(DON THOMPSON / iNFOnews.ca)

OPINION

You might not know Carol Kaye, or Tommy Tedesco, or Plas Johnson. And yet you likely know a thousand songs played on radio that we all bought on vinyl and tape in the 1960s and 1970s that they recorded.

These three - mostly playing bass guitar, drums and tenor sax, respectively - were members of an amorphous collection of nearly fifty of the world’s best so-called studio musicians.

Drummer Hal Blaine - in a 1990 memoir - attributed what many other studio musicians considered a disparaging name to the core group of older, mostly jazz musicians, who felt that an embrace of rock and roll was going to ruin the music industry…so, after the fact, he called the musicians “the Wrecking Crew”.

Bassist Carol Kaye and others in the group contend they often called themselves “the Clique”…and some who started in the 1950s had adopted “the First Call Gang” moniker. When she emailed me as I wrote this column, Carol made her feelings clear about Blaine’s misnomer.

“We were NEVER called 'wrecking crew' invented by a rock/strip-tease drummer Hal Blaine because he was jealous and hated jazz musicians who were STUDIO MUSICIANS in films, something he was so rotten a drummer (sic) he was NEVER hired to play in wonderful film scores,” she wrote (all capitalized letters are her emphasis).

One thing is undeniable…famous recording artists - from the Beach Boys to Frank Sinatra - changed their schedules to fit the availability of these players…they were that good. Like going to a fine restaurant…you don’t want to go on the head chef’s night off.

Rarely will you find their names in any of the credits on the back covers of old vinyl LP Record jackets…or on later CD liner notes. But these musicians deserve more credit than most got during the lifetimes - though some are still alive - and I did my best to research and name everyone here who legitimately was considered a go-to musician when artists cut L.A. recordings in the 1960s and 1970s.

So, bear with me in this lengthy but heart-felt tribute to studio musicians. Most played multiple instruments and some also produced, as well. Besides Kaye, Tedesco and Johnson…there were guitarists James Burton, Bill Pittman, Ray Pohlman, Jerry Cole, Barney Kessel, Howard Roberts, Louis Shelton, Bill Aken, Irv Rubins, Doug Bartenfeld, Mike Deasy, Billy Strange and Rene Hall.

Keyboardists included Michel Rubini, Mike Melvoin, Al De Lory, Don Randi, Larry Knechtel and Leon Russell. Bassists Joe Osborn, Lyle Ritz, Chuck Berghofer, Max Bennett, Jimmy Bond and Red Callender.

Lou Blackburn, Lew McCreary and Dick Hyde played trombone; Steve Douglas, Gene Cipriano, Jay Migliori, Jackie Kelsey and Tom Scott played saxophone; Chuck Findlay, Tony Terran, Bud Brisbois and Ollie Mitchell on trumpet; Jim Gordon, Earl Palmer, Gary L. Coleman, Julius Wechter and Hal Blaine on drums; and Tommy Morgan on harmonica.

Many of these guys - and one gal - were sight-reading musicians…so accomplished that you could throw an arrangement of sheet music in front of them…and they could play it effortlessly the first time…like they wrote it.

Indeed, many of them - though uncredited - after playing an artist’s song once in a recording session would suggest a change…adding instruments, a different beat…or a different opening. In 1966, Carol Kaye listened to Sonny and Cher sing “The Beat Goes On” and thought it was a dud.

After playing with it, Kaye added a steady bass backbeat - not a drumbeat “pounding rhythm to the brain” as the lyrics relate - and months later the much improved song rose to Number 6 on the Billboard Top 100.

Kaye played on about 10,000 recordings during a nearly 50-year career, starting in 1957. She played guitar, but when the regular bass player didn’t show one day…the producer asked her if she could play bass.

Kaye had an ear for bass notes and likely understood that musicians never turned down an offered gig, and soon became a sought bass player, lending her distinctive sound using a guitar pick rather than just her fingers.

The Number One songs alone recorded by these players run to more than 100, with perhaps a thousand Top 100 recordings. Suffice it to say, they played on about 85 percent of the rock and roll recordings from the late 1950s until the early 1970s.

Just a few examples make it clear. These players were the actual musicians on recordings by The Beach Boys, The Mamas and the Papas, The Fifth Dimension, Ricky Nelson, The Righteous Brothers, Jan and Dean, The Association, The Crystals, The Ronettes…and on and on.

On occasion, members of groups like The Beach Boys or The Association or countless others would show up at recording sessions, and get angry when producers would use these talented sidemen to record. Most understood and accepted the decisions to use them when they heard…and saw how fast they could record an entire album.

Typically they would record an album in the morning…and another in the afternoon. Usually a group recording their own songs took two to three weeks to complete an album. When they toured, these groups did play the music…but perhaps that’s why so often at concerts you’d hear “they don’t really sound like themselves.”

This talented group of musicians didn’t just record rock and roll. They played behind Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. They recorded almost every television program’s theme music on all three major networks during the era…including “The Twilight Zone”, “Green Acres”, “Bonanza”, “M*A*S*H*”, “Batman”, “Mission: Impossible”, and “Hawaii Five-O”. The best of the best of these musicians recorded movie themes, as well…like “Born Free” and “Shaft”.

Plas Johnson a smooth and sultry saxophonist originally from New Orleans can be heard on recordings for Marvin Gaye, Dr. John, Rita Coolidge, Boz Scaggs, Joni Mitchell, Elton John, Linda Ronstadt, Bette Midler and Liza Minnelli, among others. His most recognizable work was for Henry Mancini’s “The Pink Panther”…which your are no doubt now humming.

A few of the musicians sought and found the fame of artists they so often backed…Glen Campbell, Leon Russell and Mac Rebennack (better known as Dr. John), for example. While Campbell recorded a few songs in the early and mid-1960s, he had big hits with “Gentle on My Mind” in 1967, and “Wichita Lineman” in 1968. Leon Russell’s “A Song for You” hit the charts in 1970, and Dr. John’s “Right Place, Wrong Time” was a hit in 1973.

They weren’t given credit on album covers, but most of these studio musicians didn’t suffer…earning $5,000 a week or more backing other artists for two or more decades…all without leaving Los Angeles.

As rock and roll group musicians got better and recording technology advanced, the demand for studio musicians waned by the mid-1970s. Still, theses incredible musicians were a big part of popular music culture…and we should appreciate their contributions.

So, just to get you humming some of your old favourites, here’s another sampling of songs these musicians played on: Frank Sinatra’s “That’s Life”, Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots are Made for Walking”, Presley’s “Can’t Help Falling in Love” and “Viva Las Vegas”, Jan and Dean’s “Surf City”, Simon And Garfunkel’s “Mrs. Robinson”, Sonny And Cher’s “I Got You Babe”, The Ronettes’ “Be My Baby”, The Crystals’ “He’s A Rebel”, “A Taste of Honey” by Herb Alpert and The Tijuana Brass, and The Monkees’ “Last Train to Clarksville”.

— Don Thompson, an American awaiting Canadian citizenship, lives in Vernon and in Florida. In a career that spans more than 40 years, Don has been a working journalist, a speechwriter and the CEO of an advertising and public relations firm. A passionate and compassionate man, he loves the written word as much as fine dinners with great wines.

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