Sunday, February 19, 2012

Douglas & Lonero: This Time/Don't Let Yourself Get Carried Away (Rca)

This double sider is pure dynamite! The A-side is great but the flip "This Time" is even better. Unfortunately it is available on issues only, that are very scarce.
this time
don't let yourself get carried away

I received more information directly from Bobby Lonero. You can contact him at http://bobbylonero.net/index.html
This is what he recalls of that period:
I had another group called The Prime Ministers all from New Orleans Louisiana. We left here to go on the road and play some gigis in Atlanta Georgia and from there we went all over the Southern Regional Area's of the United States. We wound up in California and we start cutting records. We were showcasing our group at the famous Troubadour in Hollywood. We met the number one producer in Hollywood at that time which was Frank Sinatra's conductor, the legendary Don Costa who travelled the world even all over Italy.
After we cut the album with Don we were destined for stardom. With Don behind us we couldn't lose but bad luck came our way big time. Don had a massive heart attack and passed away. That destroyed everything we counted on to reach goal. After that my group went back home cause they did not want to try again but I stayed in California.
This brought me to become a beach bum in Venice California giging where I could get a music job. When I was looking for players to start another group, I walked into a club in Santa Monica and I heard a singer singing in the back of the club doing a piano bar single. He caught my attention cause I do have a nack for hearing good talent, no matter what kind it is. I then approached this entertainer and asked him if if I could sit in with him for a set. His name was Ronnie Douglas from New York. I told him I was from New Orleans Louisiana and my group broke up and went back home and I was looking for some guys to start another group. Well it was a miracle that I found this guy by chance cause we hit it off like we have been playing forever. It was awesome the way our voices blended and most of all our charisma matched perfectly on stage. We were great together, believe me. Well to make a long story short we picked up a drummer and that was the cherry on top cause he was the comedian of the group and he fit us perfect. We complemented each other on stage and off. We played every club in Hollywood including the new Playboy Club and that's where Jack Goal, the president of Columbia Records, saw us perform and that got us a contract with the biggest record company in the world, Columbia.
We made an album for Columbia and took off 4 songs "This Time/Don't Let Yourself Get Carried Away" and "Mary's Having A Party/Jubilation (Excitation)" which Paul Anka stole from me and he changed the name to "Jubilation" and did a big production of his song. So we had bad luck with that too, cause it was climbing the Billboard and Cashbox charts. Then Paul put his out and our song got buried, so that was more bad luck. Then we got out of making records and we decided to open up our own club in Marina Del Rey. We had a big grand opening and every producer, director, movie star, comedian, singer, entertainer, and even pornstar showed up. It was like an academy award night, it was amazing believe me.

1 comment:

flux_is_krux said...

Great 70's soul! Very catchy and hip sound, I love to discover obscure songs like this and read on the background story, thanks!