Story Of My Life
It's Not Fair
Day four of the Hanna-Barbera Records spotlight takes us to suburban Detroit, Michigan. It's February of 1967 and five geek-chic kids with some pretty serious musical chops just found out that the first record they ever recorded for the local SVR label is being picked up for national distribution by Hanna-Barbera Records out of LA. The five kids -- Ron Stults on vocals, Rory Mack on lead guitar, Barry Van Engelen on bass, John Torok on rhythm guitar and Andy Angellotti on drums -- call themselves the Unrelated Segments. They've recorded two songs written by Mack and Stults: Story Of My Life and It's Not Fair.
This double sided gem is flat-out a nasty-ass garage classic (as are all three singles the band put out). Story Of My Life is an upbeat number preaching the warning of money grubbing girls trying to exchange love for monetary rewards like jewelry. The song is highlighted by the brilliant bass work by Barry Van Engelen. Van Engelen's closing bass work at 1:57 is a thing of bizarre beauty far beyond what most of his contemporaries could produce. And again at 2:26. WTF?!?!?!?!
It's Not Fair is more than a solid Flip-Side. The slow number clearly owes much to the Zombies' She's Not There, but it stands on it's own legs in the end. The jazzy guitar work by Rory Mack is worth the price of admission alone. Reminds me a lot of the guitar work done by Minnesota garage band, The Gestures.
Not more than a month ago we did a more extensive feature on The Unrelated Segments and their second single, Where You Gonna Go?/It's Gonna Rain. Check that out here to learn more about the band.
Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!
This was originally released on SVR? Didn't know that.
ReplyDeleteHBR definitely gives Tower a run for the money with the garage output. Interestingly, both L.A. based labels.
Apparently, yes on SVR. But I have never seen a copy of it even in Google image search.
ReplyDeleteConfession: I've never heard any version OTHER than Linda Ronstadt's 1974 version. Here is the original (I think) from Dee Dee Warwick. You'll like the fuzz, Mr. E.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/_xUisVuPt8M
I really doubt this had a release on SVR. Something would have surfaced by now. Never happened, I bet. Just like this one: https://www.45cat.com/record/21604
ReplyDeleteThe bass is mindblowing. And really, at 1:12, that's a two note rapid fire bass solo.