vastar iner
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 15, 2010 21:51:25 GMT 1
And we go from comedy to the diametric opposite. Arnee & The TerminatersAnyone remember TOTP2 when it was voiced by Johnny Walker? Fairly gentle and genteel comments about the acts which were genuinely informed and encouraging. Then it turned out he was spending squillions on marching powder and he had his marching orders. Replaced by a gentleman whose powers of insight generally extended to "hey! Look at his funny trousers!" Yes, Radio 1 DJ Steve Wright, forcible exposure to whom nearly drove me mad at my first job. "Teenage Mutant Ninja Accountants." Laugh? I nearly started. All bloody afternoon. A number of Radio 1 DJs had turned themselves into pop stars of a middling sort; Tony Blackburn had had a couple of minor hits, Kenny Everett a top ten with the Snot Rap, and Mike "Guinness Book Of Hit Singles" Read had twice bubbled under. Most successful of these were probably Dave Lee Travis and Paul Burnett, who had adopted the monicker Laurie Lingo And The Dipsticks, and who hit the top five with the CW McCall take-off Convoy GB. In and out of the charts with almost indecent haste in those days - seven weeks. An era when the DJs were bigger than the people they were playing... Anyhoo, Steve Wright was another one of these wannabe popstars. Under the name Young Steve & The Afternoon Boys he had even slightly brushed against the top 40. He also had a couple of other hits, including "The Gay Cavalieros" (oh dear), under his own name, and then came Arnee. Basically a couple of blokes from his afternoon show, Richard Easter (main sidekick and creator of some of Wrights hilarious characters, including Arnee, who knocked the song together in a couple of hours, and it shows) and Mike Woolmans producing it, with some minimal input from Wright. And with all that free publicity, it made the top five... Easter moved into television scripts, and Wright moved on to ruin TOTP2 and lots of other things. However, time for another special quick bonus track: Mr FoodActually the second, given the DLT mention above, but this ties in with this entry more. Dave Sanderson now records under the name Flowerbed butfrom 1989 to 2002 he wrote jingles for the Steve Wright show. One of them, a series of quickfire Geordie paeans to the comestibles of our time, got taken on by a small label and released as a single. Too small, as it turned out; demand outstripped supply and mercifully the song missed the top fifty.
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 16, 2010 20:54:38 GMT 1
Tight FitAnother slight cheat, here, mainly because it's not a pseudonym per se, but more a creation a la Ohio Players. But worth a mention for reasons which will become clearer at the end. Medleymania hit the world in 1981, after Dutch producer Jaap Eggermont was asked by a local record label boss to do a legit version of a bootleg medley. He got a bunch of session musicians to do a series of covers of 1960s classics and stuck them together to make one single. "Stars On 45" by Starsound became a number 2 hit in Britain; in the States it hit number 1, albeit (for copyright reasons) with every single song covered mentioned in the title, to give the slightly more cumbersome single title "Medley: Intro "Venus" / Sugar, Sugar / No Reply / I'll Be Back / Drive My Car / Do You Want to Know a Secret / We Can Work It Out / I Should Have Known Better / Nowhere Man / You're Going to Lose That Girl / Stars on 45". (Introvenus. Heh.) Anyhoo, everyone seemed to jump on the bandwagon; there were medley hits by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Gidea Park (Beach Boys and Four Seasons segued together by producer and Eurovision failure [wrote a song for Liquid Gold, who were the real-life Creme Brulee in finishing 2nd to Bucks Fizz] Adrian Baker, who, in a weird twist, ended up playing with the Beach Boys), This Year's Blonde (guess who?), The Hollies (had they no shame?), the Portsmouth Sinfonia (which has to be heard to be believed - so here it is - and Tight Fit. The latter was a bunch of musicians vaguely resembling Darts, with a cast of thousands, performing a rip-off medley, put together by producer Ken Gold for Jive Records. A couple of hits, one big, one small, and the idea of medleys went away again until Jive Bunny. Who made one pine for myxomatosis. Anyhoo, Jive still had the rights to the name, so when they decided instead to have medleys but a proper song they brought in Tim Friese-Greene, on his way to becoming a member of Talk Talk and an occasional performer (with Praying Mantis) as well as a writer/producer to have a go. He brought in Roy Ward, former drummer of City Boy (5-7-0-5 fame) to sing the Tokens/Karl Denver classic "Wimoweh", and fellow bandmember Chris Dunn on guitar. Thing is, forgotten Brummie AOR drummers-turned-singers were not really the image that fitted Jive's plans, and the record was not the kind of thing that would be best portrayed by a bunch of soul/teddyboys and girls, so instead Jive got models Steve Grant, Denise Gyngell and Julie Harris in to front. And they ended up with a number one hit. If you take a peek at the video (which apparently is taken from Pat Sharpe's House Of Fun, there's a horror movie concept if ever I've heard one), you will notice Gyngell and Harris mugging for the cameras with various false fauna and flora. What you will not hear is any female singing voices... By the follow-up single ("Fantasy Island") the toothsome threesome WERE singing for real (well, studio-tweaked, but Grant showed an uncanny ability to imitate Ward's falsetto), and even sang live on a tour of Butlins holiday camps backed by Paul Young's old band The Q-Tips. Then the girls were replaced, and the whole thing collapsed in a welter of recrimination. Friese-Greene went on to produce the Nolans before joining Talk Talk and now works under the name Heligoland. Ward did perform with Tight Fit - in the lion costume on TOTP - and plays in a Bee Gees tribute band (see? It's ALL linked). Gyngell and Harris perform under the Tight Fit name, occasionally with Grant, and were seen in the papers about 25 years ago complaining about the royalty rate from a record he never appeared on. So again maybe a stretch to include, on the basis that for one single Tight Fit were essentially a good proportion of City Boy, but there's a more relevant reason. Denise Gyngell may have left Tight Fit, but she gained something. A husband. Someone whose chart debut came under a pseudonym, but for which I cannot find a video, or even a sound sample... 14-18...a chap who was assistant head of A&R on Magnet Records and heard a World War 1 tune on a Worthingtons advert. Obvious thought - it should be released. Problem - the singer (Chris Neill) didn't want to do it. Solution - do it himself. Use friends from the local pub to fill in the voices. As a result the song "Goodbye-ee" under a year-based pseudonym became the first chart hit for Pete Waterman.
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Post by raliverpool on Jul 16, 2010 21:01:13 GMT 1
Radio 1 DJs as popstars never a good idea, just look at that ghastly Chris Moyles album last year whose parodies were so hideously unfunny (his only good parody "Stanta" never got clearance from Eminem's people for the album) they make Katie Brand's seem like a Spike Milligan comedy genius in comparison. Although didn't Peter Powell's Aerobic Keep Fit albums do well in the early to mid 1980s?
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 16, 2010 21:07:38 GMT 1
He had a top ten, mirabile dictu, although when I think of people called Powell I'd like to see sweaty and panting in skimpy clothing I would tend to think of Jenny rather than Peter. I'd like to see Moyles cover "I Believe I Can Fly" by trying to demonstrate his belief from the Humber Bridge.
I suppose it would be too much of a giveaway to reveal the next entry is also a DJ parody....
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 17, 2010 18:09:08 GMT 1
The Shirehorses
At least these DJs had a smidgeon of musical credibility. Mark and Lard, Mark Radcliffe and Marc Riley. Riley had been in the charts before, as one of the many, many, many who had suffered through being a member of the ever-rotating supporting cast to Mark E Smith in The Fall; he appeared on the album "Hex Enduction Hour" which made number 71 in 1982. Riley was sacked early the following year, went on to form The Creepers with some other Fallen and feuded with Smith in a song-diss war ("C.R.E.E.P." versus "Jumper Clown", you choose). Along with Charlie Brooker he contributed to Viz' younger brother comic Oink! (Brooker went from that to Konnie Huq, where did I go wrong?). From 1991 he tag-teamed with Radcliffe on Radio 1.
Radcliffe was a more bog-standard DJ who had risen via oop north and Radio 5 (before the Live appendage) when he teamed with Riley; the two prepared spoof songs as part of their shtick and when they did a parody of "Love Is The Law" by John Squier's new band The Seahorses (anyone notice this is an anagram of He Hates Roses?) they adopted the spoof name The Shirehorses. Which stuck. They used it for two albums - the second of which, Our Kid Eh, made the top 20 - before they ran their course and split between Radios 2 and 6.
They also released material under another name...
Fat Harry White And The Love Limited Orchestra
...basically Radcliffe's voice run slowly through a transponder to imitate the Walrus' basso profundo.
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 18, 2010 11:32:25 GMT 1
Manuel And His Music Of The MountainsYou would think that likes of The Ting Tings, Eden Kane, The Small Faces and loads of others would share the record for the shortest length of time at number one in the singles chart, on the basis that their sole (to date) chart-toppers headed the list on precisely one "official" published listing. Some wag might however argue that the above act managed to beat that. Number one for three hours. Johnnie Walker (another link) played the chart for the week of 28 February 1976 on the Tuesday, which had the above tune - "Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto De Aranjez" - climbing from number 4 to number 1. Thing is, there were so many odd movements in the chart, that it was clear something had gone wrong. By evening, DLT (!!!) had invited a BRMB spokeswoman onto Radio 1 to explain that there had been a catastrophic computer error, and she read out the new, corrected chart, which had The Four Seasons retaining the top spot with "Oh What A Night", perhaps the most successful song about losing your virginity to a prostitute. But that wag would be wrong. Because Manuel, albeit with music for watercourses, had already had a number one hit that lasted a bit longer. Get out your copy of Danny Williams' classic " Moon River". Or look very very very closely at the link. Beneath the Williams credit you will see "Geoff Love And His Orchestra". The very man and orchestra behind Manuel. What's more, it wasn't even Love's only number one; his orchestra backed Shirley Bassey on "Reach For The Stars" and received credit on the label, if not, for some obscure reason, in the chart books. And Love's chart success did not stop there. He had a US number one. Backing the precociously-vocally-rich teenager Laurie London on the gospel number " He's Got The Whole World In His Hands". So, not quite the near-miss that it could have been. Love was a rarity on the singles chart in those days - a black British star (along with Kenny Lynch and, to extend it to the Commonwealth, Winifred Atwell and a few others), well, to be more accurate, half-black, his father being a dancer from Trinidad and his mother a touring actress from Todmorden. He became a professional trombonist soon after leaving school and in the thirties was a resident in London jazz clubs. During the war, he acted as a musical arranger for the Green Jackets' brass band, and took this experience into his post-war career, as he worked as an orchestral arranger with the legendary Norrie Paramor in the fifties. He was in such demand from record labels that he was able to start his own orchestra, which also backed Judy Garland, Paul Robeson, Alma Cogan, Anne Shelton, Pearl Carr and Teddy Johnson and Frankie Vaughan, as well as literally dozens of others. On hearing a Wally Stott arrangement of a Greek tune (Stott's orchestra backed Bassey on her other number one "As I Love You"), Love thought that he could do something with a more emphatic guitar sound. So he created the Manuel alter ego in 1959 to re-record the song - " The Honeymoon Song" - and had a minor hit. He tried to keep his identity secret, but he was too successful; the success of "Never On Sunday" blew it wide open. Nevertheless he kept the pseudonym for the guitar-based work to avoid confusing orchestral music fans. His final musical project was founding the Young Person's Concert Foundation in 1981, a charity for introducing orchestral music to children, and toured the schools with his students for years. Even after his formal retirement Love remained in music, returning to his native Yorkshire and supervising brass band festivals until his death in 1991. You may remember his elder son Adrian, a Radio 2 DJ, who sadly died a few years later from the after-effects of a car crash.
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 21, 2010 20:55:51 GMT 1
One last one for the time being...another theme coming up...if there are any other suggestions under this one, feel free to bump it up. The TimelordsAh, it had to be done. Jimmy Cauty used to be the guitarist in the indie-funk band Brilliant, which also featured ex-Killing Joke and soon-to-be-top producer Youth; Bill Drummond had been in Scouse musical university Big In Japan, with Holly Johnson, Julian Cope and Ian Broudie before moving into AOR. Drummond signed Brilliant to WEA and the duo sort of clicked. Looking to move into hip-hop in 1987, Drummond basically sounded out Cauty with a view to forming a duo, and became The Justified Ancients Of Mu Mu (the name taken from a group of inside operatives in the Illuminatus! book trilogy - Drummond and Cauty being the fifth column within the music industry). And promptly got sued to Hades for their constant nicking of uncleared samples. Mixing Sam Fox with the Beatles and the Smiths with Abba. It all ended in tears - and tiers of injuncted records being destroyed. Destruction would become a JAMMs theme. Anyhoo, having lost a stack of money, they decided to make a stack, and formed a plan to have a number one hit. So they cleared crowd-pleasing samples from the Doctor Who theme, "Blockbuster" and, most importantly, Gary Glitter's "Rock & Roll Part I" (the bit without Glitter), chose a typical one-hit-wonder name, and topped the charts. Simples. So simple that Drummond and Cauty wrote a book, "The Manual", which fetches eye-watering prices on the second-hand market now but which is available in bittorrent form - a fitting breach of copyright for the band that disdained copyright. The book itself proved influential - Austrian DJ duo Edelweiss copied it slavishly (I remember the Sun's "exclusive" that their hit "Bring Me Edelweiss" was a copy of Abba's "SOS", you can't put anything past them), and remained influential to more recent times, Bobby Barry and Julia Clark-Lowes having the idea of forming The Pipettes when discussing it in a Brighton pub. (Which I visited on a Pip-grimage.) Anyhoo, it was only ever going to be a one-off, and they reverted to the JAMMs name as well as re-monickering themselves The KLF - Kopyright Liberation Front - to global acclaim and burning a million quid. To be fair, the Timelords appelation wasn't the most opaque of pseudonyms, even The Chart Show's often ludicrous bubbles nailed it correctly on release, but whatever. One hopes that the KLF oeuvre will be made re-available some day...
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 22, 2010 19:36:17 GMT 1
Aaaand precisely 12 hours after posting what I thought was the last one, I thought of another...
The Commentators
Linked with Spitting Image, on the basis that this is the pseudonym used by the chap that did the cricket commentator voices. None other than Rory Bremner, who scored a top twenty hit in 1985 on his way to superstardom. Perhaps helped by the broadcast on television of the historical drama "Bodyline", a rendering of the controversial England tour to Australia in 1932, which saw England regain the Ashes by the simple expedient of aiming the ball at Donald Bradman rather than the wicket.
Whichever way, this record, on the back of a sell-out nationwide tour and performances on Radio 4, enabled Bremner to gain a modicum of mainstream publicity, and within a couple of years he had his own television series.
Paul Hardcastle was tickled by the idea of having his record parodied, and agreed to twiddle the production knobs. Hardcastle's manager advised against it; more proof that Simon Fuller's presence on the planet is of positive detriment.
What makes this record even more astounding, is that it is historically accurate...
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Post by Earl Purple on Jul 22, 2010 21:58:00 GMT 1
Geoff Love (Manuel & The Music of the Mountains) was father of the DJ Adrian Love.
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 23, 2010 8:36:02 GMT 1
Last line.
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Post by vastar iner on Aug 22, 2010 10:44:18 GMT 1
Found out something doing research for the next entry in Theme 2 - the lead vocalist for the original Tight Fit (the Back To The Sixties version) was Paul Da Vinci. For more on him, see Theme 2 shortly...
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Post by vastar iner on Aug 29, 2010 20:41:58 GMT 1
Silicon TeensWhat do you do if you're a synth pioneer who cannot get anything released because you're so different to everything that has come before? Form your own label, of course. Step forward (not the label, the metaphor) Dan Miller. He had worked with synths at the Guildford College of Art when he was studying there in the late sixties, and went to Switzerland to work just as Can and Kraftwerk were beginning to make moves. Thoroughly infused with the spirit of synth, he returned to Britain as punk took off. A DIY ethic, not caring what anyone else thought...it was perfectly set up for new wave. Miller saved up for a synth and recorded a debut single for Mute under the name The Normal, and a follow-up for a mate of his, Frank Tovey, aka Fad Gadget. The problem came when Miller found an old Chuck Berry songbook, and wondered what Berry would sound like if he used synths. The result? An intriguing cover that people begged him to release. Not wanting to use the name The Normal for a one-off issue, Miller just thought about what name a bunch of teenagers who had eschewed guitars would adopt. All based on the silicon chip, so... Silicon Teens remained Miller's name for recording old tunes reinterpreted via the synth - and eventually Miller had a much greater output under that name than under The Normal. Silicon Teens never made the chart; Mute Records went on to be one of the biggest indie labels ever until EMI ruined them.
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Post by vastar iner on Sept 29, 2010 7:44:23 GMT 1
Little bump, because... The CrystalsA group of girls known as The Blossoms, led by Darlene Love. ...Darlene Love is a nominee for 2011's Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
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Post by vastar iner on Dec 15, 2010 21:22:20 GMT 1
And Darlene Love is an inductee to the 2011 Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame.
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Post by vastar iner on Jan 30, 2011 0:12:40 GMT 1
Enoch Light & The Light BrigadeOne of the most unusual pop successes, Enoch Light should really never have had the number ones he did; the era of the big band had passed in the 1940s and his particular orchestra had studiously avoided the charts. Indeed, Light's own performance career had pretty much come to an end, as he moved into record management. He proved such a success in that that he became president of the budget label Waldorf. Which led to a very unexpected direction. Light had been a violinist before a car accident and wartime service saw him take up the baton, and he gained an appreciation of purity of music that saw in him an ambition to create the perfect recording. His position at Waldorf meant that he could create his own sub-label. Waldorf had been famous for budget recordings capitalizing on the Crazy Otto phenomenon, namely honkytonk piano thrashes in garish covers, usually performed by Knuckles O'Toole, which would ordinarily be a separate entry; there was no such person, and the tunes were played by other musicians, such as Billy Rowland and Dick Hyman. But Light gradually moved away from that into something more worthy. Waldorf became Grand Award, and continued in similar vein, but Light himself started up Command Records. A very different kettle of fish. Because he wanted to cater for a brand new audience. Audiophiles. Shellac was a pretty brittle and brutal medium; the creation of vinyl for records in the late 1940s enabled albums to become a single disc item rather than as had been previous, a literal photo album type thing of half-a-dozen 78s. Still many of these recordings were in mono. Until the late 1950s. Suddenly, people realized that they could have stereo recordings in a medium that could record faithfully. That is where Command stepped in. They produced records that could show off the capabilities of stereo. And which were a cut above that which were normally commercially available. You can see the impact from the first release, "Persuasive Percussion", which had a clean, modernist, minimalist cover, with both stereo tracks carrying different elements. What's more, Light invented something else to enable the audiophile to get the full SP; the gatefold sleeve. Not enough room on the back for the full techie bits, so he just put it across the middle. This first album falls under this category; I have seen it credited to Enoch Light & The Light Brigade numerous times. However the record does not do so; the sleeve rightly credits the real performers, Terry Snyder & The All Stars, and even lists the members, including pianist Dick Hyman. The label itself does not mention an artist credit, just says "starring Terry Snyder and featuring...", listing the All Star members. Seems that there's confusion with the original Light Brigade... Light moved on from "mere" recording tape to recording on 35mm film to reduce distortion. The first of these albums, "Stereo 35mm", was recorded live at Carnegie Hall, and credited to Enoch Light & His Orchestra; again it has been credited in numerous sources to The Light Brigade. Technically, it was Light's orchestra, in that it was an orchestra brought together by Light, but really an assemblage of musicians who released material on Command (such as Hyman and Doc Severinsen) and not an orchestra in the "record" sense. The album quickly reached number one in the Billboard Stereo charts - with another Carnegie recording, a Judy Garland concert, at number two. Light had a number of chart successes in the following year, but Command moved more into technically challenging recordings to test hi-fi capabilities, such as "Dimension 3" (this time definitely credited to The Light Brigade, but not of course the 1940s Light Brigade), which via an audio illusion sounded as if it came from three speakers. In 1965 Light sold Command (and Grand Award) to ABC Records, and although the names and series were continued, they didn't have the same musical intensity. Instead this was reserved for Light's new label, Project 3, which produced high-end material until after Light's retirement in 1974. It was a sadly short-lived retirement as he died in 1978. Project 3 did not last much longer.
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Post by vastar iner on Mar 29, 2011 21:21:52 GMT 1
M*A*S*HDante takes us on a mission through the degradations of the dead. Through wind, storms, mud, lakes of fire. Until he reaches the very depths of Hell. Where the ultimate sinners lie. Encased in ice. In the exact centre is Satan, weeping, forever chewing on Judas, Cassius and Brutus. What Dante doesn't mention is that this song is playing, on near-permanent loop. It was of course the theme for the film M*A*S*H, Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, a comedy about the medics in the Korean War. Later translated to the small screen where it became one of the most popular programmes ever in the States. Mysteriously so, it seemed about as funny as a dose of clap to me, but whatever, this is the country that produced Will Ferrell after all. The song was co-written by the immensely experienced songsmith Johnny Mandel - still working in his ninth decade - and Mike Altman, son of film director Robert, who wrote the lyrics aged 14 and who made more in royalties than his father as a result. The single was released in 1970, attributed to The Mash, and bombed; it became a number one hit ten years later thanks to endless promotion from the bearded gnome Noel Edmonds, another musical crime for which he will be tortured for eternity, one hopes. But, be it The Mash, or M*A*S*H, who was the group? None other than the Ron Hicklin Singers, formed around the nucleus of Hicklin and the Bahler brothers. Very experienced in the session world, they had provided the backing for most of the sixties and seventies hits - you could hear them behind Ray Conniff, The Monkees, The Union Gap, Cher, Keith Moon (!) and dozens of others, as well as providing themes for programmes like Happy Days. M*A*S*H was not the only group name under which the Hicklin Singers hit the charts... The Partridge FamilyThe vocals were all Hicklin, the Bahlers and Jackie Ward, other than on a few singles where David Cassidy managed to get himself on the front as the genuine singer (and credited accordingly, with, once or twice, Shirley Jones as well). Bonaduce and the one from LA Law never appeared, and the bulk of the successful albums were Hicklin and mates. (Incidentally, the Partridge Family was based on The Cowsills, and the fictional telly group shared songwriters with the real-life family; indeed the Cowsills were originally scheduled to be the stars of the show, but couldn't act...)
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Post by vastar iner on Jul 14, 2011 21:52:51 GMT 1
Joe "Fingers" CarrRagtime pianos had a new lease of life in the 1950s; Winifred Attwell scored a couple of number one hits and Crazy Otto had a gigantic number one single in the States. One person who ostensibly got on the bandwagon was Joe Carr, nicknamed "Fingers", who had a one-off hit with the above song. It wasn't Carr's first chart appearance, he had hit the US top ten in 1950 with "Sam's Song". But after this no more was heard of him. Who was Joe Carr? Some bar player or burlesque accompanier or something? No - he was an orchestra leader who had had a few other hits. Under his real name, with a c added to make it more distinct. Carr was none other than Lou Busch... Busch had been around the industry for most of his life, and post-World War 2 was recruited by Capitol as an A&R man. Really, the Carr name came first on record; his honkytonk arrangements for Jo Stafford were so popular that he released a bunch of records under his pseudonym (and one of them formed part of the Crazy Otto medley), but he had started as Busch, and he would finish as Busch. His biggest hit under his own name - indeed, his only British hit, and barely making the Billboard 100 - was "Zambezi", later covered by Brighton's Piranhas.
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Post by vastar iner on Mar 31, 2012 23:02:41 GMT 1
Shannon
Looks a bit like Marty Wilde, no? And the clue being that the name "Marty Wilde" crops up on a screen chyron.
This is however a bit of an oddity. Reg Smith was one of the British answers to Johnnie Ray, a softer, more family friendly version of this new fangled rock & roll, part of the Larry Parnes stable of Vince Eager and Billy Fury and so on. As Marty Wilde he had half-a-dozen top ten hits in the early sixties, and one top fifty in the US, but nothing chartwise after 1962.
Then in 1969 a song called "Abergavenny" made it to number 47 in the Hot 100. Written by a chap called Frere Manston with a well-known Wilde collaborator Ronnie Scott (no, not that one, the "It's A Heartache" one). Manston was a Reg Smith pseudonym, and so was the name printed on the single sleeve and label - Shannon. No idea why, I'm afraid, or why a small American label took a punt on a bubblegum record that missed the UK charts, but at least it gave Heritage Records a minor hit.
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Post by vastar iner on Nov 3, 2012 12:33:06 GMT 1
The House Of Zekkariyas
In 1993 an American couple, with their family, moved to Africa. They changed their surname to a more African-sounding Zekkariyas; he changed his name to Zekuumba, she changed hers to Zeniya. They started to record more house- and African-influenced music. Indeed they still record, albeit without any regular output. This, their second single as House Of Zekkariyas, briefly bothered the singles charts.
They had already however had a few hits, one extremely substantial.
Their original surnames?
Womack. And, of course, Womack.
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Post by vastar iner on Dec 27, 2013 23:38:52 GMT 1
Quick Christmas revival to see if anyone can shed light on this mystery...
The Snowmen
Pretty obvious that someone is doing an Ian Dury impression. Pretty obvious it's not Dury himself, despite the rumours. But any ideas who is? Well, the music was provided by the regular Stiff band (based at the recording studio and often appearing on TOTP backing various Stiff acts), and although it was put out on Slack Records, that in itself was a one-off name used by Stiff for this one-off hit...
...and Jona Lewie was one of Stiff's artists at the time. Having already had a pseudonymous hit as Terry Dactyl & The Dinosaurs and having a line in somewhat wry hitmaking. Could this be Mr Lewis himself poking a bit of fun at Dury? Perhaps...
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