Ron was just another one of those elitist Love Gen' assholes, who were as much creatures of their own prejudices, as any of the rest of the planets unevolved occupants. As I recall, "The Young Rascals" were a product of the record label - at least in their style of dress and physical presentation. After the "incident" in Florida aka The Land That Was/Is Lost In Time, they said a collective Peeleian "Nope" and came out of the closet to reveal who they really were to the world. This isn't surmise on my part, it's strong personal recollection of one of the three happiest/saddest periods of my life. My father owned a successful record business on Dexter Avenue, and we were always making runs over to Motown Records which was a hop, skip and a jump away. Right next door was Bishop's Barbershop where the local area performers and musicians had their haircuts and conk jobs done. Where Black Detroit Tigers baseball team members like Gates Brown and Willie Horton hung out when they weren't on the road. That 3 block stretch of Dexter Avenue also included the Safari Club (where my father's slide into the family plague first began) and the Dexter Bowling alley where I saw my first "street murder" - a near beheading by machete over a crooked dice game. It was a hotbed for the hottest topics of the time in the neighborhood - Motown and it's competitors, the Tigers and how their Black players had helped shift the balance of power away from the B'more Orioles and Frank Robinson, and the rising tensions in the inner cities of America as a result of the burgeoning social freedom/civil rights/anti-war movement. In that situational cultural context, the transformation of the Young Rascals into The Rascals wasn't perceived to be phony. Hell, Black America looked at the Hippie movement as phony because we didn't see it offering any direct substantive political support to our critical concerns of the era. Their transformation, as seen thru the critical social lenses available to my ears and eyes, was just something "that shoulda always been" as my father used to like to put it whenever something unreal got real.
Thank you, Doc. I kind of always assumed that the song's success on the Black charts testified to the sincerity of The Rascals' statement and the legitimacy of their saying it. And damn would I have loved to hung out at that barbershop listening to Gates and Willie and maybe even Earl Wilson shoot the shit...
Dan, always a treat to read your experiences with the music I also grew up with. Was struggling with a slide rule and matrix algebra as an engineering student in '68. Great to hear things about your familial past.
Ron was just another one of those elitist Love Gen' assholes, who were as much creatures of their own prejudices, as any of the rest of the planets unevolved occupants. As I recall, "The Young Rascals" were a product of the record label - at least in their style of dress and physical presentation. After the "incident" in Florida aka The Land That Was/Is Lost In Time, they said a collective Peeleian "Nope" and came out of the closet to reveal who they really were to the world. This isn't surmise on my part, it's strong personal recollection of one of the three happiest/saddest periods of my life. My father owned a successful record business on Dexter Avenue, and we were always making runs over to Motown Records which was a hop, skip and a jump away. Right next door was Bishop's Barbershop where the local area performers and musicians had their haircuts and conk jobs done. Where Black Detroit Tigers baseball team members like Gates Brown and Willie Horton hung out when they weren't on the road. That 3 block stretch of Dexter Avenue also included the Safari Club (where my father's slide into the family plague first began) and the Dexter Bowling alley where I saw my first "street murder" - a near beheading by machete over a crooked dice game. It was a hotbed for the hottest topics of the time in the neighborhood - Motown and it's competitors, the Tigers and how their Black players had helped shift the balance of power away from the B'more Orioles and Frank Robinson, and the rising tensions in the inner cities of America as a result of the burgeoning social freedom/civil rights/anti-war movement. In that situational cultural context, the transformation of the Young Rascals into The Rascals wasn't perceived to be phony. Hell, Black America looked at the Hippie movement as phony because we didn't see it offering any direct substantive political support to our critical concerns of the era. Their transformation, as seen thru the critical social lenses available to my ears and eyes, was just something "that shoulda always been" as my father used to like to put it whenever something unreal got real.
Thank you, Doc. I kind of always assumed that the song's success on the Black charts testified to the sincerity of The Rascals' statement and the legitimacy of their saying it. And damn would I have loved to hung out at that barbershop listening to Gates and Willie and maybe even Earl Wilson shoot the shit...
Dan, always a treat to read your experiences with the music I also grew up with. Was struggling with a slide rule and matrix algebra as an engineering student in '68. Great to hear things about your familial past.
Dino Danelli... The trad-gripped blueprint for Moonie (with a high hat)!