| The Reptiles have one cut on the Ren-Vell Battle of the Bands LP, The Glass Toy. I hadn't originally included in my article on that LP, but in taking another listen, I can see what the group were trying to achieve. It could have been a fine pop single with more polish, but the Ren-Vell studio wasn't prepared to offer that kind of guidance or production quality.
The Reptiles - The Glass Toy
Steve Worthy related the story of the Reptiles recording of Glass Toy to Bassman Bobb Brown:
Ron Macera was the drummer, Paul Slavin on bass, Mark Worthy on rhythm guitar and high harmony vocal on the chorus (a reversal of how we usually worked-me high harmony, him low). I played upper register rhythm guitar, because if I was doing the singing I couldn't do any leads on guitar.
I wrote the song (probably my 3rd or 4th song ever written), full of teenage angst, and having to rhyme the works criticize, minimize and brutalize in the one bridge, shows my poetic and English major leanings. Subconsciously, I imitated my heroes the Beatles by doing something I heard said later about their songs - sad lyrics with happy music!
The only other recording session for the Reptiles was with a friend of my father named Bert Haber, who worked with Famous Music Publishing, and they were looking to get some young bands on one of their record company rosters. Bert gave us this song called "Come Take A Taste" to learn, and we so despised it, but really wanted to get in on the ground floor so we did it. I was so depressed learning it, that I wrote a song called "The Moustache Song" as a joke ("Please little girl with the moustache, blah blahh, Please don't shave your little moustache, You're only girl I kissed with one before"), which went on the 45 b-side. No one else had a song, so I had to sing that one as well.
Needless to say, their Broadway-type song was like a Spanky and Our Gang type tune, and our hearts weren't in it, so it went nowhere further. The chorus sounded like "Sunday Will Never Be The Same".
The Reptiles prided itself on always being true to the song and getting all the chords right! One of our pet peeves would be songs by bands who couldn’t get the bridge right- on “For Your Love” for example- the last two chords –they would do “A followed by Am” at the end of it, instead of C#m to B. Most bands were a little lazy that way. We used sharps and flats and major seventh chords because of our Beatle training. Me and my brother would listen to records over and over until every chord was perfect, especially with the Beatles stuff, which was our supreme role model. We even did Sgt. Pepper Stuff live like “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds”, “It’s Getting Better”, “A Day In The Life”, “Lovely Rita”.
Steve also wrote about the Reptiles' rival bands, The End and The Aliens:
“The End” had Allen Spink and guitar and lead vocals, Jimmy Indusi on Guitar, Timmy Smith on console organ-sounded almost like a Hammond, Rick Selby on left-handed drums, and Pat Giordano on bass guitar. They were the second most ferocious competitors to the Reptiles after "The Aliens". We made a comeback and beat them in a Battle of the Bands at St. Augustine’s High School finally, after a humiliating defeat at St. Ann’s when Spink stacked the deck with all of his friends. One reason the rivalry was so raw, even though personally I was great friends with the leader Allen Spink, was young testosterone when the nine of us were in a room together. We were like the Jets and the Sharks circling each other, I swear!
The Aliens were composed of Ray Marion on lead guitar and lead vocals (playing a Gibson cherry red ES335), Curt Meinel, bass (Hagstrom?), Glen Kane on drums, and a guy named Howie on Farfisa organ [Howie Pobner]. They were very popular because they could be counted on to play all the standard rock 'n' roll songs like Louie, Louie, Wipe Out, Bang Bang (Joe Cuba, not Sonny and Cher), and were not adventurous at all, which is why the Reptiles and Aliens were sworn mortal enemies. Ray would do this swagger like he was so cool and shake his ass, which drove us crazy, because our impression of music at the time did not include ass shaking! Maybe he thought he was Elvis, who I both appreciate and love now, but at the time he was kind of old news to us in 1967.
The Aliens - Louie Louie
The Aliens - Gloria
Thanks to Bassman Bobb Brown for forwarding me the comments of Steve Worthy, along with the photo and the scans and transfers of the Aliens 45.
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Sing Sing Rocks!
Wow--great to get the scoop on The Ren-Vell Reptiles from Ossining-on-Hudson (home of Sing Sing prison, a.k.a. "up the river"). Hadn't heard of The Aliens before. Were they from Ossining too?
St. Ann's and St. Augustine's are still operating. My daughters both attend St. Ann's, and it wasn't even two weeks ago that I was standing in the gym looking at the stage wondering if they hosted dances with bands back in the '60s. It's the kind of gym that begs that question. Oh, it's got a new floor and lights, but other than that, it probably hasn't changed much since 1966!
Any more details about those "battle of the bands" events? Pictures?