Electric Prunes

 

Electric Prunes are an American psychedelic rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California, in 1965. Incorporating psychedelia and elements of early electronic rock, the band's sound was marked by innovative recording techniques with fuzz-toned guitars and oscillating sound effects. 

Guitarist Ken Williams' and singer James Lowe's called the sound "free-form garage music" that set them apart from many of their contemporaries.

According to Lowe, the name Electric Prunes started off as a joke, but he eventually convinced other band members to keep it, saying, "It's the one thing everyone will remember. It's not attractive, and there's nothing sexy about it, but people won't forget it."

The band was signed to Reprise Records in 1966 and released their first single, "Ain't It Hard", in the latter part of the year. Their first album, The Electric Prunes, included the band's two nationally charting songs, "I Had Too Much to Dream (Last Night)" and "Get Me to the World on Time". With the appearance of their second album, Underground, the band was more free to create their own material. However, the original group disbanded by 1968 when they proved unable to record the innovative and complex arrangements by David Axelrod on the albums Mass in F Minor and Release of an Oath. Both albums were released under the band's name, the rights to which were owned by their record producer David Hassinger, but were largely performed by other musicians. Several of the original band members reconvened in 1999 and began recording again. The band still performs occasionally, although the only remaining original member is lead singer James Lowe.

They produced albums and got FM airplay but did not really have hit singles.

Mass in F Minor is their third studio album and explains pretty well why they were not a mainstream rock band. Released in 1968, it consists of a musical setting of the mass sung in Latin and Greek and arranged in the psychedelic style of the band, and was written and arranged by David Axelrod.

Eurythmics

Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. The duo formed in Wagga Wagga, Australia, and released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981. It didn't catch much airplay, but their their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) in 1983 had a worldwide hit with the title track.

They picked Eurythmics as their name because that was a method of teaching music going back to the 1890s that Lennox had encountered as a child.

The duo was never really a "band" unless they were on tour and the two were the only permanent members and songwriters. 

Lennox and Stewart had been a couple but split as a couple around the time that they signed their RCA record deal. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. 

Stewart went on as a record producer. Annie Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva.  

After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999 and reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection. 

 

Eurythmics

Eurythmics was a British music duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and David A. Stewart, now disbanded but known to reunite from time to time.

Their musical style ranged from new wave and synthpop to pop rock and soft rock. Eurythmics originally came together in 1980 and disbanded in 1990, but reunited in 1999 and split again in 2005.

The duo released their first album, In The Garden, in 1981 but really hit it big with their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This), released in 1983. The title track from the album was a worldwide hit, topping the chart in various countries including the US.  Eurythmics went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split in 1990.


They called the group Eurythmics after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child. Dalcroze Eurhythmics (note spelling difference) is also known as the The Eurhythmics of Jaques-Dalcroze or simply Eurhythmics and is a system of interpreting musical rhythms through one's body. It was invented by Swiss composer Emile Jaques-Dalcroze to express the "symmetry and spirit" of music. Similarly, if something is eurhythmic, it is harmonious, or pleasing to the ear.

It is one of several developmental approaches including the Kodaly Method, Orff Schulwerk and Suzuki Method used to teach music education to students. Eurhythmics teaches concepts of rhythm, structure, and musical expression using movement, and is the concept for which Dalcroze is best known. It focuses on allowing the student to gain physical awareness and experience of music through training that takes place through all of the senses, particularly kinesthetic.

The E Street Band

In the good old Jersey shore town of Belmar...

E Street. Not far from where Bruce Springsteen and the band used to rehearse in the 70's (at original band member David Sancious' mom's house). Here we are at the crossroads with 10th Avenue, where the "freeze-out" occurred. (Bruce has said that he has no idea what a "freeze-out" would actually be.)

On Bruce's Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. in 1973, he didn't use many backup musicians, but on the next album, The Wild, the Innocent, And The E Street Shuffle, The E Street Band was important to the overall sound.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s there was a very active music scene in and around the City of Asbury Park. Not only Bruce Springsteen and Southside Johnny and other early members of the E Street Band (Clemons, Federici, Lopez, Sancious, Tallent and Van Zandt) played in bands there but also Little Melvin & the Invaders, the Downtown Tangiers Band, the Jaywalkers, Moment of Truth, Glory Road, Child, Steel Mill (an earlier Bruce band), Dr. Zoom & the Sonic Boom, the Sundance Blues Band, and the first incarnation of the Bruce Springsteen Band.

The single version,  B-side = She's The One

"Tenth Avenue Freeze Out" (from Born to Run) was often the first song in the band's set, and Bruce used this to introduce the band on the 1999 E Street Band Reunion tour, using it to explain what members brought to the group (Roy Bittan = Foundation, Little Steven = Soul...)

The "Bad Scooter" in the line, "Teardrops on the city Bad Scooter searching for his groove" is Springsteen (same initials) and the "Big Man" in the third verse is Clarence Clemons. Springsteen met Clemons when he came into a club in Asbury Park, where Bruce was playing. It was a stormy night, and the door actually flew off the hinges when Clemons opened it. Springsteen would talk about how he "Literally blew the door off the place."

Oh yeah - there is now an ice cream stand at 10th Avenue and the boardwalk in Belmar called 10th Avenue Freeze Out - in case you're there on a pilgrimage and need refreshment.

More on the E Street Band

Stage Names

Many a performer has changed his or her name to benefit their careers. A pseudonym is a fictitious name used by a person, or less often, a group.

Pseudonyms are also known as pen names (for writers), graffiti artists' tags, noms de guerre, (resistance fighters or terrorists) and stage names, for actors, musicians and other performers.

Stage names often were used to mask a person's ethnic backgrounds to avoid prejudices or to differentiate them from other performers with the same or similar names.



Bob Dylan's real is Robert Zimmerman. Around 1960, Zimmerman began introducing himself as "Bob Dylan". In his autobiography, Bob Dylan acknowledged that he had been influenced by the poetry of Dylan Thomas.

Explaining his change of name in a 2004 CBS interview, Dylan said, "You're born, you know, the wrong names, wrong parents. I mean, that happens. You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free."




David Bowie was born David Jones. He changed his name to avoid confusion with David (Davy) Jones of The Monkees. It's hard to believe that anyone would ever have confused Bowie and DavyJones, but...

Bowie's debut single, "Liza Jane", was credited to Davie Jones and the King Bees, but had no commercial success. After several bands and singles, he decided to use the name David Bowie after the soldier Jim Bowie and the knife he popularized, and that was the name of his first album.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_bowie

     


Though David Bowie has always had a rather androgynous personae as a performer, Wendy Carlos, the American composer and electronic musician, was born as Walter Carlos. Carlos first came to notice in the late 1960s with recordings made on the Moog synthesizer, including the soundtrack for Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange.

Carlos underwent sex reassignment surgery in 1972 and was first credited as "Wendy" on Switched-On Brandenburgs in 1979. On her official site, her transition is discussed and she clearly values her privacy on the subject.
    


Not all pseudonyms have complicated origins. Eminem took the initials of his real name, Marshall Mathers, and rewrote it phonetically.