DECADES MEMORIES! A CLASSIC 1966 YOU-TUBE VIDEO REWIND
DECADES MEMORIES! A CLASSIC 1968 YOU-TUBE VIDEO REWIND
DECADES MEMORIES! A CLASSIC 1964 YOU-TUBE VIDEO REWIND
MUSIC BUSINESS: TRINI LOPEZ, EUROPE’S BIGGEST STAR . . . SEPTEMBER 26, 1964
Trini Lopez’s Recent Continental Tour In Paris, Monte Carlo and the Riviera An Overwhelming Success, Europe Wants Him Back
Trini Lopez: Europe’s Biggest Star
Trini’s recent continental tour caused as much commotion in Paris, Monte Carlo and the Riviera as the Beatles did in the U.S.A., and they all want him back again.
MUSIC BUSINESS — (09/26/64) — If you’re part of the Jet set ‘in scene’, or you dig the discotheques and the West Coast sound in any one of its multiple facets, then you’ll appreciate that Trini Lopez is one of the leading members in all these fraternities.
At the risk of sounding a little cliche’d, but because there happens to be no other way of putting it, Trini has become the ‘darling of the discotheques’, not only here, but all over Europe where they originally started.
French scene. We caught Trini in New York last week on a 48 hour stop-over en route back to the West Coast, from a particularly successful two week season at the Paris Olympia, followed by a week of concerts on the Riviera, during which time he starred at the annual gala in Monte Carlo. The event was sponsored by Prince Rainier and Princess Grace, and generally only attended by the highest of society as the tickets work out to about $200 a throw! (At least!)
Trini digs working in France, but the French are really wild about Trini – as are the Germans, Italians, Dutch, Belgians, Swiss and Spanish.
“This last French trip was fantastic”, he enthused over veal cutlets at Danny’s Hideaway. “Everywhere I went, they went mad.
Greatest ever. “The Paris Olympia season was probably the greatest I’ve ever done. Maurice Chevalier, who never goes to the theatre except to see an opera,came to my opening night. So did Charles Aznavour, Keely Smith and Henry Mancini who was in Europe with his entire family.
“When I noticed Chevalier sitting in the audience, I dedicated a song to him, and everyone stood up and cheered. Then Chevalier rose and took a bow. After the show, he came backstage to talk with me. It was the first time I’d met him. I’m very impressed.
“Keely Smith had been appearing in Germany, so she dropped by to say hello, and I had calls from millions of people. Brigitte Bardot called me from St. Tropez, and said she learned to do the surf from all my albums, and all France is surf crazy.
Steals Show. “The audiences were beautiful. The first time I played the Olympia was earlier this year, when I appeared on the Beatles bill. The newspapers reported then that I’d stolen the show from the Beatles, and although I couldn’t believe a thing like that, when I got back this time the reception was unbelievable.
“There were riots all the time, and I had to keep doing encores. I loved it when some of the audience joined in on some of my songs like ‘Quando Caliento del Sol’, and they liked it when I spoke to them in French.
“When I arrived for the Olympia dates there was a whole crowd of fans at the airport wearing sweaters which gave my name and the dates I was playing the theatre.
“It’s amazing. It’s only been a year since I started recording, but there I was in France mixing with all the great people.”
Grand Prix award. In fact, Trini Lopez’ French success was consolidated earlier this year when he was awarded the “Grand Prix du Disque” as being the most popular singer in France. That’s why it wasn’t so surprising to learn that he had been invited to appear at the annual Gala in Monte Carlo.
“There were riots there too,” he admitted. “And the people that came to that show weren’t just ordinary people. They were real society. Anyway, I came on and did my act, and they kept on banging the tables for an encore, which I couldn’t do. They kept yelling ‘Encore Trini’, but after 45 minutes I was exhausted. In the end they all walked out of the gala without paying their tabs! The next morning, one of the French papers reported that I’d caused a mass riot!
At the discotheque. “After the gala I met Prince Rainier and Princess Grace, and believe it or not, spent an hour with them at the discotheque. Princess Grace is very charming, and spent most of the time talking about Hollywood.
“In Deauville, where he played a concert with Ray Charles, it was the same story. Riots and front page headlines. But after three weeks of wild chaos, which was nothing less than what the Beatles have been getting here, Trini was glad to be back in America.
Home Sweet Home.”You know the song, ‘I Love To Be In America,’ well that’s me,” he said. “There’s no place like home, even though I won’t be here too long.
“I noticed in my absence that my Latin album took off like crazy. I’ve wanted to record an LP in Spanish ever since I started singing, but I had no idea it would be such a big seller. I’m even more thrilled because I’m doing dates in South America later this year.
“Trini says it looks like he won’t be playing any discotheques here for quite a while yet, even though he would love to. He’s not scared of being labelled the “darling of the discotheques” as he admits to being a middle of the road singer who had to start off somewhere.
Surf Sound. He feels the discotheque sound is predominantly West Coast and exciting, but in France, it is labelled as the surfing sound, and its interpretation there has nothing to do with groups like the Beach Boys.
He is surprised and thrilled by his universal success, and proudly pointed out that “If I Had A Hammer,” his first disc on Reprise, reached number 1 in 20 countries, and sold in excess of 5,000,000.
Tight Schedule.”I want to go back to Europe again,” he said, “And I’ve been invited to play dates in Beirut, Germany and Israel, as well as France, Scandinavia and England. They all wanted me this time, but my schedule was too tight.
“I’d like to come back to New York too. I dug that booking at Basin Street East, and would like to play there again. I also enjoyed my recent concert at Forest Hills.
“But although I still live at home in Texas, I plan to move to the West Coast soon. That’s the greatest place of all.” END
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Information, credit and news source: Music Business; September 26, 1964
Trini Lopez died on August 11, 2020. He was 83. For his obituary, published in Rolling Stone please go HERE
KEENER ‘BEATLES IN DETROIT’ SERIES! ISSUE 2: SEPTEMBER 24, 1964
BEATLES IN DETROIT ’64 | WKNR EXCLUSIVE 2ND of 4 GUIDES
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ON YOUR PC? To fully appreciate this WKNR Music Guide for the week of September 24, 1964 chart feature click on image 2x and open to second window. Click image anytime to return to NORMAL image size.
Click your server’s back button to return to MCRFB home page.
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— SEPTEMBER 24-30, 1964 —
ON YOUR MOBILE DEVICE? Tap on chart image. Open to second window. “Stretch” chart across your device screen to magnify for largest print view.
— THIS WEEK 57 YEARS AGO —
FOR THE 1ST KEENER ‘BEATLES IN DETROIT’ SPECIAL ISSUE GO HERE
The above WKNR music chart was digitally restored by Motor City Radio Flashbacks
NEXT WEEK: WKNR — 3RD of 4 SERIES — OCTOBER 1, 1964
— In Memory of George Griggs —
A SPECIAL THANK YOU
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A sincere, thank you, Mrs. Patti Griggs. This featured presentation would have not been possible without your generosity, dedication, and your continuous support.
Above WKNR music chart courtesy of Mrs. Patti Griggs and the George L. Griggs estate.
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WKNR KEENER 13 BACK ON THE RADIO: JIM JEFFRIES, 1966
WKNR RECALLED on MOTOR CITY RADIO FLASHBACKS
JIM JEFFRIES | DATE: SUNDAY, AUGUST 14, 1966
— JIM JEFFRIES —
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Today we are showcasing a selected WKNR Jim Jeffries audio file from the Motor City Radio Flashbacks airchecks library.
Having been long archived in the collection, this audio file was digitally renewed and enhanced in sound. We are delighted to feature this Jim Jeffries aircheck once again — REMASTERED — from what the audio previously sounded like HERE.
Also corrected was the recording’s speed pitch, having upped the speed slightly to a more ‘normal’ state than what the original recording archived sounded previously.
For more on Jim Jeffries we previously featured on Motor City Radio Flashbacks, go HERE.
Another classic Motor City radio flashback, indeed. Jim Jeffries on WKNR, fifty-five years ago, August 14, 1966.
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THE MOTOR CITY RADIO FLASHBACKS AIRCHECKS COLLECTION
MUSIC BUSINESS: THE BEATLES CHANGED HIS LIFE . . . SEPTEMBER 26, 1964
George Martin, Who Records Beatles for Parlophone, Now Has a Big Hit in His Own Right
MUSIC BUSINESS — September 26, 1964 — His life changed. George Martin is a man whose entire life has been changed by the Beatles. This tall, lean, and quiet-spoken Englishman is the man who signed the Beatles–when they were very unknown–to a contract with EMI, the English record manufacturing giant. He is the man who records all of the Beatles sides for Parlophone (the boys’ English label) and the man who scored the soundtrack for their hit movie “A Hard Day’s Night.”
George signed the Beatles after they were turned down by a number of other labels. He has been with them ever since. He was in the United States to supervise their live recording at the Hollywood Bowl two weeks ago.
In his own right. “The boys have done a lot for me,” mused Martin during a lunch with Music Business editors. “They have helped me fulfill my desire to arrange and conduct in my own right.” His own right happens to be a very good right, by the way, because the George Martin recording of “Ringo’s Theme” from the picture soundtrack on the United Artists label in the U.S., has already sold over 200,000 recordings. And his LP, called “Off The Beatles Track” is also a big one for United Artists Records.
Before the Beatles ever came on the scene George Martin had already established himself as a top recording man in London. Some of the artists he records for EMI include Billy J. Kramer, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Cilla Black, The Hollies, Matt Monro, Shirley Bassey, Ron Goodwin, Peter Sellers, Rolf Harris, and many others. The artists whose records he supervises comes to 48 in all.
Also a composer. Martin is also a composer of note in his native England. One of his biggest songs here was called “The Niagara Theme,” and he has written many other songs, that so far have been bigger hits there than here.
A thumbnail description of a Beatles recording session, according to Martin, would go like this. The Beatles come in with a new song, written 99 per cent of the time by John Lennon and Paul McCartney. John and Paul sing the song through (none of the Beatles can read or write music) until Martin learns it, and then he sits down at the piano and plays it. Then the boys and Martin work out an arrangement together, with each coming through with ideas. It usually takes about three or four hours to work out the arrangement on each song. After that they are ready to record.
Let him run. Martin has been asked by many people whether he ever intends to put strings behind the boys, or record them with a full orchestra, or with choral backing or whatever. “I don’t intend to change anything they do,” says Martin emphatically. Recording a successful artist is like riding a good horse. The best way is to let him run. All you should provide is a good balance. “The balance that Martin provides for his artists apparently is a very good one. To illustrate this it has been estimated that the records George Martin has produced with his artists have sold over 100 million copies throughout the world. Last year–1963–recordings produced by Martin were in the No. 1 spot on the English charts 37 weeks out of 52. For 17 consecutive weeks recordings he produced for Parlophone were No. 1.
What did it. What made the Beatles take off the way they did in the U.S., Martin was asked, and would American record artists move back into the top rungs throughout the world soon or not? “There was a vacuum to be filled in the pop record business, and the Beatles filled it,” said Martin. “As for the American recordings, I think there has been a great awakening here since last Winter, and many of the new American records are getting right up there. “Among the recording men whom Martin respects very highly here are Bert Bacharach and Hal David, who produce all of the Dionne Warwick recordings. “They have brought fresh, new ideas into the recording world,” says Martin.
Breaking the hits. How does a record company break a new recording in Britain, since there is so little radio time allotted for pop records, Martin was asked. “We break our records via TV, which covers the entire country, not by radio,” said Martin. “There are TV shows like ‘Thank Your Lucky Stars’ and ‘Ready, Steady, Go,’ that put a record over very quickly. Sales of records in Britain are up very much today, according to Martin, with a sale of 800,000 average for a No. 1 recording. (The Beatles, of course, do much better.)
United Artists records is on a big campaign in the U.S. to build George Martin into a recording star, and they are on their way with “Ringo’s Theme.” What kind of recording does Martin want to do in the future? “I’m not certain yet, I know I would like to record many of my own songs for release here, and then I have a number of other ideas. I don’t intend to try to copy anyone’s style, but to create my own. That’s why I recorded all of the Beatles songs in my own way, rather than to use the same arrangements the boys do when they sing them. You know, Paul and John write very good songs.” Sales of Martin’s recordings indicate many other people feel they do too. END
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Information, credit and news source: Music Business; September 26, 1964
CAPITOL RECORDS LP AD FLASHBACK! DENNY McLAIN: BILLBOARD, SEPTEMBER 1968
AT THE MIGHTY HAMMOND X-77 ORGAN
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DENNIS DALE McLAIN is a sensitive, talented musician who throws baseballs. He is not, in his own words, a “ballplayer who plays the organ.”
He leads his own Denny McLain Quintet in the off-season when the Detroit Tigers are caged for the fall and winter hiatus, and in 1968 the swingin’ little McLain combo not only performed on the Ed Sullivan CBS-TV show but in Las Vegas and half-dozen cities in the Middlewest as well.
This is Denny’s first record.
He completed the twelfth tune (“By The Time I Get To Phoenix“) just minutes before he raced to Tiger Stadium in a driving rain. There he crushed the Cleveland Indians 13-1 for his 23rd victory of the year, propelling him three days ahead of the “unbreakable” Lefty Grove 31-4 record which no other American League hurler has come near in nearly 40 years.
Denny picked the songs himself. He chose his own musicians. Ralph Terrana’s unconventional Tera Shirma Studios on Detroit’s Livernois Avenue provided the settings.
The 24 year-old McLain, who weighs 200 pounds, recalls that music was always “terribly important” to him, even as a child.
“My father played records much of the time around our house, “Denny recalls. “Mostly I remember Frank Sinatra things. And even when I was playing baseball on sandlots, before I got into Connie Mack and American Legion baseball, I was crazy about music.”
McLain was born and reared in the Chicago area. At Mt. Carmel High School he racked up a 38-7 mark as a hurler. In his professional game at Harlan, Ky., in 1962 (he was just 18) he fashioned a no-hitter, but the Chicago White Sox, who owned his contract, somehow failed to protect him from the first-year draft. Detroit picked him up for the $8,000 waivers fee.
He was 16-6 for the Tigers in 1965 after pitching for the Bengals’ farm clubs in Duluth, Knoxville and Syracuse. In ’66 McLain went 20-14, and in ’67, plagued by a leg injury, he still went 17-16 for the Tigers who missed the pennant in the last game of the year, winding up tied with the Minnesota Twins for second place, only a single game behind the triumphant Boston Red Sox.
Denny is a strong-willed, impulsive man who speaks his mind bluntly. He has the erupting, violent temper of the Irish and it frequently flairs. He considers “For Me” (the Latin ballad popularized by Steve Lawrence) to be the “maddest, swingin’est track” in this debut album and for sheer ballad beauty–and soul–Denny picks “Lonely Is The Name.” “But the other 10 tunes are pretty darned good, too,” he adds.
McLain’s musicians on all selections in this album comprise Bob Schneider, tenor sax; Ernie Skuta, trumpet and flugelhorn; Eddie Kayne, string bass; and Eddie Demetrak, drums. They are the same musicians with whom Denny works on his personal appearances in the off-season.
Denny lives with his young daughter and son in the Detroit suburb of Farmington. Mrs. McLain is the former Sharon Alice Boudreau, brunet daughter of the great old shortstop and field manager Lou Boudreau who later became a popular baseball announcer for the Chicago Cubs.
“I am proud of this first album,” Denny says. And then, stomping the gas pedal of his bright red Pontiac as he swings onto the freeway from the Livernois off-ramp, he makes another comment:
“When it’s all said and done some day in the future,” he muses, “I hope they will remember Denny McLain as an outstanding professional musician.”
NOTES BY DAVE DEXTER (Capitol Records)
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NOTE: LP notes taken from the Capitol Records album, ‘Denny McLain At The Organ’ ST 2881 (back cover). Released in 1968
CAPITOL RECORDS
BILLBOARD | SEPTEMBER 28, 1968
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The above Billboard (9/28/68) ad was digitally re-imaged and restored by Motor City Radio Flashbacks
NEW! WDRQ-FM BACK ON THE RADIO: KIM CARSON
WDRQ RECALLED on MOTOR CITY RADIO FLASHBACKS
KIM CARSON | DATE: THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 1979
— SPECIAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT —
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NEW! A special THANK YOU to our newest contributor Dave Preston — formerly of WDRQ — for recently donating the featured Kim Carson FM 93 radio aircheck (he recorded in 1979) to our Motor City Radio Flashbacks’ airchecks archive.
Kim Carson’s tenure with Detroit radio began with WDRQ, 1978-1985; WCZY, 1985-1989; WCSX-FM. Prior to her arrival to the Motor City, Kim Carson was at Rockford, Illinois’s WROK, 1977-78.
For our previous Dave Preston aircheck contribution — featuring Don Geronimo on WDRQ (8/6/2021) — go HERE
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THE DAVE PRESTON COLLECTION
The featured WDRQ aircheck was audio enhanced by Motor City Radio Flashbacks