(484) MERLE TRAVIS : A FIXTURE AT AMERICAN MUSIC AND SONGWRITER FOR TENNESSEE ERNIE FORD

I met Merle Travis, the country western singer who they called a "guitar picker" and who came from the South - Kentucky,  when he came into American Music, the big song publishing house I worked for as a staff writer for several years when I first moved to Los Angeles!  I grew up in North Carolina and Oregon listening to Country music and never lost my enthusiasm for it.  Merle wrote songs and played on sessions for demos and became a fixture there.  Great man!

So many artists who went into performance careers have worked making demos, Bobby Darin, as I recently mentioned, made demos in the recording studios in the Brill Building, in New York City.  Glen Campbell made demos in Los Angeles, some for American Music.  I made demos while at American Music and also I made demo's for Pat Boone's company, Cooga- Mooga! 

Demo records of songs with hit potential were send out - sometimes hand delivered by people like me - to the recording artists that the writer had in mind for their listen.  Sometimes they piled up in a corner and months went by before one got a listen, so that personal connection was important.

 

DISCOGS PAGE FOR MERLE TRAVIS link

(483) BOBBY DARIN : FROM MOTOWN TO FOLK SONGS

Back in July of this year, we posted on Bobby Darin on Motown Records, where he tried on the popular Motown Sound.  Well, Bobby was challenged to find his niche in music by the mid sixties. He was challenged by changing times and the influence of Bob Dylan to cover songs that were more folk or political.  It was particularly difficult to pick and choose because he was so diverse in his talent.

I first met an ambitious Bobby in New York City in the Brill Building, introduced by Neil Sendaka, where he was making his rent by singing on demo records for song writers.  He was also writing songs of his own.  He was in the perfect spot to discover or write a hit song, and he did soon after we me with his recording of  Splish Splash.

Bobby was able to change his singing style enough to be hired to make a good many of those demos and I suspect that somewhere there is a treasure trove of them that he made - and some of them maybe you wouldn't know right away you were listening to Bobby. 

This challenge of being true to yourself, or what you're really good at, and being out of sync with the changing times, it's happened to the best of us. It happens in the music business every few, maybe every several years that music changes enough that you might get left behind, and 1966 is right about when you found the British Invasion with the Rolling Stones making the Beatles look tame - and in San Francisco, a new sound, the beginning of a Psychedelic drug fueled sound, typified by the Grateful Dead - and Peter Paul and Mary who are sticking to their folk music - while Bob Dylan is identified as a protest singer but doesn't want to be identified that way - and Bobby Darin - out of a whole group of young men who had vibrant carriers beginning in the 1950's, trying to figure out which way to go. 

Give it enough time though, and you become known as a CLASSIC.
Linking to his official site:  BOBBY DARIN NET - OFFICIAL - INCLUDING LIFE TIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD

Bobby gets the most airplay over time for Mac The Knife, with Splish Splash clearly thought of as the 1950's.

(360) DEMO TREASURE CHEST! DAVID GATES, LEON RUSSEL, GLEN CAMPBELL, and ME

Here's a demo or two I would love to find and hear again!

Pat Boone paid for the session time.
David Gates was the arranger.
I was the producer.
Leon Russel played piano.
Glen Campbell and I did two instrumentals together.

I sang on two songs which were "20 Acres of Land," and "I'm Such a Fool."

Auctioneers and collectors!?

(19) BOBBY DARIN - DEMO RECORD SINGER EXTRAORDINAIRE!

Bobby Darin and I hung out at Hansons Drug store with a number of other friends like Rock-A-Billy Superstar Buddy Knox, and Dion and the Bellmonts. There was a real old man Hanson and he was always trying to run us out of there for going on too long on one coffee. (I think he actually enjoyed the ritual, as we wouldn't budge!)

Bobby spent years making demos for other artist and specialized in sounding as much like them as possible to sell the record to them. He could sound like Elvis Presley if he wanted to but Bobby was after his idol Frank Sinatra's crown.

After years of paying his dues as the demo record singer extraordinaire, Bobby Darin signed with a label and gave making his own records his all. He soon hit with "Splish Splash!" It's a fun song with a sexy saxophone rift.

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You Tube presentation - Bobby singing "Splish Splash."

I don't know what show this was on, and I think it's from the early 1960's but this video shows just how talented Bobby was, playing his own piano and harmonica, and what a true Rock and Roller he was, before he decided to be a crooner!

Video replaced 2009 with this great one below!

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BOBBY DARIN'S OFFICIAL WEB SITE link above!