Original Facebook Post / May 2015 / MAL RYDER and THE PRIMITIVES

 
 
 
These days, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones are thought of as classic rock bands who (among many other things) formed the two halves of the quintessential 1960’s rivalry, as though they basically came along at the same time and had the same impact on the youth culture.  To some extent, that is true, but there was always more acceptance of the Beatles – perhaps because the Stones were there to provide a worse alternative to parents and other adults who didn’t approve of the Beatles’ music and long hair and all the rest of it. 
 
The above photo of the Rolling Stones from Mad magazine is one that I remember well from my younger days, not because the gag was all that great – the balloon quote from Mick Jagger is:  “I’d like people to consider me as something more than ‘just another pretty face’!” – but because the band was apparently at some sort of news conference, and there were name tags in front of each of them.  Almost as soon as we heard about the Beatles, we knew their names, “John, Paul, Georgeand Ringo”, and even casual fans typically knew the surnames as well.  But it wasn’t like that with the Rolling Stones
 
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There is a great story in Keith Richards’ autobiography, Life about a chance meeting that he had with Mick Jagger; I saw something on TV about it also, probably on CBS Sunday Morning.  In a series called Letters of Note that was printed (or reprinted) in The Huffington Post is this section of a letter that Keith Richards wrote to his aunt about this meeting – I think the very next day: 
 
“You know I was keen on Chuck Berry and I thought I was the only fan for miles but one mornin’ on Dartford Stn. [that’s so I don’t have to write a long word like station] I was holding one of Chuck’s records when a guy I knew at primary school 7-11 yrs y’know came up to me.  He’s got every record Chuck Berry ever made and all his mates have too, they are all rhythm and blues fans, real R&B I mean (not this Dinah ShoreBrook Benton crap), Jimmy ReedMuddy Waters, ChuckHowlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker, all the Chicago bluesmen, real lowdown stuff, marvelous.  Bo Diddley he’s another great. 
 

“Anyways the guy on the station, he is called Mick Jagger and all the chicks and the boys meet every Saturday morning in the ‘Carousel’ some juke-joint.  Well one morning in Jan. I was walking past and decided to look him up.” 

I think I also remember Keith’s saying in that letter, or telling his mother or something, that Mick Jagger was going to be famous. 

 

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Anyway, Mick Jagger was about the only member of the band who was generally well known by name among the kids that I knew, with Keith Richards less so.  Actually he wasn’t even Keith Richards in the early part of the band’s history; as explained in Wikipedia:  “After the Rolling Stones signed to Decca Records in 1963, their band manager, Andrew Loog Oldham dropped the ‘s’ from Richards’ surname believing ‘Keith Richard’ in his words ‘looked more pop’.  In the early 1970’sRichards re-established the ‘s’ in his surname.” 

 

Hardly anyone knew the other band members in the Rolling Stones; well, maybe multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones – unquestionably the most under-appreciated Stone (who was saddled with the title of “lead guitarist” while playing alongside Keith Richards) – who was the “cute one” with the blond hair.  But the two men who are rightfully renowned as the greatest rhythm section in the history of rock music – bass guitarist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts – were virtually unknown to the American public.  Or at least, until I saw that photo in Mad, I certainly didn’t know their names or what they looked like. 

 

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People who have known me a long time might wonder why I don’t talk about music nearly so much as I write about it.  I guess I have known for a long time that my tastes aren’t exactly mainstream, and that is part of it, even though I have loved a lot of the big hits over the years.  But I have also had a few bad experiences over the years that have left an impression. 

 

Once I was listening to the radio, and I heard a terrific Rolling Stones song, “Tell Me”.  As I remember, I was so captivated that I immediately got on my bicycle and pedaled down to our local record store, Reznick’s (“It’s been Reznick’s for Records, for Years”) and searched around the 45’s until I found the song. 

 

I don’t think that I even played the record myself before rushing over to my two best friends among the neighborhood kids, Billy Dalton and Waltie Baker.  “Wait till you hear this”, I exclaimed – but they didn’t like Tell Me much at all and started laughing at me about midway through.  It usually doesn’t take more than just the one time for me to clam up after something like that. 

 

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The thing is, Tell Me didn’t sound as great to me either while I was playing it; I puzzled about it for years.  I picked up the song years later on the first Rolling Stones album, The Rolling Stones – or actually, in the US, it was called England’s Newest Hit Makers.  As far as I could tell, that was the same version that was on the single. 

 

Just a couple of years ago, I finally found out what was going on when I read the discussion by Richie Unterberger in Allmusic about the differences between the American and the English releases of the first Stones album:  “[T]he main difference lies in the version of ‘Tell Me’ included here, which sounds about two generations hotter than any edition of the song ever released in the U.S. – it’s the long version, with the break that was cut from the single, but the British LP and the original late-’80s Decca U.K. compact disc (820 047-2) both contain a version without any fade, running the better part of a minute longer than the U.S. release of the song, until the band literally stops playing.”  Apparently that DJ had gotten his hands on a copy of the British version of the song, and I was fortunate enough to hear it that one time at an impressionable age. 

 

The New Rolling Stone Record Guide review of the first Rolling Stones album, The Rolling Stones calls it “the greatest white rhythm and blues album of all time.  That isn’t an opinion; it’s a fact.”  

 

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Tell Me was one of the earliest Rolling Stones singles and the first song credited to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards – that is, Jagger/Richards – that was used as the “A” side of a single release.  Come On, a Chuck Berry song was their first 45, as I wrote about several months ago.  

 

Their second single was actually a Lennon/McCartney song, “I Wanna Be Your Man”; from Wikipedia “According to various accounts, either the Rolling Stones’ manager/producer Andrew Loog Oldham or the Rolling Stones themselves ran into [John] Lennon and [Paul] McCartney on the street as the two were returning from an awards luncheon.  Hearing that the band were in need of material for a single, Lennon and McCartney went to their session at De Lane Lea Studio and finished off the song – whose verse they had already been working on – in the corner of the room while the impressed Rolling Stones watched.” 

 

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Like many of the British Invasion bands, the Rolling Stones primarily played and recorded R&B classics and were slow to begin writing their own songs.  By contrast, the Beatles were recording mostly new material, and this seemed to be more popular at least with American audiences – the Fab Four scored one #1 single after another over here, beginning with I Want to Hold Your Hand in February 1964.   

 

Though that was not the only time the song was released on a 45, I Wanna Be Your Man became the “B” side for the first U.S. single by the Rolling Stones; the “A” side was their terrific cover of the Buddy Holly song, Not Fade Away that features a pounding Bo Diddley beat.  The Rolling Stones recording of I Wanna Be Your Man was only released as a single and did not appear on a studio album in either the US or the UK; it was included on several compilation albums in later years though, but was not released in the US until Singles Collection: The London Years (1989).  

 

Of course, the Beatles recorded their own version of “I Wanna be Your Man”; it was included on Meet the Beatles, with Ringo Starr on double-tracked lead vocals.  

 

Not Fade Away” was not included on any of the Stones’ British studio albums either, although thankfully, it was the opening track on their first American album.  A wealth of blues and R&B singles in a similar vein were released by the Rolling Stones and numerous other British bands in this time period, but none of them made much of an impression over here.  In fact, Allmusic reports that the Rolling Stones 45 discussed above, “Not Fade Away is the only one that did reasonably well on the Billboard charts; while the song reached #3 on the UK charts, it managed #48 in the US.    

 

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(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” was the Rolling Stones’ first #1 hit in America; and believe it or not, that did not happen until the Stones had released some 12 or 15 previous singles over nearly a two-year period.  Their previous Top 10 hits were Time Is on My Side and “The Last Time”.  “Satisfaction” was released in the US 50 years ago, in June 1965.  After that, there was no stopping them. 

 

I had heard from several people that Satisfaction had dirty lyrics; we’d heard the same rumors about Louie Louie.  The line that was mentioned to me (probably by a summer camp counselor) was:  “I’m trying to make some girl” – I said, okay, but I didn’t actually know what that meant at the time.

 

There is a post discussing the meaning of Satisfaction on the website shmoop.com, and that makes reference to another line that I didn’t really understand at the time either (although I eventually decided that this must be what was meant):  “The anti-commercial rant [in the early part of the song] rubbed some folks the wrong way, but [Mick] Jagger’s blunt recapitulation of his failed attempts to ‘make some girl’ was the real problem.  Radio stations hesitated to play the song.  Funnily enough, they were actually hung up on one of its tamer lines.  When the Stones appeared on Shindig, a variety TV show, standards-sensitive execs bleeped ‘And I’m tryin’ to make some girl’.  Meanwhile, the reference to a woman being on her period – ‘better come back later next week, ’cause you see I’m on a losing streak’ – made it on air with no problems at all.”

 

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The same post about “Satisfaction on shmoop.com also notes:  “Richards claims to have heard the [song’s opening] notes in a dream, as a dead-asleep epiphany in a Florida hotel.  Of course, this is Keith Richards we’re talking about — the distinctions between awake and asleep, day and night, are a bit sketchy for the hard-living rocker.  But whatever nocturnal state he was in, Richards was wise enough to record the historic riff on a cassette player before slipping back into it.  And the tape with the rock-changing riff (and about forty minutes of snoring) was enough to give Richards and his songwriting partner Mick Jagger a rolling start in the studio.”  

 

The guitar was run through a new toy that Keith Richards had purchased, a Gibson Maestro fuzzbox; the intention by Mick and Keith was to replace the guitar with horns.  But according to Wikipedia, they were outvoted by the other members of the Rolling Stones, as well as their manager Andrew Loog Oldham and sound engineer Dave Hassinger; and the song was released as it was.  As a result, Gibson sold completely out of fuzzboxes by the end of the year, and the fuzzbox sound became an integral part of the sound of the 1960’s

 

Initially I did not recognize the introductory music on the song as being played on a guitar; I thought that must be a saxophone.  That got some undeserved laughter thrown my way, as I remember it.  But I have to admit I had no clue that a fuzzbox was involved until just a few years ago.   

 

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The Jagger/Richards songwriting partnership is one of the keys of the success of the Rolling Stones over the years.  They have also partnered as record producers using the pseudonym the Glimmer Twins

 

John Lennon believes that their experience with “I Wanna Be Your Man was helpful in getting the songwriting team underway; as he related in the famous Playboy magazine interview in 1980 (a few months before his assassination):  “We were taken down to meet them at the club where they were playing in Richmond by Brian [Epstein] and some other guy.  They wanted a song and we went to see what kind of stuff they did.  Mick [Jagger] and Keith [Richards] heard we had an unfinished song – Paul [McCartney] just had this bit and we needed another verse or something.  We sort of played it roughly to them and they said, ‘Yeah, OK, that’s our style.’  But it was only really a lick, so Paul and I went off in the corner of the room and finished the song off while they were all still sitting there talking.  We came back, and that’s how Mick and Keith got inspired to write . . . because, ‘Jesus, look at that.  They just went in the corner and wrote it and came back!’  You know, right in front of their eyes we did it.  So we gave it to them.” 

 

Their manager and producer Andrew Loog Oldham kept emphasizing to the two of them that there just weren’t that many obscure great songs out there.  Although Mick Jagger disputes that it was really this literal, Keith Richards relates their first songwriting experience this way:  “So what Andrew Oldham did was lock us up in the kitchen for a night and say, ‘Don’t come out without a song.’  We sat around and came up with ‘As Tears Go By’.  It was unlike most Rolling Stones material, but that’s what happens when you write songs, you immediately fly to some other realm.  The weird thing is that Andrew found Marianne Faithfull at the same time, bunged it to her and it [‘As Tears Go By’] was a f--kin’ hit for her – we were songwriters already!  But it took the rest of that year to dare to write anything for the Stones.” 

 

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I found another great Keith Richards quote on SongFacts concerning The Last Time” – the 45 that was released right before Satisfaction – as taken from the 2003 book According to the Rolling Stones:  “We didn’t find it difficult to write pop songs, but it was VERY difficult – and I think Mick [Jagger] will agree – to write one for the Stones.  It seemed to us it took months and months and in the end we came up with The Last Time, which was basically re-adapting a traditional Gospel song that had been sung by the Staple Singers, but luckily the song itself goes back into the mists of time.  I think I was trying to learn it on the guitar just to get the chords, sitting there playing along with the record, no gigs, nothing else to do.  At least we put our own stamp on it, as the Staple Singers had done, and as many other people have before and since:  they’re still singing it in churches today.  It gave us something to build on to create the first song that we felt we could decently present to the band to play. . . .  ‘The Last Time’ was kind of a bridge into thinking about writing for the Stones.  It gave us a level of confidence; a pathway of how to do it.  And once we had done that, we were in the game.  There was no mercy, because then we had to come up with the next one.  We had entered a race without even knowing it.” 

 

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As with the songwriting teams that I wrote about last month, early on writing the music and writing the lyrics were handled separately.  From Wikipedia:  “One of the patterns that the Jagger/Richards collaboration initially followed has been that [Mick] Jagger wrote most of the lyrics while [Keith] Richards focused on the music.  Jagger discussed this in [a] 1995 interview with [Jann Wenner], whereby he explained how songs like ‘Get off of My Cloud’, ‘As Tears Go By’, ‘Wild Horses’, Tumbling Dice, and Beast of Burden’ were created.  Jagger has also pointed out that this pattern was more prevalent in the early 1960’s, while in their later collaborations their roles have overlapped more, with both of them contributing lyrics and music.” 

 

As with Lennon/McCartney, additionally some of the songs were written only by Mick Jagger, and others only by Keith Richards.  Wikipedia gives as examples that Mick Jagger wrote “Sympathy for the Devil” and “Brown Sugar”, and that Keith Richards wrote “Happy”, “Ruby Tuesday”, and “Little T&A”.  In the same 1995 interview mentioned above, Mick Jagger said:  “I think in the end it all balances out.” 

 

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I thought that I had remembered Mick Jagger going to “art school” – that being where his flair for the dramatic in his song lyrics came from – but as it turned out, I could not have been more wrong.  From Wikipedia “Jagger continued his business courses at the London School of Economics, and had seriously considered becoming either a journalist or a politician, comparing the latter to a pop star.”  He has described himself as always being a singer from his earliest days, but he turned out to be one hell of a songwriter as well. 

 

I often had trouble figuring out the lyrics to songs by the Rolling Stones; they are easy enough to snag off the Internet now, but sometimes it was hard for me to get it from playing the songs back in the day.  In some cases, I even went down to Reznick’s Records and leafed through their sheet music for Rolling Stones songs to find out what the lyrics said – occasionally on multiple occasions for the same song. 

 

Some of it was just that they were British – not so much their accents but the idiosyncrasies of English in England.  In “Get off of My Cloud” – one of the Stones’ non-grammatical song titles according to what my English teachers told me, as was (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction (in fact, this second #1 song was their next single) – the chorus was clear enough, like the great line:  “Don’t hang around, ’cause two’s a crowd”; but the first verse includes the lines: 

 

     Then in flies a guy who’s all dressed up just like a Union Jack

     And says, I’ve won five pounds if I have his kind of detergent pack. 

 

I knew about the British currency of “pounds” even when I was a little kid, and around here detergent comes in a “box” though I still knew what they meant.  However, it was a while before I learned the nickname of the British flag.  Then the final verse ends:

 

     It was so very quiet and peaceful

     There was nobody, not a soul around

     I laid myself out, I was so tired and I started to dream

     In the morning the parking tickets were just like

     A flag stuck on my windscreen

 

I wasn’t driving then of course, and I had no clue about what the last two lines meant – I’m sure I had seen parking tickets on a car before, but not a whole cluster of them.  And the British term for a car’s windshield, “windscreen” was totally foreign to me.  As a matter of fact, the website on the Internet where I got these lyrics just now didn’t even have it right – they had “window screen”. 

 

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19th Nervous Breakdown” is one of the Rolling Stones’ songs that illustrated to me just how dense and colorful their lyrics could be – the very concept just amazes me to this day (not that I was really clear on what a nervous breakdown was at age 15).  The verses tell the story of a mixed-up girl with all sorts of problems; the first two verses go: 

 

     You’re the kind of person you meet at certain dismal, dull affairs

     Center of a crowd, talking much too loud, running up and down the stairs

     Well, it seems to me that you have seen too much in too few years

     And though you’ve tried you just can’t hide your eyes are edged with tears

 

     When you were a child you were treated kind

     But you were never brought up right

     You were always spoiled with a thousand toys but still you cried all night

     Your mother who neglected you owes a million dollars tax

     And your father’s still perfecting ways of making sealing wax

 

Adding to my puzzlement of figuring out the meaning of these words from the sheet music at Reznick’s Records was the British spelling at the end, “ceiling wax”.  I know that I had seen sealing wax used in several movies (though I doubt I knew what it was called back then), but I couldn’t imagine what you would do with wax on a ceiling! 

 

And naturally, I completely missed the drug reference in the last verse (I guess I figured it was some sort of vacation): 

 

     On our first trip I tried so hard to rearrange your mind

     But after awhile I realized you were disarranging mine

 

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When Linda Ronstadt released her version of the Rolling Stones song “Tumbling Dice” (she and Mick Jagger dated for a while), I was reminded again of how masterful the Jagger/Richards team was at crafting song lyrics.  The song is included on her 1977 album Simple Dreams; Linda had to noticeably slow the tempo in order to get all of those words out of her mouth but still turns in a fine performance.  The Ronstadt concert that forms the focal point of the 1978 film FM also features Tumbling Dice.  But there was no need to look up the words that time; Linda Ronstadt included the lyrics on most of her albums, so they were right there on the album sleeve.  These are the original lyrics for “Tumbling Dice as the Stones sang them – I will just give all of them this time; they are that great: 

 

     Women think I’m tasty, but they’re always tryin’ to waste me

     And make me burn the candle right down,

     But baby, baby, I don’t need no jewels in my crown.

 

     ’Cause all you women is low down gamblers,

     Cheatin’ like I don’t know how,

     But baby, baby, there’s fever in the funk house now.

 

     This low down bitchin’ got my poor feet a itchin’,

     You know you know the deuce is still wild.

     Baby, I can’t stay, you got to roll me

     And call me the tumblin’ dice.

 

     Always in a hurry, I never stop to worry,

     Don’t you see the time flashin’ by.

     Honey, got no money,

     I’m all sixes and sevens and nines.

 

     Say now, baby, I’m the rank outsider,

     You can be my partner in crime.

     But baby, I can’t stay,

     You got to roll me and call me the tumblin’,

     Roll me and call me the tumblin’ dice.

 

     Oh, my, my, my, I’m the lone crap shooter,

     Playin’ the field ev’ry night.

     Baby, can’t stay,

     You got to roll me and call me the tumblin’ (dice),

     Roll me and call me the tumblin’ (Got to roll me.) dice.

     Got to roll me. Got to roll me.

 

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Linda Ronstadt isn’t the only woman to cover a song by the Rolling StonesBette Midler recorded “Beast of Burden” in 1984 – her music video for the song includes a cameo by Mick Jagger playing a somewhat exaggerated version of himself (if that’s possible).  Here is a sample of the lyrics in “Beast of Burden:

 

     I’ll never be your beast of burden

     My back is broad but it’s a hurting

     All I want is for you to make love to me

 

     I’ll never be your beast of burden

     I’ve walked for miles my feet are hurting

     All I want is for you to make love to me

 

     Am I hard enough

     Am I rough enough

     Am I rich enough

     I’m not too blind to see 

 

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I putzed around in my stacks looking for a band who was clearly influenced by the Rolling Stones – the way that my “two-fer” from a few months ago was, the Richmond Sluts and Big Midnight – but I couldn’t find one right away.  So I decided to go back to the mother lode of English beat bands, the English Freakbeat series that Greg Shaw put together, where I have found several other previous UARB’s.  Sadly, these albums (both vinyl and CD) have been out of print for many years, but there are used copies available here and there.   

 

Anyway, I found one right away:  THE PRIMITIVES.  That’s the Primitives with the crazy hair in the middle of the cover of the English Freakbeat, Volume 4 CD; the caption inside the booklet says:  “The Primitives get their hair done!”).  

 

Unlike several other recent posts of mine where Allmusic really had almost nothing to contribute on the band that I was writing about, there is a long article about the Primitives by Bruce Eder – maybe the longest that I have seen on Allmusic for any of the UARB’s and UARA’s over the years.  The opening remarks make it clear how great Eder thinks the band was: 

 

The Primitives were never, ever exactly a household name, even in Oxford, where they had a serious following as a club band – and that’s a reminder that some things in life and history, and even music, are just so unfair as to be unsettling.  The Primitives [were] signed to Pye Records in 1964 [and] never found even a small national audience in England. . . .  Castle Communications issued their catalog on CD in 2003.  That CD was a delight and a vexation; it proved in the listening that these guys deserved a lot better than cult or footnote status, but it also brought home the unfairness inherent in their status.  Even in their second, slightly more pop-oriented incarnation, when they were allowed to cut loose and be who and what they really were – a loud band without a lot of subtlety but power to spare and the sincerity to put over their music – they rated a place near the top of Pye Records’ roster and in the upper reaches of the British Invasion pantheon.  Listening to the CD, this reviewer found himself pained, to the point of shedding a tear, over the fact that this band only got to leave 24 songs behind from its prime years. . . . 

 

“[T]heir sound was very similar to the Pretty Things, rooted heavily in American R&B, and [lead singer Jay] Roberts was a serious, powerful shouter who could sound seriously, achingly raspy, rough, and growly, while the others played with virtually none of the niceties or delicacy that usually marred British attempts at the music.” 

 

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The band started out with the name the Rising Sons and gained renown in the clubs around their home town of Oxford for their strong R&B sound.  After going by the surprising name of the Cornflakes for a time, they entered and won a local band competition in Northampton; the prize was a recording contract with Pye Records, home of Petula Clarkthe Searchersthe Kinks, Status Quoand other prime British artists, as well as past UARB the Soul Agents.  The owners of the Plaza Theatre (where the contest was held) agreed to be their managers, and at that point, they changed their name to a more promising one, the Primitives

 

Bandmembers in the Primitives at this point were Jay Roberts (lead vocals), Geoff Eaton (lead guitar), John E. Soul (rhythm guitar and harmonica), Roger James (bass guitar), and Mike Wilding (drums) – the latter gentleman is the son of Elizabeth Taylor and British actor Michael Wilding.  

 

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The first release by the Primitives was “Help Me” b/w “Let Them Tell”.  Both sides of this monster single are included on the English Freakbeat, Volume 1 CD.  Bruce Eder has this lavish description of the single in his Allmusic article: 

 

[The Primitives] could and should have been one of the top groups on the Pye label, based on their rough-and-ready debut ‘Help Me’, a cover of a Sonny Boy Williamson [II] number that was beautifully raw and authentic, and wonderfully intense across an astonishingly long three minutes and 39 seconds, [John E.] Soul’s harmonica and [Geoff] Eaton’s guitar keeping the verisimilitude right up there like a Chess Records session gone out of control, amid [Jay] Roberts ever more intense romantic lamentations.  The group-authored B-side, ‘Let Them Tell’, was almost as much a showcase for the harmonica and rhythm section as for Roberts’ singing.  Amazingly, that November 1964 release even made it out in America, as part of the very short-lived licensing agreement between Pye and Philadelphia-based Cameo-Parkway Records, which also issued the Kinks’ first U.S. single, before Pye headed for the greener pastures of Warner-Reprise.” 

 

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Like the band’s first record, the Primitives second single for Pye RecordsYou Said” b/w “How Do You Feel” did not chart at all in the U.K.  About the flip side, Bruce Eder notes:  “[A] bluesy cut with a nice, choppy rhythm part, similar to what the Yardbirds did with ‘Here ’Tis’ or Good Morning Little School Girl on-stage, only with better singing.” 

 

Years later, word got out that, on both of the songs on this 45, the band’s lead guitarist Geoff Eaton was replaced with future Led Zeppelin star Jimmy Page, who was a prolific session guitarist in the early part of his career.  As reported on popsike.com, the single has sold on eBay several times recently – for the equivalent of nearly $600 in one case – but oddly, this fact is not mentioned on any of the several items that I looked up on the website about this single. 

 

You Said is included in the four-CD box set, Nuggets II: Original Artyfacts from the British Empire and Beyond, 1964–1969. 

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

After two flops, the Primitives were feeling the pressure and reacted the way that many young bands do when this happens:  They broke up, but they then reformed around a new lead singer, MAL RYDER.  Ryder was already established in the British scene to some extent, having released four singles, so the band was redubbed Mal and the Primitives.  In this new incarnation, John E. Soul stayed on for awhile as rhythm guitarist, and Jay Roberts became the bass guitarist, though Ryder indicates that Roberts began using his birth name Jeffrey Farthing; they were joined by Stuart Linnell on lead guitar and Mick Charleton on drums.  

 

Singer and band combinations like this were fairly common in this era; past UARB the Soul Agents backed Rod Stewart during the first half of 1965 for instance.  The backing band for the major English rock star Cliff Richard for many years was one of Britain’s top instrumental rock bands, the Shadows.

 

Billy J. Kramer with the Dakotas had numerous hit songs, including several Lennon/McCartney songs in Britain (Billy J. Kramer was also managed by Brian Epstein) and a major U.S. hit, “Little Children” in March 1964.  They used “with” rather than “and” so as to keep separate identities for the singer and the band.  The Dakotas by themselves had a hit instrumental in the U.K. with “The Cruel Sea”; for its U.S. release, it was retitled “The Cruel Surf” and was later covered by the Ventures.  A curious song by the Dakotas called “7 Pounds of Potatoes” – “. . . come between me and my love”, according to the lyrics – is included on English Freakbeat, Volume 2 (both the LP and the CD)

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

Here is the sum total of what Wikipedia has to say about Mal Ryder:  “Mal Ryder (real name Paul Bradley Couling) (born 27 February 1944 in Llanfrechfa, Wales), is a British singer who became quite popular in Italy in the late 1960’s, singing with Mal and the Primitives.”  Italian Wikipedia though has sizable articles on the Primitives and also Mal (though surprisingly, there is not even a redirect from Mal Ryder).

 

As told on Mal Ryder’s website, www.mal.it, he first began playing with an Oxford band called the Meteors, but he jumped ship when asked to become the lead singer for a better local band, the Spirits (formerly known as the Beatniks).  At that point, he began using his stage name, and the band became Mal Ryder and the Spirits.  

 

This group made three singles from 1963 to 1965; a fourth single came out in Mal Ryder’s name individually.  The first two 45’s, “Cry Baby” b/w Take Over”, and the Bobby Goldsboro song “See the Funny Little Clown” b/w “Slow Down” were both produced by Peter Sullivan, who was also Tom Jones’ producer in that time period.  The song that Greg Shaw thought was the strongest of these songs, “Forget It” (from November 1964) is included on two CD’s that I have, English Freakbeat, Volume 1 and English Freakbeat, Volume 4.  As far as I am concerned, this bouncy R&B song with gruff, throaty vocals stacks up well with all of the Primitives material that I have heard. 

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

Mal and the Primitives released just one single in Great Britain; “Every Minute of Every Day” b/w “Pretty Little Face” (the latter song written by bandmember John E. Soul) came out on Pye Records and also made no impact on the charts, like the earlier Primitives singles.  About their final U.K. single, Bruce Eder has this praise:  “They had a sound similar to the original group, although [Mal] Ryder was more of a dramatic singer, with an intense but less raspy delivery, more along the lines of a pop-soul vocalist like Chris Farlowe in his later 1960’s incarnation.  ‘Every Minute [of Every Day] was a suitable A-side, similar to the group’s past work, while ‘Pretty Little Face’ was a lot more elegant than anything the original group had ever done, right down to the rather lyrical acoustic lead guitar doubling the opening piano part, similar to what the guitars on Bill Wyman’s ‘In Another Land’ [by the Rolling Stones] do on the middle and final verse of that song.” 

 

In January 1966, they did a brief tour of Norway; as Mal Ryder tells it:  “It seemed as though they hadn’t seen anything like us before; we felt like the Beatles.” 

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

With their experience in Norway fresh on their minds, Mal and the Primitives decided to become one of several expatriate British rock bands that began to appear elsewhere in Europe by the mid-1960’s.  The Downliners Sect and Alexis Korner followed a similar route.  Perhaps the best known is the Sorrows; unable to follow up their 1965 hit “Take a Heart” in their home country (also included on Nuggets II), the group relocated to Italy in 1966 and recorded a highly esteemed Italian album in 1968Old Songs New Songs.  I have the first official reissue of Old Songs New Songs in 2009 on Wooden Hill Records; a second CD includes an early demo of the album plus a concert performance from 1980.  A full cover by the Sorrows of the early Bee Gees hit “New York Mining Disaster 1941” is included on this early demo; only a single line from “New York Mining Disaster 1941” made it onto their album. 

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

The Primitives was the winner among 30 rock bands who tried out with the Piper Club in Viareggio, Italy; after a short stint in France, they became the house band for the club beginning in July 1966.  However, the two new bandmembers, Stuart Linnell and Mick Charleton both left the Primitives before they made the big move to ItalyMark Sumner became the new lead guitarist. 

 

The next two drummers for the Primitives made a name for themselves in later years.  Dave Withers took Mick Charleton’s place in the band when they moved to Italy; according to Mal Ryder, he played on all of the early records that he made with the Primitives.  He had the nickname Pique or Pick by then; Withers returned to England in 1969.  In the late 1970’sPick Withers became the founding drummer with the British rock band Dire Straits, playing on their first four albums, including their #4 hit Sultans of Swing.  

 

Pick Withers’ replacement in the PrimitivesRobbie McIntosh had been playing with Brian Auger in Italy.  McIntosh is from Scotland and later turned up in the Scottish band Average White Band, who had a million-selling hit in 1974 with “Pick up the Pieces”.   

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

The relocation to Italy completely turned the fortunes of the Primitives around.  Their appearances at the Piper Club turned them into stars, and they had huge record sales with their inventive Italian versions of English-language pop hits.  Their first release in Italy was the major hit “Yeeeeeeh!” b/w “L’Ombra di Nessuno” (“The Shadow of None”), that is, the Rascals’ hit “I Ain’t Gonna Eat out My Heart Anymore” and the Four Tops song “Standing in the Shadow of Love”.  Yeeeeeeh! is in the song listing on English Freakbeat, Volume 1 but is not actually on the CD.  

 

The Primitives followed up this record with a second #1 hit in Italy, “L’Incidente” b/w “Johnny No” (listed on the 45 cover as “Johnny Nooooo!!!”).  The “A” side is a version of the mostly instrumental hit “Soul Finger” by the Bar-Kays but with lyrics in Italian

 

In 1968the Primitives released a very rare album in Italy called Blow Up; the famous film by Italian film director Michelangelo Antonioni called Blow-Up had come out two years earlier.  The album mostly features other Italian-language versions of American and British hit songs of the period.  Their cover of the Strangeloves classic “Cara-Lin” from this album is included on the English Freakbeat, Volume 1 CD.

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

Of the songs that I have heard, the deceptively languid Johnny No is my favorite Primitives song and is included on the English Freakbeat, Volume 4 CD.  The mix of foreign-language lyrics and an English tag line reminds me of the delightful 1980 song “Is Vic There?” by the British band Department S; I once had the “French version” of the song on a small punk rock CD that I stumbled on in a bargain bin.  Evidently there was the regular English version and also an Italian version.  

 

Johnny No is identified by Mal Ryder and others as being a cover of “Thunder and Lightning”; I have been unable to find the connection, however.  Most of the songs called Thunder and Lightning that are mentioned on the Internet were released long after this song. 

 

The only song that I know of which (barely) predates Johnny No is “Knock on Wood” (written by Eddie Floyd and Steve Cropper) that features the dramatic lyric:  “It’s like thunder . . . lightning / The way you love me is frightening”.  Otis ReddingDavid Bowie and Eric Clapton all recorded versions of this song; however, Knock on Wood doesn’t sound at all like Johnny No to me.  (I finally thought to track it down through the songwriting credits; Johnny No” is based on a 1963 Hoyt Axton song that I did not know called “Thunder N’ Lightnin’” that Jimmy Gilmer and the Fireballs also released as a “B” side).   

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

While still being backed by the PrimitivesMal Ryder later moved to the forefront and began changing his sound.  Though I haven’t seen this mentioned anywhere else, evidently he was using only his first name “Mal” during this period, according to Italian Wikipedia.  Under this name, he had a million-selling record (a remarkable achievement in Italy) with his Italian version of the Bee Gees song “I’ve Gotta Get a Message to You” (released as “Pensiero d’Amore”).  Mal Ryder also starred in four Italian movies and had a recording career spanning 37 years, including tours throughout Europe and also in America

 

For AllmusicBruce Eder has this overview of their later years:  “Unfortunately, as the records focused more and more on [Mal] Ryder, [the Primitives] became more of a kind of generic cover outfit for English-language songs of all genres.  According to annotator David Wells, their R&B orientation gave way to pieces such as ‘Dear Mr. Fantasy’ [by Traffic] and ‘Song of a Baker’ [by Small Faces], but also ‘Love Letters in the Sand’ and (astonishingly) ‘Over the Rainbow’.  Their edge was gone and, by the mid-’70s, so was the band.” 

 

*       *       *

 

 

 

The 2003 CD on Castle called Maladjusted collects all or almost all of the songs by the Primitives plus some of Mal Ryder’s early recordings like Forget It.  Besides the early singles on Pye Records mentioned already, there is an unreleased demo called “Oh Mary”, the entirety of the Italian album Blow Up, and a four-song EP that was released in France.  

 

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FLASHBACK:  The Under Appreciated Rock Band of the Month for May 2013 – HOLLIS BROWN 

 

 

 

The years are sure flying by; it seems like I just wrote the article about this Alive Records artist.  Normally I talk about new bands in January, but I liked these guys so much that I brought ’em in early.  The message of appreciation by Hollis Brown for my picking them as a UARB comes up highest of any of my stuff on a Google search.  

 

Since then, I have gotten an acclaimed album, Hollis Brown Gets Loaded that is a cover of every song (but played in reverse order) on the Velvet Underground album, Loaded, including classics like Sweet Jane, “Rock & Roll”, and “Head Held High”.  The album was released in honor of Record Store Day 2014.  A fourth album came out this year called 3 Shots

 

An honest-to-God music video of the opening track on their debut album, “Ride on the Train” can be seen on YouTube at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GlNKST3_Rc  .  Hollis Brown’s great cover of the Lou Reed song Sweet Jane (audio only) as taken from Hollis Brown Gets Loaded is available at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=duP9OECMyWs .  Another music video of “Nightfall” that mostly features a female model posing, dancing and stretching in front of Paris street scenes like the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre is at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAXMTZi0w34 . 

 

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PICTURE GALLERY:  The Under Appreciated Rock Band of the Month for May 2012 – TINA AND THE TOTAL BABES

 

This is their album, She’s So Tuff

 

 

 

Here is a photo of the band: 

 

 

 

This is the back cover of the LP: 

 

 

 

And also the back of the CD: 

 

 

 

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STORY OF THE MONTH:  Stiv Bators and Greg Shaw (from September 2012) 

 

 

 

Stiv Batorsthe front man for one of the best punk rock bands the Dead Boyshad a tempestuous relationship with Bomp! Records’ Greg Shaw.  He was trying to reinvent himself as a pop singer and released one excellent album in 1980 called Disconnected and a lot of other singles.  It was never easy on Shaw to work with Bators; he would arrive at the recording studio with a gaggle of Hollywood hangers-on, and they might be partying in there all night long.  He was also very particular as to which musicians he wanted to work with; in many cases, he would want to fly in some first-wave punk rocker who was available (Shaw uncharitably called them “burnouts”). 

 

In about 1985Stiv Bators was recording a new version of a Moody Blues “B” side, The Story in Your Eyes; and the flip side was going to be a cover of the Richard Berry anthem Have Love, Will Travel.  (The connection to the popular TV western of 50-some years ago, Have Gun – Will Travel is likely not well remembered these days).  Richard Berry (no relation to Chuck Berryis the author of the immortal Louie Louie; one time, Stiv Bators also recorded a version of that song with a whole studio full of people – the new lyrics that he supplied extolled the virtues of his new home town and gave it the name, L.A. L.A..  

 
Anyway, for Have Love, Will Travel, Greg Shaw was hoping to bring in one of the stable of young rock bands that he had signed – but no, Stiv Bators had to have the Little KingsShaw described them as “an adequate but rootless Hollywood glam [rock]-damaged band with tattoos – drinking buddies of his I guess”.  One of their guitar players, Gore Verbinski was in several other bands in that period and started making rock videos after a while.  His debut Hollywood film was Mouse Hunt in 1997; he also directed the 2003 mega-hit Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl as well as the first two Pirates of the Caribbean Series sequels. 
 
* * *
 
The Honor Roll of the Under Appreciated Rock Bands and Artists follows, in date order, including a link to the original Facebook posts and the theme of the article.
 
Dec 2009BEAST; Lot to Learn
Jan 2010WENDY WALDMAN; Los Angeles Singer-Songwriters
Feb 2010 CYRUS ERIE; Cleveland
Mar 2010BANG; Record Collecting I
Apr 2010THE BREAKAWAYS; Power Pop
May 2010THE NOT QUITE; Katrina Clean-Up
Jun 2010WATERLILLIES; Electronica
Jul 2010THE EYES; Los Angeles Punk Rock
Aug 2010QUEEN ANNE’S LACE; Psychedelic Pop
Sep 2010THE STILLROVEN; Minnesota
Oct 2010THE PILTDOWN MEN; Record Collecting II
Nov 2010SLOVENLY; Slovenly Peter
Dec 2010THE POPPEES; New York Punk/New Wave
Jan 2011HACIENDA; Latinos in Rock
Feb 2011THE WANDERERS; Punk Rock (1970’s/1980’s)
Mar 2011INDEX; Psychedelic Rock (1960’s)
Apr 2011BOHEMIAN VENDETTA; Punk Rock (1960’s)
May 2011THE LONESOME DRIFTER; Rockabilly
Jun 2011THE UNKNOWNS; Disabled Musicians
Jul 2011THE RIP CHORDS; Surf Rock I
Aug 2011ANDY COLQUHOUN; Side Men
Sep 2011ULTRA; Texas
Oct 2011JIM SULLIVAN; Mystery
Nov 2011THE UGLY; Punk Rock (1970’s)
Dec 2011THE MAGICIANS; Garage Rock (1960’s)
Jan 2012RON FRANKLIN; Why Celebrate Under Appreciated?
Feb 2012JA JA JA; German New Wave
Mar 2012STRATAVARIOUS; Disco Music
Apr 2012LINDA PIERRE KING; Record Collecting III
May 2012TINA AND THE TOTAL BABES; One Hit Wonders
Jun 2012WILD BLUE; Band Names I
Jul 2012DEAD HIPPIE; Band Names II
Aug 2012PHIL AND THE FRANTICS; Wikipedia I
Sep 2012CODE BLUE; Hidden History
Oct 2012TRILLION; Wikipedia II
Nov 2012THOMAS ANDERSON; Martin Winfree’s Record Buying Guide
Dec 2012THE INVISIBLE EYES; Record Collecting IV
Jan 2013THE SKYWALKERS; Garage Rock Revival
Feb 2013LINK PROTRUDI AND THE JAYMEN; Link Wray
Mar 2013THE GILES BROTHERS; Novelty Songs
Apr 2013LES SINNERS; Universal Language
May 2013HOLLIS BROWN; Greg Shaw / Bob Dylan
Jun 2013 (I) – FUR (Part One); What Might Have Been I
Jun 2013 (II) – FUR (Part Two); What Might Have Been II
Jul 2013THE KLUBS; Record Collecting V
Aug 2013SILVERBIRD; Native Americans in Rock
Sep 2013BLAIR 1523; Wikipedia III
Oct 2013MUSIC EMPORIUM; Women in Rock I
Nov 2013CHIMERA; Women in Rock II
Dec 2013LES HELL ON HEELS; Women in Rock III
Jan 2014BOYSKOUT; (Lesbian) Women in Rock IV
Feb 2014LIQUID FAERIES; Women in Rock V
Mar 2014 (I) – THE SONS OF FRED (Part 1); Tribute to Mick Farren
Mar 2014 (II) – THE SONS OF FRED (Part 2); Tribute to Mick Farren
Apr 2014HOMER; Creating New Bands out of Old Ones
May 2014THE SOUL AGENTS; The Cream Family Tree
Jun 2014THE RICHMOND SLUTS and BIG MIDNIGHT; Band Names (Changes) III
Jul 2014MIKKI; Rock and Religion I (Early CCM Music)
Aug 2014THE HOLY GHOST RECEPTION COMMITTEE #9; Rock and Religion II (Bob Dylan)
Sep 2014NICK FREUND; Rock and Religion III (The Beatles)
Oct 2014MOTOCHRIST; Rock and Religion IV
Nov 2014WENDY BAGWELL AND THE SUNLITERS; Rock and Religion V
Dec 2014THE SILENCERS; Surf Rock II
Jan 2015 (I) – THE CRAWDADDYS (Part 1); Tribute to Kim Fowley
Jan 2015 (II) – THE CRAWDADDYS (Part 2); Tribute to Kim Fowley
Feb 2015BRIAN OLIVE; Songwriting I (Country Music)
Mar 2015PHIL GAMMAGE; Songwriting II (Woody Guthrie/Bob Dylan)
Apr 2015 (I) – BLACK RUSSIAN (Part 1); Songwriting III (Partnerships)
Apr 2015 (II) – BLACK RUSSIAN (Part 2); Songwriting III (Partnerships)
May 2015MAL RYDER and THE PRIMITIVES; Songwriting IV (Rolling Stones)
Jun 2015HAYMARKET SQUARE; Songwriting V (Beatles)
Jul 2015THE HUMAN ZOO; Songwriting VI (Psychedelic Rock)
Aug 2015CRYSTAL MANSIONMartin Winfree’s Record Cleaning Guide
Dec 2015AMANDA JONES; So Many Rock Bands
Mar 2016THE LOVEMASTERS; Fun Rock Music
Jun 2016THE GYNECOLOGISTS; Offensive Rock Music Lyrics
Sep 2016LIGHTNING STRIKE; Rap and Hip Hop
Dec 2016THE IGUANAS; Iggy and the Stooges; Proto-Punk Rock
Mar 2017THE LAZY COWGIRLS; Iggy and the Stooges; First Wave Punk Rock
Jun 2017THE LOONS; Punk Revival and Other New Bands
Sep 2017THE TELL-TALE HEARTS; Bootleg Albums
Dec 2017SS-20; The Iguana Chronicles
(Year 10 Review)
Last edited: April 8, 2021