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SPECTROPOP - Spectacular! Retro! Pop!
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There are 14 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: New "Smile" CD
From: Mark A. Johnston
2. Re: Brian Wilson Interview
From: Steve Harvey
3. Re: New "Smile" CD
From: JK
4. Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
From: Leslie Fradkin
5. Re: Rev-Ola Sound
From: Brent Cash
6. Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
From: Gary Myers
7. Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
From: Phil X Milstein
8. Re: Brian Wilson as lone genius
From: Phil X Milstein
9. Re: New "Smile" CD
From: Phil X Milstein
10. Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
From: Bob Celli
11. Tom Dowd Documentary
From: Al Kooper
12. Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
From: Austin Roberts
13. Cold Light of Day & Rocky
From: pres
14. Re: New "Smile" CD
From: Mark Frumento
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Message: 1
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 10:59:19 -0400
From: Mark A. Johnston
Subject: Re: New "Smile" CD
C. Ponti:
> ... What I have next to no interest in is a recording (of "Smile")
> done today...
The argument gets made that 65% of SMILE has been released over the
years. I agree that this is a miscalculation to release the new CD
version. Everyone STILL wants to see a box set, similar to Pet Sounds
Sessions, released for what remains of SMILE. This is a bunt and not
a home run it could have been.
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Message: 2
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 08:09:15 -0700 (PDT)
From: Steve Harvey
Subject: Re: Brian Wilson Interview
When the Beach Boys studio sessions started coming out on bootlegs
a few years ago I thought the "Help Me Rhonda" sessions were the
most telling. You hear Murray over the intercom bossing everyone
around and putting them down. At one point Brian says something
about Murray's shouting and how it's hurting his one good ear.
Murray suddenly backs off, probably out of guilt. I think Brian
wants to distance himself from those days and is rewriting the
truth to avoid anymore personal pain associated with dad.
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Message: 3
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 12:43:48 EDT
From: JK
Subject: Re: New "Smile" CD
The Smile CD is an all new recording featuring some new linking
segments by Brian and Van Dyke and performed using Brians live band
and maybe some more musicians BUT apart from Van Dykes involvement
the main unsung hero of this venture has to be Wondermint keyboard
mystro Darian Sahanaja. He downloaded all the Smile segments onto
his laptop and with Van Dyke and Brian helped arrange what we here
in the UK and parts of Europe have seen played live on two tours this
year...It is a work of genius and WILL NOT disappoint. Brian's road
band is an unbelievable cohesive unit worthy of taking on this music
and along with The Stockholm Strings and Horns are playing music we
never thought we'd hear, EVER. Don't miss the BW tour of the US, go
and marvel at what is (not what might have been) SMILE and realise
it's the work of a sometime troubled Genius with the help of the most
sympathetic musicians on the planet......JK
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Message: 4
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 11:28:21 -0600
From: Leslie Fradkin
Subject: Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
Denny Tedesco:
> I have been working on a documentary about my Father, Tommy Tedesco
> who worked with Phil Spector, Beach Boys and many others. I am
> looking for any Studio Photos or Film (pre-video) footage of sessions
> of that time period in Los Angeles. Between 1958-1972. Also looking
> for booth recordings between the musicians, engineers, producers, and
> the artists themselves. Love to hear any dialogue between them.
> Really desperate for leads. Hope someone out there can help.
I possess footage (VHS) of the LAST session Hal Blaine, Carol Kaye and
Don Randi ever did together. It was for my new recording (about to be
issued) of "God Bless California." There's extensive studio chat and
the whole thing was captured for posterity. Interested? It dates from
1996.
Regards,
Les Fradkin
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Message: 5
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 17:07:42 -0000
From: Brent Cash
Subject: Re: Rev-Ola Sound
Yes, anyone thinking about buying Rev-Ola stuff, do it. I don't have
the Sunshine Co. one, but all the other ones I have sound fantastic.
The Bergen White one which originally came up in question has tape
source problems as I suspected in my earlier post which has been now
confirmed by Steve Stanley. The CD is totally worth it in spite of
that (it's only 1 1/2 songs). Unless you wanna pay $60 and upwards
for a vinyl and you won't get the worthy 4 extra, new tunes that are
so equal to the rest of the album, go for it if soft-pop is your
thing (Would look good framed,though).
Steve also does a lot of the layouts/art on these and did the design
on Rhino's Come To The Sunshine Nuggets CD. (Led Zep 3 eat your heart
out).
Wish Al Kooper could've interviewed Brian instead. His interviews
with Dan Penn, Jerry Ragovoy in Goldmine in the '90's were priceless.
Best to all,
Brent Cash
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Message: 6
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 10:43:15 -0700
From: Gary Myers
Subject: Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
Denny Tedesco:
> I have been working on a documentary about my Father, Tommy Tedesco
> who worked with Phil Spector, Beach Boys and many others. I am
> looking for any Studio Photos or Film (pre-video) footage of sessions
> of that time period in Los Angeles. Between 1958-1972. Also looking
> for booth recordings between the musicians, engineers, producers, and
> the artists themselves. Love to hear any dialogue between them.
> Really desperate for leads. Hope someone out there can help.
Hello Denny,
I was interested to see your post. Although I can't offer anything like
what you're looking for, I thought you might enjoy hearing my couple of
small memories.
I believe it was your dad who played on our cut "Hiding From Myself"
from the ST LP for "Dr. Goldfoot & the Girl Bombs". Our band, the
Portraits, was signed to Mike Curb and on that cut we just put our
vocals over the already completed track. We were named "Paul & the Pack"
on that LP.
I saw your dad once at Dante's in N. Hollywood (probably 1966). He was
alternating sets with George Van Epps - two completely different styles,
both great players. Larry Carlton was a good friend of ours and he was
also there that night to see both guitarists. (I worked with Larry in
summer '67).
Gary Myers / MusicGem
http://home.earthlink.net/~gem777/
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Message: 7
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 14:10:19 -0400
From: Phil X Milstein
Subject: Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
Denny Tedesco:
> I have been working on a documentary about my Father, Tommy Tedesco
> who worked with Phil Spector, Beach Boys and many others. I am
> looking for any Studio Photos or Film (pre-video) footage of sessions
> of that time period in Los Angeles. Between 1958-1972. Also looking
> for booth recordings between the musicians, engineers, producers, and
> the artists themselves. Love to hear any dialogue between them.
> Really desperate for leads. Hope someone out there can help.
I'm afraid I have nothing to offer that'd be of use to you, but your
introduction gives us at least the opportunity to express our devout
affection for your father's work. Although his session work was, by
necessity, anonymous, I loved watching him in the studio band on the
1970s mock talk shows Fernwood 2-Nite and its successor America 2-Nite.
What he and his cohorts pulled off there was a subtly tricky thing: be
good musicians in a real band while portraying the show's bizarre and
not terribly talented combo Happy Kyne & His Merry Mirthmakers (if I
recall the name correctly). Of course the leader of that band, the great
composer/arranger Frank DeVol, had the toughest (and perhaps most fun)
job of all, as he also occasionally sat in on the panel bantering (in a
deadpan as brilliant as any since Buster Keaton) with Martin Mull and
Fred Willard.
I wonder if your dad talked much about that gig -- I'm particularly
curious to hear if DeVol served as actual bandleader while portraying
just that in his character.
Dig,
--Phil Milstein
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Message: 8
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 14:19:08 -0400
From: Phil X Milstein
Subject: Re: Brian Wilson as lone genius
Mark Frumento wrote:
> Perhaps part of my complaint has nothing to do with putting Brian
> Wilson in the public eye. I am growing tired of the Brian Wilson as
> "the lone genius behind the Beach Boys" revisionism (where's Mr
> Kooper when you need him?). That Brian seems taught to perpetuate it
> is uncomfortable for me. It makes me wonder if he really does remember
> his past.
If Brian wasn't THE brain behind The Beach Boys, who was? True, many of
his songs were collaboratively composed, but in nearly all those cases
his partner's role was restricted to the lyrics, but that was because
Brian admittedly expresses himself far better through music than through
words; in many cases, the words were specifically tailored by his
collaborator to suit the lyrical concept Brian had in mind but could not
quite execute. Apart from that, at their peak he was the person solely
responsible for virtually every other facet of The Beach Boys' music (a
situation which, of course, contributed to his breakdown); in other
words, their auteur.
--Phil M.
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Message: 9
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 13:59:34 -0400
From: Phil X Milstein
Subject: Re: New "Smile" CD
Mark A Johnston wrote:
> The argument gets made that 65% of SMILE has been released over the
> years.
I don't find that enough of a rationale not to release Smile in as close
to its presumptive 1967 form as possible. Despite having heard most if
not all of its tracks, on official Beach Boys albums and from bootlegs,
over the years, what I most yearn to hear, now that it's within reach,
is those original session tapes arranged in Brian's conception (such as
it is today) of what the album would've been had it been released at the
time (and, ideally, in a direct transfer from the masters).
I assume that his current Smile tour setlist and the forthcoming album
sequence represent his best idea of the sequence he was closest to
releasing in 1967 (or at least his reinterpretation of it today), and
are at least indicative of the fact that he's finally gotten over THAT
hump (i.e. that part of Smile's original failure was due, in my view, to
his inability to settle on one final selection and sequence list at the
time). Perhaps from that information we fans could piece together a
useful simulation from the original session tapes.
Dig,
--Phil M.
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Message: 10
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 18:30:25 -0000
From: Bob Celli
Subject: Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
Denny Tedesco:
> I have been working on a documentary about my Father, Tommy Tedesco
> who worked with Phil Spector, Beach Boys and many others. I am
> looking for any Studio Photos or Film (pre-video) footage of sessions
> of that time period in Los Angeles. Between 1958-1972. Also looking
> for booth recordings between the musicians, engineers, producers, and
> the artists themselves. Love to hear any dialogue between them.
> Really desperate for leads. Hope someone out there can help.
Denny, I was talking to Bobby Vee about many of the session players
he worked with over the years and when your father's name came up he
said, "Tommy Tedesco was so good, you could splash ink on a piece of
paper, and he could play it!" Bobby was definitely a fan of your dad.
Bob Celli
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Message: 11
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 17:00:02 EDT
From: Al Kooper
Subject: Tom Dowd Documentary
Phil M:
> Apart from that piddling complaint, however, I recommend this movie
> unreservedly, and can't imagine a single member of this list who
> wouldn't groove to nearly every frame of it when and if they get the
> chance to see it ... or who shouldn't kick themselves in the butt if
> it comes to their area and they miss it. One more thing: if nothing
> else, I finally learned how all those Turks at Atlantic pronounce[d]
> their names!
I found factual faults in that film. Dowd gave up engineering as quick
as he could to produce. Some of his most famous work is filled with
distortion in places. Ergo, I thought the glorification of his
engineering skills was misplaced. He participated in many classic
sessions and should have had a documentary made about him. This one
disappointed me.
Al Kooper
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Message: 12
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 16:33:26 EDT
From: Austin Roberts
Subject: Re: Wrecking Crew Documentary
Denny Tedesco:
> I have been working on a documentary about my Father, Tommy Tedesco
> who worked with Phil Spector, Beach Boys and many others. I am
> looking for any Studio Photos or Film (pre-video) footage of sessions
> of that time period in Los Angeles. Between 1958-1972. Also looking
> for booth recordings between the musicians, engineers, producers, and
> the artists themselves. Love to hear any dialogue between them.
> Really desperate for leads. Hope someone out there can help.
Hi Denny, I worked with the wrecking crew several times and I'm sure
with your Dad. I had pictures but through moving several times since
1968 they seem to have disappeared. Sorry. The thing I remember best
about the `crew' was how easily they were to work with, how unbelievably
well they played together, how great they were to a green artist writer,
like myself in the late sixties and even more friendly to me the more we
worked together. I also remember Hal Blaine's chili; and I'm sure your
Dad had some too. Whew! Incidently, Hal has a book out called Hal Blaine
and the Wrecking Crew, though it's hard to find.
Best, Austin Roberts
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Message: 13
Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:15:23 -0400
From: pres
Subject: Cold Light of Day & Rocky
S.J. Dibai:
> There are other Gene Pitney CDs that have that track as well:
> Varese Sarabande's "More Greatest Hits" and Sequel's two-fer
> "Young and Warm and Wonderful/Just One Smile" definitely have
> it, and I would bet that Sequel's "Looking Through Gene Pitney:
> The Ultimate Collection" has it also.
Thanks, I have been keeping my eyes open for the Sequel "Ultimate
Collection." Amazon no longer stocks it and I never run across it
in stores. I thought I had read somewhere that the sound quality
was not very good, though. Can anyone comment on that?
Gary Myers:
> FWIW, this record bubbled under in BB for 4 wks in Sep-Oct '66.
> Highest position - #115.
It's worth a million to me, I'm a bit of a chart position, release
date, label credit freak as well as a music fan. A fact proven by
the Excel datebase I've created for chronicling my music collection
- the word nerd doesn't begin to describe it!
Austin Roberts:
> "The Cold Light Of Day" was a pretty big hit for Pitney in much
> of the southeast.
Being one year old at the time of release, I can't vouch for any
airplay in my hometown of Baltimore. Regardless, it deserved
airplay, IMO.
And while I have your attention, Mr. Roberts, thanks for "Rocky."
I used to call WCAO to request that record so often (back when
you could actually talk to the DJ - in this case, a family
acquaintance) that he (Ken "The Merson Person" Merson) actually
stopped by mother's office and gave her a copy of the 45 to send
home to me. Perfect timing since I'd worn out the one I'd purchased.
pres
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Message: 14
Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2004 00:38:33 -0000
From: Mark Frumento
Subject: Re: New "Smile" CD
JK wrote:
> It is a work of genius and WILL NOT disappoint.
Being about as big a skeptic as anyone, I was surprised by the
quality of the 'Heroes and Villains' mp3 that is going around.
I've played it a dozen times trying to find the flaws and they
just aren't there. I was expecting a much more clinical reading
of the backing tracks and more bad vocals from Brian. Instead
what is there is warm and authentic sounding, though it does
miss the other Beach Boys. However, as a representation of what
could have been it's pretty darn good.
Given that the other Beach Boys aren't around to help finish
the original recordings, the Brian Wilson version will have to
do. Except what is up with the lame cover?
Mark F.
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