REAL GONE REVS UP
FOR SUMMER WITH RONNY AND THE DAYTONAS
2-CD Set Featuring
Their Complete Recordings Highlights June 30/July 10 Slate That Also Includes
Limited-Edition Releases from the New Riders of the Purple Sage, Viscounts and
Banana and the Bunch, a Deluxe Fanny Reissue and a Timely Grateful Dead Release
Nothing
says Summer like surf and hot rod music, and on June 30 Real Gone Music is
paying tribute to one of the greatest bands ever to come down the (turn)pike,
Ronny and the Daytonas, with a 2-CD, 48-track set featuring four unreleased
tracks and notes from “Ronny” himself! Being from Nashville, Ronny and the
Daytonas tossed a little country twang into their surfin’ sound; our next
artist, the New Riders of the Purple Sage, also turned country on its head by
injecting an unapologetic hippie ethos into their country-rock sound. On July
10, we are reissuing their classic The
Adventures of Panama Red album on limited edition (of 1000) purple vinyl
with the fantastic gatefold album artwork intact.
Real Gone
Music is also preparing a couple of other long-lost, limited-edition releases
on CD, both in mini LP sleeves that exactly replicate the original album
artwork. The first, The Viscounts’ Harlem
Nocturne, features the definitive hit version of the oft-covered title
track along with 11 other tracks of noir-inflected R&B and jazz. The
second, Banana and the Bunch’s Mid-Mountain
Ranch, is essentially a Youngbloods album without Jesse Colin Young, and is
an early alt-country classic.
Finally,
Real Gone returns to two artists whose catalogs the label has repeatedly mined
with great results. The label is reissuing the Fanny Hill album from the groundbreaking female rockers Fanny in an
expanded edition offering six bonus tracks and notes from three of the four
band members. And, on June 30, right smack dab in between the band’s reunion
shows in Santa Clara and Chicago, the label is releasing another essential live
Grateful Dead show from the hallowed Dick’s
Picks series of archival concerts.
Ready for
a little more octane into your car stereo? Here come 48 tracks from Nashville’s
greatest contribution to surf and hot rod music, Ronny and the Daytonas! “Ronny” was singer-songwriter-guitarist John “Bucky”
Wilkin, who wrote their first hit, “G.T.O.,” while attending physics class as a
senior in high school; his mom, country songwriter Marijohn Wilkin, then landed
him a session with producer and former Sun session saxophonist Bill Justis that
yielded the #4 chart smash. Justis became the group’s producer for their
recordings on the Amy label imprint Mala, which featured Wilkin and a rotating
cast of characters, the most prominent of which was frequent co-writer Buzz
Cason. Though Ronny and the Daytonas never notched another hit as big as
“G.T.O.,” their infusion of country twang put a unique spin on mid-‘60s surf
‘n’ drag music, and their use of strings and willingness to cut ballads
alongside the requisite uptempo fare showed that Wilkin refused to be
pigeonholed. His move towards a more personal style accelerated with the band’s
move to the RCA label, where Wilkin assumed producer duties, culminating in the
1966 solo “Delta Day”/”I Wanna Be Free” single (included here as bonus tracks),
which reflected Wilkin’s eagerness to embrace the folk-rock sounds that were in
the air at the time. Now, Real Gone Music has assembled a 2-CD set that
includes every single A and B-side (many of which have never appeared on CD)
and unique album track recorded by Ronny and the Daytonas—just like the title
says, The Complete Recordings! But even that title doesn’t really
do the set justice; in addition to all the group sides we’ve included Bucky’s
solo sides, two tracks (“Tiger-A-Go-Go” and “Bay City”) recorded under the
moniker Buzz & Bucky, and four UNRELEASED tracks, all but two taken from
the original mono tapes and remastered by Vic Anesini at Sony’s own Battery
Studios. Notes authored by Bucky himself plus previously unseen photos drawn
from his private collection round out the set. The ultimate look at one of the
all-time great surf combos.
If there
was ever any doubt that the New Riders of the Purple Sage were the ultimate hippie country rock band—and
having had Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead as
early members meant that there wasn’t much—The Adventures of Panama Red put
them to rest. This 1973 album’s loosely connected tall tales of drug culture,
complete with the album’s underground comic book graphics, ensured that this
gatefold record was a long-time dorm room favorite for separating out those
stems and seeds. But Panama Red (their
only gold record) had a lot more going for it than just countercultural
kicks—the band, by now consisting of John Dawson, David Nelson, Dave Torbert,
pedal steel ace Buddy Cage and Jefferson Airplane drummer Spencer Dryden—was
much tighter than any outfit this stoned had a right to be, and with
songwriting contributions from Peter Rowan (the hit “Panama Red” and “Lonesome
L.A. Cowboy”) and Robert Hunter (“Kick in the Head”) as well as from the band’s
own fine tunesmiths in Dawson and Torbert, the songs were of a uniformly high
quality. Production by
multi-instrumentalist Norbert Putnam, charts by the Memphis Horns and vocal
contributions by Buffy Sainte-Marie and Donna Godchaux helped enshrine this
record as one of the finest country-rock outings of the ‘70s. Now, Real Gone
Music is reissuing this classic album for the first time on vinyl, remastered
by Vic Anesini at Battery Studios in NYC and lacquer cut by Kevin Gray, with a
limited edition pressing of 1000 in—what else?—purple vinyl, with the original
gatefold album and inner sleeve graphics (with lyrics) intact. Time to add to
your stash of essential ‘70s vinyl.
A lot of
folks covered Earle Hagen and Dick Rogers’ classic composition “Harlem
Nocturne”—there are over 500 recorded versions by some estimates—but the
definitive take was laid down by a little-known R&B combo out of New Jersey
named The Viscounts, who had a hit with the song for two different labels, for Madison in
1959 and for Amy in 1965. The latter release, which cracked the Top 40, spawned
an entire album—also named Harlem Nocturne—to go with it, and if you are
looking for the perfect soundtrack to set a bleary, late-night mood straight
out of a Raymond Chandler novel (or a film by David Lynch or Quentin
Tarantino—you can bet both of those guys have listened to this record), look no
further—guitar dripping with reverb and tremolo, minor-key Hammond organ fills
and sleazy saxophone create a mutant musical love-child of the Ventures, Link
Wray and Earl Bostic. The original Amy album makes its worldwide CD debut on
this Real Gone Music release, and we’re putting it out exactly as it was
originally issued, in a limited-edition mini LP sleeve that re-creates the
original album art to the T. Remastered from the original mono tapes at Sony’s
own Battery Studios and LIMITED TO 1200
COPIES.
Recorded right after the Youngbloods broke up,
and released on their own Raccoon label, 1972’s Mid-Mountain
Ranch was
the sole solo album from the band’s multi-instrumentalist Banana a.k.a. Lowell
Levinger. Except that it wasn’t really a solo album, because the Bunch included
Joe Bauer and Michael Kane from Banana’s former outfit! So, Mid-Mountain Ranch really was a
Youngbloods album sans Jesse Colin
Young; and the absence of their former front man allows Banana and the Bunch to
stretch out with some bluegrass and jazz licks alongside their patented folk
rock sound. It’s something of an early alt-country cult classic, reissued here
on CD for the first time ever in a limited-edition mini LP sleeve that
re-creates the original packaging right down to the label on the CD. LIMITED EDITION OF 1000.
Fanny had
already stepped into some big shoes by being the first all-female rock band
signed to a major label, but with the release of 1972’s Fanny
Hill, they took things to a new level, recording at
Abbey Road with producer Richard Perry and famed Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick
(the album includes a Beatles homage with a cover of “Hey Bulldog”). And the
result was Fanny’s most varied and ambitious album, sporting a beautiful mix of
ballads and rockers and a mature, socially conscious lyrical approach. Not
coincidentally, it’s long been the most-requested reissue in the Fanny catalog,
and we’re adding six bonus tracks to the original release along with new liner
notes from the band and rare photos. Another essential, expanded Fanny album
from Real Gone Music.
Taken,
like Dick’s Picks Vol. 10, from one
of the Grateful Dead’s annual year-end runs of Bay Area concerts, Dick’s Picks Vol. 5—Oakland
Auditorium Arena 12/26/79 marked five straight volumes of
‘70s shows selected by archivist Dick Latvala to start the series, and as it
was from one of the very last days of the decade, it was the perfect way for Dick
to complete his own mini “tour” of the ‘70s (Vol. 6 would break the string by forging ahead to the ‘80s). But Vol. 5 has a lot more going for it than
just a convenient spot on the calendar; this is one of the rawest and most
energetic Picks, a complete show
anchored by a second set that is in essence one big medley that begins with
“Uncle John’s Band” and ends with it two hours later, with a supercharged “The
Other One” and the first appearance of “Brokedown Palace” in two years among
many high points in between. Set one is no slouch, either, with a great,
Garcia-led rendition of “Alabama Getaway” four months before it appeared on
record and a passionate vocal by Bob Weir on “Looks Like Rain” leading to a
spirited, set-closing “The Promised Land.” And throughout it all you’ll hear
Brent Mydland serving notice in one of his first shows with the band that he is
fully up to the task of replacing Keith Godchaux. Out of print for years, and a
perfectly timed release for the Dead reunion shows (the label is also pressing
up a 300-unit limited-edition run of Dick’s
Picks Vol. 29, the only 6-CD set in the series, consisting of two monster
May 1977 shows with stellar bonus material).
JUNE 30 RELEASES FROM REAL GONE
MUSIC
Limited
Edition 300-Unit Repress
JULY 10 RELEASES FROM REAL GONE
MUSIC
About Real Gone Music
Real Gone Music, formed and helmed by industry
vets Gordon Anderson and Gabby Castellana, is an eclectic and prolific catalog
and reissue label with distribution through Sony via Razor & Tie. Anderson
and Castellana each started businesses in 1993 — Collectors’ Choice Music and
Hep Cat Records & Distribution, respectively — that became two of the most
important outlets for buyers and sellers of vintage music recordings. They
joined forces in 2011 to launch Real Gone Music, which serves both the
collector community and the casual music fan with a robust release schedule
combining big-name artists with esoteric cult favorites. Real Gone Music is
dedicated to combing the vaults for sounds that aren’t just gone — they’re REAL
gone.
