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Spectropop - Digest Number 154


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                     The First Name in Entertainment
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There are 6 messages in this issue.

Topics in this Digest Number 154:

      1. The London Chantelles
           From: "Ian Chapman" 
      2. Autumn Records
           From: Dee 
      3. Righteous Link, Brother
           From: "David Feldman" 
      4. Spector Stereo
           From: Paul Urbahns
      5. Spector Cruise
           From: LePageWeb 
      6. Message from a Studio Musician
           From: Carol Kaye 


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Message: 1
   Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2001 23:49:39 +0100
   From: "Ian Chapman" 
Subject: The London Chantelles

Patrick:-

The Chantelles evolved from the Lana Sisters, the trio
that was Dusty Springfield's first group.  A couple of
years after Dusty's departure to join the Springfields,
the Lanas relaunched themselves with a hipper new image.
They were led by Iris (Riss) Chantelle, who seemed to
change her surname to suit the group she was in at the
time - previously she was known as Iris Lana!  They made
several singles, including more than a few fab ones:-

I Want That Boy/London My Home Town
Sticks & Stones/The Secret Of My Success
Please Don't Kiss Me/I Think Of You
Gonna Get Burned/Gonna Give Him Some Love
(above all on UK Parlophone)
There's Something About You/Just Another Fool (UK Polydor)
The Man I Love/Blue Mood (UK CBS)
Out Of My Mind/More To Love (Than Moonlight) (US GNP)

"I Want That Boy" is great Erect-a-Spector - a cover of a
US single by Sadina, but with a far more
hit-you-between-the-eyes production - one of my fave Brit
girl-group records.  By contrast, the flip "London" is
pure rinky-dink, and both "Sticks & Stones" and "Secret Of
My Success" are in a similar style.  The trio sang both
the girly "Please Don't Kiss Me" (not to be confused with
the Charmettes song) and the ballad "I Think Of You" in
the "Dateline Diamonds" movie - looking very mod with
their matching blonde bouffants and brocade trouser-suits.
"Gonna Get Burned" is more good uptempo pop, while "Gonna
Give Him Some Love" is pounding northern soul. The
northern circuit also picked up on the one-off Polydor
single "There's Something About You", and this single is
probably their most sought-after for that reason.  The
flip, "Just Another Fool", was also recorded by Lesley
Gore.  "The Man I Love" on CBS was a good uptempo reading
of the Gershwin standard.

The "Out Of My Mind" single is one of those curiosities
recently mentioned in another post - a release by a UK act
that was never issued in the UK, only the States. I'm
pretty sure the reason for the added "Of London" tag on
this release was just to allay any confusion with the US
Chantels - in fact, when the Chantelles launched
themselves in 1965, UK soul guru Dave Godin slated their
choice of name, saying it was sure to cause confusion
between the two groups.

Riss Chantelle stayed in the music biz as a publisher, and
has regularly been interviewed about her days as a Lana
Sister with Dusty - you'll find references to her, or
quotes from her, in most of the published bios on Dusty. 
Maybe one day she'll get the opportunity to tell the
Chantelles' story.

Patrick, if you're setting out to find the group's singles,
a couple of pointers - around the same time as the CBS
single, another UK girl group, the Chanters (later known
as the Chanter Sisters), also had releases on CBS.
Different group (but their records were great too!!)  Also,
you may see a 70s single by the Chantelles on the UK Black
Magic label - this was a version of Del Shannon's "Runaway"
recorded in the northern soul style by a studio group with
a male soul falsetto lead, Gary Jackson - and it's pretty
good too!

Ian


> I've been searching in vain for recordings by the
> Chantelles (of London). Can someone shed some light on
> this group. I'm under the impression there were a few
> groups using "Chantelles" as a name, so that's why they
> added "(of London)" at the end. I have two mp3s called
> Out Of My Mind and More to Love (Than Moonlight). This
> link tells me they were featured in a movie called
> Dateline Diamonds (1965) also featuring Kiki Dee and the
> Small Faces.
> http://www.sandlotshrink.com/movierockroll60s.htm

> This link (in German) mentions another 7 inch called I
> Want That Boy / London My Home Town (Parlophone R 5271 [p],
> 1965). Is that the same group?
> http://www.icce.rug.nl/~soundscapes/DATABASES/ZZD/ZZD_5C.html

> The two mp3s I have are excellent girl group sound! any
> more info would be much appreciated!
> Patrick


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Message: 2
   Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2001 14:12:56 -0700 (PDT)
   From: Dee 
Subject: Autumn Records

I sent it to Stewart Mason, who asked, but anyone who
wants an Autumn Records discography, please let me know
and I'll forward it.  I'm putting together a website at
the moment.

One question: liner notes from one Autumn Records discog
refer to unreleased material being better than some of
the released material, like that of Little Juarez.  But I
have no idea who this is or what it refers to, does
anyone know?

Another question:  Northbeach was an Autumn subsidiary
famous for releasing the Great Society (pre-Jefferson
Airplane) single "Someone To Love".  This was the label's
first single. Another single by the Chosen Few was their
third.  But what was the second? (Maybe it was by Little
Juarez!)

thanks in advance,

Dee


--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------


Message: 3
   Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2001 11:40:37 -0500
   From: "David Feldman"
Subject: Righteous Link, Brother

On 20 Apr 2001, at 8:12, Ian wrote:

> Thanks to Peter Richmond, surely the world's greatest
> Righteous Brothers fan and expert, for letting me know
> that the woman pictured with Bobby Hatfield on the back
> sleeve of the "Back to Back" album is his first wife,
> Joy Ciro.
> 
> Check out Pete's Righteous Brothers Discography web site

Ian,

Thanks for the link.  That's a wonderful website.

I wasn't aware of the Bill Medley/Darlene Love duet on
(You're My) Soul & Inspiration.  Is there any way to
hear that?  Have just the two of them recorded anything
else?


--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------


Message: 4
   Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2001 17:34:23 EDT
   From: Paul Urbahns
Subject: Spector Stereo

Mike wrote:

> Phil Spector has every single multitrack master he
> recorded for phillies locked away safe and sound.  the 
> ongoing belief is that he will not remix them because he
> feels that he could not recreate the magic of the 
> original 1960s mixes, so whats issued are the mono 
> mixdowns that were hits. 

Mike, Phil gets studio time every project he puts out. He
remixes the tracks each time they are issued. We are not
hearing the original Philles mixes unless you are playing
a stack of 45s. He just keeps remixing in mono.

Paul Urbahns
 

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Message: 5
   Date: Sun, 22 Apr 2001 01:17:29 -0000
   From: LePageWeb 
Subject: Spector Cruise

Back in April of 1997, Variety reported that Tom Cruise
and Cameron Crowe were in early talks to reteam on a Phil
Spector biopic for Universal. Cruise had long wanted to
play the role of Spector and was working towards
producing a film with Spector and Allen Klein. Cruise and
Crowe met with Spector in Los Angeles (remember, this is
four year old news), and Crowe reportedly got "reams of
research from Spector and ABKCO."

Filed under "yeah, sure," that was sure to be the last of
it, I thought. But, on April 5, 2001, in a Variety
article reporting that "Almost Famous" author Cameron
Crowe had just completed "Vanilla Sky" with Cruise, the
article said "don't dress just yet for their long-planned
biopic of music producing legend Phil Spector."

No surprise there...

The new article goes as far as to say that Cruise and his
partner Paula Wagner actually *made* a deal several years
ago with Spector and Allen Klein for the picture, and
that Cameron Crowe recently said he loves the script he's
written but hasn't found a satisfactory way to complete
the story. Between takes of "Vanilla Sky," Cruise went
into a full impression of Spector that broke everyone up.
Crowe said this incident left him hoping that the proper
ending presents itself soon according to the article.

I dunno, unless the film ends with Spector alone in his
house watching Citizen Kane after the US rejection of
RDMH (which would leave out all the Apple years and
everything after), how could one end the film? Ramones?
Yoko Ono? How about Spector driving off into the sunset
in his '64 Cobra with Dion's Born to Be With You on the
CD player? Nah...

This doesn't sound like such a good idea anyway. I mean,
can you imagine the soundtrack full of re-recordings by
flavor-of-the-month MTV acts (e.g., Backstreet Boys'
Spanish Harlem or Eminem's Instant Karma)? This may be
one film better left unmade after all. 


Jamie


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Message: 6
   Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2001 10:55:59 -0700
   From: Carol Kaye
Subject: Message from a Studio Musician

This is a message on my new Forum on my newly-designed
website I tho't you'd like to see.  Someone had said
some nice words about my 1965 multi-guitar single that
had gotten on the charts called "Ice Cream Rock" and
this is a synopsis of being a studio musician back then.
I hope this won't be "edited"...you can read the whole
version intact on my Forum.

Thank-you, 
Carol Kaye  
http://www.carolkaye.com/

[Editorial note: For the avoidance of any doubt, 
Spectropop moderators confirm the following message from 
Ms. Kaye is not "edited" and appears here intact.]

Hi JB! Yes, "Ice Cream Rock" quickly got on the charts
even, so yes, it is catchy, was starting to be played a
lot on the air but the reason for cutting that
commercial album was so I'd have the usual "introduction"
into the commercial market for clout for my jazz....and
Ice Cream Rock was the furthest one from the kinds of
music I wanted to play, so I had them pull that.

If you can't be happy in music, especially as an artist,
I'm simply not into to "making it" regardless of the
artistic cost like they do today (and look at their
problems too!), no way....I could do that happily by
staying in the studios and and at least creating what I
more or less wanted to on hit records on the bass and
then walking away from it, going to the next date, and
then going home "free", which is exactly what I did.

I had the record dropped from airplay in 1965 after my
decision based on the choice of cut that was played etc.
It would have been equivalent to having Barney Kessel
playing a surf-rock tune for the rest of his life in
public.

I'm glad you like the recording...and of course it's got
the hit-feeling of that 1965 period...and that's
wonderful, but at that time, it wasn't what I wanted to
do...was trying to restore my former career as a
reputable jazz guitarist - was recording so many years
both on guitar and bass since then, but quickly saw the
error of my ways and stayed in the studios...coming out
live again in the 70s to play jazz bass, this time with
Hampton Hawes, the fine legendary jaz pianist.

You're right, it is sickening to see all the pretense of
the syncing done on the past TV shows and they're still
doing that (btw, Timi Yuro was a pretty decent singer),
but at that time, it didn't seem to matter much...the
kids wanted the music, recorded music that made them
dance, made them happy and of course that was all studio
musicians doing their job....

playing rock and roll for many years back in the late
50s and 60s -- was sort of fun as it was brand new music
and we had free rein as to how we played to create the
hit-lines, the hooks, the arrangements even if some of
the tunes had arrangements....they still needed our
experienced and dedicated group of free-lance studio
musicians to do the job of the recordings....

no-one else could play as well and of course a lot of
the time, we'd cut the track first and then they'd put
the "group" together (if the tracks hit, and most of the
time they did...we were the "golden" bunch, what Hal
Blaine calls the wrecking crew, except NONE of us were
known as that at all back then...that's his pet phrase
for the title of his 1990 book.....

the name of "the clique" sometimes was used...we were
all independent of each other, there was NO SET RHYTHM
SECTION at all for anyone, but different artists known
as "accounts" to us preferred certain musicians and it
got to the point in 1969 that I quit totally recording
for ANYONE for 8 months -- outside of the Academy Awards
in 1970.

I was sick of recording for the Monkees, groups like
that, they were all sounding the same, with the same
recording formulae (wasn't fun at all) was totally
burned out and when I came back, I wouldn't record for
those kinds of groups again...kaput, that was it for me
>from 1970 on....and I only recorded for people and their
music I liked a lot:

Mancini, Ray Chas., etc.etc. and opted more for the
movie scores and TV-film shows I was already doing in
the 60s:  see the Paid Re-Use List of Movies on this
website, and the TV shows too which included:  MASH, Haw.
5-O, Room 222, the 1st Bill Cosby show, Mission
Impossible, Kojak, Brady Bunch, Sts. of San Fransciso,
Ironside, Love American Style, FBI, Mannix, Addams
Family, the list just goes on and on.

That music was more rewarding to me as a musician....you
can only do so many 12-hour days so many years of surf
rock or what we'd call the ice-cream candy rock and roll
(there I go again).

Hope you understand what I'm saying...and I DO
APPRECIATE your nice words of appreciation of that music
believe me....just that after some years of it you do
get burned out finally altho' you're working with the
finest musicians too.  Which reminds me:

Once in awhile, I get an email from some nice person,
meaning well, that says:  "you were so lucky to know and
play with such fine musicians" and the way it would be
worded was such that it implied that I was so "lucky"
almost a put-down......well....I have to email back to
them:

"They were lucky to play with me too -- I was ONE of the
finest musicians and the No. 1 call on elec. bass back
in the 60s totally....they were lucky to get me to help
them make a hit record". It probably never occurred to
them my status...that I was some dumb little girl who
because she looked "cute" (and believe me up-close, you
saw the buck-teeth, I was NOT cute) and was "nice" that
she talked her way into some "big-time stuff" (whee) and
so everyone probably patronized her etc.etc.....

it's hard for some to believe that I out-played everyone!
They have NO idea of all the fine woman jazz
musicianship back in the 40s and 50s at all -- hanging
on to that mysogny (damn, I can't even spell that word,
it's not in my vocabulary at all) or something.

I think the woman-thing plays into their minds
sometimes....strange, I never used to think this way as
a "woman" before, I was SO ACCEPTED as a top recording
musician in the world - it made no difference that I was
a "woman"....I was one of the guys.

Anyway, we ALL played hard, created hard, and were very
intensive in the studios back in the 60s...it's a wonder
any of us is alive today from all the hard labor....they
find mummies with bone evidence in them worn out from
their back-breaking labor, well that was US!  When I die,
they'll probably do an autopsy and find not only some
very worn-out bones from playing but also many creative
basslines stuck in my pea-brain ready to do the "next
hit record" hahahaha.  Thanks for writing!


--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
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