Neal Ford and the Fanatics' 1965 set list

The set list of Neal Ford and the Fanatics, 1965. Click to enlarge. 

(Texas Music Collection, University of Houston)

Perhaps the most elusive aspect of 1960s music research is determining what songs bands actually played live. The best one can hope for in most cases is the retrieval of the few songs that stuck in a musician's memory as being particularly resonant with crowds -- "When we did 'Shout,' that really killed 'em!" Few set lists from the era survive today. Indeed, for much of the time, bands did not even go through the formality of writing down a set list, much less keeping copies. Set lists were constantly in flux, mirroring the constantly changing state of popular music. After a week or two, the current set list would be as obsolete as yesterday's papers. 

Only a few set lists from the Houston '60s scene survive. The one pictured above is housed in the Texas Music Collection at the University of Houston. No band is listed, but it was found among the papers of Richard Ames, the manager of Neal Ford and the Fanatics, and the inclusion of their original "I Will Not Be Lonely" guarantees the identification with that band. 

If this was used as a set list, it was unusually short set that night. Thirty-nine songs at approximately three minutes each would consume only two hours, about two hours short of the average duration of a live gig in 1965. However, it wasn't that uncommon for bands to be hired to play for only two hours, depending on the event. Perhaps it was not a "set list" per se, but simply a list of the bedrock of their repertoire that month. The year is certain due to the lack of any 1966 songs appearing on the list. 

The 39 songs and their genres can be broken down thus:

1. Johnny B. Goode (standard)

2. Glad All Over (British Invasion)

3. Medley (unknown)

4. Round & Round (standard/British Invasion)

5. I'm Crying (British Invasion)

6. What'd I Say (Ray Charles/standard)

7. Hang on Sloopy (McCoys/Top 40)

8. Louie, Louie (standard)

9. Mojo (?)

10. You're My Sunshine (sic) (You Are My Sunshine) (standard)

11. Get Out of This Place (sic) (British Invasion)

12. Twist & Shout (standard)

13. I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better (Byrds/Top 40)

14. Tambourine Man (Byrds/Top 40)

15. She's About a Mover (Sir Douglas Quintet/Top 40)

16. Big Boy Pete (The Olympics/Paul Revere and the Raiders)

17. Satisfaction (British Invasion)

18. Do You Love Me? (Contours/British Invasion)

19. I Will Not Be Lonely (original)

20. The Turn On Song (British Invasion)

21. Wine, Wine, Wine (standard)

22. Keep on Dancin' (Gentrys/Top 40)

23. All I Really Want to Do (Byrds/Top 40) 

24. Bells of Rimney (sic) (Byrds album cut) 

25. Last Time (British Invasion)

26. Hard Day's Nite (sic) (British Invasion) 

27. Dirt (?)

28. Hide Your Love Away (sic) (British Invasion) 

29. You Can't Do That (British Invasion) 

30. The Dog (The Dog? Walking the Dog?) (both Rufus Thomas)

31. House Othe Rising Sun (sic) (standard/British Invasion)

32. Are You Sincere? (standard)

33. Sleep Walk (instrumental/standard)

34. Unchained Melody (Righteous Brothers/Top 40)

35. Donna (Richie Valens? Dion?)

36. Anna (Arthur Alexander/British Invasion)

37. Cry to Me (Solomon Burke/British Invasion)

38. How Strong My Love Is (sic) (O.V. Wright/Otis Redding/British Invasion)

39. Time is on My Side (British Invasion)

Not everything here is limited to one genre, but the Fanatics' set list can roughly be categorized the following way: 10 pop/rock standards (26% of the set), 16 British Invasion songs (41%), 7 current non-British Top 40 radio hits (18%), 1 instrumental (2.6%), and 1 original (2.6%). The remainder are either undetermined, R&B/soul, or somewhat familiar songs like "Anna" that were not quite standards. 

Though incomplete, the list gives us a snapshot of how a typical night at a Fanatics dance would have sounded for about two hours during the autumn of 1965. "Cry to Me" and "That's How Strong My Love Is" are most likely sourced from the recent Rolling Stones album, Out of Our Heads, rather than the originals (though this is possible). Of the three Beatles' originals present, "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away" from the summer's Help! movie and soundtrack, is the most curious choice, since this moody ballad wouldn't seem to have been a crowd pleaser. The British Invasion song on the list most unfamiliar to listeners today, but not in 1965, is undoubtedly "The Turn On Song" by Ian Whitcomb and Bluesville. The title is actually "You Turn Me On (Turn On Song)," and it reached #8 on the Billboard charts in July of that year. Though a huge hit, the song has been excluded from oldies radio playlists in the ensuing decades, perhaps because Whitcomb's falsetto vocals veer too close to novelty record status for modern tastes. 

It is somewhat surprising that the Fanatics included more Byrds songs than Beatles among these 39, especially the mournful "Bells of Rhymney" -- not a single, but the last track on side one of the Mr. Tambourine Man album (released June 21, 1965, so only about three months old when this set list was created). Perhaps they wanted to avoid being dismissed as mere Beatles imitators. The preponderance of Byrds songs suggests that lead guitarist Johnny Stringfellow was already using a 12-string guitar by this point, though plenty of groups transposed the Byrds to 6-string. 

"Donna" is a mystery, since two different hits had that title, first by Riche Valens in October, 1958, and Dion in 1963 (actually titled "Donna the Prima Donna"). One suspects that it was the latter, though both would have sounded outdated in the fall of 1965. When we recall that Ford's singing career had begun around 1963, we shouldn't be surprised to find several songs from this slightly earlier period present on the list. (Of course, this dictum excludes evergreen Chuck Berry songs from 1957-58.)

"Mojo" points to either "Got My Mojo Working" (Muddy Waters) or a song derivative of it, "Mojo Workout" (Larry Bright, the Kingsmen, or Paul Revere and the Raiders). If it is the former, the Fanatics most likely learned it from the Zombies' first album (where they would also find "Woman," recorded the following year but not released until 1988). 

Totally written out of most sixties memories are the sentimental ballads that most bands included in their sets, here represented by "You Are My Sunshine" and "Are You Sincere?" Such material became casualties in the psychedelic revolution to come in 1967, and nobody seems to have lamented their passing very much. 

"The Dog" is most likely Rufus Thomas' song of the same title (covered by Otis Redding), or perhaps Thomas's answer record, "Walking the Dog," or the Rolling Stones' cover of it. 

The most intriguing title here is "Dirt." This could have been the instrumental by Tom King and the Starfires, "Stronger Than Dirt," or the better-known vocal by A. Jacks and the Cleansers with the same title. The latter appeared on a small label, but appears to have been widely dispersed, as many bands had this in their repertoire for a time. Perhaps it was a band original, with no relation to other variations on the Ajax cleanser television commercial theme. 

The only verifiable original, "I Will Not Be Lonely," had been a local hit when released on the Gina label a few months earlier. It is the band's best-known song today, having been continually reissued since 1980. 

The McCoys' "Hang on Sloopy" entered the charts on August 14, 1965, followed several weeks later by the Gentrys' "Keep on Dancing." The presence of these two massive Top 40 hits on the set list allow us to date it to no earlier than September, 1965. The lack of anything later equally suggests that the list cannot date from very far past that month. By December, many of these songs had probably been dropped from the repertoire, and the Fanatics' set list from early 1966 must have looked markedly different from this one.  

Below: The Fanatics' Johnny Stringfellow (Gretsch lead guitar) and Jon Pereles (Fender Jazzmaster rhythm guitar) in early 1965. (Facebook Photo)

Ann Boleyn

Ann Boleyn - Illya b/w Do the Kuryakin (Mammoth 445)

1965

The historical context -- and therefore, the rationale -- of most records is usually immediately apparent just by the song titles and the musical genre. The reasoning behind others, like this one, is far more elusive to modern listeners.  Time has not recorded why Scott and Vivian Holtzman decided to write a serious love ballad to a fictional television character, but their composition "He's a Loser" had improbably been featured on an episode of Gilligan's Island around this time; so it may have seemed like a good commercial move to next write a song about Illya Kuryakin, a spy from the current hip television show The Man From U.N.C.L.E.  Perhaps the husband-and-wife team hoped that a producer with that show would hear it and want to use it. 

From our current perspective, however, everything about this record is mystifying, from the unfamiliar label with no address, to the odd instrumentation (including acoustic bass and bassoon); from the fact that both sides have the same lyrics, to the pseudonymous vocalist, named after one of Henry VIII's wives. The flipside, "Do the Kuryakin," veers into absurdity, but the listener cannot be sure if this was intentional. The date would also be difficult to guess (The Man From U.N.C.L.E. ran for four years, 1964-68) but for a disc jockey scribbling "9/19/65" on this copy. 

Although they are remembered solely for their songs today, Scott and Vivian Holtzman were better known during the 1960s for their involvement with the theater scene in Houston. Scott wrote, directed, or acted in many plays right up to his death in the 1990s, and Vivian acted as well. Their primary interest was theater, but many theater people crossed over into the music scene and vice versa. The Holtzmans were regulars at the Jester, a folk club that opened in the early '60s and stayed popular until the folk music craze faded, and both appear as vocalists on a promotional album the club put out circa 1963. Scott, of course, was a steady presence on the later rock scene as well, writing the "Now Sounds" column for the Houston Post and managing the Fever Tree. 

Scott Holtzman and Kay Oslin performing in the play 110 in the Shade at Theatre, Inc., Bellaire, 1966. (Clipping from The Bellaire & Southwestern Texan, April 20, 1966. Courtesy the Bellaire Friends Library & Historical Society.) Click to enlarge. 



Another frequent guest at the Jester was Kay Oslin, and she, too, was better-known at the time as an actress. In 1966, Oslin co-starred with Scott Holtzman in the play 110 in the Shade at Theatre, Inc., a playhouse in the Bellaire suburb. And it was Kay Oslin who was recruited by Scott in 1965 to sing "Illya" and "Do the Kuryakin." Kay's magnificent voice is well-featured on the ballad A-side, and would have worked better with a regular lyric, not one about a television character. Kay overdubs a second vocal onto her own vocal track, something new in Houston recording. Instead of pressing it locally, Scott pitched the songs to a friend at the Mammoth label -- an obscure San Francisco concern -- ensuring that the record would remain outside the Texas canon for the next 50 years. 

What to make of the bizarre "Do the Kuryakin"? The title never appears in the song; the lyrics are the same as "Illya," but recast with a new arrangement that is apparently supposed to put one in mind of rock music. One suspects that Scott said something along the lines of: "OK, let's do something that sounds really bad and stupid so Top 40 radio might play it." Folk and classical musicians trying to make a rock and roll dance record is something doomed to failure from the outset. Retaining the bassoon for "Do the Kuryakin" was ridiculous, but charming in retrospect. 

Kay Oslin and Frank Davis at La Maison (1964). 

Scott and Kay returned to the studio in 1966, continuing in the novelty vein with two singles on International Artists (released as Frankie & Johnny). Kay was also involved with the Underground, a studio group who recorded at Andrus for Mainstream Records. As far as I know, she would not record again until the 1980s, when she altered her name to K.T. Oslin and recorded many country hits. Her early days as "Ann Boleyn" would have been completely forgotten but for a total fluke: in the 1980s, Scott Holtzman gave his friend Christopher Clements a cassette with some of his old recordings, and there was "Illya," credited properly to Oslin. Clements recently confirmed that this was indeed the same performance as the Mammoth 45, which neither Holtzman nor Oslin had mentioned to him back in the day. 

Thanks to Christopher Clements for his help. 

"Illya"

Sometimes when I'm all alone

It seems inside of my dreams

He's standing right over there

Somewhere over there

Illya, look at me

Only me

Illya, reach for me

And call my name

It was always Illya

It was always Illya for me

In back of every dream

I ever dreamed was this:

That you should look at me

That I should know your kiss

That I should hear your call

It was always Illya

It was always Illya for me

(bassoon solo)

Illya, look at me

Only me

Illya, reach for me

And call my name

"Do the Kuryakin"

Illya, look at me

Only me

Illya, reach for me

And call my name

It was always Illya

It was always Illya for me

In back of every dream 

I've ever dreamed was this: 

That you should look at me

That I should know your kiss

It was always Illya

It was always Illya for me

Illya, look at me

Only me

Illya, reach for me

Call my name

Illya

KAY OSLIN 1960s DISCOGRAPHY

Kay Oslin

Brave Young Sailor

My Girl (with Frank Davis)

From the album Look, It's Us! (Jester no #) 1963-64

Ann Boleyn

Illya/Do the Kuryakin (Mammoth 445) 1965

The Underground

Satisfy'n Sunday/Easy (Mainstream 660) 1966

Get Him Out of Your Mind/Take Me Back (Mainstream 667) 1967

NB: Studio group comprised of Larry O'Keefe, Johnny Wright, Kay Oslin, and Susan Giles on vocals. 

Frankie & Johnny (Scott Holtzman and Kay Oslin)

Sweet Thing (International Artists 112) 1966

Right String, Baby (But the Wrong Yo-Yo)/Present of the Past (International Artists 117) 1967

"Illya"

"Do the Kuryakin"

The Passions

The appearance of an album entitled Texas Punk From the Sixties in record stores in 1985 would have presented a welter of confusion to any American who had lived through the 1960s and experienced its music first-hand. Music of that era had been largely defined by Top 40 radio. The songs played on the radio in Seattle were -- with a few regional exceptions -- the same songs played in the radio in Dallas, Miami, Cleveland, and Buffalo, forming a transcontinental tapestry of shared cultural experience and expectation in the minds of the young. Songs on local labels were, for the most part, not allowed to participate in this golden age, and were quite unwelcome when they began appearing out of nowhere in the 1980s and '90s. Their revival en masse gave notice to the Top 40 generation that what they had collectively experienced was actually a giant sham perpetrated on them by the music industry. The supposedly rebellious and questioning youth of the '60s had never questioned the logic of Top 40 radio, never questioned why or how major labels could dominate the market year after year. Rebellion had been packaged into a mass media consumer product, enriching the same corrupt, gray flannel suit establishment that the youth had imagined they were making irrelevant. Top 40 radio had actually prevented them from hearing most of the great songs of their generation.

So albums like Texas Punk From the Sixties were greeted with indifference or hostility by anyone who actually lived through the 1960s. The first problem with this particular offender was "Texas," a state known mostly for country music, not rock, though it was granted that a few people from the Top 40 canon had come from there (Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison). The second problem was "punk." Why punk? The term had never been used in a musical context in the '60s. It was an association that only came much later, and only among bands in places like London and New York City. It was inconceivable to the Top 40 mentality that anyone would invent a term for a musical genre and retroactively apply it to that era, nor were they aware that its application to certain songs of the sixties pre-dated (and influenced) the emergence of that later trend.

The third problem was the bands and songs actually featured on this album: there were no groups recognizable from the Top 40 era at all. Instead, it offered up groups like Kempy and the Guardians, Oedipus and the Mothers, and the Y'Alls. Surely bands with names like this did not actually exist in the 1960s, did they? Perhaps Texas Punk From the Sixties, which purported to originate in France, was an art school joke in which you collected songs nobody wanted, performed by groups no one had ever heard of, on an album no one could be expected to buy. At the very least, it was a product of the inscrutable European mind, like the eccentric Frenchmen who collected discarded, old neon signs in flea markets and displayed them in a Paris art gallery as if they were of great cultural import. More offensively, Texas Punk From the Sixties billed itself as "Volume Two" in a multi-volume series.

It's taken over 30 years to unravel all the mysteries and challenges that reissues like Texas Punk From the Sixties presented to the curious listener since they first stealthily appeared, unannounced, in the Various Artists sections of record stores across the USA as well as England and Europe. The young people encountering these albums had a completely different reaction than those who had inculcated a Top 40 mentality. These albums were instead perceived by them to contain lost treasures, rare sounds that had been unfairly resigned to a critical Sheol by the cruelties of time and fate. Their obscurity was perceived to be their greatest asset. These songs were never part of somebody's nostalgia trip; once liberated from their rare environments, they could live and pulsate on their own oxygen.

The Passions' "Lively One" was one such song liberated by Texas Punk From the Sixties. Raw, crude, sounding like an outtake from the first Rolling Stones album, "Lively One" oozed a certain quality that had been lost in the intervening 20 years. It was simple but somewhat dangerous sounding. The singer asks the listener in the first verse, "Don't I act crazy?" When he sings "dark-haired, dark-eyed," he pronounced "dark" in a way that no Texan has before or since. The point of the record was presumably to sound English, but they probably didn't fool many listeners.

***

The most surprising thing about the Passions is that, unlike most garage bands of the era, they were not teenagers, but somewhat older men: lead singer and bassist Bill Galyon was 23 or 24 when he sang "Lively One," and the ages of the rest of the group at that time ranged from 20 to 25. They had been playing together as a band since around 1962, and it's likely that at least one member had played in '50s bands. The other members of the Passions were: Gordon Eatherly, Jr. (lead guitar), Bill Sheridan (rhythm guitar), Larry Jannasch (drums), and Jerry Mullins (harmonica). The group lived in the North Texas town of Sherman (population 24,988 in 1963), and played all over the area, as far away as Dallas (60 miles south of Sherman), and into Oklahoma. Photos of the group are known to exist, but none have surfaced. (High school yearbook photos of individual members will have to suffice.)

The Passions' first single, "Mercy, Little Baby" (Shayon 101) from 1964. Lead vocals by Bill Galyon, who also wrote the song. (This copy autographed by Galyon and lead guitarist Gordon Eatherly, Jr.)

The next surprising thing about the Passions is that they had another record besides "Lively One." Their first single, "Mercy, Little Baby" on the band's own Shayon label, is rare and has only recently been reissued. It can be accessed on You Tube (clip below). Recorded at Sellers Studio in Dallas, probably in early 1964, "Mercy, Little Baby" is a fine Chuck Berry-ish rocker with strong vocals by Bill and a guitar solo from Gordon. The only flaw is its brevity -- 1:31. It has been called "rockabilly," and if we were to agree with this designation, the Passions would perhaps be the only Texas group to record both a rockabilly and garage record (the appellation that replaced "punk"). The band themselves would have tagged their first record as rock and roll, and their second as rhythm and blues.

Bill Galyon, lead vocalist of the Passions. From the 1959 Sherman High year book. 

"(In the 1950s) Gordon Eatherly and I, as young boys, used to go to the Sherman Municipal Ballroom," Bill Galyon explained to me. "About once every couple of months, a promoter would rent that out and have a big name black artist in: Ike and Tina Turner, Jimmy Reed,  Ivory Joe Hunter, Gatemouth Brown…these guys. Gordon and I would go down there on our bikes and peek through the windows. Blacks from all over that part of the country would come. Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, Etta James … you name it." These shows were hugely inspirational and motivated the youngsters to gravitate toward being musicians themselves. 

Bill couldn't recall most of the places that the Passions had played. Too much time had passed, he said. "We played North Texas, a little bit in Oklahoma. We would venture up in Oklahoma … little towns, podunk places. We began to kind of cook ‘em in Dallas. We did a couple of concerts with Jon and Robin and the In Crowd and the Five Americans. We played the Bronco Bowl in Dallas, a lot of clubs I couldn’t tell you the names of. And a lot of high school hops and things, pretty much like everybody else did back in those days.

Gordon Eatherly, Jr. -- lead guitarist for the Passions c. 1964

"We had a great response, had a great following. We did some concerts with Bruce Chanel when he was hot. He would travel around and pick up musicians (as a backup band). We were on a stage show with Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs. We did a couple of dances with Trini Lopez. The Everly Brothers, we did a backup for them once. It was great fun."

There were other Sherman groups, but according to Bill "we pretty much dominated the area there for the period of time that we were together."

Most bands that had formed in the early 1960s looked askance at the British Invasion trend that started in 1964, but not the Passions. While they were intrigued by the Beatles, they were blown away by the Rolling Stones and soon began emulating their sound, repertoire, and style. 

"We were big fans of the Rolling Stones," Bill said. "I liked them. I liked the Beatles’ music, but we liked the Stones because ... we liked their “outlaw” image. We liked the fact that they dressed differently. That was unprecedented. All the bands then had (matching) outfits, you know, like little red jackets, or what have you. And when the Stones came out, and just had anything thrown on, we thought that was the greatest thing in the world. So, we adopted that. We chucked the uniforms and began to wear whatever we wanted, and each one us would try to look more bizarre than the other one. That was fun. And we began to grow our hair longer, and the whole nine yards. All bands then were kind of feeding off that British influence.  It was great."

This was probably when they added Jerry Mullins as a standalone harmonica player: "Jerry was great. He added a whole new dimension to the band. He was in it toward the last, but we were really cooking at that time. We got into the Stones and started doing the harmonica stuff, because initially, they had some harmonica. We’d do a lot of blues, Jimmy Reed. Jerry was terrific on harp."

Bill says, "We saw Jimmy Reed on more than one occasion (at the Sherman Municipal Ballroom). One night, Jimmy Reed had to be helped out of the car, just so completely drunk. They took him in and set him up, got him set down in that chair, but the minute he started playing, it was incredible. It was like he was as straight as an arrow. His wife would sit next to him, or stand next to him, and whisper the lyrics. I’ve seen them do that on more than one occasion. That was an absolute fact." 

       Jerry Mullins, harmonica player of the Passions. From the 1962 Sherman High year book.

Prior to April, 1965, the Passions returned to Sellers Studio. A lot had changed in one year, and their new record would sound nothing like the first. They recorded four songs: one group original ("Lively One"), one song offered to them by local songwriter Donald Mask (the Bo Diddley-esque "You've Got Me Hurtin'"), and two standards ("Ooh Poo Pah Doo" and "You Really Got a Hold on Me"). Some acetates were cut and sent around to various Texas record men, including Huey P. Meaux in Pasadena (a suburb of Houston). Only Meaux expressed interest, and soon a contract was signed. The record was released on the Pic 1 label, one of the eight labels he operated, around June of 1965. The original label had no "A-Side" designation -- perhaps so the disc jockey could "pick one" of his own  -- but Bill confirmed that the band intended "Lively One" to be the A-Side. 

Gordon shows tremendous restraint on both sides, playing only a basic chord progression while allowing Mullins to take all the solos on harmonica. This is particularly striking since Bill remembered Gordon as "an exceptionally talented musician." Meaux faded both sides earlier than the band intended. "Lively One" has a second harmonica solo, and "You've Got Me Hurtin'" was not supposed to fade out. (The full 3:09 version of "Lively One" finally appeared in 2015.)

Unbeknownst to the band, Huey's signing them had an ulterior motive: he needed original material for his new hit group, the Sir Douglas Quintet, and he wanted to secure the publishing on "You've Got Me Hurtin'" so they could record their own version of the song. They did so on April 12, 1965, at Gold Star Studios in Houston during the session for "The Rains Came," their third single. Meaux ended up rejecting the Sir Douglas version, and it would not be released until 33 years later on Edsel's The Crazy Cajun Recordings of the Sir Douglas Quintet. Meaux probably had little taste for "Lively One," as bluesy harmonica is a rarity in his catalog. 

Donald Mask "had little to do with the band," Bill said. "We just kind of threw the (song) together. Donald wanted his name on the label, and he ponied up a few bucks for some outfits and instruments. We kind of went to the well with the guy. Kind of tapped him a little bit. And he was just enthralled that he could have his name on the label. Candidly speaking, we kind of used the guy. He was tickled shitless, so it was cool." Mask remained a dabbler in music. His composition "In the Alley" was recorded by area soul group the Fabulous Capris in 1971. 

"Lively One" received a good amount of airplay on local Sherman radio station KDSX (where Gordon also disc jockeyed), and was presumably sold at the local vinyl emporium, Atherton Music Company. Meaux would have sent the bulk of copies pressed to Big State Distributors in Dallas for sales in the area. The record's scarcity today probably reflects low sales. The record was too raw for most salesmen at the time, but not most teenagers, had they been able to hear it. 

It isn't known how long after the Pic 1 record that the Passions scattered to the winds, winding down after several years making music together. They were getting older and without a hit record, they were finding themselves overcome by eager, younger bands. Bill laments, "I got to feeling like there was no future in it, and I needed to pursue other things. Big mistake. I got interested in radio work. I went to school and got into radio and television. I disc jockeyed for many years, and that evolved into television work. I did some anchor work in Lubbock. But radio is very unstable. It’s a very transient life in small markets.

"We had the talent and capability to achieve greatness but, I don’t know, we didn’t have proper direction or guidance, and it all kind of fell apart. That’s a shame."

Sellers Company acetate of "Hurtin'," re-titled "You've Got Me Hurtin'". The acetate is longer than the released version, and doesn't fade. 

THE PASSIONS DISCOGRAPHY

1964. Sellers Recording Company, 2102 Jackson, Dallas, Tx. 
Bill Galyon (vocal, bass), Gordon Eatherly, Jr. (lead guitar), Bill Sheridan (rhythm guitar), Larry Jannasch (drums).

Mercy, Little Baby (Bill Galyon) Shayon 101 (SoN 7871)
I Want You (Bill Galyon)

Early 1965. Sellers Recording Company, 2102 Jackson, Dallas, Tx. 
Bill Galyon (vocal, bass), Gordon Eatherly, Jr. (lead guitar), Bill Sheridan (rhythm guitar), Larry Jannasch (drums), Jerry Mullins (harmonica).

Lively One (The Passions) Pic 1 117
You've Got Me Hurtin' (Donald R. Mask)
Ooh Poo Pah Doo (unissued)
You Really Got a Hold on Me (unissued)

Note: Both stock and disc jockey copies were released of Pic 1 117. At least two Sellers label acetate copies exist containing the full, longer versions of "Lively One" and "You've Got Me Hurtin'". The full 3:09 version of "Lively One" was reissued from the master tape on the 2015 CD release Don't Be Bad: '60s Punk Recorded in Texas (Big Beat 327). 

Thanks to: Bill Galyon and Doug Hanners. Pic 1 label scan by Mark Taylor. High school yearbook photos taken from Classmates.com. Shayon label scan from Popsike.com. 

"Mercy, Little Baby"


 "Lively One"



"You've Got Me Hurtin'"



The Sir Douglas Quintet version of "You've Got Me Hurtin'"

Lost in Tyme: the Things

Catacombs flyer for a Six Pents and Shadows show, Thursday, April 7, 1966. Within a year, the Shadows would change their name to the Things. (This was one of several different "grand openings" of the Catacombs between December, 1965, and April, 1966.) 


Although it seems incredible today, only a small percentage of Houston-area rock bands of the 1960s were able to release a record. The stacks of vinyl that one could compile would, at first glance, seem to ridicule any notion that the music scene was somehow negligent in this department -- Neal Ford and the Fanatics alone released 12 singles and a LP, and all other popular groups had at least one single. But this image is deceptive. The Houston Post estimated that there were several hundred groups operating in the city's Metropolitan area, to which one musician added that "it seems like thousands." The mind races contemplating the hundreds of great '60s songs that could have been.

On the other hand, we probably shouldn't make too big a deal out of this. We can safely assume that most groups that didn't produce a record were mediocre, had no original material, and viewed music-making as just another hobby, nothing so serious as to require the expense of studio time or getting real managers involved. Had they recorded, we would today probably have even more lame, unwanted versions of "Mister You're a Better Man Than I" than we already have.

This is definitely not the case with the Things, a highly competent local group who recorded four songs of original material at Andrus Productions in 1967 that went unissued until the 1980s. The reason for their songs' non-release is not known, but it ensured their total eclipse from popular memories of the '60s scene. Nobody I ever talked to remembered a group called "The Things." With one exception, their name does not appear in flyers or posters from the period. Their gigs are not listed (as so many others were) in the Houston Post's weekly Now Sounds calendar. They were not part of the in crowd that hung with the Fanatics, Sidewalks, Coastliners, and Countdown 5.

What little is known about the Things is that they were originally called the Shadows. A Houston booking agent still had one of their business cards in the 1990s (shown above). Most group business cards of this period list a variety of genres that the band could play ("rock - folk - rhythm and blues"), but the Shadows' card states simply that they play "rock & roll music." Their names are listed as Dave Turner, Greg Jones, Floyd Childers, Eddie Loudon, and Steve Owens. A sixth name, Joe Engle, has been marked out. As the Shadows, they were co-billed on a Catacombs flyer dated April 7, 1966, but this is the only time they are listed on any print ephemera for the best known of all Houston teen clubs. 

In July, 1967, the Shadows -- now known as the Things, with a new member David Huffman, replacing one of the others -- booked time at Andrus Productions to record their only known session. This was the same month the Golden Dawn recorded their Power Plant album at Andrus, and just shortly before the Elevators would begin laying down tracks for Easter Everywhere in the same room (there was no "Studio B" at Andrus). To the bands, it was a chaotic but propitious period. The Sidewalks' "99th Floor" (another Andrus production) had hit #1 locally and was moving nationally. The Clique's "Splash 1" would soon be released from recent sessions and become a local hit. Could it go national? Fever Tree and the Coastliners were also recording there. It seemed like things were finally happening in Houston. The Things had every reason to believe that they would be part of this excitement when their records were released. 

The most memorable track that the Things recorded that day was undoubtedly "In Your Soul." The relentless, martial two-chord beat, combined with some outstanding keyboard wizardry overcame the cliched refrain ("I can't love nobody but you..."). It's simply a great track that never gets old. 

A fuzztoned lead guitar -- barely evident on "In Your Soul" -- strongly kicks off their next song, "I Don't Believe It." A different lead vocalist is used. Five instruments are clearly heard -- lead guitar, rhythm guitar, organ, bass, and drums. This track makes it evident that everyone in the band can play their instrument well, as some aggressive drum fills really move the song along, though once again it's somewhat marred by a hackneyed chorus ("Why do I love you the way that I do..."). The agile keyboardist once again takes the solo. 

The group's vocal harmonies threaten to overpower the lead on the mix of "Another Girl Like You," their most commercial and radio-friendly track. The same vocalist used on "I Don't Believe It" returns. There is no proper guitar solo here, only a repeat of the introduction, and the organist is only briefly heard at the end of each refrain. But aggressive, driving drums continue to bolster the song and retain the driving intensity of the previous two songs. 

Finally there was "Loveless Lover," featuring the return of the same lead vocalist as "In Your Soul." The weakest of the four songs, and mixed badly for the reissue, it features no solos, and brings in the addition of what sounds vaguely like a reed instrument (alto sax?). The drumming is frantic as usual. 

Walt Andrus in his studio in 1970. (Photo by Roy Covey, printed in the Houston Post Tempo magazine, August 9, 1970.)

Had "In Your Soul" b/w either "I Don't Believe It" or "Another Girl Like You" been released as a single in 1967, it may not have gone anywhere (Top 40 airplay having nothing to do with a song's intrinsic merit), but would have since been regarded as one of the greatest Houston singles of the '60s. But the hoped-for release never came. The producer is unknown, but it was most likely Roy Ames, not the most reliable person on the Houston music scene. In a similar fashion, an album by Lightnin' Hopkins recorded by Ames in 1968 would not be released until 1975. Perhaps-- assuming Ames was the producer -- the songs were pitched to several labels but were rejected by all of them, and Ames had no interest in releasing it on his own label of the time, Cascade. Ames was mostly into R&B, and these songs are uncharacteristic for him. It may seem remarkable to us today that record companies would reject such commercial material, but once we consider that such excellent songs as Neal Ford's "Good Men," the Chapparels' "I Try So Hard," and the Coastliners' "My Kind of Girl" -- to name but three local examples -- were also rejected, it becomes less surprising. The business revolved around the often inscrutable whims of producers and salesmen.

***

There it stood until 1983. By this time, a small market had opened for what was confusingly called sixties "punk" as well as obscure psychedelic music, and into this fell the unlikely figure of Roy Ames. Ames had been an R&B producer (supervising albums by not only Hopkins but T-Bone Walker, Arnett Cobb, Clifton Chenier, and Juke-Boy Bonner), but had fallen on hard times and was in prison in the early 1980s. Ames' tapes were stored in the vault of ACA Studios, then located at its final commercial location on Westpark Drive in Houston. The exact sequence of events is now unclear, but Ames or his lawyer probably wrote to ACA president Bill Holford asking if he could find someone interested in reissuing his old tapes, as he would be released from prison soon and would need an income. One of Holford's employees, Andy Bradley, went through Ames's tapes and recognized a few things that may be of interest to Voxx Records' Greg Shaw (Bradley was familiar with Shaw's Pebbles reissues and Bomp magazine). The album that eventually resulted, given the highly misleading but salable title Acid Visions, was drawn from the few odds and ends Ames had (mostly Johnny Winter-related material, giving an overinflated impression of Winter's actual influence on the scene when included on the album), plus a few vinyl singles Ames had never heard of, missed by Pebbles and the Flashback series, such as the Stoics, Satori, and the Pandas -- loaned by Shaw, Peter Buesnel, Ronnie Bond, or David Shutt. Two Things songs ("In Your Soul" and "I Don't Believe It") appeared for the first time ever, in new rough stereo mixes, from the master tape (still a rarity in those days of needle-drops).

Transferring from the original master tape had obvious advantages, but there were also drawbacks. Most engineers in the 1980s working from '60s tapes could not help but hear them through contemporary tastes, and mixed them accordingly, with no thought whatsoever given to how the original engineer or band "would have" theoretically mixed them 20 years before (the underlying assumption being that any '60s mix -- since the technology was so old compared to the '80s -- was de facto "bad"). This resulted in many reissues sounding quite different from what '60s fans expected to hear, and this approach continues to persist among some labels to this day. The Things tape is a prime example of this tendency. Had the songs been mixed by Andrus in 1967, the drums would have been much lower, the backing vocals much higher; the inverse mixing reflects 1980s attitudes, not '60s ones. (The exception is "Another Girl Like You," where the backing vocals overpower the lead in parts.) They would have also been mixed down to mono for release. The ACA transfers use stereo mixes, which may not not have been too objectionable had the channel losses clearly audible in "Another Girl Like You" been fixed. 

Acid Visions sold quite well, prompting a "Volume 2" in 1988. There had been no indication on the first volume that more unissued songs existed by the Things, but here they were: "Another Girl Like You" and "Loveless Lover." The songwriters' credit on both went to "Don King," an in-joke. ("Don King" was a pseudonym for Roy Ames, based on the infamous boxing promoter. The actual writers for all four songs are unknown.) This time, the album carried the crucial information -- omitted from the first volume -- that the entire Things session had been recorded at Andrus Productions in July, 1967, and the band members' names were listed, which allows us to connect them to the Shadows. This new data might suggest that Ames did indeed produce the session and had a contract with this information, but with Ames anything is possible. He might well have had nothing to do with it, acquiring the tape through some other means, as he would do with others to which he retroactively applied his producer credit. ("Volume 2" was also technically an ACA production, though by this time Bill Holford was the only employee and he was running it out of his Meyerland-area house. A lot had changed in the five years since Volume 1. This was probably the last rock-related project that Holford worked on in his long career.)

News of the release of the long-dormant tape apparently did not filter to the members of the Things themselves, as reissues and compilations often did. In the 36 years since Acid Visions was first released, no member of the Things is known to have come forward, and for all I know, the members are still unaware that their '67 session has been publicly known and loved by '60s fans for over a generation now. Someone named Floyd Mason Childers, born in Houston in 1949, died at age 31 in 1980. Is it possible that this person was the same Floyd Childers who played with the Things?

***

In the 1990s, Roy Ames sold or leased the Acid Visions tapes to the Collectables label, who began a series of wretched compact disc reissues. Highly "digitally enhanced" versions of the Things' songs appear on these discs, and these versions -- still further ruined by computer remixing and speeding up -- are the basis of the versions heard today by thousands on YouTube. This is a shame. Below we have included the original vinyl pressings of all four songs, with no digital enhancement at all, only channel loss restoration on "Another Girl Like You."



"In Your Soul"






"I Don't Believe It"






"Another Girl Like You"(Channel losses in original 1988 transfer partially corrected by making the new digital transfer in mono and leveling. Some slight loss may still be audible in places.)






"Loveless Lover"