How did you get into garage records? Were YOU in a band? Are you still in a band?

[Darren J Wallace]

Just out of curiosoty,
How did you guys get interested in 45's or more specifically garage 45's?
I'll start this thread by telling you my story.
I loved records as a little kid. The earliest record I ever remember having to play was Johnny Tillotson's "Poetry In Motion" :) I even remember it was on Apex...one of Canada's many distribution labels for USA records through the Compo Co. in Montreal.
My parents and grandparents always had lots of records,especially 45's & 78's and piles of records given to them by our neighbours.I remember as a wee lad playing all those old records. Every type of music from Beatles to Lawrence Welk.
Later in life I started getting interested in old wind up outside horned gramophones,and large musical boxes,which I restore as a hobby/living, when I'm not machining dies for my employer.I got interested in the machines meant to play those old 78's.
Anyways..... I also played in many bands over the last 25+ years as a bass player and sometimes keyboards,and I've seen and have known so many local bands over the years.I guess a lot of them were actually "garage bands"
Since my favorite music has always been 60's rock,and in my teen years listened to a lot of 80's punk rock,and buying up local LP's & 45's,I started liking some lo-fi type rock......hense the attraction to 60's garage.

I used to collect records in highschool and college......I had a specific interest in any rock groups on the Captiol 6000 series. This was a series of LP's only issued in Canada.A lot of them had different covers than their US counterparts. It also was a great way to discover all the 60's British Invasion bands in the 1980's as a teeneger,as well as the Canadian bands who recorded for Capitol.
After my wife passed away in 2001 at 31, I sold all my records. It's only been in the last 5-6 years I've rediscovered all the stuff I used to have and now enjoy it digitally. The internet has filled my ipod with so many 60's tunes,I'll never have to worry about running out!

So..........what's your story.......how did you get into this hobby :)

 

[paul messis]

My Story is this...

Having been a child with a grandfather into blues, an Uncle into German Krautrock and being born and raised in an area which totally sucked and full of squares, I decided from a young age, I didn't want to be like the rest of the world around me, I purposefully wanted to be different and liked different things, so from the ages of 12 I began venturing into strange and unusual music... doo wop, rockabilly, punk, soul, 80s indie, jazz, blues etc etc

I was 16 and doing my school exams, we moved away as a family from London to the country and I got two items in the post one day.... the first was my exam results from school, I opened them up and saw a mixture of F's, D's and one C.... the other was a box with Pebbles volume 1, 2 and 3.

I played volume 2 first and my world changed!!! seriously Darren, the earth shook, I just felt that this music was written specifically for me.

After that... began my compilation search and I spent my late teens collecting garage comps, I have pretty much all the garage comps there is, including the really old 80s ones.

From these Comps I began to think to myself.... I want to OWN my favourite 45s and to this day, I still have been searching for my personal favourite 45s which relate to me as a person.... I began with the easier more well known garage 45s.... if you can get those out the way, you're cool.... then came my idea of getting the 45s which seem to mean something to me and my life and since this happened in my life I have seen I have often spent more and more trying to obtain records which mean something to me.

There are a few 45s I know I haven't a chance in hell of owning.... one is The Try-Angle.... the other is The Intruders - Now That You Know with pic sleeve (this is why I make blogs on such 45s, cos they relate to me and also I WANT to honour the bands which made songs which have effected me in the correct way that music should)

It's gotten to the point that I NEED to listen to garage daily else something feels amiss.... I'll be 26 in a couple of weeks and I still am amazed how much this music is important to me on a daily basis and I still get that excited rush upon listening to it as I did when I was 15 and 16.


Paul

 

[Darren J Wallace]

I also meant to mention,if you DID play in a band,tell us about your favorite instrument...do you still have it?
I love vintage gear. I have a small collection of vintage basses.Here's a photo of us playing in about 1989 as well.

 

[paul messis]

Darren.... if you go onto my Facebook page and look at the pics... I have two favourite instruments.... 1964 Hagstrom Futurama guitar & 1967 Vox Cougar Bass.... without the two I'd be screwed.

Darren what band are you in?

 

[wildpaws]

I also meant to mention,if you DID play in a band,tell us about your favorite instrument...do you still have it?
I love vintage gear. I have a small collection of vintage basses.Here's a photo of us playing in about 1989 as well. View attachment 212View attachment 213View attachment 214View attachment 215View attachment 216View attachment 217View attachment 218

Nice collection of basses! I have a very limited collection of 45s, many of them are ones I had in my younger days, I pick up a few 45s from time to time when I run across them. I played in bands back in the '60s/'70s, played keyboard and for much of that time used a Lowery 2 manual portable which was the same as one of the Gibson keyboards made by Lowery in that era. Later I ended up with a B3 and a Wurli EP, I stopped playing entirely in the mid '70s and sold all of my gear. I started playing again in the mid '80s, started off with a Yamaha DX21 synth and upgraded and added on over time. I decided to not try to play in bands again and went the home studio route with several synths, modules, mixer, multi-track tape, etc. These days I use a DX7IIFD, SY77, SY99 (I like older synths better than the new models), Hammond C3 w/Leslie and a Yamaha AW1600 digital mixer/recorder. I got remarried about ten years ago, my wife came with a Steinway L grand as she is a concert trained pianist, we also have a Yamaha CP300 stage piano. I also spend some of my free time as a keyboard specialist/moderator at YamahaforumsUK. One of the bands I played for in the '60s, the Wild Ones, was just profiled on the Garage Hangover site a week or two ago. I really enjoy these forums as I get exposed to 45s I've never heard as well as bringing back some old memories.
Clyde

 

[Darren J Wallace]

All very cool guys!
Paul: I started out in 1988 playing keyboards for a band called "Mud Creek Mojo". I evolved into playing bass,and joined with now long time friends Robert Breen,Glen MacArthur,& Brad Mac Donald in a 60's tribute band called PTO. This stood for Power Take Off, like on the back of a tractor:) After many years of playing in PTO,three of the band members created a 70's funk band called Thud Power. After a year or so of that,we changed our name to the Robert Breen Band. The last metamorphis was to the band we did the best as called Green Onions....still playing the 60's classics,garage and some R&B. Our latest move to playing was for the orginal members of Green Onions to create my latest terror "Wally and the Spaz Rockets" (I'm Wally)which is a pure rockabilly band. Watch for a download of our CD someday soon...hopefully. You can check out 3 cuts from the CD on Youtube.
I'm going to look at your Facebook page soon,sorry for the late reply here. Late night in the shop restoring old metal junque:)
Clyde:
Thanks for the compliments! You've got some pretty COOL stuff yerself!

 

[Darren J Wallace]

Clyde,
I also wanted to say I have a really nice 1922 Mason & Risch player piano with a Recordo expression player system.If you are into players,this is a poor man's version of a reproducing piano. It's great for belting out those Fats Waller blues rolls!

 

[beccabear67]

Love the bass guitar 'porn', does the Vox sound good? We have a beat up Brian Jones teardrop Vox lead and I'm still not sure what I think about it. I'm still kicking myself for not picking up a '60s black and silver/white accented Epiphone at a rustic pawn shop in Eastern Oregon with a $100 sticker just because it looked so pretty even though I don't play. At the time I didn't want to haul it around Idaho and back.

I got into garage primarily because of an interest in '60s Canadian 45s and the obscure and sometimes colorful labels. I really got into collecting Vancouver and Roman/Yorktown singles for awhile. My Dad had stacks of Apex, Quality and other 45s, but they were mostly beat up and old radio station promos, plus a lot of 78s which seemed to mostly come from Goodwill shops. He had a covers band around the time CCR ruled the charts and then worked (and still does) as a solo with just acoustic guitar. We just cut a couple dozen tracks in Seattle, all covers on 1 1/2" tape, analog. I offered to add a toy xylophone accompaniment but I really am not very musical myself outside the novelty Gong show type of thing.

 

[beccabear67]

I decided from a young age, I didn't want to be like the rest of the world around me, I purposefully wanted to be different and liked different things, so from the ages of 12 I began venturing into strange and unusual music...

I honestly think I would not have survived without music at different times in my life, the first save was actually the two-tone ska thing around 1980-81, it provided a lifeline to me somehow in junior high school and I didn't know any other kids who knew it existed, and there were Vancouver groups like the Pointed Sticks, NoMeansNo, Easy Money, Dishrags and K-Tels (Art Bergman). DOA and the Subhumans were more funny to me (and loud), and I really don't think I knew about the Modernettes or Seattle groups at the time. Live local do it yourself shows at an Old Age Pensioners hall were pretty exciting to me even when I was mostly outside dealing er um inhalables (I don't now, I hate the indoor grown stuff around now anyway). I was a total nothing actually, a Mo Tucker type nebish nothing, but I could go unnoticed anywhere without caring which had some advantages for certain people who protected me. I actually got As in school in some things but the pressure always gave me a nervous breakdown and I must've dropped out a half dozen times until the system gave up on me. My DJ brother had a lot of black funk records but also he would get strange German discs and weird 12" things from NYC so I was exposed to that. I love your music man, I'm sure it too will be a lifeline for some!

 

[Darren J Wallace]

The Vox sounds quite good.It sounds the best of all the basses I've owned through a fuzz pedal.The pickups are a little weak,but other that that it's a really choice Phantom. Best of all visually,the pickguard is not broken at all which is so common with these.

 

[mansson66]

When I was 12 (in '78) I heard Bo Diddley and was blown away and after that I got records with Buddy Holly, Johnny Burnette R&R Trio, Jerry Lee, Elvis, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, even Hank Williams and so on. There was a radio show where I heard obscure rock-a-billy and I set out to find comps etc... Then around 16 I became tangled up in the retro mod scene and got into Kinks, Creation, Yardbirds, Stones, Syd's Pink Floyd, The Action, TV Personalities, Chocolate Soup Comps etc and also got my first ever band together. We couldn't play so it was all very "art pop" (play a song for a while and then 'freak out' while showing 8 mm films, having smoke bombs go off etc). Because I was already familiar with US 50's I figured there must be 60's rock from the US aswell so I set out to find some and actually stumbled over The Sonics at the age of 16, which more or less changed my life! I started looking for US 60's bands... and the Pebbles comps were showing up in the stores. I had a coupla friends who were into the same thing but we still though we were alone... I made the band start playing more garage - Chocolate Watchband, Sonics, Standells... we even played Out Of My Hands by The Endd(!) and wrote our own garage songs aswell. Then in '84 I got together with some new guys and started the Crimson Shadows who were total garage nuts looking like The Music Machine and playing vox, danelectro, farfisa instruments. We became good friends with The Stomachmouths and from Stefan who sang with'em I learned that you could actually get paper lists from the States where you could buy real original 60's garage 45s - something I started doing around '87 or so. I have a few hundred of'em and I love playing the 45's on my small portable, even though I have really nice hi-fi equipment haha. Latest 45 I bought was The Grateful Dead - Cream Puff War (their only garage record and it's a killer) and Terry Knight & the Pack - How Much More (actually a buddy gave a copy to me... as I give him 45s when I got spares)
Speaking of basses: I have a Hofner violin bass from '62 (with both pick up's close to the frets) which I gotta have valued one of these days for insurance... great condition and sounds like a dream. It was actually Jeff Connolly who told me it's a rare one when he was in Sweden a few years ago and did a "Lyres" gig with my band as backing band... I'm no bass player (or Beatles fan) so I didn't really have a clue hehe
My two cents

 

[paul messis]

This Bass is used on all of my recorded output... I think it is one of the nicest sounding basses I have heard.... the easiest bass I've played is a Gibson Eb-3.

 

[Darren J Wallace]

Paul,
Your Vox bass kicks ass! That's one sweet axe! Gotta love those hollow bodies.
Hey there Manson66,
Your Hofner is indeed a rare one! They are commonly known as the "Cavern" model as Paul played one in the ealry day of the beatles in the Cavern Club. A very nice bass to have!
The Hofner 500/1 is the only model of Hofner bass that has never seen interruped production ever.It's gone through changes,but never discontinued ever to this day.It sounds like you've had plenty o' fun through the years too!

 

[mansson66]

Yeah I've been researching that bass... the only thing that's kinda confusing to me is that the mic's are placed in the 'old' position i.e. real close to each other but the logo is the 'newer' one found on the ones with the mic's far apart. It leads me to believe it might be a late '62 - some transition when they had old bodies while changing the logo design on the necks? It got diamond mic's etc. Anyway I'll be taking some good photos and have it valued by Andy Babiuk one of these days - already mailed about it... I could try and post a pic here as it seems you know your basses Darren. In any case it's a killer instrument with a sound to die for. Flatwound strings of course. My dad bought it in the 70's for ca $50. Damn I wish I could take a time machine back to the 80's when we could buy Fender amps, guitars, Voxes, Farfisas etc etc for peanuts, cause all the "serious(HAHAHAHA)" musicians wanted modern gear...

 

[TheOriginal1966BadApple]

My testimonial: I became interested in music back in 1972 at age 10 when I asked my parents to enroll me in piano lessons (I still play BTW). In 1973 my interest intensified when I “discovered” pop music. The local AM station (CFUN, Vancouver) occasionally played oldies. For whatever reason, I found these songs stuck out. Aside from that, my taste was quite mainstream. Partly because of CFUN’s occasional oldies-playing, and for many other reasons (e.g., success of “American Graffiti”), I had developed an awareness of Rock history and I wanted to know more and more. Slowly, I acquired a reasonably sophisticated understanding of Rock music.

A big change came in 1977 when my sister (R.I.P.) gave me a pre-recorded cassette of The Rolling Stones’ “More Hot Rocks.” I played that endlessly and was soon an ardent Rolling Stones fan. I bought Some Girls on the very day it was released! A second big development occurred in 1978, when I met a fellow high-schooler who knew way more than me about rock music. I was impressed. He was an avowed Bomp reader and he let me borrow these magazines. He also stated that he liked 1970’s punk rock. As my taste was still mainstream, I was initially shocked. It’s hard to believe, but in 1978 admitting you liked Punk Rock could be dangerous. Either way, sometime during 1979 I too decided that Punk Rock was where it was at. I began to buy punk rock records (esp. Ramones).

It was through Bomp magazine, and my friend’s interpretation thereof, that I first learned of 1960’s Punk Rock. This perked my attention. Because Bomp said the Elevators and Paul Revere and the Raiders were punks, and because they were the first LP’s I noticed, I bought a copy of The Elevators’ Live S.F. 1966 and of The Raiders’ Spirit of ’67 in 1980. I especially liked Paul Revere. For several years they competed with the Rolling Stones as my fave band! My 1960’s collecting snowballed from there. Corollary thereto, I became fascinated with all things associated with the mid-1960’s. I started working in May 1980, which afforded me greater spending capital.

It was during my high school graduation year (1979-80) that I heard about the Pebbles LP series, again, thru my Bomp-reading friend. I have vivid memories of playing these LP’s very loudly (in secret) in rotation at various music-loving friends’ houses whenever the parents went out. We also played a lot of 1970’s punk rock, MC5, NY Dolls, Stooges and even Blind Faith and Cream. We started going to punk rock concerts in Vancouver (Pointed Sticks, Subhumans etc.). I became mesmerized by songs on the Pebbles (and Boulders) LP’s. During these years, I spent a lot of time in record stores with a goal to acquire a 1960’s collection, including punk. I also bought reissues of classic 1950’s LPs.

Nineteen eighty-one turned out to be a vintage 1960’s re-issuing year, and I picked up copies of The Sonics two Etiquette LP’s, Wailers, Count Five not to mention many LP’s featuring mainstream 1960’s styles (Surf, British, Girl Group etc.).

In 1983, in addition to becoming a big Bob Dylan fan and Ugly Things reader, I began to focus more on the 45’s sections of local Vancouver stores and acquired many original classics, including occasional 1960’s punk rockers. Whenever an actual Pebbles record was found, I considered that the ultimate prize! Early ones found were: “Sweet Young Thing” by the Chocolate Watch Band (Canadian pressing too!) and “Swami” by the William Penn Fyve. I even subscribed to Goldmine magazine (1983-1984) and won some decent punkers thru mail auction (e.g., Sparkles “No Friend of Mine”).

I moved to Toronto in 1985, which turned out initially to be a step backwards: record store prices were out-of-sight compared to Vancouver and the 45’s selection wasn’t as good. I also had less disposable income. Through no choice of my own, record collecting had subsided. Also, I was now a working drone with two young children.

Things improved in 2004 when I started searching for 45’s again thru E-Bay. This was the true Golden Age; I was now able to find a lot of regional classics that were quite elusive to either Vancouver or Toronto. I’m still looking. I’ve found way more 60’s punk 45s thru Ebay than grinding it out in record stores and/or mail order auctions.

PS: I was also the original bass-player for Drums Along the Gardiner – we played the Toronto circuit from 1986 to 1993 even opening for Trooper at the El Mocambo in 1992.

 

[MopTopMike]

I enjoy reading these accounts - keep 'em coming - There's another 150+ folks on here!
I'll save my account for TBM as it is already scribed, at the end of the book.

 

[beccabear67]

The local AM station (CFUN, Vancouver) occasionally played oldies. For whatever reason, I found these songs stuck out. Aside from that, my taste was quite mainstream. Partly because of CFUN’s occasional oldies-playing, and for many other reasons (e.g., success of “American Graffiti”), I had developed an awareness of Rock history and I wanted to know more and more. Slowly, I acquired a reasonably sophisticated understanding of Rock music.

An interesting thing about CFUN, when I lived in Alaska for awhile it was amazing how many people talked about how great it was listening to CFUN at night in the '70s particularly. This was in the panhandle, and I was amazed to find out myself you can still tune in the station at night on higher ground. Otherwise you could only get two stations by day (NPR and one of those 'praise FM' type Christian outfits peculiar to the U.S. with artists nobody outside a christian specialty shop has heard of).

 

[Richard Whig]

I got into 60s sounds as a kid in the 70s mining my parents records - which included a copy of the Fly's "Reality Composition No. 6", plus Hangmen, "You're Gonna Miss Me", some Prunes, Seeds, Music Machine. I loved those the best, but didn't think of it as a Thing. Saw The Chesterfield Kings, Lyres, et al in 84 or so and that set me on The Path. But it didn't 100% click until I moved out to Tucson in 86 and met Tim Gassen and we became best pals and then I went to LA for a visit and went to a Charmkin party and it was like walking into a scene from Riot On Sunset Strip!! Whatta Mynd-blower! Hung out and gabbed with Lee Joselph, Rich Coffee, several of the Untold Fables, Primates, Ten Tons of Lies, etc. The next day I bought a pair of Beatle Boots and saw the Unclaimed. Hole-LEE CRAP!

I feverishly started buying comps and records by current groups and took over Tim's radio show, along with Efram T Walrus, when he retired. I was OBSESSED with the finding the rarest of the 80s garage records - the first 2 Crimson Shadows 45s, the withdrawn second Chesterfield Kings 45, the 45s that came with the Lost Trails zine, etc. When I moved back to DC I bought anything Vox I could find even though I couldn't play, and started a band (Thee Flypped Whigs) and recruited some guys to play (all Vox - we couldn't find Vox drums. So, we made Vox lettering stick-ons that looked pretty good. We also made a Vox banner, like we were sponsored by Vox!) We made one EP, which I am quite proud of - had a guy from AUSTRALIA track me down after I moved to Atlanta. He called b/c he just HAD to talk to the guy that made that record. For a moment, I knew how it must feel like to be "discovered" by Moptop or Tim Warren! haha

Thee Whigs fizzled when we moved to Atlanta. So, I started the King's English. We were RnB in the Pretties/Q65 vein - no records. We also put on two festivals (FuzzFest), and we had the first shows by the original reformed Questsion Mark and the Mysterians outside of Michigan in probably 30 years. We also had GONN, who blew the frickin doors off!! Blackout was BRUTAL!! We also had the stars of the day - Fortune and Maltese, the Loons, the Others, the 1-2-5, Treblemakers, Fleshtones, Woggles, Bomboras, Royal Pendletons, Insomniacs etc. Shortly after that I retired to concentrate on career stuff.

Then a few years ago, I got back into it (playing that is - never quit on the records) and did a No-Star recording only group, Thee Myspelled. That has lead to my current grooup the myopic i. We play vintage gear (just like it's 1986! haha) and still have our beatle boots and stripe-y shirts and tight pants. I even still (mostly) have my hair!

At some point, I started collecting original 45s. While in the King's English, I went through a Dutch phase and have a few decent boxes of nederbiet and UK beat/freakbeat. But mostly it's US and Canadian. Though, I am a sucker for the wyldest Aussie/Kiwi sides!

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!!

 

[paul messis]

Thee Myspelled haha total genius.

I go through phases all the time Richard, going through a Dutch Phase isn't a bad thing, the Dutch really had something special, dare I say at times they had it down better than the Brits?

Nothing can beat US garage for me though!

 

[mansson66]

It's a bitter sweet feeling getting 'tracked down' yeah haha. Old n proud at the same time. Reissued is even weirder. I agree that Thee Myspelled is a total genious name :)