Dirt
City Chronicles_ Cassette to MP3
The
Best of The Standells_ Rhino Records_ 1984
Another exemplary compilation from
Rhino Records. As I've mentioned before, nobody does it better. Audio
quality, liner notes, track selection... it's the bees knees. Not
everyone feels the same way about Rhino's efforts. Larry Tambyln,
who coined the name “Standells” and co founded the band has
voiced his displeasure with Rhino's description of the band as “a
clean living fun bunch of bananas” Larry likes to point out that
The Standells were indeed hip and happening. They were after all, the
first SoCal band in the 1960s to have long hair (which they promptly
cut in order to land a gig at PJ's, notorious for its “no long
hair” and matching suits dress code) Larry doth protest too much,
the band's pre-Dirty Water recordings and publicity shots do present
a clean cut, albeit lame bunch of bananas.
Larry Tambyln especially had a bone to
pick with Harold Bronson, who researched and composed the liner
notes. Stating that Bronson never met with him or any members of the
band to verify any biographical info. Bronson noted that “The band
included one guy who spoke with a very unhip broken Italian accent”
That would be Tony Valentino, fresh off a pasta boat and as evidenced
by Dick Clark's interview after The Standells performed “Help
Yourself” Valentino spoke in a monosyllabic manner that brought
Balki Bartokomous, Bronson Pinchot's immigrant character on the
television sitcom, Perfect Strangers to mind. Harold Bronson also
pokes at them for having “a Mouseketeer in the band... that's Dick
Dodd, though Dick was cool, upping the band's “cool” quotation by
a 100%
Let's face it, before Ed Cobb and
“Dirty Water” The Standells were destined for the cut-out bin.
Their legacy of failed singles and lame cameo appearances in
b-movies and television sitcoms preceded them. Harold Bronson was
right “Perhaps the years of growing up squeaky clean had suppressed
a lot of angst that unleashed itself in the group's new found
personality” “Oooh, that's a bingo. Is that the way you say it,
"That's a bingo?” “The Best of The Standells” is an
excellent and comprehensive collection of the band's best music
during their “Dirty Water” period. There's nothing on here
recorded before 1965, it's strictly Ed Cobb produced, Tower Records
material. For earlier recordings go to my previous post http://dirtcitychronicles.blogspot.com/2015/11/your-ever-loving-punksthe-standells.html
We're Your
Children. Don't Destroy Us
*My
primary research source for this section is “Wild Streets: American
Graffiti versus the Cold War”
author:
Mike Davis, International Socialism Archive
In 1966 the Sunset Strip was seething
with young club patrons, milling about doing what bored white punks
with too much time on their hands tend to do... disrupt things. To
combat this trend, annoyed residents and merchants in the district
pushed for the passage of a 10 pm curfew and loitering law to reduce
the traffic congestion. The curfew was passed and went into effect in
late 1966. In response, fliers were distributed along the strip
inviting people to demonstrate. Hours before the protest, KRLA , a
“rock” station, announced there would be a rally at Pandora's
Box, a club located at the corner of Sunset and Crescent Heights
Blvds. (owned by radio deejay and Shindig host Jimmy O'Neill) It was
the opening salvo in what came to be known as “Sunset Strip Curfew”
or “Hippie” riots.
“Hippie” was a misnomer, as the
Sunset Strip protest riots kicked off, the hippie movement was in its
infancy and still centered primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Of the “thousand people in the street, singing songs and carrying
signs” some were decked out in proto hippie gear, but the majority
were clean cut kids driven by a powerful revulsion against arbitrary
authority and perceived repressive enforcement of laws invoked
specifically to curtail their movement and behavior. For white
youths, this wasn't an entirely new phenomena. The roots of the
Sunset Strip riots could be traced back to a series of riots that
took place during the summers of 1960-61. The El Cajon Blvd. riot in
San Diego, which involved thousands of white youths, erupted during a
protest over the closing of a popular drag strip.
Subsequent clashes, Griffith Park
(African Americans youth challenging de facto segregation that
denied them access to the park) As the LAPD rushed in en-mass, black
youths were heard chanting “This is not Alabama” Zuma Beach,
exploded in violence during KRLA's “grunion derby” when police
attempted to clear the beach at closing time. A crowd estimated at
25k, battled police, armed with beer cans stuffed full of sand and
beer bottles. Almost simultaneously a second uprising broke out in
Rosemead and a wedding reception in Bell resulted in a mob of 300
teenagers fighting in the street. Veteran cops accustomed to teenage
deference were shocked by the crowd's angry defiance. They were “at
a loss to identify a root cause for these white riots”
Sheriff Peter Pitchess observed that
“defiance of authority, had moved beyond the point where blame can
be placed solely on juveniles or adults, minority or majority groups”
There's something happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear.
Following the initial riot, the Los Angeles City Council voted to
acquire and demolish Pandora's Box, which was indeed demolished in
Aug. of 1967. This ill advised action did little to quell the
protests. The Sunset Strip wasn't wracked by a single riot, but
rather by a series of counterculture clashes over an extended period
(1966-69) thousands of youthful demonstrators joined by at times by
celebrities (Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, Sonny & Cher etc.)
which ensured that the national media paid attention.
As Mike Davis points out: radicalized
by the anti-war movement, the white youth battling police on the
Strip started to see themselves as a secondary front in the struggle
being waged by The Black Panther in South Central Los Angeles. Which
led to a strange phenomena, the culminating showdown between
thousands of white kids and the sheriffs in 1969 was mobilized by a a
leaflet demanding “Free the Strip, Free Huey” Davis: “The
battle over the urban night had joined forces with the revolution”
It was however, a war of attrition. The urban night gave way to the
neon nights and heshers of the late 1970s. The revolution petered out but not
before it provided a shit load of fodder for exploitation movie
producers
"The
marketplace sold adolescent society its banners"
The struggle against curfews and crowd
control on the Sunset Strip in the late 1960s was ripe for parody and
“Riot on the Sunset Strip” Sam Katzman's teen exploitation film,
released in 1967, directed by Arthur Dreifuss for American Pictures
International did not disappoint. The Standells landed a coveted spot
on the soundtrack album. They were joined by The Chocolate Watch Band
(Dave Aguilar = Mick Jagger with maracas) and The Mugwumps (Cass
Elliot, Denny Doherty, John Sebastian and Zal Yanovsky, pre- Mamas
and the Papas, Lovin' Spoonful fame) The title track“Riot on Sunset
Strip” written by John Fleck and Tony Valentino, almost overcomes
some laughable lyrics, “I'm going down to the strip tonight, I'm
not on a stay home trip tonight” not even Dodd's snarly vocals can
save it.
The movie is part exploitation film,
part cautionary tale. No actual riot is depicted, unless you count
the ensuing laugh-riot brought about by Mimsy Farmer's LSD induced
dance number, which I can only describe as Tina Turner playing The
Acid Queen doing an impression of Linda Blair in The Exorcist. The
acid trip scene is worth the price of admission alone. What we do get
is a morality tale of what happens when a square girl hooks up with a
bad crowd. Mimsy Farmer (who went on to appear in a series of Giallo
films, i.e. Italian thriller or slasher movies) is Andy, short for
Andrea, the new kid in town. The product of a broken home, her mother
is an unbearable lush and her father is a police detective, too busy
busting heads to notice that the times-they-are-a-changing.
Andy meets up with a crowd of Hollywood
stereotypes, led by Herby (Schuyler Haydn) who has all the leadership
qualities of Charles Manson but none of his charisma. His henchman,
Grady is played by Tim Rooney, the son of Mickey Rooney. Tim was
another of the ill-fated original Mousketeers. Both Tim and brother
Mickey Jr. were dismissed from the show after just one season when
they got into the paint shop at Walt Disney Studios and ruined
hundreds of gallons of paint. He was stricken with polio shortly
after he left the show and was paralyzed for two years. Ironically
enough, Tim Rooney was replaced on The Mickey Mouse Club by none
other than Dickie Dodd of The Standells. Tim's acting skills were
limited and his limitations are in full display in this cinematic
dumpster fire.
Let's cut to the chase... Andy is lured
to a “freak-out” Her diet soda is spiked with LSD, she gulps it
down exclaiming “I was thirsty” an almost instant identity
transformation begins, one that produces instant licentiousness. Andy
performs a cringe inducing raunchy dance, meant to imply that she is
indeed asking for it. Herby slings Andy over his shoulder carrying
her upstairs for the inevitable gang rape, declaring “Grass is
fast, but acid is like lightning” Andy's father gets wind of the
goings-on and shows up to find Andy somewhat catatonic as she
declares “Five boys have been here” this causes him (played by
raspy voiced, ex-Navy frogman, Aldo Ray) to punch out Herby, Grady
and a few random punks at the hospital in a rather anti-climatic
ending.
I'm
gonna tell you a big bad story, baby
“Dirty Water” written by Ed Cobb, was the song that launched The Standells to everlasting fame. It's since been
adopted by Boston pro sports teams as an anthem of sorts. Which is
silly, the song paints a less than attractive picture of the city,
implying that it's crime ridden and that its men can't get the job
done. “Frustrated Women (I mean they're frustrated) have to be in
by twelve o'clock” Cobb also appears to mock the bean eaters for
cowering in the face of a serial killer. “Have you heard about the
Strangler? I'm the man I'm the man” As the story goes, it was with
due cause, Cobb was the victim of a mugging while strolling along the
Charles River with his girlfriend. “Dirty Water” was the first of
a handful of songs authored by Ed Cobb, recorded by The Standells and
hands down, the most successful.
“Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear
White” also penned by Ed Cobb was the followup single to “Dirty
Water” it failed to crack the top forty (Dirty Water peaked at #11
U.S.) Cobb was adept at emulating the musical trends of the day, thus
“Rari” and “Barracuda” sound derivative and yet it's hard to
pin down how and why. “Why Pick on Me” is the best Sonny Bono
song that Sonny never wrote. “Have You Ever Spent the Night in
Jail?” replete with jail guitar doors and references to refried
beans and lumpy beds, establishes once and for all that Ed Cobb was
indeed the Shel Silverstein of 60s garage punk. “Mr. Nobody”
written by Larry Tamblyn combines fuzz buster guitar with an angst
fueled melody reminiscent of Bang era Neil Diamond.... which is
to say, the best Neil Diamond.
The Standells were versatile if they
were anything... “Mainline” is a throwback to the band's earlier
frat rock days. A carefree jaunt that sorta brings their
contemporaries, The Bobby Fuller Four to mind. “Medication” The
Standells most overtly “psychedelic” song was actually written by
Minette Alton and jazz pianist Ben Di Tosti. “She do what a good
girl should she do what she do good” (The Chocolate Watch Band's
version, also on Tower Records, gives the song a “Vanilla Fudge”
treatment) Ben Di Tosti is a rather square guy who nurtures a
Dixieland jazz fetish. It's easy to see that Ed Cobb and his studio
hack, Lincoln Mayorga took some major liberties with the arrangement
on both versions. “Dropped the pills like a maniac shaken bad like
a walking sack of little pills”
“Try It” was The Standells “banned”
song... written by Joey Levine and Marc Bellack, it never got off the
ground due to Gordon McLendon's pious grandstanding. The Ohio
Express, who at that point in time were actually Sir Timothy and The Royals out
of Mansfield, o-HI-o covered the song for Super K Productions. In
fact, “Beg, Borrow & Steal” the debut album by The Ohio
Express, features The Royals, The Rare Breed and The Measles, a band from Kent,
Oh. led by none other than Joe Walsh. The Super K version almost
cracked the Top Forty. Joey Levine who would go on to fame as lead
singer for The Ohio Express, wasn't yet involved with The Ohio
Express, though he was working for Super K Productions. The lead
vocal on “Try It” a song Levine co-wrote, was out sourced to Dale
Powers of Sir Timothy and The Royals.
With “Can't Help But Love You” The
Standells venture into Stax/blue eyed soul territory. I'm amazed the
British “Northern Soul” crowd didn't pick up on this song. It met
all their prerequisites, a big beat, soulful vocals, driving horns
all released on a relatively obscure regional label. “All Fall
Down” a rare collaboration between Dick Dodd and John Fleck is
innovative psychedelia, it's a shame the band didn't get to showcase
their songwriting skills more often.... the self penned tracks they
did record are pretty damn good. “Animal Girl” a plaintive ballad
totally inspired by The Rolling Stones “Aftermath” album. The
song is credited to Slim Harpo, though for the life of me I can't
find his version and I can't even begin to imagine what Slim's
original may have sounded like. Perhaps it's a typo.
Dirty Water
Riot on Sunset Strip
Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White
Why Pick on Me
Mr. Nobody
Mainline
Have You Ever Spent the Night in Jail?
Try It
Medication
Barracuda
Rari
Can't Help But Love You
All Fall Down
Animal Girl
