The Beatles Go Boom!
B-Day, Feb. 9, 1964, 8pm. Everyone remembers that episode of "The Ed Sullivan Show"…like they remember where they were when Kennedy was shot, or the Challenger disaster, or 9/11. Reading people's stories on the Internet, a certain pattern emerges…Dad was appalled, wanted to change the channel…Mom was more receptive…and of course the kids went bonkers. The next day, on the school bus and on the playground, everybody was talking about it. A few sour-puss teachers, especially music teachers, had some unkind thoughts, and predictions, to share with their students.
Me, I missed it. I was 12 at the time, but being the oldest of 5 kids in a one-TV family, what we watched tended to skew to the young end. We were watching "Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color" on NBC, as we did every Sunday night, 7:30 to 8:30. It was the first of 3 episodes of Patrick McGoohan as "The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh." Great show, I have no complaints. But it took several decades before Baby Boomers felt brave enough to admit they'd been watching the Scarecrow, too. Some were even watching "The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters" over on ABC, with Tiger Beat heart-throb Kurt Russell, and the Osmond Brothers…that's Alan, Jay, Merrill, and Wayne…no Donny, altho the 7-year old had joined the "family business" the previous year on "The Andy Williams Show."
Interestingly enough, depending on where you lived in the North Country, you might have watched both the Beatles and the Scarecrow! That's because while CBS programming was broadcast on Channel 7 WCNY (they changed to WWNY in 1965), CJOH out of Ottawa ran Disney earlier in the evening, at 6:00. One Baby Boomer, told me he watched the Scarecrow, then went to bed. His dad woke him up and said: Kid, you've gotta see this!
And 47 years later, I finally watched the Beatles, too. Their appearances on 3 consecutive Sundays are available on DVD, just as they originality aired, complete with all the other acts and the original network commercials. It was an eye-opening experience to say the least. On B-day the Beatles performed live and they were at the top of their game, altho the reaction shots of the girls in the audience losing their minds looked to me to be pre-recorded clips from earlier in the day.
Two of the other acts on the show are of interest. Davy Jones, future Monkee, sang as part of the cast of the Broadway show "Oliver." He had just turned 18, but was already a seasoned pro, and arguably had even more stage presence than the Fab Four at that point. Then there was McCall and Brill…Mitzi and Charlie…a husband and wife comedy team in the Nichols and May/Stiller and Meara mold. They did a so-so routine about a talent agent auditioning female singers, but had the presence of mind to put in a Beatle joke, which got a screech from the audience.
The next week, the entire show was broadcast from Miami, or as Ed called it "Miamah," with the Beatles again live, altho not nearly as good. The 3rd week, it was a segment taped on the afternoon of B-Day, and it's here you can see the resemblance to the reaction shots from the first week. I'm thinking that even for the Beatles, they only had so many cameras to work with.
But an intriguing story that's seldom told is Dick Clark's part in all of this. And Jack Paar's as well. Because the explosion of popularity in the wake of B-Day had been foreshadowed a month earlier when Jack Paar aired a complete clip of "She Loves You" on his Friday night 10PM variety show on NBC, January 3. Not surprisingly, he had some sarcastic things to say about the sorry state of the British Empire. But sales of the single, up until then lackluster, shot thru the roof. Ed Sullivan must have smiled, knowing he'd been on the right track all along.
And that's the big question: how could an old geezer like Sullivan have scooped the King of Pop, the Eternal Teenager, the Hitmaker Himself, Dick Clark? Recall that after 2 Beatles singles in 1963 went nowhere, Vee Jay passed on "She Loves You," and the small Philadelphia label Swan put it out in mid-September. Swan owner Bernie Binnick was a friend of Dick Clark's, and when he pitched the record, hoping to get it played on "American Bandstand," Clark was unimpressed, saying it sounded like Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry mixed together. When Binnick showed him a picture of the group's unique look, Clark opined: "You're insane…it'll never fly."
"She Loves You" was duly played on the Rate-a-Record segment and earned 71 out of 98, considered a poor showing. When shown the photo of the group, the kids giggled. Clark figured the Beatles were going nowhere. He later admitted: "We all found out the truth soon enough." And to his credit, the Saturday following B-Day, "American Bandstand" featured a telephone interview with the Lads, followed by another phone call in April, then 2 shows devoted entirely to the Beatles…one in July, promoting the movie "A Hard Day's Night," and another in October.
But the Beatles never performed live on American Bandstand. In fact, for the years 1964 and 1965, the total number of live appearances by the Dave Clark Five, the Animals, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, the Searchers, the Rolling Stones, the Swinging Blue Jeans, Herman's Hermits, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Freddie and the Dreamers, Manfred Mann, the Nashville Teens, the Honeycombs, the Small Faces, the Kinks, Them, the Yardbirds, and the Zombies, COMBINED was…0. That's right, zero, nada, zilch. British groups of any note, as opposed to duos, didn't crack the show until the Hollies in November of 1966, almost 3 years after B-Day.
The best 1964 could offer was: the American Beetles from Florida on June 20th (as the Razor's Edge, they had minor success with "Let's Call it a Day, Girl" in 1966)…the Standells on August 29, 2 years before they'd hit the charts with "Dirty Water," Chad and Jeremy on November 28th, and that was it. 1965? The first successful American "beat" group the Beau Brummels in February…the Standells again, the Beau Brummels again, the Liverpool Five (who?) in August…the Gentrys, Gary Lewis and the Playboys…then in January of 1966, Chad and Jeremy returned, and Peter and Gordon were on the following week. Is it just me or did Dick Clark simply not get it?
He insisted on booking Jan and Dean, Johnny Rivers, Fabian, the Hondells, Dick and Dee Dee, Duane Eddy, Donna Loren, Johnny Mathis, Roger Miller, Trini Lopez, Bobby Vee, Gale Garnett, the Ventures, the Newbeats, lots of soul and R&B performers, and a salute to Elvis. Well and good…it didn't seem to affect the show's popularity, as it would continue for decades. And he did branch out in the late 60s with the hipper "Happening" and "Where is the Action Is." Still, he seemed to be breaking the cardinal rule of music programming: you play what they want to hear, not what you personally like. Or was he just being "patriotic," if you get my drift?
Groovy Stolf Stuff on the web at deepfriedhoodsiecups.wordpress.com…and till next time, rock on, yeah, yeah, yeah!
