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Archie Bell & The Drells - Tighten Up

In 1968, I was living in New Orleans with a new wife and a new son. Archie Bell hit the number one spot in April of 1968 with his funky toe-tapping “Tighten-Up” “He says My name is Archie Bell and I’m from Houston and I can dance just as good as I walk”. A great dance song for the time. Today, Sept 1 is Archie’s birthday, so I want to extend a Happy Birthday to Archie. The ironic thing about Bell and one of the best dance songs of the 60’s, is that at the time Bell had just returned from Vietnam with a leg injury and he couldn’t dance. Others had to fill in for him when they went on tour.

“Tighten Up was written by Archie and Billy Buttier. It was originally meant to be the B-side of the record, but when Bell’s promoter pushed the A-side and nothing happened, they decided to turn it over and “Tighten-Up” went to number one on both the Hot 100 on Billboard and the R&B charts. Bell could not repeat the feat, however. His second hit was “I Can’t Stop Dancing” which did a respectable number 9 on the Hot 100, but their third effort “There’s Gonna Be a Showdown” peaked at number 21 and that was the end of Archie Bell & The Drells. The group had splt up by the 80’s.

If you don’t remember this one, here’s a link to YouTube where you can listen to it again: Archie Bell & The Drells

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Nick Ashford and Jerry Leiber Both Gone

I’ll bet not too many people who read this have ever heard of Nick Ashford. Maybe Jerry Leiber is a name you may have heard. But both of these men wrote some of the greatest songs that we have been listening to over the past fifty years. Both have died this past week, Ashford at age 70 and Leiber at age 78.

Nick Ashford

Nick and his wife Valerie Simpson wrote some of Motown’s greatest hits. Like “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” which was recorded by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell. It only reached number 19 on the Billboard charts, but almost anyone in this country would recognize it when they heard it. They also did “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing” which was also done by Gaye. They wrote “Reach Out and Touch Somebosy’s Hand”, recorded by Diana Ross and “I’m Every Woman” recorded by Chaka Khan. Ashford and Simpson also recorded a few albums under their own name. They hit the Top 40 with “Found a Cure’ in 1979 and “Solid” in 1985.

More recently, they collaborated with Amy Winehouse on her tune “Tears Dry On Their Own” which contains a sample of “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”. They were great songwriters and will be missed. I don’t know if Valerie Simpson will keep writing without her husband, but I hope so.

Here is a short youtube video that summarizes what Ashford and Simpson have done for modern American music: Nick Ashford video.

Jerry Leiber

As I was growing up, one of my favorite groups was the Coasters. They were labeled a novelty group and did songs like “Charlie Brown”, “Yakety Yak”, “Searchin”, and “Poison Ivy”.  All of these, I believe were written by the writing team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller.

Leiber and Stoller have written over 200 songs and I’ll bet you would recognize most of them. Let’s start with “Hound Dog” which was originally written for Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton in 1952. It was a hit on the R&B charts but nobody outside the black community heard it. The Elvis Presley recorded it in 1956 and it was a number one hit. Leiber also wrote “jailhouse Rock”, one of Elvis’ best and most well known songs.

Leiber also wrote for The Drifters and Ben E King and many others. A true icon of early American rock and roll.

Here is a short video honoring Jerry Leiber on his death at 78: Jerry Leiber video.

Leiber and Ashford should rightly be honored, in their own different ways, as two greats of American popular songwriting.

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Back in Business - The Everly Brothers

I have been away from this blog for way too long. I have been busy trying other things and even while doing those other things, I kept feeling the tug of number1project. Music is my main love in life (after my family and church). It is my passion. I think it’s time to follow my passion. I’ve been writing little e-books for the Kindle. I think everyone’s heard of the Kindle, but if not, then it is an e-book reader that Amazon sells. They are great in that you can carry it with you anywhere you go and it holds up to 3000 or so books. Imagine carrying 300 books around with you and being able to read one anything you want.

So, I decided to write an e-book about the Everly Brothers. Now, since I don’t know the Everly Brothers and really have no way to contact them personally, I compiled all the data I could find on the web and wrote up a biography of their lives up to this point. It’s not very long, but it’s cheap. And I think you will find out just about all you need to know about the Everly Brothers.

If you’d like to buy the book from Amazon, you can go to this page: Legends of Rock & Roll - The Everly Brothers and download it for your Kindle.

As a teaser, here is the first chapter of the book. There is much more in the actual Kindle book.

Introduction

The Everly Brothers were one of the most important and influential of the early rock and roll bands. They set the standard high with close two-part harmonies and were the first of the rockers who combined country with rock and roll and, surprisingly, impressed both sides of the fence.

When I was a boy in High School, the Everly Brothers were one of my favorite groups. Like most teenagers in those days, rock and roll was the center of my life, and the Everly Brothers were at the center of that movement; at least for me. The Everly Brothers were different in that the kids liked them, but so did the parents. Most parents in those days hated Rock and Roll, but the Everlys were mellow enough that my Mom, at least, liked them too.

I remember when you could go into a record store and actually play a record. They were 45 rpm in those days, (the record with the big hole in the middle). The store had little rooms that were like telephone booths. You could take the record into the booth and listen to it on a turntable, something that doesn’t happen anymore.

When “All I Have to Do Is Dream” came out in 1958, I listened to it in the record store and bought it immediately. It has since become one of my all-time favorite songs. This is the kind of song that you would put on a desert island list. You know the kind of list I mean, if I could take a hundred records to a desert island, which ones would I take. “All I Have to Do Is Dream” would definitely be on that list for me. I took it home and immediately called my girlfriend. We were not going steady (yet), but we both had a love of music and so I played the song on a little 45 rpm turntable I had. I held the receiver of the phone up to the speaker of the record player. She thought it was a great song. It was especially great dancing with her to “All I Have to Do Is Dream” at the next school dance. That song eventually became a number one song for the Everly Brothers.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. You picked up this book to learn about the Everly Brothers. So, let’s get into their life and music.

Here is a grainy old black and white video of the Everlys singing “All I Have to do Is Dream” and “Cathy’s Clown”. The link is to YouTube.

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