THREE DOG NIGHT - "It Ain't Easy" (1970)

 

Here's one more page out of the book of "How In The Hell Is That Even Possible," the band Three Dog Night is not in that farce they call The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and even worse, they have never even been nominated!

 Ridiculous and absurd!!

They had twenty-one consecutive Billboard Top 40 hits, Eleven Top 10 hits, and three number-one singles between 1969 and 1975, but I guess they didn't snarl as much as Billy Idol, or have monsters on their covers like Iron Maiden, or argue enough with each like the members of Oasis, all of who are getting inducted this year.

Rich has already written twice about Three Dog Night, but it's now my turn at the plate!

This is the original cover for "It Ain't Easy," but you don't have to be a rocket surgeon to figure out that it didn't take the company long to yank this naked guys cover out of distribution in record breaking time.

 

They quickly replaced that cover with this tame and mundane one, because it just ain't easy trying to sell a record in 1970 with golden naked guys on the cover.

The original cover is so rare that even I didn't know about it until I started writing this!

It took a lot of balls to do that cover, fourteen to be exact, and you'd think that would have been good enough, but it's not.

THREE DOG NIGHT - "It Ain't Easy"

SPEEDBALL BABY - "Cinéma!" (1996)

 

Straight outta New York City in 1996, and their first album release called "Cinéma!," here's just a really great song from the band known as Speedball Baby.

I love this song, it's got it all! 

SPEEDBALL BABY- "Rubber Connection" 

TIMES 5 - "Is Your Radio-active" (1980)

 

They don't seem to be that popular with most people, but I've always loved compilation albums by various artists, and this one titled "415 Music" on the San Francisco based 415 label from 1980 is no exception.

Lots of songs on the LP are fun, but one of my faves is a great play on words by a band that's not easy to find much information on called Times 5. 

 

 Coming in at 1:35, and wasting no time getting there, here's

TIMES 5 - "Is Your Radio-active"

CAL TJADER - "Trick Or Treat" (1967)

 

There have been hundreds if not thousands of Halloween songs made over the years, and a lot of them are novelty songs, and a lot of them are just weird, but I don't think any of them are quite as weird as this one.

From the 1967 album "Along Comes Cal," 

Here's

CAL TJADER - "Trick Or Treat" 

THE RATTLES - "The Witch" (1969-1970)

 

In the "If You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again" category, the winner is the German band The Rattles.

In 1969, when this record was recorded, the members were Kurt “Zappo” Lüngen playing bass, Rainer Degner on guitar, Peet Becker playing the drums with Henner Hoier doing the vocals.

"The Witch" was released as the 'B' side of a record titled "Geraldine." 

 

The record didn't do well, and by 1970 most of the original band was gone, leaving only Kurt “Zappo” Lüngen from the original band.

The new band re-recorded "The Witch with vocals by Edna Bejarano, with Frank Mille, and Borny Bornhold now playing guitar and drums, and the song became a hit.

They flipped the order of the songs to "The Witch" being the "A" side.

 

There are countless versions of this song on YouTube but I do believe even the one that says it's the original from 1969 is still the 1970 version, so instead of giving you two versions of the same thing, here's a version with Henner Hoier that's sung in German followed by the hit version.

HENNER HOIER &THE RATTLES - "The Witch" (Auf Deutsch) 

 

THE RATTLES - "The Witch" (1970) 

The Supergroup You May Never Have Heard Of - Toy Matinee, "Last Plane Out" (1990)

 

Rich Here. In the late '80s some of LA's new crop of session players gathered together to start Toy Matinee, a band whose only eponymously-named album was a masterpiece of playing and singing and production and intriguing arrangements. 

 

Out front was Kevin Gilbert, a young good looking, charismatic singer whose "knowing" voice was full of personality. Keyboardist Patrick Leonard and guitarist Tim Pierce created an interesting tapestry of sound (some may be aware of Tim Pierce due to his frequent appearances in Rick Beato's videos) -- all underlaid by Guy Pratt's bass and Brian MacLeod's drums.

 

Together, their playing was several notches above the Alternative music that was starting to dominate the charts. Their debut album was a tour de force with an intellectually-inclined bent -- subject matter included surrealistic painter Salvador Dali, a Czech poet, an Eastern European political figure, escaping a war zone, and even a song about Madonna. The songwriting was tight and focused, and the arrangements intriguing, with influences ranging from prog to pop to new wave. And full of hooks. It was the kind of musical ambition that had characterized The Beatles and The Beach Boys. 

 

A couple songs received fairly wide radio play. But, alas, the should-have-been mainstream success was short-circuited. Despite the accessibility of the band's appearance and songs, their complexity and intellectualism was not what the Public was looking for in the Age of Nirvana. As well, each of the band's members were busy with more session work than they could handle, and touring required replacing them with new players who weren't on the album was daunting. 

 

And, then, disastrously, Kevin Gilbert, who'd tried to promote the band and the album, died of tragic circumstance.

 

But they left behind one magnificently-made album.

TOY MATINEE - "Last Plane Out"  

BOBBY & DALLAS - "Vampira and Elvira"

 

Well, All Saints Eve is almost upon us so how about a small tribute to the mistresses of the dark, none other than 'Horror Hostesses' Vampira and Elvira.

"Elvira" was a song written and recorded by a guy named Dallas Frazier in 1966, and has nothing to do with Cassandra Peterson, aka Elvira who didn't appear on the pop culture scene until 1981.

This song made it to number 72 on the music charts in 1966. 

It was recorded again in 1970 by Kenny Rogers and the First Edition but was not released as a single. 

In 1981, Dallas Frazier probably made a couple of million dollars when The Oak Ridge Boys recorded "Elvira" again, and it rose to the top of the Country and Billboard charts.

And why not, since the lyrics "Elvira, my heart's on Fi-ra" is probably one of the best rhymes of all time.

DALLAS FRAZIER - "Elvira" 

 

It's just a coincidence that both the song "Elvira" by The Oak Ridge Boys, and the first appearance of Elvira, Mistress of the Night both happened in 1981.

Believe it or not, Cassandra Peterson just recently turned 75. 

 

Besides her appearance in the Ed Wood Classic "Plan 9 From Outer Space" and other films, Maila Nurmi, aka Vampira had her own hit TV show from 1954 to 1955.

 

 

It's said that Vampira was also the model that Disney's Maleficent was based on, and Vampira's look was based on Morticia from The Addams Family. 

Here's Charles Addams first drawing of Morticia. 

What a wild trifecta! 

Oddly enough, Maila's Mother's maiden name was also Peterson. 

Here's the awesome opening introduction from her TV show! 

 

In 1965, Bobby Bare brought out this less than scary looking album with his song "Vampira" on it, which unlike Dallas Frazier's "Elvira" was actually a tribute to Vampira.

Although it's an endearing Halloween classic, it never made it to the top 100.

BOBBY BARE - "Vampira"