My Thanksgiving, 1976: By Harvey
Kubernik
For many reasons, this national
holiday wasn't ever a big deal for me or something to celebrate. I also don't
like turkey.
On Thanksgiving Day, 1976, The
Band was going to perform live on stage for the very last time, at the
Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Producing the landmark event was Bill
Graham, and Martin Scorsese was scheduled to make a documentary about it.
For the show, Rick Danko, Levon
Helm, Garth Hudson, Richard Manuel and Robbie Robertson were joined by an
all-star group of recording artist friends, including Paul Butterfield, Muddy
Waters, Van Morrison, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Dr.
John, Bobby Charles, Joni Mitchell and Ronnie Hawkins.
I had previously seen three
Band/Bob Dylan concerts in February, 1974, at the Fabulous Forum in Inglewood.
After the first night, I had a soulful encounter with Richard Manuel at the
Beverly Wilshire Hotel. A tortured soul whose voice could steer you through the
light and the dark.
At one show I sat with Bob
Sherman in the front row next to Henry Mancini. Hank and I spent 20 minutes
discussing his Peter Gunn and Mr. Lucky television themes.
Mancini touted fellow jazz and classical composers Johnny Mandel, Leith
Stevens, Andre Previn, Elmer Bernstein and Alex North.
When I interviewed Robbie
Robertson in 1975 and ’76 for a Crawdaddy! magazine cover story at
Shangri-La recording studio in Malibu while the Band were recording Northern
Lights–Southern Cross, Robbie mentioned he was writing his first
soundtrack with Alex North for the movie Carny.
1976 hadn’t been a terrific year
for The Band. There’d been canceled performances, internal problems and a loss
of energy, reinforcing the decision to stop live dates and concentrate on
future albums and solo projects. So, after 16 years on the road, the Band was
going to call it quits.
I made immediate plans in
Hollywood with my pals, drummer Paul Body, filmmaker Michael Hacker and
photographer Lester Cohen, to catch the action. It wasn’t easy to book a plane
from the Los Angeles airport on Thanksgiving to fly up to San Francisco to
report on the event for Melody Maker.
As a music journalist I had a
press pass connection with a publicist at the Winterland box office. She
quickly steered all of us into a side artist entrance and we copped a table
right in front of the stage.
Five thousand ticket holders
paid $25 each (well worth it) for a tasty Thanksgiving dinner of turkey or Nova
Scotia salmon stacked with potatoes, tons of gravy and pumpkin pie.
I knew I was gonna eventually
get a 25-pound check ($40) in the mail for this story that was gonna get
published in the December 11, 1976, issue of Melody Maker, so how could
I miss this?
At 9:00 p.m. promoter Bill
Graham strolled out and laid down a sincere spiel about how the evening was
being filmed and recorded for “posterity and our grandchildren,” and that a
concert like the one about to begin “could only happen in San Francisco.”
During the intermission, when
several poets read, including Michael McClure, Lenore Kandel, Lawrence
Ferlinghetti and Diane di Prima, I bumped into a frantic Bill Graham who was
pacing the Winterland floor.
I had previously conducted an
interview with Bill, Carlos Santana and Jerry Garcia inside Graham’s Mill
Valley home that ran in the April 21, 1976, issue of Melody Maker. At
the time I asked Bill where the Rolling Stones were lodged when they played
Winterland for him in 1972. Graham confided, “We put them up at the Miyako
Hotel.”
At 2:00 a.m. the dazzled crowd
stomped and the Band alone came out for the last number, “Don’t Do It,” a cover
of Marvin Gaye’s “Baby Don’t You Do It” penned by the Holland-Dozier-Holland
songwriting team.
“Good night. Goodbye.” And that
was it — the end to an incredible night.
So I then said to my friends,
“Let’s get a drink at the Miyako bar!” We proudly walked into the elevator and
were then immediately greeted by a grinning Levon Helm. The singing drummer
extended his hand. “Did you enjoy the show, boys?”
“Yes, Mr. Helm.”
We couldn’t afford to actually
stay there at this swanky hotel, so we took a 6:15 a.m. flight back to LAX
after devouring at least a dozen iced teas.
On the plane back home, I was
flashing on the late summer of 1968, when I first met singer and songwriter
Jackie DeShannon at the Laurel Canyon Country Store. She was cutting a new
album called Laurel Canyon album for Imperial Records.
I recognized Jackie from a 1965 Shindig!
ABC-TV appearance and newspaper coverage in the KRLA Beat. After I
complimented her on “When You Walk in the Room” and “Needles and Pins,” Jackie
said, “Have you heard the new LP of the Band? I just recorded ‘The Weight’ from
Music From Big Pink at Liberty Studios. Harvey! Have you heard
their songs?”
Jackie DeShannon was a person
who knew Elvis Presley and Eddie Cochran, opened for the Beatles on an American
tour, had songwriting credits with someone named Jimmy Page on a Marianne
Faithfull LP I owned. I had heard her voice for half a decade on local AM radio
stations KHJ, KRLA and KFWB.
In her alluring Southern drawl —
she was born in Kentucky, as Sharon Myers — Jackie DeShannon gave me a
directive I never forgot: “Boy, you need to go to Wallichs Music City and get
this album!”
HK
More from Harvey …
Since HBO started airing this
new Yacht Rock documentary, I've been getting emails and phone calls about my various
interviews with Steely Dan's Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, whose catalog is
at the epicenter of this documentary. Perhaps Fagen himself would not be
pleased with his work deeply displayed or cited in this endeavor. I'm sure he
declined to be an interview subject. However, as the guest deejay, who world
premiered "AJA" on acetate, with Fagen and Becker in the KPFK-FM
radio studio in North Hollywood, it's interesting to be asked about Steely Dan
now more than ever. Be it at the Whisky A Go Go, a “Midnight Special"
taping, and their 1974 farewell concert at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, I
was there.
Always happy to see and hear
Steve Lukather on screen in this documentary.
You may dig my online interviews
with Donald and Walter.
Check out this one from Tracking
Angle ...
https://trackingangle.com/features/vint…
And here’s part of Harvey’s conversation with Boz Scaggs,
whose album, “Silk Degrees” (prominently featured in the Yacht Rock documentary
as well, and whose sessions for which are about to celebrate their 50th
anniversary):
This genre-changing LP was
released to retail outlets in February, 1976, and was recorded during 1975 in
Southern California. The overlooked producer on this album was the great Joe
Wissert. He and Columbia Records publicists invited me to a 1975 session at
Hollywood Sound Recorders.
At the 25th anniversary of
"Silk Degrees," I interviewed Boz Scaggs.
HK: It’s the ”25th
anniversary of “Silk Degrees” being released. Did you know when you cut it that
you had a big hit album and had lightning in the bottle being captured.
BS: We knew we had we had done
something that satisfied at least us. When you’re coming up trying to reach
a broader audience, you think ‘maybe this is the one people will get to.’
Able to hear and reach segments then you’ve ever reached before. There
were a couple of incidents that took place at the end of the making of the
"Silk Degrees” album after it was just completed some things shattered and
whatever hope I had for hit getting out there.
I really didn’t have high hopes.
Emotionally we made a recording and it had integrity and we had made a good
musical record. Then a series of events took over that really defined and
determined where that record went. Airplay. The real key besides the
musical quality it might have been, I had a manager for the first time, Irving
Azoff, and he was very enthusiastic about the record and he was feeling
strong. He was The Eagles’ manager and this gave him a foothold in to CBS
Records, at the time the biggest record company in the world. And he did the
things that had to be done to promote the record and to encourage the record
company.
Then the little fires started.
It was a slow take on ‘Silk Degrees.’ It was not an instant hit. It came up
through the Provinces. It was not my first album. It was my fifth or sixth
album. I was ready to go. I had a great organization, a tour manager that has
been with me for over 25 years. I had the band: Jeff Porcaro, David Paich,
David Hungate, the basis of a super section. And I was used to working, so when
these little fires started, we were seasoned veterans out there ready to go and
hungry. As things happened, we moved right along with whatever the activity
was. There was a group of monsters at CBS Records in promotions and sales who
liked me and I liked a lot and I had experience with them from my previous
recordings. Everything came into conjunction with that record. It also happened
to strike a public nerve.
And it seemed like on ‘Silk
Degrees’ our peers were with us and we covered a lot of ground. We covered a
lot of musical styles. It was very satisfying and we were proud of that record
and played well."
Harvey Kubernik also sent us this vintage interview with Dick
Clark to share with our readers … https://bestclassicbands.com/dick-clark-interview-9-10-222/
Kent,
Congratulations on 25 years of Forgotten Hits and helping
to keep the classic hits of the 1960's & '70's alive.
It is a rare day that I don't read FH and, in addition,
learn something new — which is a tip of the cap to you and your regular contributors.
Keep up the good work and Happy Thanksgiving to you
and all the readers of Forgotten Hits.
Joe Cantello
Marietta, Ga
FORGOTTEN HITS = HAPPY 25TH
ANNIVERSARY
KENT - WILD WAYNE – GLEN -
HAPPY 25 FOR FORGOTTEN HITS ---
DON'T EVER CALL IT QUITS.
FROM THE BEATLES TO SHEBOOZEY
& OVER THE YEARS = BLOOD , SWEAT & TEARS (GROUP & KENT's HARD WORK)
SOUNDS INSANE --- 25 MORE YEARS
& YOU'LL CATCH UP TO WILD WAYNE!
YOU'VE BEEN AROUND LONGER THEN
GLEN FISHER’S NEWSLETTER (DOO-WOP RAMBLINGS)
CAN'T MAKE UP MY MIND WHOSE
NEWSLETTER I LIKE BETTER ---
THAT’S WHY / I'LL CALL IT A TIE.
THIS SUNDAY STARTS CHRISTMAS
MUSIC ON THE " MEMORY MACHINE " ---
I THINK THATS KEEN.
WILD WAYNE = HALL-OF-FAME AWARD.
KENT = ALL-STAR AWARD.
GLEN = ROOKIE OF THE YEAR AWARD.
THANKS FOR ALL THE GREAT
MEMORIES.
FRANK B.
Like Joel Whitburn, I was born
on November 29th.
I use Record Research nearly
every day. Though not a Joel book, my daughter
gave me this mixtape book for my birthday.
It is a way to journal your favorite music memories (concerts, first
albums, etc.)
Phil Nee
The kids got me something called “Boom Again: Replay the ‘50’s, ‘60’s and ‘70’s” for my birthday last year … but then
we never had time to play it! (lol) Maybe next time. (It’s still sitting in the box, ready to
go) kk
Last week held a couple of Important
Music Days In History.
Memorable Forgotten Hits Days of
Note included The Third Annual Joel Whitburn Record Research Day as well
as the 25th Anniversary of Kent Kotal's Forgotten Hits Newsletter!
Both individuals and their efforts
have been instrumental in keeping the History of Rock and Roll Music alive over
the decades.
They have both chronicled the Music
and Soundtrack of our Lives, an era that grew from a Unified and Split
Beginning by those who loved our Rock 'n' Roll and those who
condemned it to the memories it holds for us today.
So, in Honor of those two, and
of our Pop Music History, here's a short two-minute "Brief FHs Rock
and Roll Timeline!"
Kent! Congrats on your Anniversary! Joel Whitburn rules!
Happy Birthday 🎂 to Billy Idol!
Seen here with fans on Sunset in Hollywood.
Just finished reading Randy Newman’s new book. Wishing him a
Happy Birthday 🎂!!! … seen here at a Beverly Hilton event.
Jim Roup
Here’s another review of the Disney+ Beatles documentary, “Beatles
’64” …
https://bestclassicbands.com/beatles-64-documentary-scorsese-review-11-29-24/
We watched it again over the weekend and had pretty much the
same reaction as the first time. Some
cool footage, some great music, a glimpse of “the mania” … but not the
excitement one would expect to feel watching such an amazing piece of history unfold. (I mentioned previously that perhaps some
upbeat narration might have helped … and watching it the second time, began to
feel it more like a Power Point presentation they way the story was advanced
along.) Again, NOT discouraging anyone
from watching it … it’s a fine piece of that moment in time … but also again, I
think so much more could have been done with it. (If it had to be SO exclusive to that first
two week period no mention of ANYTHING else that happened to them that year, then
how do you explain the clip of Smokey Robinson singing “Yesterday,” which
wouldn’t even be written and recorded until a full year later???
By the same token, we also enjoyed HBO’s Yacht Rock
documentary (dockumentary) although I found it to be a bit exclusive … so many other
artists are featured in the Yacht Rock genre today but this film zeroed in on a
very select few, primarily Michael McDonald (and ANYTHING he had anything to do
with), Kenny Loggins, Christopher Cross, the guys from Toto (and their work both
inside and outside the band), Steely Dan, and slight nods to Ambrosia and a
couple of others and that was about it.
The genre (on the radio anyway) has expanded to include SO
many more (although I will admit to never needing to hear anything other than “Escape”
by Rupert Holmes ever again!) What
happened to Pablo Cruise? They said Hall
and Oates were NOT Yacht Rock … but it sure doesn’t sound that way to me when
you tune in and listen.
How it was formed as a comedy bit was quite interesting … Boz Scaggs got a mention (primarily because
of his association with the Toto guys, who played on virtually EVERYTHING while
still carving out their own career) as did a few others. Still, at 90+ minutes I found it fun and interesting
to watch with a WHOLE lot of great music thrown in along the way. It’s already replayed several times … and I’m sure
it’s also available on demand thru HBO and/or Max. (kk)
The following Record Research Chart Books are STILL
IN STOCK:
Can’t say we didn’t warn you …
These Chart Books are now OUT OF
STOCK:
- Billboard
Hot 100 Charts 1980s
- Billboard
Hot 100 Charts 1990s
- Billboard
Pop Albums Charts 1965-1969
- Billboard
Singles Reviews 1958
- Record
World Singles Charts 1964-1972
Order the books you need for your collection NOW before they’re
gone …
‘Cause once they’re gone, they’re gone for good!
40% off thru Friday, no minimums or limits (kk)
https://www.recordresearch.com/
Kent ...
Congratulations on your 25th Anniversary of Forgotten Hits. A
real milestone.
On another musical note ...
I saw you recently mentioned these ...
>>>Remember the old
Leave It To Beaver TV Show? Wild Wayne
Just Played Two Songs By The Beaver …
1962 = "DON'T YOU CRY"
/ Jerry Mathers
1966 = "HAPPYNESS IS
HAVIN'" / Beaver & The Trappers
I Didn't Know That He Did Any
Recordings!
FB
I may be late to the party, but here are a couple of other Jerry
Mathers Classics. I apologize if you have already found them, and even
more if you have already listened to them ... but here are two more.
Wind Up Toy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhqG7gW1tOE
In Misery: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_lpzPgPzzM
Ted Gorden Smucker
Wind-Up Toy is the one I remember … I think Dr. Demento may
have played that one from time to time.
Thanks, Ted! (kk)
MICKY DOLENZ LIVE AT THE
TROUBADOR IS LIVE NOW ON ALL STREAMING PLATFORMS
MICKY DOLENZ – LIVE AT THE
TROUBADOR -Micky’s first live album in seven years is available today on all
streaming platforms.
Micky Dolenz Live at the Troubadour
The sold-out concert was in aid
of the Make-A-Wish Foundation and features a plethora of Monkee-hits punctuated
with stories from Micky’s life, as well as songs from artists who got their
start at the Troubadour: Neil Diamond (who wrote two of the Monkees’ biggest
hits), Steven Stills (who auditioned for The Monkees), Linda Ronstadt (whose
first big hit was penned by Michael Nesmith), and Elton John (whose US debut
was at the iconic venue in the presence of Micky and a gaggle of Hollywood
regulars).
“The Troub was the go-to
place for me and my crew in the day. We were there all the time. In fact, I
remember spending two years there one night”, quips Dolenz. The show (subtitled
AN EVENING OF SONGS AND STORIES) also includes delightful ruminations from his
Monkee days, such as hanging with Jimi Hendrix (the first opening act for the
Monkees) and being at Abbey Road Studios with The Beatles during some of their
Sgt. Pepper sessions.
December 2nd was also the first
date of the MICKY DOLENZ: SONGS AND STORIES Winter Tour – Ridgefield Playhouse,
Ridgefield, Connecticut being the debut show. Additional dates include:
Sellersville Theater on Friday, December 6; the City Winery in NYC on Tuesday,
December 10; the Flagstaff/Westbury Music Fair on Saturday, December 14; and
Bergen Pac in New Jersey on Sunday, December 15.
UK Rock Legends Status Quo Announce the Release of the New
“Driving to Glory” Collection, Including Rare Songs Unavailable for Over 20
Years! OUT NOW!
Status Quo has endured for over 50 years and is known for
worldwide hits and tours to millions of fans across the globe.
This compilation collects together, for the first time,
many of the band’s rare tracks from the late 1990s and early 2000s, some of
which have been unavailable for over 20 years.
Until now, many of these tracks have only been available on
CD singles, a soundtrack, or editions of albums only available in one country.
This remastered compilation is supported by the band and
has been overseen by the recordings’ original producer, MIKE PAXMAN, who has
also written liner notes for the release.
Mike Paxman said of the release: “Known for their hard
driving style, it’s fitting that this Status Quo collection is called ‘Driving
To Glory.’ Many of the songs included were recorded for soundtracks or to go
with non-album single releases - this collection brings them together for the
first time.”
“Driving to Glory” is available as a 14 track CD in a
lavish 6 panel digipak and as a 7 track 12” single picture disc vinyl.
Amazon CD: https://geni.us/SQUOcd
Picture Disc 12” Single: https://geni.us/SQUOpd
Spotify:
https://geni.us/SQUOsp
Also available directly from Cherry Red: https://www.cherryred.co.uk/artist/status-quo
Youtube Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIeX_pjccC8
Track List:
1. Driving to Glory
2. Analyse Time
3. Fighting with the Pack
4. Obstruction Day
5. Famous in the Last Century (Full Length Version)
6. You Let Me Down
7. Money Don’t Matter
8. The Madness
9. Don’t Bring Me Down
10. You’ll Come ‘Round
11. Thinking of You
12. Lucinda
13. Whatever You Want (New Version)
14. Don’t Waste My Time (’98 Version)
Kent,
There are many concerts here,
but there seems to be a new development.
They are scheduled during the
week more than on the weekends. I will be optimistic and say that our
performers are so popular, they need to be scheduled throughout the week or the
venues won't get them. For me, this makes things difficult ... getting there,
getting home and then getting up to get to school ... too much getting.
Are you finding the same in the
Mideast?
Shelley
We've seen much slimmer pickings of late ... but yes, a lot
of weekday shows ...
WAY too many tribute bands (and getting top dollar for some
of these tickets, which hardly seems worth it to me) ...
We find ourselves going less and less ... or being motivated
to go unless it's something really special.
And so many of the others are the same old, same olds that
come thru here all the time ... very little in the way of NEW entertainment.
(kk)
60 YEARS AGO TODAY:
12/3/64 – Major League Baseball agrees to adopt The Major
League Draft, beginning in June, 1965
