A
PHIL BRODIE BAND'S FUN PAGE
updated
for February 2012
.
.MUSIC
TRIVIA
NEW FACT EVERY MONTH
I write a new fact
each month, these facts are "to date" of when I put them up
on the page, which I started back in 2004, curtain of the facts might
have altered over the years.
If you would like to contribute to this page I am only an email
away.
Did You Know . .
. ??
*As well as being lead guitarist
of the rock band Queen, Brian May is an animal activist. He formed the
group, Save Me (named after the May-written Queen song), which campaigns
for the protection of all animals against unnecessary, cruel and degrading
treatment. As well as this, he is an astrophysicist and is the co-author
of "Bang! – The Complete History of the Universe". Brian
also has had a lifelong interest in collecting Victorian stereophotography
and in 2009, with co-author Elena Vidal, he published his second book,
"A Village Lost and Found", on the work of English stereophotography
innovator TR William.
*Clark
Terry is one of the most prolific jazz musicians in history, having appeared
on 905 known recording sessions, which makes him "maybe" the
most recorded trumpet player of all time. In comparison, Louis Armstrong
performed on 620 sessions, Harry "Sweets" Edison on 563, and
Dizzy Gillespie on 501.
*Gene Autry's version of Rudolph
the Red-Nosed Reindeer holds the distinction of being the only No.1 hit
to fall completely off the chart after hitting No.1 the week of Christmas,
1949. The official date of its No. 1 status was for the week ending January
7, 1950, making it the first No.1 song of the 1950s. None the less, it
sold 2.5 million copies the first year, eventually selling a total of
25 million, and it remained the second best-selling record of all time
until the 1980s
*The Doors drummer John Densmore,
and guitarist Robby Krieger worked as technical advisers on the 1991 film,
The Doors. John also had a cameo roll in the film, he played the studio
engineer in the booth urging Jim (Val Kilmer) to call it a night in the
opening sequence. Although impressed with Val's performance as Morrison,
John & Robby were unhappy with the film as a whole.
*In 1957 at the age of 13, guitarist
Jimmy Page appeared on BBC TV 's "All Your Own" talent quest
programme in a skiffle quartet. They played "Mama Don't Want To Skiffle
Anymore" and another American-flavoured song, "In Them Ol' Cottonfields
Back Home". When asked by the host Huw Wheldon what he wanted to
do after schooling, Jimmy said, "I want to do biological research
to find a cure for cancer, if it isn't discovered by then"
*Carlos
Santana spent several years working as a dishwasher and busking for spare
change on the streets of San Francisco before becoming a full-time professional
musician. After the band, Santana's first audition, at the Avalon Ball
Room in the summer of 1967, promoter Chet Helms told the band that they
would never make it in the San Francisco Music Scene playing Latin fusion
and suggested that Carlos should keep his day job washing dishes at Tick
Tock's Drive-In on 3rd St
*U2 album covers: The child on the
cover of 'Boy' is Peter Rowan, a nephew of a friend of the band. Then
2 albums later, Peter was used again for the cover of 'War'
*"Dueling
Banjos" the instrumental composition by Arthur "Guitar Boogie"
Smith made famous by the 1972 motion picture Deliverance. The song was
composed in 1955 by Smith as a banjo instrumental he called "Feudin'
Banjos". Smith recorded it, playing a four-string plectrum banjo
and accompanied by five-string bluegrass banjo player Don Reno. The song
went to No. 2 for four weeks on the U.S. pop chart in 1973 and topped
the adult contemporary chart for two weeks the same year. BUT it also
led to a successful lawsuit by the song's composer, since it was used
in the film Deliverance without his permission.
*The front cover of E.L.O.s 4th
album "Eldorado - A Symphony" officially known as simply Eldorado,
was designed by Sharon Arden, later known as Sharon Osbourne (Ozzie's
wife). It comprises a still from the popular 1939 film The Wizard of Oz...
the ruby slippers.
*The Beatles's Help!
album cover features the group with their arms positioned to spell out
a word in flag semaphore, but it does not read "help", as many
believed. On the UK Parlophone release, the letters formed by The Beatles
appear to be 'NUJV', whilst the slightly re-arranged US release on Capitol
Records appeared to feature the letters 'NVUJ'
*While many people believe Eric
Clapton is nicknamed "Slow Hand(s)" because of his style of
playing or even because his fingers are slow on the guitar; it is actually
because once during a concert he played his guitar so hard that one of
its strings broke, and he took time out to re-string it. As he did, the
fans in attendance began a "slow hand" clap.
*When
The Inspiral Carpets headlined Reading Festival in 1990, they brought
on a pantomime cow. The band's then guitar roadie, Noel Gallagher - now
of Oasis, was one half of that cow.
*John
Lennon and Paul McCartney both had their first 'Beatles' haircut during
a trip to Paris in 1961. The pair hooked up with old friend Jurgen Vollmer
who they knew from Germany, who wore his hair brushed forward. Vollmer
had copied the style from actor Jean Marais in the 1959 Jean Cocteau movie
'Le Testament d'Orphee'
*The Four Pennies' "Juliet"
was the only 1964 No.1 by a UK group not to chart in America. The U.S.
division of Philips Records issued only two of the Four Pennies' singles
stateside. Both were major European hits, "Juliet" and "Until
It's Time for You to Go", but neither saw any significant chart presence
or airplay in the US.
*Steppenwolf's keyboardist Goldy
McJohn, once played in a band The Mynah Birds with Neil Young and Rick
James
*Jamaica 1963... Studio One’s
Coxsone Dodd asked the pianist of The Skatalites, Jackie Mittoo to compose
an original music
while running recording sessions. With the help of drummer Lloyd
Knibbs, Mittoo turned the traditional ska beat into reggae music by slowing
down the tempo. Bob Marley who had recorded ska, rocksteady and nyabinghi-drumming
records early in his music career, played an hugely important role in
popularizing reggae throughout the world.
*Johnny Cash was given the name
"J.R." because his parents could not agree on a name, only on
initials. When he enlisted in the United States Air Force, the military
would not accept initials as his name, so he adopted John R. Cash as his
legal name. In 1955, when signing with Sun Records, he took Johnny Cash
as his stage name
*According to the band, the song
"Black Sabbath", released February 13th 1970, was inspired by
a frightening experience that Geezer Butler had related to Ozzy Osbourne.
In the days of Earth, Geezer painted his apartment matte black and placed
several inverted crucifixes on the walls. Ozzie gave him a book about
witchcraft. He read the book and placed the book on a shelf before going
to sleep. When he woke up, he claims he saw a large black figure standing
at the end of his bed. The figure disappeared and Geezer rushed to get
the book, only to find that the book was gone. He then told Ozzie, who
wrote the lyrics to the song
*In 1986, David Gilmour purchased
the houseboat Astoria which is moored on the River Thames near Hampton
Court, and transformed it into a recording studio. The boat was built
in 1911 for impresario Fred Karno, who wanted to have the best houseboat
on the river. He designed it so that there could be an entire 90-piece
orchestra playing on deck. The majority of the two most recent Pink Floyd
albums, A Momentary Lapse of Reason and The Division Bell, as well as
Dave Gilmour's 2006 solo release On an Island, were recorded there.
*Elvis
Presley has
had the most Hot 100 entries with a total of 151 and
Paul McCartney has written the most number-one hits with a total of 32
*Glastonbury Festival: The first
festival at Worthy Farm was the Pilton Pop, Blues & Folk Festival,
mounted by Michael Eavis in September 1970, and attended by 1,500 people.
The first act to perform was the group Stackridge; the headline act was
Tyrannosaurus Rex, later known as T.Rex. The
larger free festival at the summer solstice in June the next year was
the first to attract nationwide interest, and the event became an important
precursor of later Glastonbury Festivals. The Glastonbury Fayre of 1971
featured the first incarnation of the "Pyramid Stage" built
from scaffolding and metal sheeting. Performers included David Bowie,
Pink Floyd, Traffic, Fairport Convention, Quintessence, and Melanie.
*Dennis
Wilson of the Beach Boys died in 1983, he drowned while swimming near
his boat in California, US; Ronald Reagan, then President
of America gave special permission so Dennis's body could be buried
at sea
*In 1966 British pop music promoter,
group manager and songwriter Ronnie Scott, along with legendary UK pop
singer Marty Wilde wrote the track "When Jesamine Goes", for
Welsh rock band The Bystanders (later called Man), BUT the songwriting
duo went under the pseudonyms of Frere Manston and Jack Gellar. (In 1968
the track was covered by The Casuals as "Jesamine" and got to
No.2 in the UK singles chart).
*As
of 2005, according to The Guinness Book of World Records, Queen albums
had spent a total of 1,322 weeks or twenty-seven years on the UK album
charts; more time than any other musical act. In 2006 the Queens Greatest
Hits album was the U K's all-time best selling album, with sales upwards
of 5,407,587 copies, over 604,295 more copies than its nearest competitor,
The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The band has released
a total of eighteen number one albums, eighteen number one singles, and
ten number one DVDs worldwide making them one of the world's best-selling
music artists. Their total album sales have been estimated at over 300
million worldwide including 32.5 million in the United States alone as
of 2004.
*After counting 23 faked orgasms
performed by Donna Summer in "Love to Love You Baby", the British
Broadcasting Corporation (The BBC) banned the song. However, it did not
stop it from becoming a massive hit, in 1976, Love to Love You Baby reached
No.4 on the UK single charts and peaked to number two on the American
Billboard pop chart.
*The week after Michael Jackson
died he had thirteen top 40 Hits in the charts (the chart w/e 11th July
2009), he held positions 2, 10, 12, 13, 19, 25, 26, 32, 33, 34, 35, 38,
40 with "Man In The Mirror", "Billie Jean", "Thriller",
"Smooth Criminal", "Beat It", "Black Or White",
"Dirty Diana", "They Don't Care About Us", "Earth
Song", "The Way You Make Me Feel", "You Are Not Alone",
"Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough", and "Bad".
*According to Berklee College of
Music in Boston, USA, Carol Kaye is the most recorded bassist of all time,
with 10,000 sessions spanning four decades.
*In the mid-1950s, Ella Fitzgerald
became the first African-American to perform at the legendary Mocambo,
on Hollywood's Sunset Strip, after Marilyn Monroe had lobbied the owner
for the booking. The incident was turned into a play by Bonnie Greer in
2005.
*In 1962, Polydor released the Beatle
album My Bonnie across Germany. The word Beatles was judged to sound too
similar to the German 'pidels' (pronounced peedles), the plural of a slang
term for penis, hence the album was credited to Tony Sheridan and The
Beat Brothers. After The Beatles had gained fame, the album was re-released
in Britain, with the credit altered to Tony Sheridan and The Beatles.
* In 1986, Alanis Morissette was
a cast regular on the CTV/Nickelodeon show, "You Can't Do That on
Television".
*John "Speedy" Keen, was
the vocalist, songwriter, drummer for Thunderclap Newman, a band which
The
Who's guitarist Pete Townshend created in 1969, to play and record songs
written by 'Speedy' who had been The Who's roadie and chauffeur for Peter.
Originally Peter Townsend played bass for the band under the pseudonym
Bijou Drains.
*In 1955, while still at Brooklyn's
Abraham Lincoln High School, Neil Sedaka formed the group The Tokens (originally
called the Linc-Tones). Neil recorded their debut single, "While
I Dream" before he left the band in 1957, who went on to have the
major hit in 1961 with "The Lion Sleeps To-night".
*In
March of 1980, Elvis Presley's autopsy is subpoenaed during the trial
of Dr. George Nichopoulous, who would later be found guilty of overprescribing
drugs to Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and other clients.
*Paul H. Tutmarc invented an electric
upright "bull-fiddle" in 1935 but it mainly served as a publicity
tool. His real claim-to-fame was the marketing of the fretted and solid-body
(Model #736) "Electronic Bass Fiddle" which was designed to
be used in a horizontal position. That then-radical instrument is considered
to be history's earliest electric bass guitar -- and one that preceded
the far more famous Fender "Precision" Bass by a decade and
a half.
*TLC's second album, "CrazySexyCool"
(1994), was the first album by a female group to be awarded diamond certification
by the RIAA for selling over 11 million copies in the USA and shipping
over 15 million copies worldwide.
*English rock band, Black
Sabbath, formed in Birmingham in 1968 by Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer
Butler, and Bill Ward, was
originally formed as a heavy blues-rock band named "Earth",
the band began incorporating occult and horror-inspired lyrics with tuned-down
guitars, and changed their name to "Black Sabbath". The
band has since experienced multiple lineup changes, with a total of twenty-two
former members.
*The first UK male artist to top
the US singles chart was Laurie London with the track " He's Got
The Whole World (In His Hands)", April 19th 1958 and the first record
to entry the UK singles chart straight in at the No.1 spot was Elvis Presley
with ''Jailhouse Rock'' w/e January 25th 1958.
*George Harrison originally wrote
"All Those Years Ago" for Ringo. Although he recorded it, Ringo
thought it too high for his voice. When John Lennon got murdered, George
altered the words and made it a tribute to John. Although the band had
split up, all 3 remaining Beatles plus Linda McCartney are are featured
on the track.
*In 2000, the Rhino Handmade label
released the posthumous Tiny Tim Live at the Royal Albert Hall. This recording
had been made in 1968 at the height of Tiny Tim's fame, but Reprise Records
never released it. It sat on the shelf until its limited Internet release
some 32 years later.
Also
at the fest "Isle Of Wight 1970", Tiny Tim brought a massive
crowd of 600,000 revellers to their feet with overwhelming cheers when
he sang "There'll Always Be an England" through a megaphone.
*Paul Weller played guitar on Champagne
Supernova by Oasis.
*Elisha Gray transmitted music over
a telephone line in 1876, the same year the telephone was patented Alexander
Graham Bell. Elisha
Gray invented the first electronic music
instrument in 1874, calling it the "Musical Telegraph."
*Billboard’s Hot 100 Chart
debuted in 1958, with Ricky Nelson’s first recording “Poor Little
Fool.” in at #1. . "Mr. Postman"
by The Marvelettes was Motown's first #1 on Billboard's Hot 100 in 1961,
and The Supremes have scored twelve US #1 hits, more than any other female
vocal group in history.
*Releasing 'Monkey Grip'
in May 1974, Bill Wyman became the first member
of The Rolling Stones to release a solo album. He is also the only Rolling
Stones' member to have had a hit single as a solo performer with "(Si,
Si) Je Suis Un Rock Star" released in July 1981, peaking at No.14
in the UK.
*At the Wembley Memorial Concert,
the long goodbye to Freddie Mercury in 1992, 316 miles of cable were used
to enable the event to be relayed to 80 countries. The stars plus V.I.Ps,
in a replica of the Hard Rock Cafe backstage, consumed 2000 hamburgers,
1000 veggieburgers, a quarter of a ton of fries, 3000 bottles of wine
and 4000 gallons of coke and beer.
*Pre the Stones days, in 1960, Keith
Richards, Mick Jagger and Dick Taylor (later of Pretty Things), formed
the band Little Boy Blue and the Blue Boys.
*Peter Gabriel started the annual
WOMAD (World Of Music And Dance) festival, held for the first time July
16-18 in 1982 at Shepton Mallet in England, it featured musicians from
Africa and the Far East who had influenced Gabriel. WOMAD
currently holds festivals in over 20 countries.
*At one point in the 60s the Beatles
were paying in excess of 100% tax; effectively they were paying to work!
*The famous long guitar intro to
Led Zep's "Stairway To Heaven" is taken from the track "Taurus",
which was composed and played by guitarist, the late Randy California
when he was only 16 in 1967. The instrumental was dedicated to his Taurian
girlfriend and recorded a year later by his band "Spirit". Led
Zepplin heard it while on tour with Spirit in USA. (Randy Wolfe, was named
"California" by his great friend of Jimi Hendrix, who tried
to bring him to the UK, but Randy was too young at the time)