by Robert Wilkinson
Today we celebrate some GREAT talents born November 29. It was the 82nd birthday of a musical legend, one of rock's most accomplished organists and blue eyed Soul Brother, Felix Cavaliere. Tonight we have great videos of one of the greatest dance bands of the 60s! It would also have been the 85th birthday of the extraordinarily talented Peter Bergman of Firesign Theater fame, and the 88th birthday of songwriter Mike Hawker.
We begin this dance celebrating the great songwriter Michael Edwin "Mike" Hawker (29 November 1936 – 4 May 2014). He was relatively obscure, except for two gigantic hits he wrote with Ivor Raymonde for the divine Ms. Dusty Springfield in the early 60s. For your enjoyment, our brief opening act has two of my favorite tunes delivered by one of my favorite female vocalists!
For your enjoyment, an excellent video clip from The Ed Sullivan Show where Dusty belts out ”Stay Awhile” and “I Only Want To Be With You.”
Last year I had two very early live television performances by Dusty on one clip, a mashup from the Russ Conway Holland video and her very live performance on the Sullivan Show. This year I found another early video with her lip synching to her extraordinary breakthrough hit from January 1964, “I Only Want To Be With You”
Here’s the original studio version of “I Only Want To Be With You” set to slides.
From American Bandstand, May 1964, Dusty performing her second huge hit of that year (to a backing track) “Stay Awhile”
This clip looks like it’s from Ready Steady Go, where she’s lip-synching in a “live” performance of “Stay Awhile”
Here’s a remarkable live performance on radio in 1964! What a voice! “Stay Awhile”
We’ll close this short set with a great live television performance on Aspel and Company in 1989 of her breakthrough tune, delivered by the immortal Dusty Springfield! This one has a live chorus, three violins, and big brass section! “I Only Want To Be with You”
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For our brief intermission before the main act, a huge Happy goes out to one of the funniest men ever to walk open his mouth. Mister Peter Bergman. Peter Bergman (November 29, 1939 – March 9, 2012) was an American writer and comedian, and a founding member of The Firesign Theatre, one of the most hilarious acts ever assembled.
Peter did some amazing work, both with the FT and a remarkable and very rare video called Martian Space Party, three shorts involving strange themes as toy dinosaurs picketing a president and a department store mannequin named Todayo Tomorrow with Peter playing a twisted driver who picks up the mannequin hitchhiking.
As IMDB put it "A concert film/mockumentary posing as live news coverage from the 1972 National Surrealist Party Convention, interupted by news flashes from Monster Island, where the president is denied entrance to the forbidden city, but does meet his nemesis, Glutomoto."
As one reviewer put it over there, "So, for example, there's one plank in the Surrealist Light People's Party platform which is prophetic: "One Man, One Channel". In 1972, among people unaware of the ARPA/DARPA funding that started forming the Internet, this just sounded delightfully loony. But it was truly a harbinger of things to come."
Unfortunately, he left the stage a few years ago. If you don't know who he was, well, the Firesign Theater were an amazing group that did some of the craziest "radio programs" ever recorded! Here's something I found on youtube:
A short tribute to Peter Bergman
This was their first, and it's funny from the very beginning! This is serious satire!!!
From 1968, the entire 1st Firesign Theater Album Waiting For The Electrician or Someone Like Him - Check it out, since it really is funny!
Speaking of funny, here's the entire 2nd Firesign Theater album! How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All? (All hail Groucho Marx and John Lennon!)
If you haven’t had enough, here’s the 3rd album, Don’t Crush that Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers
Here’s a 41 minute movie made by the FST titled Everything You Think You Know Is Wrong
This is how magnificent a mench that he was! This comes from Peter’s last show on Radio Free Oz on March 6, 2012, 3 days before (as it is said) “he caught the last train for the coast. Hobos call it the Westbound.” This is worth a minute of your time, as it is a message of home from a walking dead man. Peter Bergman – parting words on Radio Free Oz
If you want some real laughs, check out any of the Firesign Theater's works. Just absurdly brilliant. And very, very funny....
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For the main act, we’ll close this show with one of the most electrifying organ players of all time! Though you may not have heard of this musical phenomenon, Felix Cavaliere (November 29, 1942) was the driving force behind the Rascals, one of the top "blue eyed Soul" bands of the 60s. Known as “the blackest white group of all,” the Young Rascals hit the charts in 1965, and never looked back!
The Young Rascals, later just the Rascals, were one of THE premier "white soul" groups of the 60s, and their music stands up today as some of the best ever made. They still are, if their recent performances are any indication!
Felix, along with Eddie Brigati, wrote or co-wrote some of their biggest hits. “Groovin’, “Lonely Too Long,” “You Better Run,” “A Beautiful Morning,” “How Can I Be Sure,” “People Got To Be Free,” and too many more to list here! So it’s on with the birthday celebration! Time to dance to rock and soul music!
Here's their first big hit, a major tune with an even bigger attitude! (The Rascals always did songs with attitude, even when they were just "groovin'") From Shindig in December 1965 (with Alan King doing an intro schtick) here are the Young Rascals on tv doing their breakthrough tune "I Ain't Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore."
Here’s a treat! From Hullabaloo in 1966, a spoof video of the Rascals set to them performing a wailing version of the Larry Williams smash hit, the "B" side of "Ain't Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore," “Slow Down”
From early in their career, a live 1965 performance of their first monster hit, "Good Lovin'." Studio version of "Good Lovin'" here.
We'll close this 1965 set of tunes from their first album with a great rave up penned by Gene and our birthday boy Dino Danelli! One of my faves from that first album, the infinitely danceable tune giving us a hint of things to come, "Do You Feel."
I found this live performance gem from 1968! Dino’s drumming is highlighted, and this band cooks! Seriously, check this one out. "Do You Feel."
From their second album Collections, the original studio version of the beautiful "What is the Reason"
The original studio cut of the infinitely danceable "Come On Up."
This year I only found one of the pair of tunes in this performance. Here they are live and in color in 1966 on television doing an absolutely electrifying performance of the soul classic "Mickey's Monkey" This one's kinetic, and so is Dino’s drumming! (This year the second performance, "Turn On Your Love Light," Is nowhere to be found.) The second clip with “Lonely Too Long” and “Come on Up” has also disappeared.
Here’s the studio version from the album with both tunes! "Mickey's Monkey"
Here they are again in 2013, in concert cranking out their two-fer soul classics "Mickey's Monkey" and “Turn On Your Love Light.”
Punk attitude with a wailing Hammond B-3 and a guitar riff wound tighter than a watch spring! The original studio cut of "You Better Run."
A live lip-synched performance of "Lonely Too Long."
Here’s the studio version of a tune co-written by Eddie, the infinitely danceable “Love Is A Beautiful Thing”
Here are the studio versions of two songs written by Gene, the first a soulful ballad "No Love To Give," and the second a raw rocker, "Nineteen Fifty Six."
I found it again! Here’s the studio version of a tune the Young Rascals covered on Collections. It originally won an Academy Award Nomination for the top song of 1963, and is a classic! For your enjoyment, one of the best known songs in the world that was the soundtrack tune from Mondo Cane, the beautiful "More (Theme from Mondo Cane"
We launch into 1967 with a great live performance on The Ed Sullivan Show on February 12, 1967, where they knocked these two out of the park! Here’s a GREAT live performance of ”Lonely Too Long" and “Come On Up:
Here's a great live set showing off Felix's amazing singing and organ work, with some classic and utterly fantastic drumming by Dino Danelli. Seeing this shows how exciting the Young Rascals were at their peak! From The Mike Douglas Show on March 3, 1967, a four song set! Last year I had the first three on one clip, but it’s disappeared. So now we have the set on four clips. Have fun enjoying ”Good Lovin’” followed by ”Lonely Too Long," moving into “Since I Fell” and closed with a short minute and a half playout of "Come On Up."
Here’s the studio version of “A Girl Like You.”
Here’s the studio version of the “B” side to “A Girl Like You,” an amazing soulful psychedelic tune featuring the exquisite flute playing of Hubert Laws! One of my all-time favorites, here’s the fantastic “It’s Love”
From the Groovin' album, two tunes written by Gene Cornish! "I'm So Happy Now" and the mellow bongo sound of "I Don't Love You Any More"
Here's a live performance of "How Can I Be Sure."
From 1968's Once Upon A Dream, one of their obscure gems! Here's the studio version of an archetypal 1967 vibe, "It's Wonderful."
Also from "Once Upon A Dream," the Gene Cornish tune "I'm Gonna Love You."
Here's a 1968 performance of "It's A Beautiful Morning."
Here’s the original studio version of "It's A Beautiful Morning."
Here they are live in 1969, doing their huge #1 hit from the 1969 "Freedom Suite" album, "People Got To Be Free."
From Sweden in 1969, a b/w performance of “People Got To Be Free”
Here’s another great live version from 1970 of ”Glory Glory” and “People Got To Be Free”
Original 1968 studio version of “People Got To Be Free” here. (This song was written in reaction to the assassinations that year of Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., and went straight to #1 on the charts.)
Also from Freedom Suite, here are the Rascals in 1969, performing live on German television! For your enjoyment, “Heaven.” Here’s the original audio-only studio version of “Heaven”
From Freedom Suite, studio versions of tunes Gene wrote, "Me and My Friends" and "Love Was So Easy To Give."
Last year I had a great 1969 live performance on ABC’s Music Scene of the next song, but it’s disappeared. So instead, here’s the studio version of “Carry Me Back” And here the New Rascals take us to church at the Greek in 2013 with a rousing live performance of “Carry Me Back”
Couldn’t find a live clip that’s been pulled recently, but here’s the original studio version of “See” (It’s obvious where the J. Geils Band got their sound!) And it seems they’re still rocking out on this song. From what looks to be their 2013 tour, the 21st Century original Rascals cranking out “See”
Here's a clip from 1988, The Rascals on Regis.
We'll close this birthday tribute with a smokin' live performance of 'the Young Rascals and Friends" doing the immortal rock and roll anthem "Good Lovin'"
Here’s a great 9+ minute encore! The Rascals were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame by Steve Van Zandt, lead player for the Boss and mos def NEW JERSEY ATTITUDE! His speech is great, but this year the clip chops the final 2 minutes when Felix gives us his speech cuts to the heart of the matter. It reminds us how art can help us heal even when too many assassinations have killed a dream. For your enjoyment, The Rascals’ Induction Into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, pt. 1 Part 2 where they perform “Good Lovin’” and ”Groovin’” is still nowhere to be found, but this year this came back up, so enjoy their signature tune “People Got To Be Free”
Part 2 where they perform “Good Lovin’, ”Groovin’,” and ”People Got To Be Free” is still nowhere to be found. So instead, our second encore will be their live performance at the 2013 Tonys honoring their Broadway Musical “Once Upon A Dream Starring the Rascals” of "Good Lovin'."
Our second encore will be their live performance at the 2013 Tonys honoring their Broadway Musical Once Upon A Dream Starring the Rascals of "Good Lovin'."
There are a bunch of great videos out there of recent performances by this Rock and Roll Hall of Fame group, so if you’re of a mind, you can find all the classics and more, so if you want more, enjoy!
Happy Birthday, Felix! You, Eddie, Dino, and Gene made my teen years a true joy.
© Copyright 2024 Robert Wilkinson
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