The Prime Mover were led by two brothers from New York, John Pastor and Tony Pastor, Jr., who wrote both sides of this mystical opus.
Released in late 1967 on the Socko label, “When You Made Love To Me” contrasts droning chords with ringing chimes and quirky lead guitar work. The dense production prevents this song from having as strong an impact as it could have.
The less ambitious flip, “Shadow of a Day Gone By”, falls flat by comparison. The Pastors were sons of jazz bandleader Tony Pastor, and also had a vocal group the Pastor Brothers with their other sibling, Guy.
One of the reasons New York City doesn’t get a lot of credit from garage fans nowadays for its local music scene in the 60s is illustrated by this cut by Prime Mover. The criticism that the dense production on this tune diminishes its impact makes perfect sense in the context of rawer stuff that was coming out of Michigan, Texas, and other places. Let’s face it, since the 80s, no factor has made the collective “garage-o-meter” spike more noticeably than the perceived “rawness” or “primitiveness” of a record. But if you can set that aside, this is simply a fantastic 45: a nearly note-perfect performance of a very catchy and musically interesting tune, well produced. It approaches, but definitely doesn’t cross the line into the schmaltzland occupied by groups like The Vogues or Four Seasons, yet it’s very much a product of its time and place. Along with The Rites “Hour Girl”, The Brigands “Would I Still Be Her Big Man”, The Primates “She”, Raves “Mother Nature” and other well-produced records by NYC groups, it’s also a showcase for the *good* stuff that could happen when NYC’s entrenched doo-wop and Brill Building influences collided with the sounds emanating from garages nationwide, and of course the Beatles, which no other city copied so shamelessly (and convincingly!) right out of the box in ’64-5. And remember, in 1966, the second largest media market in the U.S. (Chicago) was less than one THIRD the size of NYC. A record as gloriously sloppy as The Keggs or Teddy & His Patches stood zero chance of getting played even on a greasy-spoon jukebox within the 5 boroughs, much less on WABC or WMCA!
Released in February 1968, this group was made up of five students from St. Francis College in Biddeford, Maine. They were performing at the college Winter Carnival February 17, 1968 with Jay & The Techniques also on the bill. (Source Biddeford-Saco Journal February 14, 1968.) The newspaper said the 45 would be released the next week. The record label name SOCK.0 was possibly a take off of the neighboring town of Saco, Maine which is pronounced like the record label name .