A fixture in the ’60s, Gary U.S. Bonds continues rocking to this day

(No. 36 in a continuing series on artists who should be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, but are not)

By Phill Marder

Revisionists will tell you the period between 1960 and the British Invasion was Rock’s darkest hour, a desolate wasteland where nothing but Frankie Avalon, Fabian and Bobby Rydell existed.

As with most Rock history written by those experiencing it second hand, this is total bs.

First off, many recordings by the three Philadelphia teen idols were good. Sure, Fabian couldn’t sing. But there’s about a dozen current Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees who were just as bad…or worse. And at least Fabian had Doc Pomus songs.

Many rock journalists make it sound as if every major star vanished overnight. Not true. Early ’60s radio still had regular Elvis releases, even if he was in Germany. And many – “Stuck On You,” “A Mess Of Blues,” “I Gotta Know,” “I Feel So Bad,” “Marie’s The Name,” “Little Sister,” “(You’re The) Devil In Disguise” and more were solid rockers. Chuck Berry started the decade with the double-sided blast, “Too Pooped To Pop” and “Let It Rock” and added “Nadine,” “No Particular Place To Go,” “You Never Can Tell” and “Promised Land” in 1964.

And while Jerry Lee, Richard and Buddy Holly had all but disappeared from the airwaves, Fats still rocked and Roy Orbison, Ray Charles, the Four Seasons, Del Shannon, Gene Pitney, the Impressions, Dion, Chubby Checker, James Brown and many others were picking up the slack in addition to Motown beginning to fire on all cylinders. By the way, all but Chubby and a few Motown acts have been rightfully inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame.

Does that sound like a musical wasteland to you? On the contrary, Baby Boomers were now teenagers and we had plenty of great stuff to listen to.

Two more who left an indelible mark on Rock in the ‘60s were Gary U.S. Bonds and Freddy Cannon, who should receive serious consideration for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Bonds started with “New Orleans,” which climbed to No. 6 in 1960. This was not just a hit record, but an anthem of sorts, Bonds breaking in with the chant “I said ahey, heya, hey yeah.” The sound of the record, produced by Bonds’ mentor Frank Guida, was the ultimate in low-fi, filled with doubled (tripled?) vocals, tape hiss, heavy bass drum and Guida’s ripping house band, The Church Street Five, featuring Gene Barge (Daddy G) on sax.

“A rock and roll juggernaut had been launched that would roll on for only two years but leave an indelible mark on a generation of rockers and producers then coming of age at the dawn of The British Invasion,“ David McGee so accurately wrote in “The New Rolling Stone Album Guide.“

But surprisingly, the follow-up, “Not Me,” was a total flop, though it became a #12 hit for The Orlons in 1963. Maybe even the world of Rock was not ready for the line, “You better shut up before I bust you in the lip” in 1961. But shortly after, “Quarter To Three” brought Bonds back to the top – in fact, all the way to the top – becoming one of Rock’s all-time classics, in spite of some x-rated yelps buried in the party atmosphere crowd noise.

Through 1962, Bonds continued to hit the charts with hard-rocking blasts, “School Is Out,” “Dear Lady Twist” and “Twist, Twist Senora” all cracking the top 10.

When the hits stopped coming, Bonds continued making public appearances and co-wrote “She’s All I Got,“ a major country hit for Johnny Paycheck in 1971.

In 1981, Bonds received the considerable support of Bruce Springsteen. “The Boss” played “Quarter To Three” in many of his concerts and threw his weight behind a Bonds’ comeback, writing two big hits, “This Little Girl” and “Out Of Work” for Bonds while he and Steve Van Zandt produced two fine albums for the Norfolk native.

In 2004, he released “Back In 20” and in 2009 “Let Them Talk.” I had the pleasure of seeing Bonds three years ago, and he still rocked the house.

Calling Freddy Cannon explosive was an understatement

Cannon blasted – and that term is a mild description – onto the scene in May, 1959 when his “Tallahassee Lassie” began its run up the charts, eventually peaking at No. 6. As a budding deejay, this was the first record I ever played and it was a nightmare, the tone arm jumping all over the place thanks to the pounding bass drum, which became one of Cannon’s trademarks. The other was the well-timed “yelp,” which dotted most of Cannon’s records.

Cannon rocked as hard or harder than anyone in the early ‘60s, whether remaking old classics such as “Way Down Yonder In New Orleans” or “Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy” or doing originals such as the double-sided “Jump Over” and “The Urge” or the wall-rattling “Buzz Buzz A-Diddle-It.”

Three years and one day after “Tallahassee Lassie” introduced Cannon to the Billboard Hot 100, his biggest success entered the charts. “Palisades Park” went on to reach No. 3 and become a staple of oldies radio stations. Cannon continued to have hits until 1966, reaching the top 20 with “Abigail Beecher” and “Action,” the theme for Dick Clark’s “Where The Action Is” TV show.

And speaking of Clark, Cannon was one of the most popular and accessible rockers of the early ‘60s, setting the record for most appearances on Clark’s “American Bandstand.”

The late, great Cub Koda, a former “Goldmine” columnist, wrote a glowing summary of Cannon for allmusicguide.com. Noting that many early rockers quickly abandoned the music that got them to the top for “tuxedos” and “supper club schmaltz,” (Bobby Darin anyone?) Koda wrote, “Freddy Cannon was a true believer, a rocker to the bone. Freddy Cannon made rock & roll records; great noisy rock & roll records…”

Koda describes “Tallahassie Lassie” as “a record that simply rocks from beginning to end like few others.”

Today, Cannon seems hardly remembered, except by those of us who grew up with his powerful records.

“…Cannon is wrongly lumped in with the “Bobbies and Frankies” that proliferated during that era (the early ‘60s),” Koda noted. “But a quick listen to any of his finest records … quickly dispels any preconceived notions of him being a pretty-boy teen idol no-talent…in a time frame full of phony baloney teen idols Freddy Cannon always remained a true rock & roller.”

Yes, it may have been the era of phony baloney teen idols, but it also was the era of much great Rock & Roll. And two who contributed mightily were Bonds and Cannon, and each deserves induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Goldmine magazine, March 2011 (Issue #797) is on your newsstand now!

The theme of the issue: What makes a five-star album: the songwriting, the historical impact of the record, the band itself? Goldmine mulled all those points, and more, to present its first class of five-star albums for your consideration. Did your favorites make the cut? Find out which artists’ albums made our list, and why. And sticking with the five-star theme, record collecting expert Stephen M.H. Braitman explores why five-star albums don’t always become five-star collectibles.

Also in the March 2011 issue of Goldmine (available now at Barnes and Noble or Borders — or, better yet, subscribe now)

• The multi-talented Todd Rundgren talks about his extraordinary career;

• Guitarist Peter Buck gives us the scoop on R.E.M.’s new record, plus gives us a peek at his massive record collection;

• Keyboardist Bobby Whitlock goes back to the days of “Layla,” when Derek and the Dominos was a musical phenomenon (albeit a short-lived one);

• Ex-Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett shares the records that changed his life;

• Find out why “Texas” Alexander’s life reads like something out of a blues song;

• Rediscover Johnny Maestro and The Crests (and some long-lost Coed gems, to boot);

• Check out reviews for CDs and DVDs for Johnny Cash, Gregg Allman, Elvis Presley, John Lennon and more;

• Learn everything you always wanted to know — buy may have been afraid to ask — about 78s;

• Meet fellow Goldmine reader Jimmi Retzler;

• Discover a Dick Clark flexidisc rarity

• Find out which jazz records have been hitting all the right notes with online record buyers;

• Say farewell to several high-profile musicians, including former Thin Lizzy guitarist Gary Moore, performer Doc Williams, composer John Barry, drummer and comedian Charlie Callas, Marvelettes co-founder Gladys Horton, composer Milton Babbitt, country musician Charlie Louvin, Broadcast lead singer Trish Keenan, rock promoter Don Kirshner, big-band singer Margaret Whiting, folk singer Debbie Friedman, drummer Alex Kirst, TV personality David Nelson; flamenco singer Enrique Morente and guitar craftsman Lorenzo Pimentel.

Cleveland is fortunate the Kiss army has not yet attacked the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

(11th in a series on artists who should be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, but are not)

By Phill Marder

My first glimpse of Kiss came on a TV special. I believe it was a concert on PBS, of all places, but it’s been so long ago I can’t remember. So if any of you can fill in that missing blank, please do.

Obviously, it fried my mind…in a positive way, though. I remember thinking that here, finally, was a band capable of reaching Beatlesque popularity. What a great show!

The concert featured most of the material on their debut album, which I purchased soon after and began wearing out immediately. From the opening riff of “Strutter” to the last pounding chord of a fading “Black Diamond” this wax was – and remains – one of my favorite albums, each cut a classic.

That Kiss never came close to duplicating that musical effort doesn’t matter. What the group did do has made it one of the most popular bands in the history of Rock & Roll. Popular with the masses, but, evidently, not with those who decide who should be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. For Kiss has been all but ignored, though eligible since 1999.

The band did finally get nominated in 2009. Didn’t make it, but at least the nomination was there. Alas, they are missing from this year’s ballot.

An ad placed by Peter Criss in “Rolling Stone” captures just what makes Kiss so despicable to so many of the powers that be in the music industry. The ad read simply, “Drummer willing to do anything to make it.” Naturally, he got the job. For Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley, the group’s founders, never have been shy about their goal to do anything to make as much money as possible. At least they’re honest about it.

And money the group did make, selling millions of records, selling out concert after concert and even appearing in comic books, on lunch boxes, pinball machines, you name it. Their Kiss Army – the group’s fan club – quickly swelled to six figures, one of those being my wife, though I didn’t know her at the time. She was just another pre-teen with a dollar, and if it could make a dollar, Kiss was there. But – and it’s a big but, if you’ll pardon the expression – Kiss was capable of backing up everything it did with talent befitting a supergroup.

Though never much of a factor on the singles’ charts, Kiss did manage three major hits, all rather strange considering the source. “Beth,“ was the violin-soaked ballad sung by Criss, which reached No. 7 on the Hot 100 in 1976. It was the antithesis of their sound and image.Naturally, it became their biggest hit. Their only other Top 10 effort was “Forever,“ No. 8 in 1990. This was co-written by Paul Stanley and …Michael Bolton?

In 1979, the group just missed the top 10 with “I Was Made For Loving You,“ which stopped at No. 11. This effort saw Kiss doing what most everyone was at the time – dabbling in disco. The Stones hit with “Miss You,‘ the Kinks with “Superman” and ELO even released an album titled “Discovery,“ which, of course, can be read “Disco Very.“ That effort included several disco-flavored hits. So for those who refuse to count disco as what it is – a branch of Rock & Roll – consider the above. And also for those too young to have seen it, keep in mind Dick Clark‘s “American Bandstand” record review, one of “Bandstand’s” most popular segments which let the teens on the show rate new records heard for the first time. The most common explanation for a good rating, a response that became one of Rock & Roll’s earliest catch-phrases, was “It’s got a good beat and you can dance to it.“

A good beat and you can dance to it. Kids – that’s a BIG part of the definition of Rock & Roll. And it sounds just like a definition of disco.

Kiss did offer a steady stream of best-selling long players, each usually containing at least one or two instant classics. From the amazing debut all the way to last year’s “Sonic Boom,” Kiss has been a force on the album charts. In fact, “Sonic Boom” was their highest-charting effort, reaching No. 2 35 years after their breakthrough and 11 years after their No. 3 “Psycho Circus.” It upped the group’s total of top 10 LPs to eight with two stopping at No. 11.

Can you hear the “William Tell Overture” without thinking of the Lone Ranger? Even the biggest musical snob would be hard-pressed to hear someone say, “I Want to Rock & Roll All Nite” without thinking “and party every day.”

Intellectual, no. Rock & Roll, yup.

While the HOF has inducted almost every punk group that never sold 10 albums, it ignores many of the most successful bands in the history of recorded music. Of that rejected class, Kiss may be the most successful of all, at least with the public.

Outlandish, bombastic, original, intelligent, successful and … gasp … even talented, Kiss remains one of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s most notorious omissions.

• Get 20% off by pre-ordering the newest Ozzy book,“The Wit & Wisdom of Ozzy Osbourne”

• Download Goldmine’s Guide to AC/DC (PDF download)

TV appearances, including several in conjunction with Dick Clark, helped boost the visibility of Paul Revere & The Raiders. “Where The Action Is” and “Happening” were among the shows members graced. Photo courtesy Phil “Fang” Volk

By Brett Milano

Think of Paul Revere & the Raiders and you invariably think of the Revolutionary War costumes, the Dick Clark connection, the TV show “Where The Action Is,” the 16 Magazine photo spreads of Mark Lindsay and his ponytail…and, oh yeah, they made some pretty great records, too.

“The hats and the tights and the goofy costumes — all that gets burned in peoples’ retinas, and it can be hard to remove that,” says frontman Lindsay.

Phil “Fang” Volk, bassist for the first main lineup, agrees.

“I don’t think we ever got the street cred we deserve,” Volk said. “You take a band that played for years on the garage circuit. Then you put them on TV, and it changes the whole image.”

Collectors’ Choice three-CD set “Paul Revere & the Raiders: The Complete Columbia Singles” is the latest attempt to put that right. True, there isn’t much music here that hasn’t been reissued before, either on the double-CD set “The Legend of Paul Revere” or Sundazed’s reissues of the original albums. But it is the first set to put all the singles in one place, mostly restored to original mono (and without the much-disliked remixing on the Legend set).

Put it all together, and you’ve got a taste of everything that ever mattered about AM radio. With Lindsay (and at first, the late Terry Melcher) taking the lead in the writing and production, the band changed direction every few singles, getting from “Louie Louie” to more textured soul and pop, fusing The Stones with Phil Spector on “Him Or Me – What’s It Gonna Be?,” doing Southern rock before it was even a genre, going protest-pop on “Indian Reservation,” and finishing up with the one of the weirdest-ever Dylan covers — all in just more than a decade. If you bought the albums or played the B-sides, you’d hear ambitions that went well past the confines of the Top 40.

“I was influenced by everything out there,” Lindsay says. “Growing up, I listened to everything from classical to pop to comedy records. It would be a lie if I said I wasn’t influenced by The Beatles or The Stones, but I was aware of everything on the charts, and Terry, in the beginning, was very conscious of that. He originally pegged the Raiders as somewhere between The Kinks and The Stones, and tried to steer us in that direction. And we had plenty of angst and sweat to go along with it. Our first singles were very much mixed for AM radio; we were always shooting for the sound coming through those speakers. As we moved on, I wasn’t reinventing myself, since I liked all kinds of music so it was easy to switch up and lean in a particular direction.”

The new set shows one anomaly of the Raiders’ career: The singles were often wildly different from the album versions. Most sported different mixes on 45. “Too Much Talk” and “The Great Airplane Strike” had sections unique to the single; “We Gotta All Get Together” was a different (and better) recording than its album counterpart. The album cut of “Cinderella Sunshine” was not only twice as long, but also a completely different arrangement.

“I never put anything away,” Lindsay explains. “I’d cut two, maybe three versions of a song. Sometimes I’d cut it for the album, and when it came time for the single I’d think, ‘Maybe we can punch it up, streamline this a little.’ With something like ‘Cinderella Sunshine,’ the single came first, and after listening to it for a while I’d think, ‘Now I wish I’d done it this way, instead’.”

Also unique to the singles were instrumental B-sides that were purposely too loose (and at four and five minutes, too long) to challenge the A-sides for airplay. On “Shake It Up” and “B.F.D.R.F. Blues,” you hear the Raiders being a garage band, with Revere wailing on, of all things, a harpsichord — which just happened to be left over from a classical session.

“When I listen to those I say, ‘Wow, man, I had better chops than I thought’,” notes Volk. “I already knew what ‘Hungry’ and ‘Steppin’ Out’ sounded like; those were written lines. But when I hear those instrumentals, I hear cats that are just playing from their souls.”

Volk also wants to put to rest the idea that Lindsay and Melcher relied on session players in the studio. True, some hired guns were around: Ry Cooder was one of many guitarists on “Him Or Me” (Jerry Cole played the lead), and Van Dyke Parks did the organ mini-solos on “In My Community.” But the Raiders themselves — including Revere, at least in the early days — played most of the basic tracks. “I was the bass player on everything recorded when I was in the band,” notes Volk. “You hear a lot of talk about the Wrecking Crew being involved, but Terry and Mark would use them to augment the band.”

From the start, the Raiders risked getting too risqué for the radio. By now, it’s well documented that their version of “Louie Louie” had an F-word in the groove, one of Lindsay’s offhand shouts during the solo. In one of the great ironies, the censors instead went after The Kingsmen, whose lyrics were unintelligible but squeaky-clean).

“B.F.D.R.F. Blues” had a title that would’ve never seen the light of day spelled out (“Big deal, rat fink” would be the clean version). And the two Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil-penned hits, “Kicks” and “Hungry,” had grown-up slants for a teen-idol band. “Kicks” could have referred to any number of things; Lindsay’s animal growls on “Hungry” clearly refer to one thing only.

“To be honest with you, I never understood the depth of the lyrics in ‘Kicks’,” Lindsay says. “It wasn’t even written about a girl; it was about [Carole King’s writing partner] Gerry Goffin who was dabbling in some hard stuff at the time. I was naïve; I just thought it meant that it wasn’t as easy to have a good time as it used to be. Then Time magazine asked me how it felt to have recorded the first anti-drug song, and I said, ‘We did?’”

As for the more overtly sexual “Hungry,” he says, “The feedback I got later [from the teenybopper fans] was that it was a little scary for them, and really exciting. Some of our stuff was more obviously geared for the 16 Magazine readers, and some was for the fans at the dance halls, so we appealed to both. I suppose that later came back to haunt us.”

There were also psychedelic hints between the lines, though most of that was on album tracks — the most psych single was the B-side “Observation From Flight 285 (in 3/4 time)”, sort of a hazier cousin to “Eight Miles High.”

“I could only get away with so much of that on the records,” Lindsay says. “Though I have great visions of driving up the Canyon listening to Jimi and thinking, ‘God, where did that come from?’ I remember that ‘1001 Arabian Nights’ (one of their trippier album cuts) came after Terry and I listened to Donovan one day, through the cannabis haze that was around L.A. at the time.”

The Raiders’ teen-idol days effectively ended in 1968, when Volk, guitarist Jim “Harpo” Valley (who’d replaced original member Drake Levin) and drummer Mike “Smitty” Smith all jumped ship, and a new round of Raiders, with guitarists Freddy Weller and Keith Allison, came in.

Melcher also fell out around this time, and Revere got less involved in the studio, leaving Lindsay solidly in charge — though both Weller and Allison (who was last seen playing guitar on Ringo Starr’s latest album) would have a hand in the new, Southern-styled direction. Lindsay’s debut as sole writer/producer, 1968’s “Too Much Talk,” was the group’s first — and, until “Indian Reservation,” only — political single.

“We traveled a lot in the South at the time, and I’m sure that inspired it,” Lindsay says.
Around the same time, the group’s Christmas album was the most political thing it did, just when the label was expecting the group to do ‘Sleigh Ride’,” he said.

The start of the 1970s found Lindsay making his most ambitious Raiders album “Collage,” but having greater success with a more pop-friendly solo career. The Raiders’ comeback hit, “Indian Reservation,” was in fact recorded as a solo single.

“I honestly didn’t know if it would be the biggest smash or a giant flop, and I can usually call records within 10 points. All I knew was that there’d be no middle ground on it. We had ‘Birds of a Feather’ up as the next Raiders single; and I knew that would go Top 30. And I said, ‘Well, I have this other thing I recorded, but I’m really reticent to put it out’.”

Thanks to a few factors — an especially strong vocal, Hal Blaine’s tom-tom hook, and Revere setting out by motorbike to visit radio stations — it was the group’s first and only No. 1.

Yet “Indian Reservation” didn’t totally revitalize The Raiders’ career. An album comprised mainly of leftover tracks was rushed out; there was only one follow-up (“Country Wine”). Both tellingly lacked original songs, as Lindsay was still smarting after the near-flop of “Collage.”

“Birds of a Feather” was indeed a modest hit as a follow-up; but the last batch of Raiders singles never stood much of a chance. The oddball Dylan cover “(If I Had to Do It All Over Again, I’d Do It) All Over You” wasn’t even intended to.

“That was the last single on our contract, and it was definitely the big F-You to the label. If I thought it could have been a hit,

I wouldn’t have sung it with so much Dylanesque twang,” Lindsay says.

One more single followed without Lindsay, but by then, the band had simply run its course.

“ ‘Indian Reservation’ put us back on the road, but my taste for the studio had basically soured at that point,” Lindsay admits. “I honestly didn’t know what to do next; I know we didn’t want to go back and do “Louie Louie’ again. Though in retrospect, that might not have been that bad an idea.”

Lindsay began a solo career that’s still going strong. Revere still tours with latter-day Raiders, and Volk just did a new CD with his band Fang & the Gang. Sadly, both Smith and Levin have passed away.

Go here for more on Paul Revere & The Raiders on CD

Read about the strange Christmas album Paul Revere & The Raiders once put out.