PRAYERS ASKED FOR TIM MOCKLER
From Michael Hossler on Facebook: When I was a kid in Broomfield, as a fledgling guitarist, I was influenced by the other guitarists around me in that small town in the middle of nowhere. The one guy who was the most creative, the very guy who put a twelve string in my hand and had me record with him and Katy Moffett (my first recording session), is now slipping away in the ICU in Boulder. If you can spare a prayer for Tim Mockler, he sure could use it.
* * * * *
CHRIS DANIELS ON THE DEATH OF JOHNNY RAY ALLEN (SUBDUDES)
I’ve managed my own band for 30 years and I’m in the Colorado Music Hall of Fame. While all that’s nice, today’s music business is changing at light-speed and you have to know what’s going on. Careers are still built on some tried and true elements: great music, performance and timing. But today’s artists must work harder than ever before to succeed. And we have new tools to help young musicians grow their fan base. The book I wrote for my class at CU Denver on artist management is called “DIY: You’re Not in it Alone.” While you are ultimately responsible for your own career, these days there is help out there.
Sex, drugs and rock n roll – F#@king A!!! That was the mantra. From “Need A Little Sugar in My Bowl” to “It’s Getting Hot In Here So Take Off All Your Clothes” to “Honey Let Me Check You For Ticks” – Bessie Smith to Brad Paisley the sex thing is pretty easy to figure out. And there are even some great pushbacks against the stereotypes, like Maddie & Tae’s “Girl In A Country Song”- It’s both funny and a little disingenuous. One way or the other we seem to have the sex part of the equation under control.
Rock n’ Roll’s been part of our world since before Ed Sullivan refused to show Little Richard or Elvis pelvis gyrations. Whether it is the wonderful eastern European influenced rock of Denver’s own DeVotchKa or the Americana flavored Lumineers or the EDM force of Pretty Lights we’ve got that covered here in Colorado. This is a region that loves music. We support it in some of the best venues in the country.
But, “drugs” (and alcohol) … I’m not sure we have that figured out yet. It might be time we looked closer at what it means to glorify drugs in the mantra. I don’t drink or do drugs (I quit 30 years ago). I remember it well and fondly. It was fun. But I quickly developed a problem with it. Substance abuse was a way for me to deal with the pressures of touring 300 days a year and all the pain in my life at the time. (My son’s mother died of cancer right about then). As a single parent I realized I needed to be there for my son and that was impossible with drugs and alcohol in my life. Being an addict is an expensive way to deal with problems: so I got help.
Robin Williams (when he was Mork) used to come to my band’s shows at the Blue Note in Boulder. He cracked us up – emptying the local dealer’s $500 cocaine vile into the noses of everybody in the ‘green room’ all the time cracking jokes and riffing. As Robin once said about those years, “I was on everything but skates.” What’s remarkable is that the party never ended for a lot of people. And there has been a pervasive attitude in the entertainment industry that drugs are sort of an accepted work place hazard … something we all go, “wink wink – nod nod” about because we are – you know… musicians.
This all came home for me with Williams’ suicide and the heroin overdose death of one of the best songwriters I ever knew, Johnny Ray Allen of the Subdudes. Admittedly there is no evidence of relapse at the time of Williams’ death, but he was suffering from depression and had been in and out of rehab during the summer. He even made us laugh about it saying, “I went to rehab in wine country just to keep my options open.” (wink wink, nod nod) I know his demons were bigger than just drugs or alcohol but whether it was a good merlot or a ‘shot of Jack” the added depressive elements of those chemicals are well documented.
Like Robin, I have a dark side – I came from an alcoholic family. I still carry those tendencies with me – coffee, chocolate, or waffles you name it – if it can be abused, I can abuse it. I’ve been lucky because I’ve known that for 30 years. I can consume an entire family-pack of M & Ms in one sitting – ha, the demon! But I’ve never gone back to drugs or booze. Once Williams ‘went out,’ during a movie shoot in Alaska, the game changed. It was only a matter of time and timing – a heart surgery – a canceled TV show and the depression he lived with all his life that took control. All of us wish we could have grabbed him and said, ‘please don’t do this – we need your voice to help us make sense of it all.” What concerns me is the point of view that excuses his relapse because of depression. We know what happens when we see people headed that way – Whitney Houston, Amy Winehouse, Jimi Hendrix – we know the end of the story. And it’s not just Hollywood, it’s right here in Colorado.
Johnny Ray Allen was one of the founding four members of the Subdudes. The four-piece band relocated from New Orleans to Ft. Collins in the mid 1980s and in 1989 they got a major record deal from Atlantic Records. It was a huge deal for the time – close to half a million dollars. Herman’s Hideaway was our home base and we all celebrated the night they signed the Atlantic deal. Johnny helped write some of the Subdudes most memorable hits. Johnny played with the band until 1996 when the band officially broke up. The original Subdudes reunited this past spring for a series of very successful and critically acclaimed shows including several Colorado dates. John was just 56 years old when he died on August 8th 2014. He had so much more music to write and play.
New Orleans was and is the home of Mardi Gras… party central. There is also a long history of NOLA musicians involved in a drug culture that played with the ‘hard stuff’ like heroin. We all thought Johnny was clean. And when the original Subdudes got together to do this series of reunion shows we all thought the same thing, FANTASTIC! They sounded amazing. In retrospect, I’ve talked to some who saw him and they were worried. I had not seen Johnny in years but was hoping to catch up with him when we were to play together on August 16 and 17 at the New West Festival. I never got the chance.
And here is my point. I have no idea what pain or suffering Johnny had in his life. But I can no longer accept or excuse what happens to artists when they use drugs or alcohol to excess and it affects their ability to play or write or even function. This is not a “nanny state” rant. I am not proposing some legislation for a musician or entertainer annual psychiatric evaluation. Your choices are your choices. But the business of music seems all to willing to excuse Janis or Amy or Robin or Johnny because of some pain in their lives and I think that is wrong. As Williams said, “It’s a permanent solution to a temporary problem.”
Every famous musician, comedian or performer I have ever known personally – didn’t perform better high. Every local or regional musician who thinks they are playing better high, is kidding themselves. Williams said it, and riffed on it. He also talked about how recovery was not easy for him saying, “It waits. It lays in wait for the time when you think, ‘it’s fine now, I’m OK.’ Then, the next thing you know, it’s not OK.” The toughest thing for me to see is someone I know who stood up and said – yes, I am an alcoholic or addict” … or I suffer from depression – and then went back out with drugs and alcohol. Those are the ones that we keep reading about: Johnny, Robin, Amy, Whitney and on and on.
Life is tough. We all have pain. Four years ago I was told I had a 10% chance of survival from Leukemia. They told me that no matter how well I do, Leukemia can always come back and kill me. That sucks big time. I could either act like a victim or realize that I’m going to have to live with the fear of cancer, chemo and all the awful stuff that goes with it. My choice … squeeze as much life out of every hour I get. As Tim Robins said in Shawshank Redemption “You either get busy living or get busy dying.” Since coming back from eight months in a hospital I have produced 4 albums (two to be released in 2015) been nominated for a Grammy, won the award for Excellence in Teaching from my College and been inducted into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame. I’m getting busy living because dying is easy…living is hard.
So that is my plea for musicians. If you have a drug or alcohol problem you know it in your heart…even if you tell everybody you are just fine and to fuck off – you know it if you have a problem. And you also know you’re not creating the music you are capable of making. And too many of us excuse this as some aspect of the musician’s lifestyle… bullshit. Make the choice to get the help you need to get back to making the best art you can. What I wanted from Johnny, what I wanted from Robin, was another great recording – more of the powerful creative force that they brought to the planet … not to be watching some damn internet feed on their death. I want to hear more music from Colorado artists young and old. You get one shot….about 650,000 hours …that’s a long life. That’s it as far as we know. I don’t ever want to read another headline about an artist who died because we said “oh, they had problems.” As Robin said, “Major league Ca Ca!” … it’s really time for that to stop. Sex and rock n’ roll fine. Drugs are a much more complicated issue and if you have a problem with them or depression or a combination and it is threatening your art and your life, you know it, for god’s sake get some help, because we really do want to hear the music … we want to hear your voice…not your obituary.
By Chris Daniels
http://www.colomusicbuzz.com/the-managers-corner-6/ will I see you at Durango?
[Contributed by Steve Garvan who also wrote this note: I have worked with Chris as manager/ team builder/project manager for his last 3 CDs. At Swallow Hill when I was board officer, he was Executive Director – as a friend, colleague and immensely talented, grounded fellow human. PLEASE READ THIS. Thank you. Lots of love. Steve]* * * * *
STANLEY ROBERT CREWE, WRITER OF HUGE HITS, DIES
Stanley Robert “Bob” Crewe (November 12, 1930 – September 11, 2014) was an American songwriter, dancer, singer, manager, record producer and fine artist. He was known for producing, and co-writing with Bob Gaudio, a string of Top 10 singles for The Four Seasons.
As a songwriter, his most successful songs included “Silhouettes” (co-written with Frank Slay); “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “Walk Like a Man”, “Rag Doll”, “Silence Is Golden”, “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)”, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” and “Bye, Bye, Baby” (all co-written with Gaudio); “Let’s Hang On!” (wriiten with Sandy Linzer and Denny Randell); and “My Eyes Adored You” and “Lady Marmalade” (both co-written with Kenny Nolan). He was also known for his hit recordings with The Rays, Diane Renay, Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels, Freddy Cannon, Lesley Gore, Oliver, Michael Jackson, Bobby Darin, Roberta Flack, Peabo Bryson, Patti LaBelle, and his own The Bob Crewe Generation.
Early Years
Born in Newark and reared in Belleville, New Jersey, Crewe demonstrated an early and apparent gift for both art and music.Although lacking in formal musical training, he gravitated to learning from many of the great 19th and 20th century classical romantic composers as well as giants of jazz and swing, including Stan Kenton, Harry James, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and Tommy Dorsey. He studied for almost a year at Parsons School of Design in New York City with the intention of eventually pursuing a career in architecture.
After a European trip as a young man, Crewe returned to the US and landed a succession of recording contracts as a solo singing artist. Although he was an attractive and strong singer, his gifts as a songwriter and entrepreneur were to bring him his greatest attention, success, and acclaim.
The 50s
In 1953 Crewe met and partnered professionally with Frank Slay Jr., a young pianist from Texas. Their collaboration created several hit songs (including a small record label XYZ), for which Crewe performed as the demo singer. Crewe and Slay’s 1957 recording session with The Rays for their XYZ label (picked up nationally by Cameo Records) produced two big song hits. Produced by Crewe, the record’s A-side, “Silhouettes”, became a doo-wop anthem of the era. Climbing to #3 on The Billboard Hot 100 for 1957, “Silhouettes” displayed the flair for story-driven lyrics, innovative musical “hooks”, and a final lyrical twist that were to become known as Crewe trademarks. In 1965, with a slightly faster tempo, “Silhouettes” became a hit again for the British group Herman’s Hermits, reaching #5 on The Billboard Hot 100. Although Bob Dylan also recorded “Silhouettes” during his legendary Basement Tapes sessions of the late 1960s, that version remains unreleased.
. . . . . . . . . .
Crewe and Slay built on those successes with a deal with new Philadelphia-based Swan Records. Sessions with Billy and Lillie, singers Billy Ford and Lillie Bryant, produced the 1958 hit “Lah Dee Dah”, which reached the #9 position on The Billboard Hot 100; the following year, Billy and Lillie’s recording of “Lucky Ladybug” hit #14.Also for Swan Records, Crewe and Slay helped continue the rise of hard-driving, raucous popular singer Freddy Cannon with their Top Ten hits “Tallahassee Lassie” and “Okefenokee”.
The 1960s
In the early 1960s, Crewe began writing with Bob Gaudio, who had risen to fame at age 15 when, as a member of the Royal Teens, he co-wrote the hit “Short Shorts”. The first Crewe-Gaudio collaboration, “Sherry”, was written by Gaudio and produced by Crewe. It became a #1 single in 1962 for The Four Seasons (fronted by Frankie Valli). The pair wrote many other songs for the group, including the #1 hits “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “Rag Doll”, and “Walk Like a Man”, as well as “Ronnie”, “Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby, Goodbye)”, and “Connie-O”.
Crewe collaborated with Sandy Linzer and Denny Randell on The Four Seasons hit “Let’s Hang On!”. The Four Seasons were also the first to record the Crewe-Gaudio composition “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)”, later covered virtually note-for-note by the American singing group The Walker Brothers, who recorded their #1 selling version in England; their version made the American Top 10 as well. The Crewe-Gaudio collaborations capitalized on the extraordinary and distinctive voice of Frankie Valli, who could effortlessly soar to a piercing, emotionally-expressive falsetto that became one of the emblematic and widely-imitated sounds of the era. Record sales racked up by The Four Seasons are estimated as being between anywhere from 100 million to 199 million.
As the “Four Seasons sound” became more and more defined, other signature touches emerged, including dense but pristine-sounding percussion, military-sounding march cadences and drum-stomps of “Sherry”, “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, and “Walk Like a Man”, and the other-worldly glissandos of “Candy Girl”. The sophisticated harmonic patterns of The Four Seasons punctuated by the distinctive falsetto of Frankie Valli were at once classic and innovative, as were Crewe’s use of a melancholy harmonica in “Big Man in Town” and the space-era organ of “Save It for Me”.
In addition to his work with The Four Seasons, Crewe also oversaw recording sessions by such artists as Dee Dee Sharp, the Orlons, and Ben E. King. He also cowrote “Navy Blue” (with Bud Rehak and Eddie Rambeau) and produced the record for singer Diane Renay. Renay’s recording made the top ten on the US pop chart in early 1964, and number one on the adult contemporary chart.
. . . . . . . . . .
The Mid-to-Late 1960s
n 1965, Crewe formed his own record label, DynoVoice Records. With the release of the 1965 hit Concrete and Clay by Eddie Rambeau, DynoVoice launched a run of twenty-one Top 100 hits. The label found early success with the R&B trio The Toys, best known for their single “A Lover’s Concerto”, a #2 hit single, and “Attack”. The Toys were produced by Denny Randell and Sandy Linzer for executive producer Crewe. Writing about “A Lover’s Concerto”, based on a melody inspired by “Minuet in G major”, critic Dave Thompson observed, “Few records are this perfect. Riding across one of the most deceptively hook-laden melodies ever conceived … ‘A Lover’s Concerto’ marks the apogee of the Girl Group sound.” The song has been subsequently recorded by The Lennon Sisters, The Delfonics, Sarah Vaughan, The Supremes, Mrs. Miller, Audrey Hall, and Kelly Chen.
Another DynoVoice powerhouse of the mid-1960s came when Crewe discovered a band called Billy Lee & The Rivieras. The group had limited success until he renamed them Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels. Under his direction, they scored eleven Top 100 hits, most notably Crewe’s powerful and muscular arrangements of “Devil with a Blue Dress On”, the group’s highest-charting single at #4, as well as “Sock It to Me, Baby!”, a #6 hit in 1967, and “Jenny Take a Ride”, which reached #10 in 1965.
. . . . . . . . . .
In 1967, Crewe and Gaudio scored one of their greatest successes with “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You”, recorded by Frankie Valli with The Four Seasons. The song reached #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earned a gold record. Subsequently, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” has been recorded by a number of international vocalists and bands through the years. The 1968 version by singer Andy Williams climbed to #5 on the UK Singles Chart. Also achieving chart status over the decades were such other English-language versions as those by The Lettermen, Maureen McGovern, and Lauryn Hill. The song has also been heard in numerous motion pictures, including The Deer Hunter, The Fabulous Baker Boys, Conspiracy Theory, 10 Things I Hate About You, Drop Dead Gorgeous, and Bridget Jones’s Diary.
In 1969, Crewe collaborated with the singer known as Oliver, including the production of his pop hit “Jean”, a song written by poet Rod McKuen that served as theme to the Oscar-winning film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie starring Maggie Smith. Crewe also produced a hit single of Oliver performing the optimistic “Good Morning Starshine” from the rock musical Hair. The song reached #3 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and Easy Listening singles surveys.
. . . . . . . . . .
Another Bob Crewe-Kenny Nolan collaboration, “Lady Marmalade”, recorded by Labelle, became notorious for its sexually provocative, New Orleans-inflected chorus, “Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, ce soir?” The song became a radio and dance club sensation. It achieved status as the #1 chart-topper of 1975 and has since been used in numerous motion pictures including Cheech and Chong’s The Corsican Brothers, Beethoven, Carlito’s Way, The Birdcage, The Long Kiss Goodnight, and Semi-Pro.
The 1980s and Beyond
In 1984, a collaboration by Crewe and writers Jerry Corbetta and Bob Gaudio produced another Billboard Top 100 success with the romantic duet “You’re Looking Like Love To Me”, sung by Roberta Flack and Peabo Bryson. Another Crewe-Corbetta project united them with singer-songwriter-producer Ellie Greenwich for whom they produced the original cast album for Greenwich’s Broadway musical Leader of the Pack. The album was a Grammy Award nominee and the show itself was nominated for a Tony Award.
In 1985, Crewe was inducted into the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame.
“Lady Marmalade” was re-recorded by Christina Aguilera, Lil’ Kim, Mýa, and Pink for the soundtrack of the 2001 film Moulin Rouge!, and this version stayed at #1 in the U.S. for five weeks. It repeated the same chart position in the United Kingdom and Australia. Rolling Stone ranked “Lady Marmalade” as the 479th greatest song of all time.
In 1999, when the US performing rights and royalties organization BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) announced its Top 100 Songs of the Century, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” landed in the top ten with six million airplays or BMI calculates one million continuous performances of a song of the average length (3 minutes) as representing 5.7 years of continuous airplay.
. . . . . . . . . .
From April 2014 until his death, Crewe resided in a Scarborough, Maine nursing home. Crewe died in the nursing home on September 11, 2014, at the age of 83. He had been in declining health for several years following a fall. His Bob Crewe Foundation donated $3 million to the Maine College of Art in April 2014.
Selected U.S. singles (written and/or produced by)
US peak chart position on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart follows the song title. Only singles that reached a position of #30 or higher on the Hot 100 are listed here.
1957: “Silhouettes”, #3.
1957: “Daddy Cool”, #10.
1958: “La Dee Dah”, #9.
1959: “Lucky Ladybug”, #14.
1962: “Sherry”, #1
1962: “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, #1
1963: “Walk Like a Man, #1
1964: “Dawn (Go Away)”, #3
1964: “Ronnie”, #6
1964: “Navy Blue”, #6
1964: “Rag Doll, #1
1964: “Save It For Me”, #10
1964: “Big Man in Town”, #20
1965: “Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby, Goodbye)”, #12 (“Bye Bye Baby” on initial release)
1965: “Let’s Hang On!”, #3
1965: “A Lover’s Concerto,” #2
1965: “Silhouettes,” #5 [Herman’s Hermits cover]
1965: “Girl Come Running,” #30
1965: “Jenny Take A Ride,” #10
1966: “Devil With A Blue Dress On,” #4
1966: “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine,” #13
1967: “Sock It To Me, Baby,” #6
1967: “Music To Watch Girls By,” #15
1967: “Silence Is Golden,” #11 [Tremeloes cover]
1967: “Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You,” #2
1967: “I Make a Fool of Myself,” #18
1967: “To Give (The Reason I Live),” #29
1969: “Jean,” #2
1969: “Good Morning, Starshine,” #6
1974: “Lady Marmalade”, #1
1974: “Get Dancin’,” #10
1975: “Swearin’ To God”, #6
1975: “My Eyes Adored You,” #1
1975: “I Wanna Dance Wit’ Choo,” #23
1975: “The Proud One,” #22 [The Osmonds cover]
2001: “Lady Marmalade”, #1 [Christina Aguilera cover]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Crewe
* * * * *
Other Notable Musicians’ Deaths…
September 2014
15: Jackie Cain, 86, American jazz vocalist (Jackie and Roy), complications from a stroke.
14: Peter Gutteridge, 53, New Zealand singer and guitarist (The Clean, The Chills, Snapper) (death announced on this date).
12: Salah El Mahdi, 89, Tunisian musicologist and composer; John Gustafson, 72, English singer and bassist (Ian Gillan Band, Roxy Music, The Big Three); Andrea Marongiu, British-Italian drummer (Crystal Fighters); Joe Sample, 75, American jazz musician (The Crusaders), and songwriter (“One Day I’ll Fly Away”, “Street Life”); Tom Skeeter, 82, American music executive and manager, co-founder and owner of Sound City Studios. (death announced on this date); Zhou Weizhi, 98, Chinese musician and politician, minister of culture.
11: Bob Crewe, 82, American songwriter (“The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)”, “Lady Marmalade”) and record producer (The Four Seasons); Antoine Duhamel, 89, French composer and conductor; Cosimo Matassa, 88, American recording engineer and studio owner.
9: Firoza Begum, 84, Bangladeshi singer; Antonín Tucapský, 86, Czech-born British composer; Robert Young, 49, Scottish guitarist (Primal Scream) (body discovered on this date).
From http://www.wikipedia.com
* * * * *