Performance Artist Of The Month

Performance Artist Of The Month

The Rascals

ENDLESSLY GROOVIN'

"The Rascals are all nerve, soul and viscera. They possess all the mood and message of a revival, the energy and sounds of the city and the rhythms of a bluesjoint "

-Constance Tegge, DETROIT NEWS, 1969

IN MAY 1997, The Rascals -alternately known as The Young Rascals- were welcomed into the prestigious Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. During a ceremony that included the induction of such luminaries as The Jackson 5, The Bee Gees and Crosby, Stills & Nash, one highlight stood apart from the rest: a poignant reunion of all the original Rascals, who last shared a stage together 28 years ago.

The group spun apart in 1970 after an impressive five-year reign atop the charts, turning out one hit after another for Atlantic Records. In 1965, The Rascals were signed as the company's hot prospect for a "crossover" act, one that would find mass appeal with audiences regardless of color.

From the beginning, Atlantic ceded creative control over all the group's recordings to the members themselves and provided The Rascals with unlimited time in the studio to experiment, an unprecedented gesture of corporate confidence. Within months, the group demonstrated such a Midas Touch with both albums and Top 40 singles that any reservations about the label's gamble quickly evaporated.

The breadth of The Rascals' vision and the magnitude of their accomplishment can still stagger anyone with ears to listen. Sure, they were an instant sensation. But echoes of that overnight success still ring in the ears of Rascals acolytes across the globe. Critics and devotees alike continue to pay homage to the group, leaning on that shopworn "blue eyed soul" catchphrase to describe their raw, R&B-inspired sound. And Atlantic's gamble paid off too, earning dividends far beyond mere profits for the band or the record company. The Rascals marked the label's first tentative foray into the rock group market. In short order, the Atlantic family grew to include Cream, Buffalo Springfield, Led Zeppelin and The Rolling Stones, as well as soul legends Aretha Franklin and Otis Redding.

Thirty years on, the passage of time has diminished neither the brilliance of The Rascals’ music nor their architects: Felix Cavaliere (keyboards, vocals), Eddie Brigati (vocals, percussion), Gene Cornish (guitars) and Dino Danelli (drums).

Their music may have been forged in the simmering street sounds of the day, but years on the stage and in the studio smoothed those edges and allowed them to construct some of the most enduring melodies in pop's grand pantheon. On disc, they melded a cornucopia of diverging influences into a shimmering whole. Their recorded legacy includes a treasure trove of memorable singles: "Good Lovin'," "Lonely Too Long," "Groovin'," "A Girl Like You," "How Can I Be Sure," "A Beautiful Morning" and "People Got To Be Free." After starting out as four musicians who had each fronted his own band, The Rascals proved just how much greater the whole can be than the sum of its parts.

Each of them had one thing in common long before they met: a love for music delivered with equal doses of passion and precision. "For me, the moment of discovering music was seeing a jazz show on television," Dino Danelli recalled sometime later, "and it was a drum battle between Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa. I was in my house getting ready to go out, and this music and these drums came on, and it just blew me away. Once I heard jazz, I didn't want to hear anything else. I stopped listening to rock 'n' roll, and just started learning jazz music. When I used to go to sleep at night, I would put on a jazz record and the needle would pick up and go back to the beginning of the album over and over again."

Danelli took the train into New York, and even though underage, hung out in front of the big glass window at The Metropole as Krupa's band played inside, sometimes until 4 a.m. While Dino peered through that window like a hungry pup in front of a butcher shop, Eddie and Gene were busy soaking up every influence to seep up the street grates of the East Coast - doo-wop, R&B and early rock 'n roll - and were entranced by everything they heard.

Felix received formal keyboard instruction as a youngster that took a sharp turn the moment he first heard Ray Charles. "In the beginning," he says, "my Mom insisted I had a classical education. I wanted to be a producer because of Phil Spector, I wanted to be a singer because of Marvin Gaye, I wanted to be a keyboard player because of Ray Charles, and I wanted to be an organist because of Jimmy Smith."

Another early inspiration, according to Cavaliere, came from a New Rochelle club, "a black club, where I heard The Mighty Cravers. I had never heard anything like that big organ sound. I couldn't have been any more than 16, and it sounded like an orchestra to me, completely unbelievable. I used to go to the city to Macys, where they had a Hammond organ on display. There was a guy there who used to let me sit and fool around on it, even though he knew I could never afford one, because those things were something like $3,000."

Cavaliere soon formed a working band of his own, and, instead of the Hammond, he wound up with "something for about a third of the price. In 1964, 1 ran into Joey Dee And The Starliters [of "Peppermint Twist" fame] who were appearing in the same resort I was working at, which is how I met Eddie's brother, David. I saw they were performing with a similar instrumental arrangement." The elder Brigati was already something of a local legend, and generously provided Eddie his first opportunity to sing on record, a backing vocalist appearance on Joey Dee's "What Kind Of Love Is This?" Around the same time, Eddie began sneaking into a local nightspot called The Choo Choo Club seeking to follow in his brother's footsteps. Somewhere in the maelstrom of the Starliters' constantly shifting roster and the bustling scene at The Choo Choo, each began an acquaintance with the other three. Top flight players with overlapping tastes, all four members began to see their futures converge. "I saw a little kid walk into the place. He didn't look old enough to go out of his house alone," Felix told pop journalist Don Paulson in 1967. "He used to walk into the club and no matter who was singing, get on the stage, and bury them with his voice. We made an impression on each other. He used to come around every once in a while, and I loved to play behind his singing. I told him that someday we were going to get together. "