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S - P - E - C - T - R - O - P - O - P
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Volume #0048 03/03/98
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Subject: Petula, Scorsese, & Bread!
Sent: 3/1/98 3:26 AM
Received: 3/1/98 9:57 AM
From: Brent Kubasta, bkubaXXX@XXXXXXccc.edu
To: Spectropop List, spectroXXX@XXXXXXies.com
> From: le_page_XXX@XXXXXXies.com
>
> Jack Madani said:
>
> > ......it seems to me that Hatch understood that Gold Star
> > sound so well that he was well capable of recreating it
> > in England;
>
> That's exactly right. Hatch's style is quite recognizable
>... I don't know if I'd go so far as to say he
>"recreated" the Gold Star sound, because as I mentioned
>before the Pet Clark sides I am so fond of are very
>British. Yet, Hatch-produced records certainly share
>common ground with the West Coast sound. Even if his
>production style was derivative, it worked.
if hatch was trying to emulate the gold star sound in any way, it's worth
noting that he was taking a sound associated with teenage rock 'n' roll
and applying it to records appealing to an adult pop audience. (i've
heard a recording of a mid-60s radio interview with petula where she
laughs, though not condescendingly, at the dj's classification of her
records as rock 'n' roll.)
> David Bash wrote:
>
> >"I Can Hear Music: The Songs of Greenwich & Barry", and it
> >was created by Polygram Publishing.
>
>OK, a question about this. If memory serves, Barry/
>Greenwich were signed to Trio Music, which was a Leiber/
>Stoller publishing firm. Trio is still controlled by
>Leiber/Stoller to this day. How do PolyGram fit in?
when i bought the reissue of ellie's _let it be written, let it be sung_
album in the late 80s, the album was on verve/polygram. perhaps she is
considered a polygram artist? or made a publishing/administration deal
with the label?
>Although Jeff, Ellie and Phil wrote a relatively small
>number of songs together, almost every one was of stellar
>quality and today retains great value. All of these co-
>writes are co-administrated with Phil's company Mother
>Bertha, and it is ABKCO who administers Phil's interests
>(both publishing and masters, btw).
>
>Trio Music have most likely been a benefactor of ABKCO's
>careful administration of Mother Bertha and Philles
>properties. ABKCO is known to be very selective in
>granting licenses; rare in today's corporate "maximize
>profits" mentality.
thank goodness that abkco had the good sense not to be overly selective
when it came to _goodfellas_ and _casino_. spector's philles recordings
weren't merely well-placed in these films; they added absolute magic to
certain scenes. is there a single spectropop list member who will not
agree that the "then he kissed me" sequence in _goodfellas_ is one of the
coolest moments in the history of civilization?
i'll bet that martin scorsese is friends with both phil spector and allen
klein: the use of philles and rolling stones masters in scorsese's films
goes all the way back to _mean streets_. (one can only imagine scorsese
and spector in the same room. how could four walls possibly withstand the
pressure from such a concentration of wiry, high-strung, nervous energy?)
> I would guess an amicable agreement was struck when the
>Jeff & Ellie CD was planned where funding might be more
>appropriately used to produce new masters of these classic
>Spector/Barry/Greenwich songs by contemporary artists.
>
>or it just might be spector not wanting to be generous in
>any way with his masters.
A friend of mine in record retail told me that when the spector box was
released, spector/abkco didn't even send out promo copies of the complete
box. instead an *empty* box (i.e. with nothing but the lyric booklet) and
a stingy (7 or 8 songs) sampler cd were sent out. if this is completely
true, one can only deduce how phil would feel about lending out his
*master recordings* to a mere songwriter/publisher sampler!
> >Subject: KHJ
> >From: Paul MacArthur, rtf_XXX@XXXXXXdu
>
> > Some say the sixties began when Kennedy was shot and ended
> > with Nixon's resignation. I think in terms of musical
> > excellence, it started a little earlier than that, circa
> > Phil Spector, but after Nixon's resignation we had a
> > dramatic down turn in the quality of popular (and less
> > popular) music.
i don't want to waste spectropop space on sociological conjecture, but i
think any decade takes a couple years to "get going".
and i don't want to waste spectropop space on a large subject that might
be out of the forum's agreed limits, but i must say this: i think people
have developed a far too narrow, negative view of the 70s. without any
problem, i could list a hundred *great* singles released during that
maligned decade; i wouldn't even attempt starting such a list regarding
the 80s or 90s.
granted, a good number (a majority?) of these treasured 70s records might
not have been on the radio. but some *were* on the radio, and those that
weren't had at least been written, recorded, produced, and
released--giving me joy in the present and hope for the future.
personally, it wasn't until the 80s kicked in that i truly felt like a
stranger in a strange land.
> Nice one, Paul. That's a pretty good description of what
>"Spectropop" encompasses.
not that i'm trying to set a chronological limit on this forum (see
above!), but if i'm clear on page's vision of "what 'spectropop'
encompasses" i'd say it ended at the woodstock festival, obviously
long before nixon's resignation.
> > Gates...does Gates not receive enough credit when the
> > great pop svengalis are written about?
>
> I really don't care to mention Bread etc. as all that is
> from the 70's and after.
david gates wrote some *incredible* songs. if i don't dig listening to
'em all that much, it's only because those bread records are casualties
of clean, soft, sterile, 70s multi-track production. five years earlier,
had gates been in a band such as buffalo springfield and provided them
with "everything i own" and "let your love go", i'm sure those songs
would be held in high regard by all spectropop list members.
brent
---[ archived by Spectropop - 03 /3/98 - 02 :23:39 AM ]---
Subject: Re: Nino & April
Sent: 3/1/98 4:49 AM
Received: 3/1/98 9:57 AM
From: Alec Palao, paXXX@XXXXXX.com
To: Spectropop List, spectroXXX@XXXXXXies.com
>> "I Love How You Love Me," is a masterpiece, perhaps my
>> favorite non-hit record from the mid-sixties. Nino and
>> April belt it out, complete with bagpipes and electric
>> guitar! Hey, it worked for me when I bought the single
>> in 1965, and it's even greater in stereo CD sound.
>
>I still find the bagpipes to be a distraction from an
>otherwise rocking track, but I certainly won't begrudge you
>the right to like it. In general, the whole album has
>grown on me since my first impressions.
Interestingly enough, the 'bagpipe' arrangement of this track was pinched
by others - Paul & Barry Ryan in the UK, The Fair Sect Plus One in New
Zealand. I actually think the bagpipe riff works quite well, in the
context of a more 'uptempo' rendering of the song.
ALEC
---[ archived by Spectropop - 03 /3/98 - 02 :23:39 AM ]---
Subject: who'dathunk
Sent: 3/1/98 9:22 PM
Received: 3/2/98 10:03 AM
From: Jack Madani, Jack_MadXXX@XXXXXX2.nj.us
To: Spectropop List, spectroXXX@XXXXXXies.com
Guess what I picked up for real cheap and have been loving:
"It Must Be Him: The Best of Vikki Carr," part of the EMI
Legendary Masters series. Tracks date from 1962 to 1969;
there's the Easy Listening stuff one'd suspect (Can't Take
My Eyes Off You, Summer Samba, It Must Be Him, San
Francisco, the last on which Vicki sounds amazingly like
Judy Garland), but there's also a lot of Fifth Dimension/
Partridge Family/Gary Puckett style charts. There's also
some of that Big Beat stuff that I dig so very much,
sounding like Mel Carter's Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me, and--
holy cow--there's even a couple of girl group cuts! Love
that combination of picked bass/distorted guitar plucking
out the bass line. There's lots of it on this disc.
First track is He's A Rebel, which if I understand the
history of it, is actually the "original" recording of the
song, which Spector managed to hear before it was released
and then he recorded and released the famous Crystals
version, thus forcing Vikki's version to stall at #115.
Vikki's version is inferior to Spector's, being built atop
an extremely martial rhythm; it's like what Sgt. Barry
Sadler's version might've sounded like. However, it's
interesting to note that Vikki's version also features the
surprise key change just before the first chorus, just as
the Spector version did.
The second track is the gem here, total girlgroup manna: "I
Got My Eye On You," a previously unreleased track that has
no songwriting credit but which based on the liner notes I
infer was arranged by a fellow named Bob Florence. With its
doubletracked vocals that split into two-part harmony on the
choruses, and the bubbly rhythm track, it reminds me of
Skeeter Davis's "I Can't Stay Mad At You" or "Let Me Get
Close To You." Yowza, hit the repeat button on the cd
player for this one.
Other tracks of interest include: "My Heart Reminds Me (And
That Reminds Me)," which reached #31 on the 1966 Easy
Listening Charts for the Vikkstress and which the liner
notes mention was also covered by Della Reese; however, the
notes make no mention of another version of the same song
which members of this list may know, a recording by the
Dolls on the Warner Brothers compilation disc "60's Girl
Groups." The Dolls version is total Spectorish wall of
sound; Vikki's version is considerably cleaned up, but still
features a cello line in the instrumental break that will
put the listener in mind of the break from the Ronette
recording of Be My Baby. And those clean, crystal-clear
drum fills--it's gotta be Hal Blaine.
"(Walk In The) Sunshine" begins with harpsichord and cello
working out over unusual chord sequences, before becoming
more conventional on the choruses. Not too far in feeling
from psych-pop, if you would replace Vikki's strong single-
voice lead with a Spanky & Our Gang sort of group-harmony
vocal.
"A Bit Of Love:" Starts off like the Fifth Dimension's Up
Up And Away, and then screeches to a halt and cops the
chorus from Pet Clark's Don't Sleep In The Subway. There's
an awful lot of stuff on here that sounds like Hal Blaine on
drums, and therefore I would suspect the rest of the LA cats
are on here as well. Co-written by Dick and Don Addrisi, in
case that means anything to someone here (Jamie?).
"The Silencers" is the theme song from the Matt Helm movie
of the same name. Cool spy music. I've seen this song on
at least one "lounge" compilation.
I have seen this disc in a number of bargain bins already,
but it was only when I had a chance to hear it before buying
did I finally pick it up. In the price range of three to
five dollars, it'd be worth it just for the handful of cuts
that I mentioned, but if you also like stuff like Pet
Clark's Kiss Me Goodbye or Who Am I, or Sinatra's music for
moderns as appears on the Strangers In The Night album,
you'll probably go for this disc in a big way.
Interesting how confusing the music scene was in the first
half of the sixties, where an "adult" artist like Vikki Carr
could wax girlgroup tracks, or a "youth" artist like Lou
Christie would fill up half of his Lightning Strikes album
with covers of standards.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jack Madani - Princeton Day School, The Great Road,
Princeton, NJ 08540 Jack_MadXXX@XXXXXX2.nj.us
"It is when the gods hate a man with uncommon abhorrence that they
drive him into the profession of a schoolmaster." --Seneca, 64 A.D.
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---[ archived by Spectropop - 03 /3/98 - 02 :23:39 AM ]---
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