I like this band. The songs "She's Just My Style," "Count Me In," and "You Don't Have to Paint Me a Picture" are particular favorites. I think of them as "the American Herman's Hermits." Rock critics consistently enjoy pointing out that the Hermits used studio musicians, implying that they couldn't play their instruments. This is clearly nonsense, as there are many live videos of the band playing. However, in the case of Gary Lewis & the Playboys, it seems very likely. There appear to be no live videos of the band from the 1960s. Also, Lewis suddenly switched from being the drummer to a guitarist about a year or so in. The Playboys albums are quite mediocre. It eventually occurred to me that they are basically like recordings of karaoke. When did karaoke get started? Were Gary Lewis & The Playboys LPs influential in the creation of karaoke equipment?
They were briefly featured in "The Wrecking Crew". Their studio recordings were primarily done by the Crew, IIRC.
Literally, about 20 minutes ago, I was very happy to find my two Gary Lewis and the Playboys compilation CDs (that had been hiding from me for some time) as I'm doing a "CD Organizing Week." Excellent recordings.
Bob V. and I mastered the complete Gary mono 45 releases for Collector's Choice at the Capitol Tower. Ed Osborne got me to do it for them. It was quite interesting working on his stuff. Fun, but very hit oriented, albums were just an afterthought musically (as were most LP's in those days). That quickly changed thanks to the Beatles, etc. Basically it was Leon Russell doing the heavy lifting on those tracks..
The Gary Lewis and the Playboys Collectors Choice 2-CD “Singles” set (that I just found... note Post #5 above) was mastered by you? If so -->
Fun band with great hit singles. The albums were the hit and cover versions of the latest hit parade. Gary sounded pretty good when I saw him on The Happy Together Tour. She's Just My Style is my fave. Own most of the albums. Things were never quite the same after he came back from Vietnam.
All Wrecking Crue....Lewis denies Hal Blaine was 100% on drums. He was cept a Jim Keltner tracked 45rpm. Keltner was in the band for about 3 months til he got fed up with Lewis' mother jamming him on salary. Leon did lots on those records.....his Okie pals were in the Lewis bands. JJ Cale buds. Snuff had problems with Lewis' voice. Triple tracked with pro session singers along with him. I think Gary sets the record for wives, I believe it was 7 starting with the Manila gal.
Gay played drums sometimes. There are two versions of "Sure Gonna Miss Her," and he plays on this one-- probably throwing a bunch of fills in because it was his big chance.
Very interesting five minutes here with Ron Hicklin, who ghosted along with Gary's lead vocals on most all of Gary Lewis & The Playboys hits to make them seem fuller and stronger, along with some other fun stories ...
One of the many great "mono single mixes" CD sets that I own! I so wish that they would have continued doing those as there are still a few that many of us would welcome in our collections, like Three Dog Night and Johnny Rivers
The architypical singles band. Not really a band that rewards deep album dives. But some swell singles.
Every live video from the 1960s I have seen is a lipsync. The bands' recordings had a lot of overdubs, so I suppose no band could have really played them. Some of the records have prominent piano (Leon Russell) and the band didn't feature a piano player. Later versions of the band features some guys Russell brought in from Oklahoma including Carl Radle. So those guys were likely fine live playing a version of what was on the record as the girls screamed. The band had a Cordovox (electric accordian) player. I wonder if any of the recording actually feature this instrument.
Gary Lewis and the Playboys is one of those rare groups that I heard many times on the radio and thought was really just childish and laughable and the worst example of 60's AM radio dreck, and then suddenly I changed my mind completely and now I love them. Mostly it's Lewis's voice, which is just sort of simple and honest and unaffected. He just seems like a nice guy. And the songs are very hooky and well-constructed. And they're so 60's without being psychedelic. Of course I love psychedelic music as well, but it's important to remember that not everything about the 60's was about long hair and smoking dope and dropping acid.
One of my favorite flip-sides by Gary was this little gem, Little Miss Go-Go! Listen to Ron Hicklin's brilliant falsetto singing on this song, it's as good as anything that The Beach Boys or Jan & Dean ever released, in my opinion.
Love me some Gary Lewis & The Playboys. The Collector's Choice mono singles compilation is worth having. Probably one of the last titles in my collection I'd ever part with. For stereo: The Legendary Masters collection.
Singles oriented band for sure, but all the records were played by the wrecking crew, Leon arranged most of the tracks and wrote a few. As the original playboys quit, they were replaced by Leon's pals from Tulsa (Jim Keltner then Jim Karstein on drums, Tommy Tripplehorn guitar and Carl Radle on bass - all killer players) through Gary's entering the Army in '67, so I'm sure the live shows were solid, but all those TV appearances were lip-synced. Post-Army, Leon was gone, but John Gallie (later in Leon's band) and Billy Boatman (another Tulsa guy) rode out the end of the Playboys, then Gary moved to Tulsa to start the band Medicine with Boatman, Gary Sanders, Larry Bell, Gordon Shyrock & occasionally Jim Karstein & JJ Cale. Per my research, Hal Blaine was the studio drummer on all tracks '65-'67 except for Keltner on the "She's Just My Style" LP.
One of the original Playboys moved to my area at some point. I can’t even remember which one at this time because this was in the 80’s. The only thing I remember is that he complained that some of the things the studio guys played on the records were too hard for him or them to play live .
In the early 1980s I worked for a time at The Smoke House restaurant, located near the Burbank Studios. The restaurant had a lounge with entertainment, and somewhere around 1982 Gary Lewis and the Playboys -- by then many years past anything remotely resembling a hit -- played there. I only caught a bit of the show as I'd never been a major fan, and have no clue how much of the original lineup remained. But I do remember thinking it was kind of sad that an act that had once been a pretty major hitmaker was playing a restaurant lounge that didn't even have a cover charge.
