Here are some true authentic historical gems from Cleveland’s Golden age of Sixties Rock! These are the studio and demo sessions that Alan Cassaro recorded for INTEGRITY Records during 1963-1965. Alan was 21 years old and at the top of his game. The musical genres range from rockabilly to pop to folk/rock. We included one of these songs on our “GHOST TRAIN” CD last year, and we got a lot of emails asking us if we had any more vintage material that we did back in the Sixties. So, here are thirty tracks from that period!
In 1963 Bob Scherl and Alan Cassaro formed INTEGRITY RECORDS, one of the earliest indie labels operating out of Cleveland. The label had only two releases before Bob was suddenly drafted into the army, which brought about the early demise of the label. The first single was “BLUE LIGHTS” b/w “WHY DON’T YOU EVER THINK OF ME (Integrity #251). The instrumental backing was recorded at WBKR Studio; a basement studio usually used for spoken radio ad spots. This was the first music session ever done at that studio, and as it turned out, they were not properly prepared to overdub vocals. As you can hear from the two early WKBR outtakes, tracks 11 and 12.
A bit discouraged, they took their backing tracks to CLEVELAND RECORDING, where Ken Hamann, audio engineer, was able to save the day by multi-tracking Alan’s vocals on to the studio’s state-of-the-art three - track Ampex recorder. Over the next two years the team would record numerous sessions at the studio. The second single was the hard rockin’ “GOTTA GET TO MOBILE” b/w “SONG OF A FOOL” (Integrity #252). Members of Cleveland’s top band, “TOM KING AND THE STARFIRES” (later known as “The OUTSIDERS”), were the backing musicians on most of the studio sessions, tracks 3 through 10, and 13. These performances were all recorded and intended for future release on the Integrity label. Tracks 14 through 30 were original, raw, pre-production concepts and ideas, many of which were never finalized in the studio. In hindsight, it seems pretty obvious that had some of these other performances been issued and promoted properly at the time Alan might have broken through to some major chart successes. But hindsight is always twenty/twenty, so it doesn’t really count for much.
CREDITS: Ken Hamann, engineer on tracks 1-10, and 13. Bill Baker basic track engineer on 1, 2, 11, and 12. MUSICIANS: (1,2,11,12): Jim Brenner, lead guitar; Chuck Ruffing, drums; unknown electric bass. (3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,13): Tom King, guitar; Walter Nims, lead guitar; Jimmy Fox, drums; Mert Madsen, bass and harmonica. (9,10): Vocal Chorus, Don Rothman, and Jebb Stroud, Sheila Sherman All Rights reserved. Unauthorized duplication is not permitted
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