolved and Spector used The Ronettes (billed as The Crystals) on several tracks of the album “The Crystals Sing Their Greatest Hits.” Such was the music business of the early sixties! No matter who was actually in the studio, I think it’s safe to say that The Crystals made a clutch of world-class classics that have stood the test of time.

Song Of The Day by Eric Berman – The Jukebox Series #94 – The Crystals: “He’s A Rebel” b/w “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)” – Collectables/Philles Records COL 3200

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crystalshesarebel45crystalshehitme45

Song Of The Day by Eric Berman – The Jukebox Series #94 – The Crystals: “He’s A Rebel” b/w “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)” – Collectables/Philles Records COL 3200

They had a string of hits in the early ‘60s written and produced by the best of what The Brill Building had to offer. There was “Uptown,” written by Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil, the ludicrous “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss) (Carole King and Gerry Goffin), “He’s A Rebel” (Gene Pitney), “Da Doo Ron Ron” and “And Then He Kissed Me” (Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich), to name but a few.

All of the aforementioned classics were produced by Phil Spector utilizing the Wrecking Crew session musicians to employ his over-the-top “Wall Of Sound” production that sounded best when emanating out of a mono car radio speaker (preferably of early ‘60s vintage).

But who were The Crystals…and did they even perform on all of the records that were credited to them?

The original Crystals consisted of school friends Barbara Alston, Mary Thomas, Dolores “Dee Dee” Kenniebrew, Myrna Girard, Patricia “Patsy” Wright and Dolores “Lala” Brooks (who replaced the pregnant Girard after their first few hits).  This was the group that was featured on the classic single “Uptown.”

Once The Crystals began to tour in support of their hits, Spector began using whoever was available when he was ready to record, resulting in hit records credited to The Crystals that were actually performed by Darlene Love and The Blossoms.

Lala Brooks shared how she first heard today’s jukebox classic with Songfacts.com: “We’re riding in a car, all of us girls going on a gig, and we hear: ‘He’s a rebel and he’ll never never be any good.’, but we don’t think anything of it. At the end, the DJ said, ‘The Crystals, ‘He’s a Rebel.” We looked at each other like, ‘The Crystals? Where did that come from?’ So we were confused.”

The song went on to top the pop charts in spite of New York DJ, Murray the K who sensationalized the story on WINS radio that the Crystals were not the group on the song. On the road, it was business as usual with The Crystals performing the song as if they actually recorded it.

Crystals member Dee Dee Kenniebrew had this to say about the record: “The Crystals’ first hit in the UK was ‘He’s A Rebel,’ but we didn’t sing it. When we rehearsed it we hadn’t particularly liked it. Also, we’d already had two hit records in the States, plus an album, yet we still hadn’t been paid. Phil Spector probably thought we were giving him too much hassle about money, so he got a studio group to record the song. Unfortunately, our first manager didn’t get us a good contract and Spector was able to use the group’s name.” (as told to the Daily Express Saturday Magazine 8/25/07 via Songfacts.com)

The lead vocal on the original single was sung by Darlene Love of The Blossoms who got paid $5000.00 for her session work along with the promise of a future solo single under her own name which took a long time to materialize. Spector recorded Love as the lead vocalist on the single “He’s Sure The Boy I Love,” but ended up releasing the record as a Crystals record without giving her credit. It wasn’t until 1963 that Love finally got her own singles including “Wait Til’ My Bobby Gets Home,” “(Today I Met) The Boy I’m Gonna Marry,” “A Fine Boy” and her signature recording “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home.)”

Darlene Love: “Between ‘He’s A Rebel’ and the Christmas album two years later, The Crystals didn’t sing on any of their own records, they just went out on tour to promote them.” (Record Collector via Songfacts.com) A slightly different version of the original group was soon back on their records until jealousy began to bear its ugly head between them and Spector’s other main protégé’s The Ronettes.

Things got so bad, that The Crystals finally dissolved and Spector used The Ronettes (billed as The Crystals) on several tracks of the album The Crystals Sing Their Greatest Hits. Such was the music business of the early sixties! No matter who was actually in the studio, I think it’s safe to say that The Crystals made a clutch of world-class classics that have stood the test of time.

Phil Spector used the royalties from “He’s A Rebel” to buy out his partners at Philles Records using profits from the next two Crystals singles as collateral. The first single was the aforementioned “He’s Sure the Boy I Love” (recorded by The Blossoms as The Crystals), and the second single was a five minute tune called “(Let’s Do) The Screw.” The song featured Spector’s lawyer saying “do the screw” over and over again. A total of one copy of the 45 was pressed and given to Spector’s partner Lester Sill. The single made no money and received no airplay.

The flip of today’s single is by far the most embarrassing record to come from the pens of Carole King and Gerry Goffin. The song was written after their babysitter, Little Eva (of “The Locomotion” fame) told King and Goffin that her boyfriend beat her on a regular basis, and it proved to her how much he loved her. (Go figure!)

It was a song that garnered little airplay, and even The Crystals didn’t want to record it. Lala Brooks: “That was weird for us. We were thrown aback by the song. I’m a teenager at the time. Barbara (Alston, fellow Crystal) was a little uneasy doing it. And I was trying to figure out the song and why Phil would record something like this. Barbara was so turned off because she was singing the lyrics and can’t feel anything. So in the studio Phil was telling her, ‘Don’t be so relaxed on it.'” (Mojo via Songfacts.com)

Even during the relatively innocent early sixties, this record is totally cringe-worthy. That said, it does have its kitsch value. Where is Quentin Tarentino when you need him…

“The Jukebox Series” focused on the 80 records that currently inhabit my 1963 Seeburg LPC1 jukebox. I’ve had my jukebox (or as I like to call it “the prehistoric iPod”) for a little over twelve years and in that time I’d like to think that I’ve perfected the mix of 45s within. Over the years, records have come and gone out of the ranks of the juke, but they were all at one time juke-worthy. I’ve decided to expand “The Jukebox Series” to include many of the “juke-worthy” records that are no longer currently in the mix, but at one time inhabited a coveted slot.

The 3D Wonders of The World

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On this episode of The Award Winning 3D RadioActivity, we are playing Wonderous music. Various lists of the Wonders of the World have been compiled from way back when to the present day, to catalog the world’s most spectacular natural wonders and man made structures. The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is the first known list of the most remarkable creations of classical antiquity, and was based on guide-books popular among Hellenic sight-seers and only includes works located around the Mediterranean rim. The number seven was chosen because the Greeks believed it to be the representation of perfection and plenty. More recent lists include The American Society of Civil Engineers who compiled a list of wonders of the modern world, Seven Natural Wonders of the World, and The New Seven Wonders. Typically these include a variety of items ranging from The Internet to the Great Migration of The Serengeti, The Aurora Borealis, The Polar ice caps and a few structures like Stonehenge, Rome’s Colosseum, The Great Wall of China, The Leaning Tower of Pisa, The great Pyramids, San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, Panama’s Canal, and The Taj Mahal, the mausoleum in India, not the musician with that name.

The 3D Wonders of The World

 

Be sure to tune in next week, when we will feature “One Hit Wonders”!