New England Spotlight: The Remains - Once Before and Diddy Wah Diddy

The New England Battle Of The Bands just keeps rolling! The bands we have featured in the last five posts have been small potatoes. All but one of those artists only had one release. The other artist, The Blue Beats, two releases. Today we turn our attention to a real, legitimate band.

The Remains hailed from the unofficial capital of New England, Boston, Massachusetts. The members of the band, Barry Tashian, Vern Miller, Billy Briggs and Chip Damiani, all met while Freshmen students at The University of Boston in 1964. From day one the band was in a groove. And the kids at BU knew it. The legend goes: acoustic dorm room rehearsals with kids spilling out into the halls led to the kids in Kenmore Hall setting up a rehearsal spot for the band in the basement. Kids from all over Boston started showing up to hear them groove. Then came the first gigs already filled with adoring fans pouring out into the streets. Epic Records heard of the legend and the band was signed in the waning hours of 1964.

The band released their first single in March of 1965. The Tashian penned Why Do I Cry was sophisticated and catchy. A real gem of production. But we're going to jump ahead and feature the band's third single. And of course, we're going to flip the sides.

The Flip-Side of their March 1966 release was composed by the rhythm section of the band, Vern Miller, the bassist, and Chip Damiani, the drummer. Once Before is a rocket fueled attack that would have made The Yardbirds proud. And damn, it's catchy too! Tashian's vocals are matched beautifully by his edgy guitar tone and wonderful rhythm guitar work and tastefully subtle fills.

The A-Side was a cover of the traditional blues number, Diddy Wah Diddy, and certainly picked up from Bo Diddley's version. The Remains do a great, peppy version that tracks closely with Mr. McDaniels' take on the number. It was a solid choice for the A-Side.

Everything was going great for The Remains. Epic Records moved them to New York, took them into a studio to record a full length album of killer track after killer track. Then they got the call. The Remains were tagged to open for The Beatles on what would prove to be the band's last ever tour. The Remains got a spot performing live on The Ed Sullivan Show. Hullabaloo was next. Everything was looking perfect. But just days before The Remains were to take off on the tour, drummer Chip Damiani decided he didn't want to go. What?!?!?!?! The band soldiered on without him but the remains of the band felt that it wasn't the same without him. So just as their album was released, the band broke up. Sheesh!

Barry Tashian went on to play with numerous Nashville-based acts including performing with Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris and is still active in music today.

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

New England Spotlight: The Shames - The Special Ones and My World Is Upside Down

The New England Battle of the Bands competition continues on this Tuesday with a band out of Ipswich, Massachusetts, a town just north of Boston. The band was The Shames (formerly the Cryin' Shames, but that name was taken) and consisted of Denis Trudel on vocals, Gerard Trudel on bass, Joey Amerault on drums, James Amero on lead guitar, and Patty Germoni on organ. That's right, The Shames were rockin' it with a girl in the band. And her nickname was apparently "Beetle". Bitchin'! The Shames played all over New England and, according to Back From The Grave Vol. 6, as far West as Buffalo and even had Bo Diddley in their audience one night. The band kicked out only one record, released on RFT out of Hyannis, Massachusetts, the same tiny town in Cape Cod where they recorded this sloppy-ass gem. And here is the kicker about this 1967 release. They forgot to put their name on the record. D'oh!

The A-Side, The Special Ones, was composed by singer Denis Trudel (second from right in the scanned photo below). The song starts with a sloppy racket of brazen guitar banging away. Trudel laments the life of being a long hair mod in a town of squares. But he stands up for himself, calling themselves The Special Ones (a title that takes on a different meaning when you consider they forgot to put their name on the record!). He even works in the band's original name of The Cryin' Shames into his lyrics. 

The Flip-Side is perhaps the better known of this double sided raver. My World Is Upside Down was co-written by the guitarist (the blonde cat on the left) and starts epically awesome with Trudel (voice cracking like Peter Brady) calling the flock to church before Gerard Trudel rips off a bass solo that would put John Entwistle to Shame (see what I did there?). I say this next thing with 100% sincerity: The loud jangly guitar overwhelming the recording, the drums banging away deep in the background, beyond dodgy harmonies, funky time changes, ridiculously simplistic song structure and the requisite 'woe-is-me' lyrics makes this a garage classic in the first order. It's just the kind of rock-n-roll approach that makes teen-driven garage music from the 60s so damn good. We don't need to be going up, up and away in a beautiful, beautiful balloon. We don't need to be going on an overly complicated musical journey to tell us that 'your's is no digrace'. Nope. We need one diminutive, snot nosed outsider telling us about how he feels like a 'broken limb on a tree'. And in less than 2:40 to boot!

If I recall correctly, San Diego's Tell-Tale Hearts did a spot on cover of this song back in the early to mid 80s. It must have taken their bassist, Mike Stax, hours in front of the turntable to figure out that bass solo!

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

New England Spotlight: The Squires - Going All The Way and Go Ahead

The New England Battle of The Bands continues into this new week. We start the week with a monster double sided record.

The Squires were a bunch of high school buddies out of Bristol, Connecticut (perhaps best known today for being the home of ESPN). In the fall of '66 they loaded into the van and drove to New York to record a few original songs. One of them was the mega gem, Going All the Way, from drummer and singer, Michael Bouyea. Thomas Flannigan was holding the Fender Jazzmaster guitar, John Folick owned a cheap bass that looks to me to be a Kay; and Kurt Robinson from nearby Torrington, played a mean Farfisa organ. The band would later add a drummer and move Bouyea to the front, but that guy isn't on this recording.

The A-Side is the Bouyea composed Going All The Way. The jangly guitar, the lonely bird chirp of the far off organ, the lyrics that exude cockiness, the blazingly fast jazzmaster guitar lead that takes up nearly 1/4 of the entire song. Michael Bouyeau's scream that leads us into said guitar solo. It is perfect. Perfect, perfect, perfect. The Flip-Side is nearly as good. Go Ahead, also composed by Bouyeau, is a classic folk rock, pop number and tells the tale of the 60s garage, time-tested theme of "bad girl does good boy wrong." With all it's suspended chords and efficient 2:07 of length, this could have been an early Byrds number. 

The record was released on Atco Records in September of 1966. But Atco fell down on the job with a monster record on their hands. The Atlantic Records subsidiary did not promote their local gem and the number of pressings of the record is rumored to be 2,500 or less. I want it. 

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

New England Spotlight: The Cobras - I Wanna Be Your Love

New England battle of the bands continues on this bitchin' Friday!

This is one of those killer songs I almost forgot about. Until today when I pulled out an old vinyl comp that had been sitting in my bins for about 25 years untouched. I Wanna Be Your Love is the first song on New England Teen Scene Vol 2.

Little is known about this band, but a bit of digging around on the internet has turned up a few hints. One sight claims the boys are from Smyrna Mills, Maine. This is beyond a small town nestled near the Eastern border of Maine with Canada. How these lads found enough people to form a band is beyond me. But, hey, stranger things have happened. 

More digging shows that The Cobras were a trio. Gary Leavitt was on vocals and guitar. His brother Jay Leavitt on drums. I don't know who was playing that bitchin' bass. The Cobras lone record was released in 1966 (weren't they all?) on Big Beat Records (the label's only release) and produced by a cat named Bobby Herne. He is the same guy that recorded the legendary Shaggs record, Philosophy of the World, in Revere, Massachusetts. Us Flipsters are betting The Cobras made the same trip from the north woods of New England down to Revere to record their disc. We're also betting that dad drove the station wagon.

I Wanne Be Your Love is a wild stomp of a song with a quasi-Bo Diddley beat on crack and wild screaming and demonic Jagger influenced vocals. The bass work is top notch and pounding. I particularly dig the run after the first verse and at the end of the guitar solo. The guitar solo is quite impressive (again...Smyrna Mills?!?!?!?!). Banging drums and some depraved lyrics like "your eyes are colder than ice cream" make this an A+ gem. A Mount Garagemore, if you will. 

I Wanna Be Your Love was written by Levitt-Levitt (note that their names are misspelled). One source shows Gary Leavitt as passing away in 1975. Jay Leavitt is apparently still kickin' around Maine. Contact us Jay, let us know about this recording and clear up some info on this cool record!

New England Spotlight: The Bold - Gotta Get Some

"Gotta get some. Yeah baby!" We're back for more of our battle of the bands in New England.

The year is 1966. The town is Springfield, Massachusetts. Four college kids living in nearby Amherst stride into a studio and spew onto wax their love of college girls, sexual voyeurism, and the need to let it erupt. The song is the very boldly titled Gotta Get Some and the band call themselves, what else, The Bold. A pretty cool and different sounding name in their day. The bold result of this trip to Springfield is one of the best garage rock songs to ever come out of the holy grail year of 1966. Snarly vocals, fuzzed out guitar and an incessant 4/4 rhythm back up some of the best sexual gratification lyrics you will ever hear.

"Gotta get some. (Yeah baby).

Sitting in class, waiting for time to pass

I'm eyeing some girl and getting mad at the world

When I'm out for the day, I meet some nice thing on the way

I said "if you're free come along with me"

(When I get too close and the feeling comes over me)

Gotta Get Some!

On the beach when it's just out of reach

All the girls gather round, you know they're digging my sound

Holding hands in the sand, getting wet, getting tan

I'm so ready to go my mind's gonna blow

(When I get too close and the feeling comes over me)

I Gotta Get Some!

In the night when the feeling is right

And the band is playing you know they are out of sight

I'm dancing with my girl and we're both uptight

you know it can't be wrong the way she turns me on.

(When I get too close and the feeling comes over me)

I Gotta Have My!

After hours when we're hanging around

digging sounds, and crowded pathways, said somebody's tired

well it's too late for home, I know I ought to phone

what can anybody say when you're feeling this way?

(When I get too close and the feeling comes over me)

I Gotta Get Some!

Yeah baby, yeah.

Yeah, I gotta get some!

WoWWWWW"