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SUITABLE FOR 14 - 20 AGE GROUP
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There are 12 messages in this issue of Spectropop.
Topics in this Digest Number 93:
1. "vo-dee-oh-doh"
From: "mikey1"
2. Re: retro retroness
From: Stewart Mason
3. Vo-Dee-Oh-Doh, Doo-Dah
From: "Joseph Scott"
4. Voh-Dee-Oh-Doh Sixties
From: John Frank
5. music hall nostalgia
From: Jamie LePage
6. Lesley's Bear Family
From: ELRONBEE
7. What Am I Gonna Do?
From: "Will (Allen) George"
8. Re: Peppermint Rainbow
From: Marc Wielage
9. Jackie DeShannon
From: "Will (Allen) George"
10. Re: The Orchids/ Blue Orchids
From: Jamie LePage
11. Phil Spector's girlfriend
From: "GSPECTOR"
12. Re: Nancy & Phil
From: Carol Kaye
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Message: 1
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 03:06:57 -0500
From: "mikey1"
Subject: "vo-dee-oh-doh"
"alan zweig" wrote:
> Spanky and Our Gang and Harpers Bizarre. Each of their
> records is almost ruined for me by songs that I can only
> describe as "vo-dee-oh-doh". Oldtimey, Rudy Vallee. They
> parody some barbershop Roaring Twenties song style. If
> you want, I can name songs. But they both do it and it
> drives me crazy. Who liked that stuff? What were they
> thinking?
Why?: Very Simple......because record companies in the
'60s were always quick to exploit any genre that was a
hit for someone else. "Winchester Cathedral" was a HUGE
hit at this time, and was done in that 20s style, so
just about every other record compay tried the thing....
........thats why!!
Mikey
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Message: 2
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 02:51:14 -0700
From: Stewart Mason
Subject: Re: retro retroness
Alan Zweig asks:
>I get the sense that Spanky and Our Gang were more
>"genuinely" hip. I don't know why. Maybe it's their
>association with Bob Dorough who seems like the real
>thing to me. Then again, he could be hip but they don't
>have to be. Which actually brings up a question I've
>always had. Two really cool soft pop vocal groups.
>Spanky and Our Gang and Harpers Bizarre. Each of their
>records is almost ruined for me by songs that I can only
>describe as "vo-dee-oh-doh". Oldtimey, Rudy Vallee. They
>parody some barbershop Roaring Twenties song style. If
>you want, I can name songs. But they both do it and it
>drives me crazy. Who liked that stuff? What were they
>thinking? If it was just one group or one song, I could
>ignore it. But it seemed like some kind of "phenomenon".
>
>Please explain.
Dude, it was *way* more than those two bands. Remember
that faux-swing revival from a couple years ago? It was
that pervasive, if not more so. As near as I can figure,
there were two reasons:
Two words: "Winchester Cathedral"
Three more words: "Bonnie and Clyde"
The song is all but forgotten now, but the novelty hit
"Winchester Cathedral" by the New Vaudeville Band was a
*H*U*G*E* hit in 1966, and it touched off a fashion for
'20s and '30s-style pop songs. Tons of artists in both
the UK and the US did this sort of thing, from the
Beatles ("When I'm Sixty-Four," "Your Mother Should Know")
on down. The Association did a song in this style on
INSIGHT OUT called "Isn't It A Bit Like Now," Nancy
Sinatra did an entire album of them called SUGAR (which
by the way has about the porniest major label album
cover of the '60s--she's the only person in the photo
and she *still* looks like she's having sex), Michael
Nesmith went through a phase of writing these songs
("Magnolia Simms" from THE BIRDS, THE BEES AND THE MONKEES
is an obvious one, and "Tapioca Tundra" from the same
album replicates the through-a-megaphone singing style),
even Moby Grape did a song on WOW called "Just Like Gene
Autry: A Foxtrot" that went so far as to feature Arthur
Godfrey and (on original pressings) have to be played at
78 rpm! This is just a sample off the top of my head,
there's dozens more examples.
(The New Vaudeville Band themeselves were actually part
of a minor re-revival of trad jazz which flared up
around early 1966, a good three years after the first UK
trad jazz revival supposedly ended; other members of this
scene included The Temperance Seven and the early lineups
of my beloved Bonzo Dog Band, whose first single was two
old vaudeville novelties, "My Brother Makes the Noises
for the Talkies" and "I'm Going To Bring A Watermelon To
My Girl Tonight." There were people who played in all
three of these bands at one time or another.)
The fad would have died around the fall of 1967 if not
before, but then Arthur Penn's BONNIE AND CLYDE became a
boffo box office sensation. Not only did the fad for that
era of music kick back up into high gear, it touched off
a fashion trend where people around the world were
dressing like Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway for at
least the next couple of years. F. Scott Fitzgerald was
extremely fashionable for a few years right around the
same time, and seemingly every high school and college
girl went through a Zelda Fitzgerald phase around then
as well.
So, as for the question, "Who liked this stuff?"...seems
like pretty much everyone did!
Stewart
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Message: 3
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 10:41:34 -0700
From: "Joseph Scott"
Subject: Vo-Dee-Oh-Doh, Doo-Dah
Alan Z. wrote:
>... Which actually brings up a question I've always had.
>Two really cool soft pop vocal groups. Spanky and Our
>Gang and Harpers Bizarre. Each of their records is
>almost ruined for me by songs that I can only describe
>as 'vo-dee-oh-doh'. Oldtimey, Rudy Vallee. They parody
>some barbershop Roaring Twenties song style. If you want,
>I can name songs. But they both do it and it drives me
>crazy. Who liked that stuff? What were they thinking? If
>it was just one group or one song, I could ignore it.
>But it seemed like some kind of 'phenomenon'.
>
>Please explain.
I think that was one part of an overall revival of
interest in '20s-style music by some rock groups and
similar during the '60s, particularly vaudeville (which
is pretty much the same thing as music hall). Imo the
two most important and influential people to popularize
that revival were Ray Davies of the Kinks and John
Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful, starting around '65.
"Sunny Afternoon" and many other Kinks songs are in a
vaudeville-like style. The Lovin' Spoonful were mostly
(just about everything except "Summer In The City")
strongly based on the sound of the jug bands (which were
typically not vaudeville as such, but quite similar to it)
of the late '20s and early '30s, despite the fact that
they didn't have a jug player.
(An example of a Roaring Twenties-associated style that
we're not talking about here much at all would be '20s
"Jazz Age" jazz, which typically pretty much sounded
about halfway between "Dixieland" and Rhapsody In Blue.)
Barbershop is the term that became popular in the '40s
and '50s to describe a style of male quartet singing
that ruled around the '10s. An example of a vaudeville-
and barbershop- influenced group from the old days would
be the Ink Spots, guys who started out in the business in
the '20s, and were influenced by both vaudeville-style
jive singing and sweet quartet singing (and by the '40s
were mostly emphasizing the sweet quartet singing).
Anyway, mostly, I think there was a revival of interest
in vaudeville and similar in the '60s, and not so much a
revival of interest in the '00s-'20s barbershop sound.
(A separate issue is that the close-harmony rock groups
of the '60s, their harmony singing all went _ultimately_
back to the close-harmony singing of roughly the '10s
anyway, i.e. barbershop, but through a gradual evolution
over the decades, not deliberate revivalism of an old
style a la John Sebastian.)
Vaudeville-style music was so popular for a while there
in the '60s that e.g. even the Rolling Stones could be
expected to try their hand at it, and they did in places
on Between The Buttons, but not particularly convincingly.
Imo, the problem with any feeble music is not so much
that it's in such-and-such musical style, but that it
just doesn't have it, doesn't happen to sound nearly as
good as "Sunny Afternoon," if you know what I mean.
Joseph Scott
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Message: 4
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:06:22 -0800
From: John Frank
Subject: Voh-Dee-Oh-Doh Sixties
Alan Zweig said:
>Spanky and Our Gang and Harpers Bizarre. Each of their
>records is almost ruined for me by songs that I can only
>describe as "vo-dee-oh-doh". Oldtimey, Rudy Vallee. They
>parody some barbershop Roaring Twenties song style. If
>you want, I can name songs. But they both do it and it
>drives me crazy. Who liked that stuff? What were they
>thinking? If it was just one group or one song, I could
>ignore it. But it seemed like some kind of "phenomenon".
>Please explain.
>AZ
I clearly remember that there certainly **was** a
20s-nostalgia thing going on during part of the 60s, and
not only reflected in some of the music. The Andrews
Sisters made a comeback with guest appearances on TV and
with a theatrical musical "Over Here". I vaguely remember
TV series that were placed in that time, but the only one
I distinctly remember is "Margie" with Dorothy Provine,
but that was early 60s, I think. Julie Andrews' "
Thoroughly Modern Millie" was in the theatres (although
not a box-office smash).
Besides Spanky & OG, and Harpers Bizarre, you could
point to Tiny Tim, "Winchester Cathedral," "Second Hand
Rose," Guy Marks' "Loving You Has Made Me Bananas,"
Susan Christie's "I Love Onions" (Is she *really* Lou's
sister?!), The Youngbloods' "Grizzly Bear" and more, I'm
sure, that I can't think of right off the top of my head.
On the surface, it was bizarre that in the midst of the
60's "cultural revolution" there was this 20s nostalgia
trend, but scratch the surface, and maybe it makes sense,
oddly, as the 20s was a decade of deep cultural change
as well.
John Frank
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Message: 5
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 01 16:19:14 +0900
From: Jamie LePage
Subject: music hall nostalgia
Hi Alan,
First of all I have to agree that the 60s music hall
nostalgia thing generally hasn't held up well; in
retrospect it seemed to patronize both the under and
over 30 generations. It usually interrupts the listening
experience. I always skip over tracks like Hello, Hello
on Claudine's album. On the other hand, when it was good,
it was very good, and I think Harpers were an
exception to the rule. In other words, I can live
without Herman's Hermits' Mrs. Brown and Henry VIII but
I need my Kinks' Face to Face LP.
When I'm 64, You Know My Name, Your Mother Should Know...
McCartney took the Beatles down that road even,
although not nearly as convincingly as those trad-jazz/
music hall freaks who made a brief appearance in their
Magical Mystery Tour flick. I need the Bonzos but
perhaps not those particular McCartney tracks.
I have a half-baked theory here. I think the music hall
nostalgia thing may have largely been about a naive yet
widely-accepted assumption that the increasing
acceptance of marijuana use would eventually lead to its
legalization. Open defiance of prohibition circa 1967.
Roaring 20s speakeasies become Swingin' 60s pot parties.
If you dig, you're there. If you don't, you're square.
The Monkees. Paul Mazursky. I love you Alice B Toklas...
don't laugh! As inexplicable as it may seem, New
Vaudeville Band, Sopwith Camel, etc. are today
associated with the 60s "psychedelic" movement!
Perhaps as an indirect result of that 60s defiance,
since then, casual use of marijuana has become so banal
that jokes such as "I didn't inhale" are instantly
understood by entire populations. Even today, the Bush
one-liners are relentless. But in the 1960s, for one
moment it seemed music was going to change the world,
and one of the changes on its promised horizon was the
endorsement of legalized use of marijuana, a big issue
with the under 30ers. Delivery was pre-empted, however,
with the Brady Bunch, Have a Nice Day and a legacy of
dead rock stars. But that's a whole different subject
for a whole different thread.
Regards,
Jamie (who ALWAYS skipped over "Mabel" when listening
to the first Procol Harum album for the very reason you
describe)
np - That Acapulco Gold by the Rainy Daze
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Message: 6
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 04:22:16 EST
From: ELRONBEE
Subject: Lesley's Bear Family
<< Jamie also asked whether the Bear Family box was worth
the investment, and I say yes, even if "only" for the
sake of all the previously unreleased material found
there, not least of which is the entire cancelled
"Magic Colors" album. Other votes? >>
You can have my vote, too. Just to have both mixes of
"The Look of Love" together in glorious sound is enough,
but you also get Magic Colors and her foreign language
offerings. Superb!! and another vote for her web site.
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Message: 7
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:11:47 -0000
From: "Will (Allen) George"
Subject: What Am I Gonna Do?
I love this song, and I only know one version of it.
Nobody mentioned it in the discussions. The version I
have is by Skeeter Davis. She does an excellent job with
it. I think it must be from the mid-60s. Does anyone know
this version?
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Message: 8
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:08:19 -0800
From: Marc Wielage
Subject: Re: Peppermint Rainbow
Randy M. Kosht" commented on the SpectroPop group:
>"Will You Be Staying After Sunday" was out in the spring
>of '69 -- if memory serves, Paul Leka wrote it(?).
>----------------------------------------<
Actually, Leka just produced it. The song was written by
Al Kasha and Joel Hirschorn, who later wrote some 1970s
tunes like "The Morning After" and most of the songs for
the Disney film PETE'S DRAGON.
As far as I know, the singer on "Sunday" was Pat Lamdin;
that's at least the impression I got from the liner notes
on their 1969 album. I agree with the others who said
that her voice was very close to that of Elaine "Spanky"
McFarlane. Maybe the confusion happened because her group
had another "Sunday" song -- "Sunday Will Never Be the
Same."
--MFW
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-= MusicTrax, LLC | on rock, pop, & soul." =-
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Message: 9
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:09:32 -0000
From: "Will (Allen) George"
Subject: Jackie DeShannon
Hi all,
I'm a new member here. I was just catching up on a few
of the archives. I was lucky enough to be in the studio
audience the night that Jackie DeShannon sang on David
Letterman. She sang Just How Right You Are (from the new
CD), Needles and Pins, When You Walk in the Room, Bette
Davis Eyes (twice; they had to redo it for technical
reasons), and Put A Little Love In Your Heart. It was my
first time seeing her live, and I was thrilled to find
that she sounds great. Better than on the new CD,
actually. I'm very much looking forward to seeing her in
concert in NYC in March.
Anyone interested in Jackie should check out this
website:
http://www.spectropop.com/go2/deshannon.html
William George
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Message: 10
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 01 14:44:04 +0900
From: Jamie LePage
Subject: Re: The Orchids/ Blue Orchids
Scott wrote:
>In 1965 they (the British group) changed their name to
>The Exceptions and released one final single before
>splitting up.
And what a single it was - well, at least the B-side!
Soldier Boy, written by Orchids/Exceptions' lead
vocalist Georgina, is killer! It can be found on the
recent Decca CD "The Girls' Scene", along with Orchids'
Oo-chang-a-lang. A must-have for girl groups fans.
The CD is annotated by our own Ian Chapman, whose remarks
on the Orchids can be found at:
http://www.spectropop.com/go2/orchids.html
Jamie
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Message: 11
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 13:23:11 -0700
From: "GSPECTOR"
Subject: Phil Spector's girlfriend
TO: Steve Marinucci
Well, I guess it's true now.
Actually it was addressed in Spectropop #66:
-------------------------
Message: 5
Date: Wed, 06 Dec 2000 12:40:21 +0900
From: Randy Wheeler
Subject: Phil Dating Nancy?
Just read this "item" in the Detroit Free Press, Monday,
Dec. 4, 2000:
"Dating: Nancy Sinatra, Frank's 60-year-old daughter,and
legendary record producer Phil Spector, also 60.
-------------------------
Though at the time of the message, He was not 60 yet but
he is now.
And no, she has not met or spoken to his "kids". I
personally think it's great that he found someone again
to have a good time with since his only daughter is now
in college in a different state and he does not interact
with any of his sons.
From the Keyboard of:
Gary Spector
Not just another P.S. fan.
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Message: 12
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 07:12:34 -0800
From: Carol Kaye
Subject: Re: Nancy & Phil
>>>Apparently, the new issue of Entertainment Weekly
mentions that Phil Spector's girlfriend is none other
than Nancy Sinatra. Talk about a small world...
steve<<<
Like I said in a previous post, they are just buddies at
this time. They got together as friends when we were all
at Jack Nitzsche's funeral some weeks ago.
Carol Kaye
http://www.carolkaye.com/
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
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