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KF5JRV > TODAY 12.04.19 12:30l 50 Lines 2707 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 34346_KF5JRV
Read: GUEST
Subj: Today in History - Apr 12
Path: IW8PGT<IZ3LSV<IK6ZDE<VE2PKT<XE1FH<JE7YGF<GB7CIP<AB0AF<KF5JRV
Sent: 190412/1124Z 34346@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KOn April 12, 1954— Bill Haley and the Comets recorded “(We’re Gonna)
Rock Around The Clock.ö If rock and roll was a social and cultural
revolution, then “(We’re Gonna) Rock Around The Clockö was its
Declaration of Independence. And if Bill Haley was not exactly the
revolution’s Thomas Jefferson, it may be fair to call him its John
Hancock.
Bill Haley put his enormous signature on rock and roll history during
the final 40 minutes of a three-hour recording session in New York
City—a session set up not for the recording of “(We’re Gonna) Rock
Around The Clock,ö but of a song called “Thirteen Women (and Only One
Man in Town).ö It took the group nearly all of their scheduled session
to get a useable take of “Thirteen Women,ö a song that was entirely new
to them but was chosen as the A-side of their upcoming single by their
new record label, Decca. With time running out and no chance of
extending the session, Haley and his Comets were eager to lay down the
song they’d been playing live for many months to enthusiastic audience
response. The lead guitarist brought in for the session, Danny Cedrone,
had not had time to work up a new solo for the instrumental break on
“(We’re Gonna) Rock Around The Clock,ö so he repurposed one he’d used on
a Haley recording two years earlier called “Rock This Joint.ö Cedrone
was paid $31 for his work that evening, which included performing what
is still recognized as one of the greatest guitar solos of all time.
Haley and the band had time for only two takes, and in the first, they
played so loud that Haley’s vocals were almost inaudible on tape. In an
era before multi-track recording, the only solution was to do a second
take with minimal accompaniment and hope for the best. Later, a Decca
engineer painstakingly spliced together segments from both takes—a
near-miracle given the technology of 1954. The finished version was
judged good enough to include as the B-side on “Thirteen Women,ö which
was released in May 1954.
The single sold a respectable but underwhelming 75,000 copies in the
coming months, and was destined to be forgotten until a 10-year-old kid
in Los Angeles flipped “Thirteen Womenö and fell in love with the
now-famous B-side. That kid, Peter Ford, happened to be the son of actor
Glenn Ford, who was slated to star in the upcoming teenage-delinquency
drama Blackboard Jungle. Peter turned his father on to “(We’re Gonna)
Rock Around The Clock,ö and soon enough, the song was chosen to play
over the opening credits of Blackboard Jungle, which is how it became a
pop sensation, selling a million copies in a single month in the spring
of 1955.F5JRV@GMAIL.COM
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