As you may have heard, Bob Dorough passed away this week at the age of 94. He had a range of talents, including a unique singing voice, arranging, writing and playing piano.
My favorite of his works is “The Dream Keeper”, one of his three adaptions of songs by Langston Hughes, from the Jazz Canto LP on Pacific Jazz. The other two songs are “Daybreak in Alabama” and “Night and Morn”, plus the LP features his setting of Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s “Dog”. None of these were mentioned in reports when he passed, or even on his Wikipedia page.
I wrote to Mr. Dorough in 2013 and this is what he told me about this album:
Billy Bean used to come to NYC, from his native Philadelphia, to blow in a jam session I held at my apt. – in the 50’s.
Then I lived in LA for 3 years. I had already composed and performed the three songs to Langston Hughes, with Ralph Pena on bass, at the Lenox Jazz School.
After Ralph knew I was in LA he spoke to Lawrence Lipton about the songs and Dr. L called me to ask me to record them for Jazz Canto. I said “It’s not ‘Jazz & Poetry’ – they’re ‘art songs’ in the jazz idiom.” “I want them on the album anyway,” he said. So I said, “OK, but let me do one at least that I would think of as ‘Jazz & Poetry.'”
“What would you do” he asked – without hesitation I said “Dog” by Ferlinghetti. He was astounded and said OK.
Bunker and Hardaway were just cats I’d met since moving to LA and also special pals of Pena’s.
The lineup on the album is:
Bob Dorough – piano Ralph Pena – bass Billy Bean – guitar Bob Hardaway – tenor sax Larry Bunker – drums and vibes
Stairway to the Stars, 1967, from left: T.r. Sollosi, Dave Benard, P.J. Geary, and Ray Niccolai. Photo courtesy of Paul Geary
The Stairway to the Stars came from the Pittsburgh area, but cut this 45 for the Brite-Star label out of Newberry, Ohio, near Cleveland. Newberry is only a couple hours from Pittsburgh, but the labels indicate a Nashville base.
One side has a moody, echoing vocal, “Cry”, written by Tom Sellosi and Dave Benard. The intensity grows for the short recitation at the end.
On the flip is “Dry Run” a great instrumental featuring a lot of tremolo on the guitar, a strong three note riff that sounds like a keyboard more than guitar, and a long and dissonant middle section for the lead break. Phil Dirt pointed out the similarity of the opening melody to the Vistas “No Return” on Tuff, but the Stairway to the Stars really expand on that theme in the rest of the song.
The Rite account number is 728 and the release numbers are 17909 (“Dry Run”) / 17910 (“Cry”), released in September or October 1966.
Members on the record included:
Tom Sollosi – lead guitar Dave Benard – lead vocals Paul Geary – tenor sax Ray Niccolai – rhythm guitar and bass
Paul Geary provided the photos and wrote to me:
We all lived in the Monongahela, Pa. area south of Pittsburgh. Tom Solossi knew I played tenor sax in the jazz band in high school and he was trying to get a little band together. He had already recruited Ray Niccolli for rhythm guitar. Tom himself played lead guitar and also taught guitar at a local music shop. Dave Benard who worked at a furniture store in Mon City was our vocalist.
The band did a lot of weddings, teen dances, and social clubs. We were all in high school at the time and appreciated the extra money we made playing music.
Tom knew a local DJ in Charleroi, Pa. His name was Johnny Barbero and he wanted us to come to the radio station WESA for a recording session. I played sax on the recording but was drowned out by the heavy guitars.
We made a demo and paid Brite-Star Records to make some records to distribute. It played on a few local radio stations, but never took off.
Q. Do you remember who played drums on the record?
We were between drummers at the time but I’m pretty sure it was George Tirpack.
We stayed together for about a year and then everyone started applying for colleges and that ended the group.
The Library of Congress has a registration for “Cry” from September 12, 1966, to David Benard and Thomas Sollosi. The “Dry Run” label lists T.R. Sollosi, but this song wasn’t registered.
Teen Beat Mayhem indicates this 45 came with a picture sleeve, which I’ve never seen. Paul tells me there was never anything but a plain sleeve for the single.
The Blue Knights, precursor to Stairway to the Stars, from left: Frank Champ, accordion and keyboard; Tom Sollosi, lead guitar; Bill Garrison, drums; Paul Geary, sax; Ray Niccoli, rhythm guitar. Photo courtesy of Paul Geary.
Info on Brite-Star came from the 45rpm Records site.
This is a probably unrecorded group from the Dallas area called the Galaxies.
Members were:
Steve Connor Frank Schefflier Monty Oakley Garry Ford – guitar
Garry’s father, Robert Ford wrote a profile of the group for AP which ran in the Garden City Telegram on November 10, 1965.
These Galaxies are NOT the Garland, TX Galaxies that recorded “Gitchy-Gitchy-Goo” on Limelight and were active throughout most of the ’60s. That group included Bobby Lake, Kenneth Pugh, Bubba Tomlinson, and Ray Windt.
Here’s an unknown group, the Four Counts, or the Counts Four, possibly from Reading, Pennsylvania. There’s a chance they could have evolved into the Counts who came from Valley View and cut “Last Train” / “I Will Lose My Mind” for the Kingston label in July of 1969, but from the small b&w photo I’ve seen of the Counts I’d say this is unlikely.
Charlie Harrington on drumsBarry Elam sent in the photos of his band the Specters, and wrote the following about the group:
The Specters from Kirksville, Missouri were active from 1967-1972. They were a popular band in Northeast Missouri and played many area dances, fraternity parties at Truman State University, and private events. The band’s material covered originals as well as top hits of the day.
Band members were Randy Crowder on vocals and guitar, Barry Elam guitar, Randy Grissom bass and vocals, and Charlie Harrington, drums.
The Specters did not release any records but we were friends with another local band that did, Friar Tuck and The Merry Men. My original guitar teacher was Bud Porter who was the lead guitarist for Friar Tuck. They had a regional hit called “Peanut Butter” on Sherwood Forest Records, released in 1966.
Here’s an excerpt of an alternate version of Baker Knight’s original “Are You Satisfied Now”.
The Reprise single version of “Are You Satisfied Now” has horns, a female chorus, a completely different band and a smoother vocal from Baker. It was the b-side of “The Verge Of Success”, Knight’s seventh and last release on Reprise Records from April, 1968. That version was produced by Jimmy Bowen.
This demo definitely comes from an earlier session, I’d guess around 1966 given the folk-rock backing and grittier vocal. Although this demo lists Hill & Range publishing, by the time Knight registered the song in 1968 that had changed to Smooth Music / Noma Music as it is on the single. In fact I don’t find any evidence of Baker publishing through Hill & Range during the mid-60s.
I only wish Knight would stop singing long enough for a guitar break, but he had plenty of lyrics to get through.
This 8″ lacquer was cut at Stereo Masters Co. on Melrose.
The Continentals cut two fratty originals, “Rufus Rastas” / “Donna” on Tortoise Records. I found a copy with an inscription on the “Rufus Rastas” label “First copy to Jim McKee, Oct. 12, 1965 … Joe Doll, President, Tortoise Records”.
I wrote to Mr. Doll and he while he didn’t recall Jim McKee, he replied,
I was president (and janitor, too!) of Tortoise Records. I began college at Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio in 1963, then transferred to U. of Michigan in Ann Arbor in 1966 to complete my Electrical Engineering degree.
I most likely met the Continentals when they were entertaining at one of the numerous fraternity/sorority parties in Delaware. Too bad, I have no recollection or documentation of the band members. I do remember the general parameters of the recording session with The Continentals, at the WSLN studios in Delaware, OH, north of Columbus. I also remember thinking at the time that their “Rufus Rastas” made a pretty good side. I don’t think we did a test pressing, so what you found was probably the top copy in the shipment from the pressing factory.
When it was over, they departed with their box of pressings and we had no further contact.
Tortoise Records was named for the very first band on the label, the Turtles, with their “Pungfoo Watusi” from 1964:
“Pungfoo Watusi” was the not-very-carefully-conceived B side of “Pungfoo”. It was the first record I produced.
“Pungfoo” originated with me and some fraternity brothers fooling around with a piano, sax, and drum set in the parlor of our fraternity house. We whimsically called ourselves Tuggy and the Turtles. The original title and lyric was “Fungu”. It was a made-up word, but someone thought that meant something bad in another language. One unreleased recording is “Fungu” recorded on cheap equipment in the fraternity house.
The record was taped at Fortune Studios in Detroit. I played piano, whistled, and hollered into some sort of trash can. Jim Guiness played saxophone. Our usual drummer, “Tuggy,” could not make it, so we picked up a drummer in Detroit. That’s why the group name is just The Turtles. A couple others assisted with clapping, which I believe we overdubbed.
I had done some work for the [Fortune] studio the previous summer, and they allowed me to use it without charge. I didn’t do a lot of work there, just came in to help them adjust and maintain their equipment from time to time.
Frank Uhle, who took on the project to do a 50th Anniversary re-release of the Beau Biens record, at one time contemplated a vinyl album that would contain some unreleased material. I have about a half hour of covers recorded by the Mark V, a pretty good rock band that played fraternity/sorority parties at Ohio Wesleyan. I recorded them in the WSLN studios, like the Continentals. There was an outfit called the Crystal Set Radio Band for whom I taped several tunes, originals I believe, in the WCBN studios. Ken Phillips, a U of M student, recorded with a small group a couple of tunes he had written and had them pressed as a demo record.
Joe Doll would become a DJ at WCBN at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he would record the Aftermath for Tortoise, and the Beau Biens for Malibu Records. For more info please look at Joe’s website.
Tortoise Records discography:
Tortoise T 64001 – Turtles “Pungfoo” / “Pungfoo Watusi” (both by Joe Doll)
Tortoise T-66003 – Aftermath – “Messing With the Kid” / “Bury My Body” (Campbell, Connelly)
Malibu MB-67001 – Beaubiens (aka Beau Biens) – “Times Passed” (arr. by Salvo & Palazzolo) / “A Man Who’s Lost” (both by Kleene & Tapert, Linnoah Music BMI, produced by Joe Doll). The Beau Biens were Tom Kleene, Don Tapert. Tom Hartkop, Jim Masouras and Rick Fine.
A special thank you to Joe Doll for his help answering my questions and allowing me to quote him.
The Penetrators came from Crown Point, NY, on the west shore of Lake Champlain above Ticonderoga.
Members included Dan Rabideau and Larry Rabideau, Kim Joiner and Joe Dugan on bass. John Hoffman seems to have been a later member of the group.
There is a single by the Penetrators on Penstar Records 1146, “Guitar Boogie” / “Coming Home Baby”, both instrumentals. I’m not yet positive this is the same as the Crown Point group.
In March of 1968 they made what I believe to be their second record, the cool garage original “I’ll Make You Mine” by Dan Rabideau and Kim Joiner, backed with a good instrumental, “Splitter Splatter” by Dan Rabideau and Larry Rabideau.
The 45 came out on Ferus Records FR 4958. Ferus had an address of 64-12 60th Pl., Brooklyn 27, New York. Tommy Wilde produced the single, I’m not sure how the band came to find Ferus.
1971 Battle of the BandsThis is a styrene 45 with the Columbia custom pressing code ZTSP 124958/9. Both songs published by Ferus Music BMI.
As Danny and the Country Penetrators they put out a single that I haven’t heard, “She’s My Mother-In-Law” / “I’ll Be Waiting” on Delta Records in June of 1968.
The band was well known locally as as Danny and the Penetrators. They appeared on the Ted Mack Amateur Hour and continued with local bookings into the 1970s.
From a 1971 news item, it appears the Rabideau’s mother Doris managed the band.
Info on the band from a Port Henry forum. Thank you to Anthony M. for the original 45.
The Ugly Z are a mystery band to me. There are plenty of names on the labels, but it may be that none of them belong to the band’s members.
“Down to My Very Last Tear” has a cool twelve-string guitar opening and a good band performance full of harmony singing. It was credited to the Ugly Z and Steve Fazio Jr.
Chris Crocket wrote “Kathy’s Back” which is similar to the flip in sound and almost as catchy.
Rick Lawrence, Stuart Richard produced the record, with Richard also arranging both sides.
It was released on Rondo 9158 in June, 1965, as shown from the Alco delta numbers: ∆57098 / ∆57098-X. Rondo had its address at 15101 Magnolia Blvd in Sherman Oaks, CA, and also published the songs through Rondo BMI.
Steve Fazio would show up about a year later as a talent scout for Valiant Records and producer Al Kavelin. Steve Fazio, Jr. also wrote “All Because Of You” recorded by Guiseppi Apollo with the Revels & the Mapes Sisters on Impact 12-IMX, published by Anthony Music.
This site is a work in progress on 1960s garage rock bands. All entries can be updated, corrected and expanded. If you have information on a band featured here, please let me know and I will update the site and credit you accordingly.
I am dedicated to making this site a center for research about '60s music scenes. Please consider donating archival materials such as photos, records, news clippings, scrapbooks or other material from the '60s. Please contact me at rchrisbishop@gmail.com if you can loan or donate original materials
