From the Ensley Highlands section of Birmingham, Robert Alexander (bass), Ned Bibb (vocals and guitar), and Bobby Marlin (drums) started playing in high school in 1962, rehearsing in Robert Alexander’s basement.

In 1965-66 they backed Travis Wammack, then took the name The Distortions from his record “Distortion pt. 1”. They added Zack Zackery on keyboards, and recorded their first three 45s on Sea Records. These included an interesting Ned Bibb original, “Can You Tell”, which was backed by a slow, loopy take on “Hound Dog”; and a raging version of Howlin’ Wolf’s “Smokestack Lightning”.

The band added Eddie Rice on guitar in 1966 and switched to the Malcolm Z. Dirge label for their next release, “Thank You John”, which reached the charts on WSGN in town. On the flip they recorded a fine version of the Rascals’ oft-covered “I Ain’t Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore”.

When their next 45, “Behind My Wall” was picked up for national distribution by Smash, they had their biggest hit, selling 10-15,000 copies according to their producer Ed Boutwell. Their penultimate 45 was a good Bill Haney original, “I Found a Girl”, with a version of “I Don’t Really Like You”, originally done by Baton-Rouge’s Canebreak Singers on Montel and written by Mike Crespo. It was produced by Haney and Richie Becker and released on Casino, a subsidiary of the Dover Records company of New Orleans.

In ’67 the Distortions added Roy Alexander on saxophone.

Dale Aston of the Torquays sent in the photo above and writes about his time with the band:

I played guitar with the band. Steve Salord and I had just left The Torquays and joined with The Distortions for a brief period. We recorded “Let’s Spend Some Time Together” at Boutwell Studios in Mountain Brook, AL.

As I recall Ed Boutwell had a hand in getting Capital Records to pick up “Let’s Spend Some Time Together”. The other labels were homegrown and produced by the band for local distribution only.

Their last release was a cleaned-up version of the Stone’s “Let’s Spend the Night Together”, retitled “Let’s Spend Some Time Together”. This was picked up by Capitol but didn’t sell particularly well.

Henry Lavoy took over on drums during the late 1960’s.

The band split up in 1969, but Zack Zachery and Roy Alexander played college and club shows as the Distortions into the ’70s, with Clif Payne on drums and Ed Finn.

Clif Payne sent in the photo of the group from the 1970’s as well as four unreleased songs from 1975 in a polished, commercial sound the band developed later on, something akin to the Average White Band. See Clif’s comment below for more information about that band at this time.

Roy Alexander and Bobby Marlin are now deceased.

45 releases:

Hound Dog / Can You Tell – Sea 100
Take This Ring / You Know I’m On My Way – Sea 101
Smokestack Lightning / Hot Cha – Sea 102
I Ain’t Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore / Thank You John – Malcolm Z. Dirge 45000
Smokestack Lightning / Behind My Wall – Malcolm Z. Dirge 45002
A Love That Loves You / Behind My Wall – Smash S-2068
I Don’t Really Like You / I Found A Girl – Casino 501
Let’s Spend Some Time Together / Gimme Some Lovin’ – Malcolm Z. Dirge 45008 and Capitol 2223

Sources: Reunion of the Sons and Daughters of the Sixties program, May 8th, 1987; Birmingham News. April 30, 1987, Birmingham Weekly, vol. 10.

Thank you to Mike Pair for loaning me the Birmingham News article, “Hair” Rally notice and Reunion program.