Ariel wrote:
Seems like they pride themselves of being 'pure' surf and want to distinguish themselves from the lesser 'pure'. That is ego driven and not quite historically correct too, as many surf bands from all eras dabbled in other instro stuff to some extent. The limits of the genre aren't that cut and dry.
Well said. I think it is safe to include a great deal of instrumentals from The Shadows and The Ventures catalogs in your sets and still be called a surf band. When I was writing up my Classic Instrumental Surf Music Timeline, I could not tell the story accurately without including many “Proto-Surf” instrumentals.
Just for grins, I thought it would fun to list those “safe” instrumentals and see what else the SG101 community could add. In keeping with my “Classic” theme let’s limit the pool to 1969 or earlier.
Here’s the link to my full timeline, if you are interested:
https://surfguitar101.com/forums/topic/31843/?page=1#p426008
Timeline of “Proto-Surf” from the Classic Instrumental Surf Music Timeline – Surf’s First Wave
Guide to code keys:
[Proto-Surf] – Instrumentals that pre-date the generally accepted “Let’s Go Trippin’” & “Mr. Moto” Birth of Surf in late 1961, or Non-surf instrumentals that are a significant influence and/or sometimes included in surf band repertoire.
[BillboardYE100/xx] – Top Position on National Billboard Year-End Hot 100 Charts
[BillboardTop10/x] – Top position on weekly National Billboard Top 10.
[NorthSeaSurf101/xx] – Position in the SurfGuitar101/North Sea Surf Radio Top 101 in the December 2016 vote.
MM/YY – Month and Year of single release. If not available, it’s the date of the album release.*
[[ 1957 ]]
”Raunchy” – Bill Justis 9/57 [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/55] This Alabama sax man convinced Sam Phillips to make him Sun Records' music director. It was during this tenure that Bill wrote and recorded the #2 1957 smash. Raunchy is one of first to use the twangy lead guitar effect, which was later developed by others and became a staple for the next few years. Soon after the hit, guitarist Duane Eddy and producer Lee Hazlewood took it upon themselves to develop that style to an ultimate degree. They greatly enhanced the reverberation in their recordings, creating a far from light lead guitar sound.
[[ 1958 ]]
"Rumble" - Link Wray 3/58 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#67]
This is the earliest “Surf” track awarded a place in the North Sea Surf Radio / SurfGuitar101 Classic Top 101 Surf Music Poll.
”Tequila” – The Champs [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/8]
“Rebel Rouser” – Duane Eddy [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/46] Duane Eddy’s influence on the birth of Surf Music is cited by many surf guitarists.
Duane Eddy (born April 26, 1938) is an American guitarist. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, he had a string of hit records produced by Lee Hazlewood which were noted for their characteristically "twangy" sound, including "Rebel Rouser", "Peter Gunn", and "Because They're Young". He had sold 12 million records by 1963.
Eddy devised a technique of playing lead on his guitar's bass strings to produce a low, reverberant "twangy" sound. In November 1957, Eddy recorded an instrumental, "Movin' n' Groovin'", co-written by Eddy and Hazlewood. As the Phoenix studio had no echo chamber, Hazlewood bought a 2,000-gallon (7570-litre) water storage tank which he used as an echo chamber to accentuate the "twangy" guitar sound.
[[ 1959 ]]
"Bulldog" - The Fireballs 1/59 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#101]
Dick Clark's American Bandstand show, January 4, 1960, featured them performing "Bulldog". Little did the Fireballs know by now that their guitar instrumental music was one of the foundational influences of the Surf music culture that was starting to make big waves. Later, coupled with a new vocalist, the Fireballs savored success in a new dimension. "Sugar Shack", a vocal released in 1963 on DOT records, was a #1 hit and the largest selling single of that year. More vocal singles and albums followed. It was a very unique transition in the music business for an 'instrumental guitar band' to become 'vocal' and retain prestige in both fields.
“Sleep Walk” – Santo & Johnny [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/11]
“Red River Rock” – Johnny & The Hurricanes [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/31]
“Guitar Boogie Shuffle” – The Virtues [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/35]
“Teen Beat” – Sandy Nelson [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/36]
“Forty Miles of Bad Road” – Duane Eddy [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/59]
“The Peter Gunn Theme” – Ray Anthony [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/67]
[[ 1960 ]]
“Because They’re Young” – Duane Eddy [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/37]
“Apache” – The Shadows 6/60 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#90] Number 1 in Britain, 7/60. What The Ventures did for guitar-based instrumental bands in the U.S., The Shadows’ Apache did in England. In 1961, Danish jazz guitarist Jørgen Ingmann's cover of "Apache" (which he recorded in the fall of 1960) went to No. 2 in the US and No. 2 in Canada.
A 1973 version by the Incredible Bongo Band has been called "hip-hop’s national anthem". Although this version was not a hit on release, its long percussion break has been sampled countless times on hip hop and dance tracks since the 1980s.]
”Walk Don’t Run” – The Ventures 12/60 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#23, BillboardYE100/25] Personal note: Purist don’t consider this to be surf music, but I do. This was the blueprint for what was to come and launched a thousand garage bands.
”Although not considered a surf band, their influence and inspiration strongly affected every surf instrumental band that followed. They are the number one instrumental rock band in pop music history” (J. Blair)
"Moon Dawg!" - The Gamblers ?/60 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#82] Predates the earliest surf instrumentals, but influential to the surf music genre.
[[ 1961 ]] - There was no shortage of Billboard Hot 100 instrumental music in ’61. That would change by ’65, but with Rock & Roll on the ropes with Elvis in the army and the death of Buddy Holly and Ritchie Valens, the rise of the solo Singer, and with the public very accepting of instrumental music, the stage was set for a new sound of rock in the form of surf music.
“Wheels” – String-a-longs [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/8] Released in 1960, the tune peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was the #8 single of the year.
”Underwater” – the Frogmen 4/61 [Proto-Surf]
The April 17, 1961 issue of Billboard touted the song as a breakout single in Seattle and Los Angeles. It peaked at #44 on the Billboard Pop Hot 100. “Underwater” is considered by some to be the first surfing instrumental, predating Dick Dale's influential “Let's Go Trippin'” and The Marketts’ “Surfer's Stomp” by several months.
In a June 1992 interview with author Stephen McParland, Jack Andrews, the writer of the song, said that The Frogmen were a four-piece band from Culver City (called The Corsairs, J. Blair) that he met at a party. He took them into American Recording and cut "Underwater." (The tune was originally called "The Happy Frog, J. Blair) Andrews told McParland, "I shopped it to every record company in town and got booted out...by every [one]. Then my friend Joe Saraceno told me I should overdub something on it to make it more interesting, so I went back in the studio. H.B. Barnum had just done a session and he had a bunch of percussion stuff around. [Engineer Frank DeLuna] happened to pick up a guiro [pronounced "wee-ro," this is a Spanish percussion instrument typically consisting of a long-necked gourd that is sounded by scraping a stick over ridges cut into its surface] and he began making this croaking sound [with it] as we were playing the tape. I said, 'Hey, can you do that on mike?' and he said, 'Yeah, but who's gonna engineer it?' and I said, 'I will.' So, he went out and played and I engineered. Then I took it out and shopped it again."
Saraceno worked for Candix Records and helped get the record released on that label, but was not involved in the recording, itself. According to Andrews, Saraceno also came up with the name Frogmen. Little is known about the band because the members were all under 18 years old at the time "Underwater" was recorded. They were basically a high school band that recorded a few singles and then broke up.
"Jack the Ripper" - Link Wray 7/61 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#21]
“Apache” – Jorgen Ingmann 7/60 [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/35] It was Ingmann, not The Shadows, that scored a hit with “Apache” in the United States. In 1961, Danish jazz guitarist Jørgen Ingmann's cover of "Apache" (which he recorded in the fall of 1960) went to No. 2 in the US and No. 2 in Canada.
[[ Ground Zero – The Birth of Surf - September 1961 ]]
"Intoxica" - The Revels ?/61 [Proto-Surf, NorthSeaSurf101#80]
[[ 1962 ]] - The Surf Craze – High gear period of instrumental surf music.
“James Bond theme” - 10/62 [Proto-Surf]
Telstar – The Tornados 12/62 [Proto-Surf] a 1962 instrumental written and produced by Joe Meek for the English band the Tornados. The track reached number 1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in December 1962]
[[ 1963 ]]
“Wild Weekend” – The Rockin’ Rebels [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/22] Released in 1961, Originally a vocal song, it was written by Tom Shannon and Phil Todaro as a theme song for Shannon’s radio show. The Buffalo Rebels, or Rebels, asked Shannon to play at a record hop and also asked if they could play his theme song. They did and Shannon and Todaro thought there was something to it. They moved the group to a recording studio in the same building where they had a production office. The record came out locally and was a hit, but since it wasn't on a major label, the song just stopped. In 1963 the track was re-issued on Swan Records (Swan 4125) and reached #8 on the national charts. To avoid confusion with Duane Eddy and his Rebels, the Rebels became the Rockin' Rebels. Swan pressings can be found with either name.
[[ 1964 ]] - The Beatles appear on Ed Sullivan. They have 9 Billboard Top 100 year-end hits. The British Invasion begins. Hot Rod music (esp. Vocal) kicks in.
[[ 1965 ]] – The Year that Surf Music’s First Wave Ended
[[ 1966 ]]
“No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach’s In)” – The T-Bones [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/66]
[[ 1967 ]] There is nothing remotely surfy in the Billboard Year-End Hot 100)
[[ 1968 ]]
“The Good, The Bad and the Ugly” – Hugo Montenegro [Proto-Surf, BillboardYE100/8] Embraced by surf musicians, the Spaghetti Western lives on as a sub-genre of instrumental surf rock. "While surf music gives you the feeling of riding the waves, spaghetti western music conjures images of riding tall in the saddle," says Ted James, owner of Deep Eddy Records in Austin, Texas, a label that specializes in surf, instrumental rock and garage.]
—
-Tim
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