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Volume #0383 February 4, 2000
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replaced by two-minutes of jazz riffs
Subject: BOUNCE Spectropop Bulletin Board | Post Followup |
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Spectropop Admin
To: Spectropop!
========= Start of forwarded message =========
Subject: Icing On The Cake
From: Spectropop Bulletin Board | Post Followup |
Posted by Alan Ackerman on Tue, 01 Feb 2000 15:00:05
Hi everybody!
This is my first post to this Board, but I've been
reading all the previous posts as much as time allows.
All I can say is that this is terrific stuff!
Reference has been made to The Cake. I've had their album
for at least 30 years and cherish the first three cuts on
Side One. I've played those cuts at least twice a year
for the past 30 years! The rest of the album is flat and
uninteresting.
For those of you who are not familiar with this group and
their album, let me reel-off a little of what's on the
album jacket.
"ALL SELECTIONS WERE PRODUCED WITH TENDER LOVING CARE BY
CHARLES GREENE AND BRIAN STONE FOR YORK-PALA RECORDS INC.
AND WERE ARRANGED AS A LABOR OF LOVE BY HAROLD BATTISTE."
Greene and Stone were not record producers, they were
personal managers. However, they had the bucks to be
"executive producers." I surmise the real producer was
Harold Battiste, who arranged all the Sonny and Cher
stuff, and must have acted in a producer role on their
records as well, because Sonny was a musical illiterate
and stated so in his book. He very much depended on
arrangers like Battiste to get things together in the
studio.
The phrase "labor of love" can be translated "dedicated
to the sound of Phil Spector."
"THE RECORDINGS WERE ENGINEERED BY DOC SIEGEL, JIM HILTON
AND STAN ROSS AND WERE RECORDED LIVE AT GOLD STAR."
There were other engineers at Gold Star besides Larry
Levine who, as we all know, was Phil Spector's. These
engineers knew how to use the great Gold Star echo
chamber, too. The phrase "recorded live" has a
back-to-mono ring to it. Spector's basic rhythm tracks
were all recorded "live" in that the ambience and leakage
of the studio itself helped to create the Wall of Sound.
Multi-track separation of each instrument would have
destroyed that concept.
SIDE ONE
BABY THAT'S ME (2:40) (JACK NITZSCHE/JACKIE DESHANNON)
WORLD OF DREAMS (2:15) (MALCOLM REBENNACK)
YOU CAN HAVE HIM (2:50) (WILLIAM S. COOK)
followed by 3 throwaways: "Medieval Love," "Fire Fly,"
and "Rainbow Wood"--all written by two of the group's
members: Jeanette Jacobs and Barbara Morillo and
published by Ten East Music (Green/Stone owned that)
SIDE TWO
begins with 3 New Orleans songs: "I Know," "Mockingbird,"
and "Ooh Poo Pah Doo." Jessie Hill wrote the last one and
also is featured on this album playing percussion. Harold
Battiste was involved with the original production of "I
Know" by Barbara George on the AFO label (All For One).
Side Two is filled out with the perennials "Stand By Me"
and "What'd I Say".
I believe the New Orleans copyrights were part of a deal
with Harold, Jesse and Mac--all New Orleans cats.
Anyone with a tone deaf ear and no sense of what the Wall
of Sound was all about could still tell the difference
between the Baby That's Me/World of Dreams/You Can Have
Him sides and the rest of the album.
"Baby That's Me" was co-composed by Jack Nitzsche, who
surely knew the nuts and bolts of the Spector style as
well as anyone on this planet, except for the Man himself.
The opening bars have a simple bass riff with a choked
triangle followed by a wave of strings just to set the
atmosphere.
The lead vocals are not distinctive enough to produce a
hit record. Sorry folks. The Cake were probably nice
girls and all that but Green and Stone should have known
what it takes to make a hit record cut through: a strong
lead vocal! Spector's productions always had great vocals.
That's part of the formula that his imitators often
failed to consider. I believe the Cake producers were
aiming for a vocal sound somewhat like the Crystals when
La La Brooks was singing lead.
The best part of "Baby That's Me" is from the second
verse on when the strings are allowed to enter the party
in the Spector manner and remain there the rest of the
evening. The strings on this record are as near perfect
as I've ever heard on record. Maybe even better than
Spector did except for a couple of times. The echo
becomes a whole other sound, very ethereal and compelling.
I'm not thrilled with the drum sound on the Cake album.
It is too thin, no tom-toms, with all bongoes. I need
more bottom sound when Spectorized. Also, there are no
lead sax breaks, which I feel would have strengthened
these cuts. However, the saxes are used to good advantage
in the arrangement when they match the bass and deepen it.
Goes back to "He's A Rebel" doesn't it?
The musicians listed are all the usual Spector/Beach
Boy/Gold-Star suspects of the 60s, including one Carol
Kaye who posts to this Board. I really hope Carol will
add her memories for us about the Cake sessions.
"World of Dreams," by Mac Rebennack, is as perfect a girl
group ditty as was ever written. The arrangement and mix
here are a clinic in how to produce a Phil Spector song.
"You Can Have Him" has those heavenly strings back again!
The saxes pulsate and punctuate the building rhythm in a
very inspired orchestration.
I bought this album in a cut-out bin sale at a local
Woolworth's. I had never heard the Cake on the radio and
was totally unfamiliar with them. I bought it strictly on
the basis of the album credits. I was disheartened in
that only three of the cuts were fully-produced in the
Spector manner, the rest of the tracks reminded me of
flipping over a Spector 45 to find that the Wall of Sound
was replaced by two-minutes of jazz riffs--a throwaway.
Well, so much for my impressions of the Cake.
Cheers,
Alan Ackerman
========== End of forwarded message ==========
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: The Cake
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Joseph Scott
To: Spectropop!
Hi,
The Cake were Barbara Morillo, Eleanor Barooshian, and
Jeanette Jacobs. Jacobs sang backup on some Hendrix I
believe (Electric Ladyland?).
Best,
Joseph Scott
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: Women In Music Touchstone Awards
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Carol Kaye
To: Spectropop!
BTW, never heard of "Cake," not on that at all.
Pictures of below will be on my website within 10 days.
>>>>Women In Music Touchstone Awards, Feb. 1, 2000
It was just the greatest, what can I tell you. Arrived
into NYC from LA in time to sit in with Les Paul who was
so funny, we traded quips back and forth and jammed (he
mostly watched while I played), and his bass player Paul
Nowinski was so gracious (he studied out of my books he
said) and even sat in on upright a little later, so I
grabbed Les's accompanyist's guitar (thanks Lou! You're so
gracious too) and played some jazz, and Les looked over
saying "now just stop that," it was so funny! Hahaha, the
crowd just roared, Les was so gracious, so wonderful, such
a great man! Was a lot of fun - John Polakis, Tom & Marge
Campbell, regular posters on my message board as well as
special thanks to Debby Hastings whose bass I used (she
barely had a chance to tune it up there, thanks Deb!) were
there too.
Then, the next day at the beautiful Marriott Marquise
Ballroom Luncheon, was a huge affair. Can't tell you....
I've given some speeches, done 100s of large seminars but
this was really something. So many VIP women and men there
from our business, especially from the NYC area, was
momentous.
I have to mention a lot of names here, as I've just now
had time to really check out the book/program. There were
important congratulations to us all from the governor of
New York, and from the White House.
I was on the stage first (for "Pioneer" in recorded music)
on the list of the awardees which included: Monica Lynch,
pres. of Tommy Boy Recods, Mary Jo Mennella senior VP of
Fox Music, the legendary Odetta, Barbara Skydel exec. VP
Premier Talent Agency, all the best of company, and a
posthumous award to the late Marie St. Louis, formerly
senior VP, Festival Productions.
The order was slightly changed in the ceremonies, with
Odetta being last and sung a little. This was hosted by
the wonderful Pat Prescott, jazz DJ in NYC WRUR FM who
also appeared on Broadway, lovely woman.
The presenters were:
My presenters were Ron Carter and Will Lee -- you can't
get any better than that for royal bass players the world
over!
Ron is grammy-award winning jazz bass legend playing on
such great lps and touring with Miles Davis, Dexter Gordon,
Horace Silver, etc. Ron is teaching at City College in
NYC, still playing momentous jazz concerts, wonderful to
renew old aquaintance with him (we cut an lp together for
a jazz artist, I played guitar, in the 70s at Fantasy
Records) -- he took the time out of his heavy teaching
schedule to make this event.
And Will Lee, giant busy NYC studio bassist who took time
out of his recording session that day especially for this.
Dave Letterman TV show bassist, his credits range from
Becker Bros., touring and recording w/Horace Silver, BJ
Thomas, Bette Midler, to having the #1 top jazz lp in
Japan. And what a singer!
He sang things like "I Get Around" etc. some of the hits I
played on; he knocked everyone out with his exciting
speech as did Ron Carter with his beautiful speech too.
Talk about having to follow both of them! How do you do
that?
I had to skirt around some of my studio stories, as the
crowd was heavy with VIP people, and George Wein
(wonderful man, Newport and New Orleans Jazz Festivals
producer) told someone who said he was laughing hard, that
"bet she's got some stories she can't tell here."
Other presenters were: George Wein for the late Maria St.
Louis, his great VP on all the productions for the Newport
Jazz and New Orleans Jazz Festivals. This was especially
beautiful, as this lady did so much for the music business,
was well-loved. Robert Kraft, Shelly Shcultz, Ron
Selsens, Tom Silverman, Jimmie Goodson, and Odetta's
sister.
MTV had a big table there, as did other news medias (CBS,
etc.) and it was filmed. Anyway back to credits:
The past winners of this award (which just grows leaps and
bounds every year, this is the 4th year) include: Ellie
Greenwich, Ruth Brown, Helene Blue, Valerie Simpson, Betty
Comden, Darlene Love. The pres. of the WIM (Women In Music)
is: Gini Andrioli, VP is Joanne Geogio Nathan, others on
the Board are:
Claudia Koal, May Pang, Lisa Brigantino, Faith Fusillo,
Carolyn Horn, Pat Rod Jennings, Margo Lewis, the list goes
on and on. Debby Hastings, the 14-year bass veteran for Bo
Diddley, personally went out of her way to design the 8-ft.
high credits board for me (Faith helped) - thanks Debby
& Faith -- (each one of us had a credit list board
there)...it was beautiful.
The highlight I tho't was both Ron's gracious warm great
speech and Will's thrilling 1/2-sung speech, what pipes!
Will mentioned (I didn't know this) that he learned to
sightread from all my books.
The trophy was especially designed by Picasso protege
Ousmane Gueye who was also there.
Lesley Gore and I had a great conversation, talking about
all the recording we did together at Gold Star (she lives
in NYC, looks the same!), catching up on a few years, a
great chat, and had a nice time speaking with others too,
inc. Max Weinberg, drummer on the Conan O'Brian TV show,
and especially loved speaking with May Pang, whose husband
is bassist Tony Visconti, has his own record productiong
company in NY.
I wish to thank the following for their marvelous ad
messages and personal support for me:
EMP Music (Paul Allen's Experience Music museum project in
Seattle) Connally & Co. - Thomastik Strings Debby Hastings
- no-one better my Message Board Gang - Randy Baran, John
Bulette, Tom & Marge Campbell, Gaye Colvin, Cyndy Elliott,
Chuck Kirkpatrick, Rich Paton, John Polakas, Tim Schnautz,
Jeanne Willoughby (and in spirit, so many others).
Another Message Board member: Lonnie and his wife Cecilia
Carter -- by the way, he also brought a little nicely-made
token that said "Carol Kaye No. 1 call on Bass and Bongos,"
it's an inside joke as my biggest hit credits with Ray
Charles mention me as a "bongo player"!
Special THANKS to the regular Message Board people who
were there: Tom Campbell and his wife Marge, all the way
from Texas - he was the tour bassist for the Righteous
Bros. years ago btw, Cyndy Elliott from Wash. DC (she's a
good east coast bassist), Lonnie and Cecilia Carter from
Boston, and John Polakas (good bassist in NYC) from NY
proper. I owe you all so much, thanks! John put the large
ad together.
And 2 who couldn't make it, I understand about work
scheduling: Nancy Sinatra who sent me the greatest message
! And another friend, Ben Valley, AirForce One designer...
.sorry you weren't there, we missed you both!
Aria Guitars (and Basses); Henry Mancini Institute;
Polytone Amplifiers; John Clayton; Steve Bailey ; Perry
Botkin, noted arranger/composer; David Axelrod, noted
arranger/composer (Elec. Prunes, etc.); Alf Clausen,
composer/arranger Simpsons TV show music; Bassics Magazine,
who I write a column for; Jewel Akens, such a beautiful
message, the "Birds & Bees" hit; Bob & Judi Bain (Johnny
Carson TV & LA studio guitarist); Baker Roric, noted
journalist; Joel Leach (noted educator); Chuck Berghofer;
Alison Prestwood; Alan Boyd & Irene Liberatore (Alan
produced VH1 on BB's); David Leaf and Eva Easton (David is
BW's best friend, noted producer); Dennis & Dina Baxter,
American Guitars Documentary; Buddy Capers, singer with
the Busse band 45 years ago; Abbey Tape; Frank Mills, and
other gen'l ads from Warner Bros.; ASCAP; BMI; SESAC; RIAA;
FPI Festival Productions; Harry Fox Agency; Billboard,
Metropolitan Entertainment Group; Talent Consultants
International; Zildjian; Music Data; Toy Specialists NY;
Clippers; Helene Blue Musique; Unique; K2 Productions;
Ethel Gabriel; Almp; the list goes on and on.
Monica Lynch gave a beautiful heartfelt speech, as did
Mary Jo Mennella and Barbara Skydel, and Odetta quoted a
beautiful piece from Nelson Mandella and sung some blues.
Thank-you everyone for a momentous occasion, I'll always
cherish this great award.
Carol Kaye
http://www.carolkaye.com/
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: Fifth Dimension
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Ponak, David
To: Spectropop!
"The Jimmy Webb Songbook" is indeed one of those Japanese
"grey area" boots that used to be legal before the
copyright laws were extended there. It contains only the
Webb compositions from the first two LP's. (Which only
leaves one song off "Magic Garden," the cover of "Ticket
To Ride.") It also has a few Johnny Rivers and Glen
Campbell songs. The sound quality is ok, but not as
sparkling as the 2 disc F-D comp on Arista.
I was trying to do some reissue work for an indie label
about a year and a half ago, and I approached Arista about
licensing the 2 LP's. I was told that they were holding
them back to push sales of the compilation, and when and
if they did decide to license them, the fee would be quite
expensive.
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: Re: This Diamond Ring-pre-Gary Lewis version
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Doc Rock
To: Spectropop!
Claudia Cunningham wrote:
Regarding "This Diamond Ring" - Maybe I'm going bananas
but I seem to clearly recall a pre-Gary Lewis version by a
soul group...the song was slowed down a notch and had a
horn section! Can anyone help me or am I totally
dillusional?
Gary Lewis did it first. Bobby Vee coulda done it, but he
turned it down.
Doc
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: "This Diamond Ring" - your bananas are well-placed
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: DJ JimmyB
To: Spectropop!
In a message dated 2/2/0 1:08:05 PM, you wrote:
>Regarding "This Diamond Ring" - Maybe I'm going bananas
>but I seem to clearly recall a pre-Gary Lewis version by a
>soul group...
Claudia, your bananas are well-placed. Sammy Ambrose
recorded the song in 1965 for Musicor Records (I believe).
It became a minor staple (in other words it probably
received 2 spins) on the early 8T's Northern Soul circuit
and may or not be the original but was out at the same
time as Gary Lewis' version....
Jimmy Botticelli/Hangin' my name in the Soul Hall of Fame
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: Re:Back-up singers
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Ron Buono
To: Spectropop!
Hello-
With all this talk about session musicians, I began to
wonder about all those uncredited back-up singers on
countless hits (i.e. "The Cookies" backing up Ms. Gorme on
"Blame it on the Bossa Nova," The Blossoms on "Johnny Angel,"
The Marvellettes on "Pride & Joy," etc...). I recently
read that it was actually The Angels, and not The Tammys
who sang on Lou Christie's "Lightning Strikes"! That blew
my mind! (By the way, what happened to the Tammys?).
Actually, what I wanted to know, was if anyone out there
knows the identities of those great gals who back up Bobby
Rydell on so many of his hits ("Volare," "Wild One."
"Swingin' School," etc.). They add such a distinction to
those tunes. I can't even imagine those songs without them.
And what about that other great team of girls who backed
up Del Shannon on songs such as "Little Town Flirt," "Too
Many Teardrops," and the rest of those album cuts? It's a
shame there wasn't more info on the liner notes in those
days. All those talented singers and musicians went
unheralded for years!
I would appreciate any info on these and other singers.
Can anyone reccommend a good resource? I was once told
about a book titled "Behind the Hits" which apparently has
a great deal of information regarding this subject, but I
haven't been able to obtain a copy. Any info would be
greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Ron
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: The Present
Received: 02/04/00 1:57 am
From: Michael Gessner
To: Spectropop!
Does anyone recall a 1967-8 group called The Present on
Philips. They had a nice pop song that was a hit in
central Florida caled "Many's the Slip Twixt the Cup and
the Lip (Baby the World Really Turns)." Only song I recall
with a rock and roll harp.
Thanks,
Mike
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
ADMIN NOTE: On behalf of everyone at Spectropop, heartfelt
congratulations to Carol Kaye on the prestigious Women In
Music Touchstone Award. We are delighted to see this award
bestowed upon someone so deserving.
End
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