Happy Thanksgiving:
Johnny Pierre - Vocals, guitars, piano, bass
Bibby N. Dean - Drums
Sweet Loretta - cheesy organ, "Hey!" vocal, hand claps
Molly Gelinas - "Hey!" vocal, hand claps
Single cover art: M.C. Osso
JOHNNY PIERRE BIO:
I guess you could say that I was born to be a musician. My earliest musical memories began in New Orleans where I lived for several years when my Dad was stationed by the US Army. I was at such an impressionable age that to this day, I clearly remember being engaged by the earthy sounds of Professor Longhair and Fats Domino. After falling under the spell of the British Invasion in the early sixties, I started to form my own rock n' roll bands. My first paid gigs took place while I was a teenage Army brat living in France back in 1966. It was during this period of my life that I started writing my own songs as well. As the sixties drew to a close, I returned to the States where I had a brief fling with the folk music scene and began performing at local coffee houses and colleges around Pennsylvania. From 1970 to 1974, I attended The University of Dayton in Ohio. While there, my friend Billy Cairns and I assembled a seminal rock combo named the Freelance Vandals.
By 1977, I moved to the Long Island area of New York where I became involved in launching a new version of the Freelance Vandals. This band proved to be quite popular on the Long Island music scene and for the next seven years we performed in a wide variety of venues; opening up for such artists as John Hiatt, Dr. John and NRBQ. During this period of my career, my work as the band's lead singer/frontman received accolades in such trade publications as Variety, The Hollywood Press and Creem Magazine; my onstage antics earned me the nickname "The Jellyroll Joyboy of Rock & Roll". The band released several vinyl record projects during this period; a double 45 rpm collection known as The Dogpak (Dog Records, 1978) and a live album, Yer Money Or Yer Ears (Gunga Din Records, 1984). The band staged a reunion tour in 1996 to promote the release of the studio anthology, Songs That Never Made Us Famous (FV Productions, 1996).
Over the next two decades, I pursued songwriting and ended up working on several film projects in addition to working in two new bands, The Mighty Young Fish and The Helpless Bovines. In the late 90's, I released two solo albums, Like Milk For Feet and Radio Lux; both albums featured a style I like to call suburban blues music.
Currently, I'm appearing as a solo artist as well as working with the Biscuit Kings whose most recent project is their debut album, Hambones & Trombones (Mind Smoke Records, 2011). The album is a collection of songs which touch on the universal themes of love, death and the path to the Great Unknown. My most recent project as a solo artist is the release of several Holiday singles, "It's Halloween", "Happy Thanksgiving", "Doin That Holiday Thing" and "Christmas Forever Tonight".
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