Our Monthly Club Meeting will be this Sunday, October 12th at the Homewood Public Library. 2:00 PM
*****Next club meeting will be November 9th, 2008, the second Sunday******

What would you say is the common bond in the following songs? The Beach Boys’ “It’s About Time”, Fats Domino’s “Mardi Gras In New Orleans, Eugene Church’s “Pretty Girls Everywhere”, Ritchie Valens’ “La Bamba” & “Donna”, Little Richard’s “Rip It Up”, Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues”, Nino Temple & April Stevens’ “Deep Purple” and Etta James’ “Dance With Me Henry”? Oh, wait. Add to that list, Doris Day’s “Everybody Loves A Lover”, Frank Sinatra’s “I Get A Kick Out Of You”, Bobby Darin’s “Beyond The Sea”, Andy Williams’ “Can’t Get Used To Losing You” and The Partridge Family’s “Come On Get Happy”. And for good measure let’s throw in Ray Charles’ “Let’s Go Get Stoned”, Larry Williams’ “Slow Down” and Lloyd Price’s “Lawdy Miss Clawdy”. Quite a conglomeration of musical genre’s wouldn’t you say. Well, the one thing they have in common is Earl Palmer. Earl Palmer was the drummer on those and literally 1000’s of other songs from rock, to pop, to soul, to R&B, to jazz.

Mr. Palmer recently passed away September 19th at the age of 84. He was the session drummer’s, session drummer. He was born in New Orleans in 1924. He moved to Los Angeles and worked extensively in both cities. He did session work for the likes of Phil Spector and for the Motown sound. Also on his list of artists he recorded with include the Monkees, The Righteous Brothers, Neil Young, Dick Dale, Rick Nelson, Dizzy Gillespie, Jan & Dean, Lightin’ Hopkins and Little Feat. The list goes on and on.

After studying piano and percussion at Gruenwald School Of Music in New Orleans he got a start playing drums for the Dave Bartholomew Band in the late 1940’s. He was the session drummer on Fats Domino’s “Fat Man”, Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” and “I Hear You Knocking” by Smiley Lewis in his early years.
Mr. Palmer also was the drummer on many soundtracks and TV theme songs including “Judgment At Nuremberg”, “Hud”, “It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World”, “How To Stuff A Wild Bikini”, “Cool Hand Luke” and “In The Heat Of The Night”. TV theme songs included The Flintstones, 77 Sunset Strip, I Dream Of Jeannie, Green Acres, The Brady Bunch, M.A.S.H. and Batman.

He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame in 2000. Little Richard wrote in his autobiography that Earl Palmer was the greatest drummer of all time.

RHYMING SIMON’S RISE TO STARDOM
If the first Paul Simon song you heard was when you went to see the movie, The Graduate, then you missed quite a few hits before then. Before the soundtrack came out, Simon & Garfunkel already had had 8 songs in the top 40, 3 of which made the top 10. All this fame for Paul Simon began in 1965 with the release of “Sounds Of Silence”, a song Simon wrote in the aftermath of the Assassination of John F. Kennedy. But 1965 was 8 years after he had recorded his first song.

Born in 1941, Paul Simon began singing at high school dances with his friend, Art Garfunkel. They were heavily influenced by The Everly Brothers. Still in their teens, the two recorded as Tom & Jerry on the Big label. Their song, “Hey, Schoolgirl”, reached # 49 on the charts. After high school they each went to different colleges but occasionally got together and continued to record as Tom & Jerry. They did songs such as “Our Song”, “That’s My Story” and “Surrender, Please Surrender’. Although Simon earned a degree in English literature he had a passion for music and wrote and produced many songs between 1957-1964. He would record unreleased demos with Carole King using the name The Cosines. These songs would then be recorded and released by other groups. He produced for artists such as The Vels, Ritchie Cordell, The Fashions, Jay Walker & The Pedestrians and Dougie & The Dubs.

During these years he recorded on many different labels such as Amy, ABC Paramount, Big, Hunt, King, Madison and Tribute. Names he recorded under were Jerry Landis, Paul Kane and True Taylor. In 1962 he was with a group called Tico & The Triumphs. They had a song entitled “Motorcycle” which reached # 99 on the charts. That same year, recording as Jerry Landis, Simon had a # 97 song entitled “The Lone Teen Ranger”. Both of these were on the Amy label.

It was during this time he was attracted to the folk music scene. “Carlos Dominguez” and “He Was My Brother” were two songs he wrote in this vein. The latter being dedicated to a friend who was murdered while working in Mississippi on the Freedom Summer Project. In the mid 1960’s while living in the UK he went to London and performed at local folk clubs. While in England he recorded his solo LP, The Paul Simon Songbook. He co-wrote songs along with Bruce Woodley, a member of the Australian group The Seekers. One of the songs they wrote was “Red Rubber Ball” which as covered by The Cyrkle and went to # 2 on the US charts.

Simon reunited with Art Garfunkel in 1964 and recorded an album for Columbia entitled Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. which was a failure except for some airplay the song, “Sounds Of Silence” was getting in Boston and in Florida around Gainesville and the Cooca Beach area. The song originally had Simon on acoustic guitar with Simon and Garfunkel singing. As the song was gaining popularity, producer Tom Wilson took the original track and added electric guitar, electric bass and drums. He did all this without consulting with Simon & Garfunkel. With this the song gained popularity and began going up the charts. It reached # 1 in early 1966. The duo hastily went in the studios and used the song as the title track of the album “Sounds Of Silence”.

Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs Of All Time include 3 of the duos songs including “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, “The Boxer” and “Sounds Of Silence”. Paul Simon has had quiet a musical career and its beginnings go back to singing at high school dances. Would one believe listening to his hit songs that he once had a passion for good ‘ole Rock & Roll.

A few samples of early Paul Simon Music from Youtube

“Motorcycle” as by Tico & Triumphs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmValLnsZd0
“Lone Teen Ranger” as by Jerry Landis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-A1DC_BqyA
“Hey SchoolGirl” as by Tom & Jerry http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsnwAN5bezw
“Tick Tock” by Ritchie Cordell. Written by Jerry Landis AKA Paul Simon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JukOv1k1egE

Upcoming record shows

FRIDAY OCTOBER 24-SUNDAY OCTOBER 26 WFMU RECORD FAIR, NYC The big one wraps up the year with the wildest wax weekender yet! www.wfmu.org/recfair

Upcoming Concerts

Oct 11, Dave Mason & Poco, Wildhorse Saloon, Nashville, TN
Oct 18, Blind Boys Of Alabama, Alys Stephens Center, Birmingham, AL
Oct 24, Jackson Browne, Alabama Theatre, Birmingham, AL
Nov 9, Tina Turner, Philips Arena, Atlanta, GA
Nov 10, Brian Wilson, Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN
Nov 11, Kelly Clarkson & Reba McEntire, BJCC Birmingham, AL
Nov 16, eagles, FedEx Forum, Memphis, TN
Dec 5, Aaron Neville, Wildhorse Saloon, Nashville, TN
Dec 11 Johnny Winter, Smith’s Olde Bar, Atlanta, GA

UPCOMING PROGRAMS AT THE BRC CLUB MEETINGS
Looking for some interesting websites that are dedicated to searching for songs, doing some research on recording company labels, stations that play oldies or obscure songs or just need an update on how to navigate through the BRC website and maybe do your own radio show? A program is being planned that will help you. If you are new to the computer or can operate one blindfolded, this will be a helpful program for all.

What recordings that are relevant to Alabama do you consider the most important? Club member Andy Millard, who is employed at UAB and has written a book on the local music scene, has picked his top 5. Start thinking about this and be prepared to give your top 5. COMING EARLY 2009.

Are you a picture sleeve junkie? Do the covers of CD’s leave you feeling blue because they don’t have that something that sleeves give you? Club member Gus Liberto has a collection of picture sleeves that will rival many and wants to share them with us. This program is planned for November.

Dirty Santa in December. An extra feature is in the planning process for this meeting as well.

See ya. Charlie