WHEN WERE THE INSOMNIACS NOT THE INSOMNIACS?

 

Rich here to talk about another DIY band I met back in the somewhat early days of my involvement in Cassette Culture. 

 

Back in the early '90s a friend of mine sent me a mix-tape that included a couple songs that I really liked by a band I'd never heard of -- THE INSOMNIACS from rural Illinois. I was strongly attracted to the unique voice of their lead singer, their rough-hewn sound and melodies that bore mid-Sixties Kinks and other British Invasion influences, and the band's heartland appeal. 

 

A few months later I was fortunate to find myself trading some of my self-recorded music with the bass player and principal songwriter of THE INSOMNIACS, Bill Retoff, and we became quite close, often talking on the phone for several hours about how we wrote songs, how we recorded, and about the difficulties of making a living as a musician in the Heartland of America, a subject I knew well, given that before I moved to Seattle in the mid-'80s, I'd tried to make a living as a "road musician" in Kansas.

 

At some point, the tapes and records Bill was sending me were no longer inscribed with the name "The Insomniacs." Instead, they bore the name RETOFF, McKENZIE, BUTLER & PIERCE.

 

Turns out there was another band known as The Insomniacs who were unhappy that someone else was using their name, which they felt they had prior rights to. Being the nice, polite Midwestern guys they were, RETOFF, McKENZIE, BUTLER & PIERCE relinquished the Insomniacs name and adopted a "law firm" type moniker featuring only their surnames. 

 

 

After that, the band lasted only a few short years more (roughly 'til the mid-to-late '90s, I believe). But in 1997 the French label Pop The Balloon Records released a compilation album called "Where Were You . . . When the Lights Went Out! The Retoff, McKenzie, Butler & Pierce Story," a collection that included all the band's recordings. 

 

After the dissolution of the band, Bill Retoff went on to release several solo recordings on his own label (Maize Records), which were recorded in his home, which he calls "The Psychedelic Farmhouse," and he has a busy schedule playing with the bar band Ray's Rockets. Meanwhile lead singer Dan McKenzie has performed with a couple other bands, including The Porcupines and The Gilligans (the latter whom I have written about before) and is a leading figure in local community theatre.

 

But the music of The (Illinois) Insomniacs lives on.

 THE INSOMNIACS - "If I'm Not Your Man" (1989)

"THE INSOMNIACS - "It's What You Do To Me" (1992)

THE BATMEN - "Get On Your Knees" (1987)

 

The Batmen were from Grenoble, France. 

The band formed in 1984 and disbanded in 1988, and in 1987 they brought out this snappy little single. 

From the sound of it, they truly deserved a larger audience! 

THE BATMEN - "Get On Your Knees" 

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)