on the following Jackie DeShannon records;]
5-63     Needles & Pins/Did He Call Today Mama (Liberty 55563)(Arr.)
7-63     Little Yellow Roses/Oh Sweet Chariot (Liberty 55602)(Arr.)
11-63     When You Walk in the Room/Till You Say You'll Be Mine (Liberty 55643)(Arr.)
2-64     Oh Boy (Liberty 55678) (Arr.uncredited)
6-64     Hold Your Head High/She Don't Understand Him Like I Do (Liberty 55705)(Arr.uncr.)
10-64     He's Got the Whole World in His Hands/It's Love Baby (Liberty 55730)(Arr.)
?-68     I Keep Wanting You/MeAbout You (Imperial 66291)(Prod.,Arr.)
?-63     Jackie DeShannon (Liberty LRP 3320)(Arr.
?-64     Breaking It Up on the Beatles Tour (Liberty LRP 33901)(Arr.)(reissued as You Won't Forget Me (Imperial LP 9294)

Another Reprise

3-65     Peter James-You Won't Forget Me (Reprise 0357)(Arr.)
4-65     Donnie Brooks-If I Never Get To Love You (Reprise 0363)(Arr.)
6-65     Joni Lyman-IJust Don't Know What
    To Do With Myself/Happy Birthday Blue (Reprise 0378)(Prod/Arr.)("Oh God, learning how to produce records...")
8-65     Dino Desi & Billy-Chimes Of Freedom(Reprise 0401)(Arr.)("Forget that!")
11-65     Caesar & Cleo-Love Is Strange/Let the Good Times Roll (Reprise 0419)(Arr.)
12-65     Regents-When I Die Don't You Cry/She's Got Her Own Way of Lovin'(Reprise 430)(prod.arr.)
4-66     Gas Company-You're All Alone/You'll Need Love (Reprise 0454)(Prod.)
9-66     Paris Sisters-It's My Party/My Good Friend(Reprise 0511)(Prod./Arr.)
("Please don't remind me of them!")
9-66     Gas Company-Get Out of my Life/We Need a Lot Mor of Jesus(Reprise 0512)(Prod/Arr.)
1-67     Paris Sisters-Some of your Lovin'/(wr. King/Goffin)/(Reprise 0548)(Prod./Arr.)
3-67     Judy Henske-Dolphins in the Sea (Reprise 0567)(Arr.)
?-67     Judy Henske-Road to Nowhere (Reprise)
6-67     Gail Martin-After Loving You (Reprise 0585)(Arr.)
9-65     Dino Desi & Billy-I'm A Fool (Reprise R-6176)(Arr. some tracks)
8-67     Paris Sisters-Sing Everything Under The Sun (Reprise R-6259)(Co-prod.)

[The Jimmy Bowen connection continued at Reprise, and Nitzsche began to produce records for the label as well, for which he seems to retain little affection.]
    Donnie Brooks. I bet this must be horrible. Oh God-"Crocodile Rock!"
[The vocal chorus is in fact a dead ringer for Elton's opus...]
Denny Bruce: Elton probably has it, that's where he got the lick.
    No, it came from something else, "Little Darlin'..."
[Or "Cry Myself To Sleep" by Del Shannon...]
    My God, I don't even know who thay (the Regents) are! Can I hear that one? They played at It's Boss (primordial Hollywood rock spot)?
Got it!
Denny Bruce: They played on The Dating Game too.
    Thank you. Byrds [laughs at stereotypical folk rock setting]. I remember them now. Boy were they lame! They were terrible. No one knew what to do. It was all those Jimmy Bowen contacts with clubowners, the owner of P.J's etc...
    Caesar & Cleo. This one was recorded in '64 or '65. It was after "Baby Don't Go," really, in terms of recording. "Baby Don't Go" was the same time as Hale & the Hushabyes [see below].
    That was a good record [Judy Henske]. I liked the first one better. It was done at the same session..."Road to Nowhere."
[Note: Mike McDonald of the Regents later gained fame in Steely Dan and currently the Doobie Bros. Caesar & Cleo were of course our old friends Sonny & Cher in Roman/Egyptian drag.]

The Eminent Domain Of Bob Krasnow

4-64 Round Robin-Kick That Little Fool, Sally Ann(wr.Sloan/Barri) (Domain 1404)(Arr.)
    Bob Krasnow's label. I never got paid for it. Every time I'd go in to get my check, he'd say, "Goddamn, those partners of mine ran off with all the money. Those bastards! They didn't pay you either?"

Girl Talk

6-65     What Four-Anything For a Laugh/Baby Can't you Hear Me Call Your Name (Capitol 5449)(Arr.)
12-65     Donna Loren-Call Me (Capitol 5548)(Arr.)
["The friendly Pepper-Upper"]
8-64     Fashions-Baby That's Me (Cameo 33)(co-wrote)
9-65     Karen Verros-You Just Gotta Know My Mind/Karen's Theme (Dot 16780)(Arr.)
?-65     Karen Verros-Little Boy/I Can't Remember Ever Loving You (Dot 16815)(Arr.)
5-66     Satisfactions-Daddy You Gotta Let Him In/Bring It All Down (Imperial 86170)(prod/Arr)
9-67     Cake-Baby That's Me (Decca 32179)

    Steve Douglas: These [What Four] are four girls, right? Well, one of them was real pretty. What for the What Four? Well, one of them was real pretty!
    Is that "Little Boy"?
[No, it was the other Karen Verros record, a Donovan song, but was that the same Crystals tune, and did it come out?]
    Yeah, on Dot. It sounded exactly like the Crystals except for her. We did four tunes in one session, three hours. She was awful!
    It [the Satisfactions] wasn't done well. This one's embarrassing because I should've done this at Gold Star.
    The Cake. I don't know a whole lot of stories about them. It was just Charlie and Brian [Greene & Stone] as far as I was concerned. I wrote it a long time ago. All I know about is the Lesley Gore and the Cake. I don't know the Fashions. Greene & Stone had the demo. We were all friends- all incestuous stuff.
[Note: Despite Nitzsche's demurrals, the Satisfactions record is a highly enjoyable Crystals-meet-Shangri-las motorpsycho extravaganza, and the Karen Verros record has a great instrumental track. The Donna Loren reference above, which might seem a bit cryptic, alludes to her lucrative gig as the Dr. Pepper girl in mid-60's TV commercials.]

What Am I Gonna Do With You (Hey Baby) - With Lesley Gore

Lesley Gore-No Matter What You Do (Mercury 72513)(Arr.)
Lesley Gore-Off and Running (Mercury 72580) (Arr.)
Lesley Gore-You Sent Me Silver Bells (Mercury 72892)(Arr.)
Lesley Gore-My Town My Guy and Me (Mercury MG 21042)(Baby That's Me;A Girl in Love;What Am I Gonna Do With You)(Arr.)

    I don't have this ["Off and Running"] either. There was a better one on the date, that was on her album. I don't remember the song, it wasn't "Baby That's Me." Russ Titelman and Gerry Goffin wrote it, and that was a pretty one...
(The song was "What Am I Gonna Do With You (Hey Baby)," a moody masterpiece as done by the Chiffons, excellent by Lesley as well and covered rather ably by Skeeter Davis, too. "Off and Running" is a stirring Merseyish rocker, also done by the Mindbenders, and one of Lesley's better late recordings.)

A Date With Superstars

8-64     Hale & Hushabyes-Yes Sir That's My Baby/Jack's Theme (Reprise 0299)(Arr/Co-Prod)
7-67     Date With Soul-Yes Sir That's My Baby/Bee Side Soul (York 408)(Arr/Co-prod)
[In 1964 Nitzsche assembled an all-star cast in the studio as a favor to his temporarily destitute friends Charlie Greene & Brian

Stone, notorious LA managers/manipulators who masterminded Sonny & Cher, the Troggs (in America), the Cake, and Buffalo Springfield at different times. The record was an awesome stately Spectorian renovation of the Gus Khan chestnut; the story behind it is rather intriguing as well...]
    This [the York reissue as Date With Soul] is the third one. There's one on Reprise as Hale & the Hushabyes and one before that on another label [Apogee]. That's an all-star group, that one-that's Brian Wilson singing falsetto, with Sonny & Cher and the Blossoms and Albert Stone. The guy singing bass is someone who was in the lobby. Honest to God, a black guy was in the lobby and I went out there and said,"Do you sing bass?" He said yeah and I said,"Come in and sing it." That's Edna Wright singing lead, singer of the Honey Cone. Darlene Love's singing background, Jackie DeShannon's on there. It was good.
    That was also the session where I met the Rolling Stones. Andrew Oldham called me and asked if they could come. All these people were in the studio recording and the Stones walked in. Wow...but nobody cared.
    First Terry Melcher did this ("Yes Sir") with a guy named Little E [a legendary Bay Area R&B/rock pioneer noted for his "Candy Apple Red Impala" in the early 60's - see the BOMP Bay Area special in #12). So we did this at Columbia but it never came out. I thought it was a good idea...Charlie and Brian didn't have any money, so we went to RCA and just recorded it, because we were so sure of it-and nobody got paid. Sold it to Reprise. I got the people. Charlie and Brian just sat there and smiled.

Car Talk With Lou Christie-The Gypsy Tried

8-66     Lou Christie-If My Car Could Only Talk/Song of Lita (MGM 13576)(Prod/Arr)
10-66     Lou Christie-Wild Life's In Season (MGM 13623)(Prod/Arr)
[I intro'd "If My Car" as one of my personal favorites...]
    Me too! The Gypsy-Twyla [the middle-aged Romany-type who's been Christie's collaborator forever-today,too]. I thought they were good. Lulu and Twyla. He was really a pro at what he did.
    I was with Bob Marcucci [Christie's manager]. We were supposed to do a production thing, and he wanted to rewrite "La Boheme" and he used to say I was his Puccini. Then I realized the whole office was gay. I liked him though. "Wild Life's In Season" we did on the same date.

Return Of Eddie Hodges

10-65     Eddie Hodges-Love Minus Zero/The Water Is Over My Head(Aurora 156)(Arr.)

    That's Crazy Horse singing behind him on that record. I didn't even know them. I think they were the Rockets by then.
[Apparently early 60's child film star Eddie was in pretty shaky shape by this time, and in truth little has been heard from him since. Nice record though.]

Brian W. Meets Phil S. - Big Trouble

Ronettes-Don't Hurt My Little Sister (unrel.)(Arr.)
Blossoms-Things Are Changing (Equal Opportunity T-4LM 8172)(Arr.)

    I remember that. I bet Gracia was on that. I think I did do it. That's great!

[At this point I am struck by the Blossoms track's distinct resemblance to the Beach Boys' Today track "Don't Hurt My Little Sister." Recalling a rumor I'd heard, I ask if Brian Wilson had ever worked with Phil Spector.]