Oh, She's The One

Mike O'Berry

Oh, She's The One

Soo Records No. 0011

199 E. Blvd. S.
Pontiac, Mich.

1966

I've found nothing on this one.  No other Soo record. No other Mike O'Berry recording. Michael O'Berry copyrighted this song in 1960. This Perry Music Co., affiliated with ASCAP, is unrelated to Perry Music Co (affiliated with BMI) out of Vidalia, Georgia. 

God Made A Way

God Made A Way

The Songsters Quartet from Charleston, West Virginia, on their own label pressed by King Records in Cincinnati, Ohio.  Date is 1960

Little Kitten

Little Kitten

Colpix CP 153
1960

His first record before his better known on Gone Records  — a cover of Rock Around The Clock (as Franny Boye) — on  also issued in 1960.

Real name : Frank Ciliberti from Media, Pennsylvannia.

Francis Ciliberti, 17-year-old Penncrest High School junior, appeared twice on American Bandstand as a dancer when kids and dance to the tunes Dick Clark played.  When he recorded "Rock Around the Clock,"   Frank mentioned to Dick Clark that he didn't want to get in trouble because he had a record of his own.  Clark then invited him to perform his song.   Clark said thanks for letting him know about the record, then he said  'have your manager get in touch with me so you can appear on the show.'" [ed. you all know what that means...]

"Little Kitten" was written by his manager Charles D. Poole,of Woodlyn, formerly leader of the Channels combo and Ted Fedena of Marcus Hook.

Dick Clark will always have a special meaning to Frank's family.  According to his son :

Every year, it was a fact that my family would watch Dick Clark count down a new year on Dick Clark's "New Year's Rockin' Eve." Even my son started getting interested in the show because a lot of his favorites were performing.

Watching Clark push forward after a stroke was both heartbreaking and inspiring. He wasn't going to let this obstacle stop him from doing what he loved. I also would watch Dick Clark with my grandmother during the 1970s when he hosted the $25,000 Pyramid.

Clark, forever known as "America's oldest teenager," had also a rep of a greedy exploiter of pop culture, an insatiable money-grubber with countless business ventures who produced and often hosted game shows, lowbrow bloopers shows and awards ceremonies,  according to Ben Fong-Torres who interviewed him when they met in 1964 in Malibu.

I asked why he had to get his hands into everything. Clark smiled at this naive, long-haired inquisitor from San Francisco. "The problem with you," he said, "is that you're a liberal, and I'm a f--ing whore."

Of course, he was effing right.  

Dick Clark: 'You're a Liberal and I'm a F---ing Whore,' the TV Icon Once Told a Famed Rock Music Editor  The Hollywood Reporter

Hat-Shi

Grrrrrr

In our series "The Great Unknowns" here is a recent (2015?) re-issue (by Bear Family, I believe) of a mysterious old recording.   Nothing is known about the original release, believed to be from the Middle East, possibly Iraq?

Mustang Sally

Gene Dozier & The Brotherhood

Mustang Sally

Minit 32031
1967

Unusual cover of the Mack Rice song by Gene Dozier & The Brotherhood, which were Ike Turner's band in 1966/1967, with Gene Dozier on keyboards

Ugene Lloyd Dozier (who also wrote and recorded under the name Billy Jackson) got his start in Philadelphia working at Cameo records. By the mid-60’s he had relocated to Detroit where he had wanted to work for Motown, but ended up working briefly at the Golden World label writing for Theresa Lindsey (‘Daddy-O’) and Pat Lewis (‘Let’s Get Together’) under the Jackson name. He soon found his way to the West Coast, where he signed with the Minit label and began recording as Gene Dozier & The Brotherhood. The Brotherhood sound was mostly instrumental, marked by a funky rhythm section backed by a full horn section, with Dozier composing, arranging and playing keyboards

Funky16corners

Vladimir and The Grave Diggers

Vladimir Twist


Drac Walk

 Mel Par 45-1006
October 1962

Review from Kicks Magazine #6
 Inscription on the Billy Miller's copy reads
"when you hear this 'abortion' don't tell
anyone you know me!"

Vladimir, aka Ronald Klugman, aka Ron Barry
1944-1995

Born in Newark, N.J., Ronald Klugman was a son of Fani (Pickar) Klugman of Springfield, N.J., and Samuel Klugman. Actor Jack Klugman was his uncle.   A 1966 graduate of Emerson College, Boston (B.S. in Speech Broadcasting), he was a radio personality, under the name Ron Barry, with WEST and WEEX, Easton, and WBAX, Wilkes-Barre.  As big a fan Ron was of Dark Shadows, he was an even bigger fan of Laurel and Hardy, and as an adult got to know and befriend Stan Laurel.
 

Ron Barry has been collecting Elvis Presley records since 1956. "Being born and raised in New Jersey," said Barry, "we never heard the original Sun records, because their distribution was limited to the South. So Elvis had already made the five Sun records before I heard about him. But once I saw him on the Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey "Stage Show," I knew he was going to be a big star." It was then that Ron started building his file of Presley discs. 

In 1961 when Barry was working as a production assistant for WPIX-11 TV New York, he asked his boss for Stan Laurel's address in hope of acquiring an autographed picture. After a few weeks the photo came, and, to Barry's surprise, a personal letter from the famed comedian.

That first letter developed into a four-year pen pal relationship between young Barry and the aging Laurel. "Very few carried on pen pal relationships with Stan," Barry said, adding that he received the last letter just two weeks before Laurel's death. "He wrote me every two weeks whether I did or not."

Later, while at W.E.S.T. in Easton,Pa. as the story goes, Ron was home sick one day and turned on the t.v. where he saw an episode of Dark Shadows. He became so enamored with the show that he eventually would make several trips down to the NYC studios to visit with and get to know the actors, as well as watch tapings of the show.  Over a 2-3 year period he interviewed many of the actors on his radio show, either in person in the Easton studio, or over the phone.  Using members of his radio show production crew, Ron created a parody version of Dark Shadows entitled 'Dumb Shadows'.

As far as I know the Mel-Par single was his only record.  But young Ronnie certainly wrote other songs.  One of these was sent to Stan Laurel in 1962.  In a letter addressed to Richard [Sloan] dated Nov. 28th, 1962, the actor wrote :

 No, I've never talked on the phone with Ronnie Klugman, but have heard him on tape a couple of times, he sounds a normal nice chap then suddenly lapses into that 'Horror' character mentality - I imagine he 'Hugs' the character too (a la that picture!!) Am enclosing you a tape of his latest idea for a record he sent me, I think its titled 'The Lumbago Limbo" or something - he requested my opinion - I of course am not familiar with this type of Opera - told him I was strictly a "Siatica Shuffle" man with a touch of 'Hi Nonny Nonny'.!

I'm A Little Piglet

I'm A Little Piglet

Angela Records No. IP-127
1970

Angela Vella Ghelarducci, who graduated from The Juilliard School, composed children's music for dance studios, some of which can still be purchased. 

As children in the 1920s, Angela, Jane and Louise Vella regularly traveled by train to New York City with their mother Margaret, who wanted them to acquire an appreciation of dance by taking lessons and seeing world-class performances.

The Vella sisters were quick studies. By 1937, they were running a studio in the dining room of their Canonsburg [Pennsylvania] home. Their reputations grew and the Vellas expanded their lessons to 13 sites through the region. The fourth generation of students is now taking lessons in a Vella studio.
Among the early hoofers in their studios: Canonsburg boys by name of Perry Como and Bobby Vinton, who clearly learned all the right moves.

The singer is probably not Angela herself, but rather an uncredited vocalist, as it's almost always the case on dance records on labels such as Danro Records, a quite prolific imprint, who released several Angela Ghelarducci compositions.

Waxmate Of The Month : Apollonia Kotero

Apollonia Kotero (born Patricia Kotero; August 2, 1959) is an American actress, singer, former model and talent manager.  She is best known for co-starring in Prince's 1984 film Purple Rain and for having been the lead singer in the girl group Apollonia 6.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollonia_Kotero