WristRock "This Day in Music" Video Blog: "Hats Off" to Del ...Why Did He "Runaway" So Soon?

Today we begin pay honor to a true Rock and Roll pioneer... a day late thanks to AT&T's incompetence and their broadband network failure.

DEL SHANNON (1934-1990)

"Runaway" live at 1987 Rock-n-Roll Reunion Concert

Happy 78th birthday to Rock-n-Roll legend, DEL SHANNON. Del was born Charles Weedon Westover in Grand Rapids, Michigan on December 30, 1934. He picked up the guitar at age 14 after learning the ukelele as a child. After a stint in the Army in the mid-50's, he joined a country-rock band in Battle Creek playing the Hi-Lo Club. Two years later he was discovered by Ann Arbor DJ, Ollie McLaughlin, and was off the New York in 1961 to record "Runaway", which skyrocketed to #1 within weeks.

"Hats Off to Larry" (1961), Del's second big hit, reached #5

Del's hit streak continued with this, quickly followed by "So Long Baby," and "Hey! Little Girl" giving Del four Top 40 hits in the first year of his short career. "Swiss Maid" (1962) bombed in the US but hit #2 in the UK, while his "Cry Myself To Sleep" later proved to be the inspiration for Elton John's "Crocodile Rock." His success in the UK prompted a tour which introduced him to The Beatles who were recording "From Me to You" at the time. He recorded it upon his return to the US and thus, became the first artist to cover a Beatles tune. He returned to the charts in 1962, however, with this one:

"Little Town Flirt" reached #12 in 1963

After minor success with covers of Jimmy Jones' "Handy Man" & Bobby Freeman's "Do You Wanna Dance", he came back strong with "Keep Searchin" (1964) and "Stranger in Town"(1965).

Other little known facts about Del:

~ He wrote "I Go To Pieces" in 1963, while on tour in Australia for Britain's Peter and Gordon (Peter Asher, then brother-in-law of Paul McCartney).

~ In 1964, he discovered Bob Seger & The Lost Herd in Detroit and produced Bob's first recording, "Alone In The Crowd".

Smith, Live on The Barbara McNair Show in 1969

~ In 1967, he discovered the band, Smith, with lead singer and psychedelic predecessor to Lady Gaga, Gayle McCormick. Del helped launch their hit cover of The Shirelles, "Baby, It's You" in 1968.

~ in 1990, he recorded with Jeff Lynne of Electric Light Orchestra. There were rumors Del would join The Traveling Wilburys after Roy Orbison's death.

Part 1 of the Traveling Wilburys' documentary. Here's Part 2.

This was Del's last public appearance from March, 1989, paying tribute to one of his biggest influences, Roy Orbison (Hank Williams was his biggest influence). This is a live performance of his 1972 cover of Roy's, "Crying". After this last tour of Australia, he withdrew to California for good. This concert, was released as a live album in the 1990 Live: The Final Concert. Del's final album, Rock On! was released after his death in 1991.

Del's demons had returned in the late '80s. He had previously overcome problems with alcohol addiction in the late '70s and early '80s with the help of ELO's Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty. He ultimately "ran away" by putting a .22 caliber rifle to his head while on a prescription dose of the anti-depressant drug Prozac in his Santa Clarita, California home in 1990. There have been many attempts to psychoanalyze his demise. We prefer to leave all that alone and honor the memory of the man who influenced so many, like Mark Knopfler who was quoted as saying, "Del Shannon was the reason I picked up my first guitar."

Del was been recognized by the Rockabilly HOF, was inducted posthumously into the Rock HOF in 1999, and in 2005, was inducted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.

RIP, Del

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February 8th Birthday Tributes...

Tom Rush, 71

Happy 71st Birthday to this American folk and blues singer, guitarist and songwriter was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and began his career in 1961 while attending Harvard University. With 23 albums from his very first, Tom Rush at the Unicorn (1962) to his most recent The Fish Story Song (2011), Tom is credited by critics as being the pioneer of the singer/songwriter genre.

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Creed Bratton, 69, The Grass Roots and TV's The Office

Happy 69th birthday to original Grass Roots member and actor from The Office, Creed Bratton. He toured with the Grass Roots from their very first chart hit in 1965, "Where Were You When I Needed You", written by P.F. Sloan, to the Top 10 hit here sung by the recently deceased Rob Grill, lead singer and bassist for the band, "Let's Live for Today" (1967), to their #1 hit "Midnight Confessions" (above). Creed made use of his drama education beginning in 1969 appearing in the films, The Mask and Heart Like a Wheel. After releasing three solo album in 2001 and 2002 with the help of smooth jazz and fusion guitarist, Peter White, he is a currently a cast member of NBC's Emmy-winning series, The Office.

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Will Turpin, 41, Collective Soul

Happy 41st birthday to Will Turpin, bassist for the American rock band from Stockbridge, Georgia, Collective Soul. This video, "Shine" is from their 1993 debut album, Hints, Allegations and Things Left Unsaid. The band has had seven #1 chart singles. Collective Soul released their 8th studio album, Rabbit in 2009 with the single, "Staring Down" reaching #17 on Billboard's Top 100. Collective Soul was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 2009.

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Dave "Phoenix" Ferrel, 35, Linkin Park

Happy 35th birthday to Linkin Park's bassist, Phoenix Ferrel, born in Plymouth, MA, but relocated to California when he was young. Taught to play guitar by his mother, he picked up the bass while a student at UCLA and joined the band, Xero, aka Linkin Park. He left the Agoura Hills band in 1999 to tour with his former Christian punk band, Snax, but returned to The Park in 2001 after the release of the multi-platinum debut album, Hybrid Theory. Combining rock, rap, and electronics, they went to the top of their genre overnight. Phoenix made his recording debut with the band on the collaboration album with Jay-Z, Reanimation (2002) and has been with them ever since. Linkin Park has sold over 50 million albums worldwide and has won two Grammys. The band's most recent 'concept' LP, A Thousand Suns, was released in 2010. (This video is the "full experience" 48 minute HD version.)

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Cameron Muncey, 32, Lead Guitar, Melbourne, Australia's JET

Happy 32nd birthday to Cameron Muncey, lead guitarist for the alt rock band, Jet formed in 2001 while Cameron, Mark Wilson (bass) and brothers Nic and Chris Cester (vocals/rhythm guitar and drums respectively) were attending St Bede's College Mentone in Melbourne. Jet's debut album, Get Born (2003), sold 3.5 million copies. Their most recent album was Shaka Rock (2009). Their last single released from the album was "Seventeen" (2010).Combined they've sold over 6 million albums worldwide.

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February 9th Birthday Tributes...

Carole King, 70

Happy 70th birthday to New York City native, singer, songwriter and pianist, Carol Klein, aka Carole King. She attended Queens College in NYC, and was a classmate (and girlfriend) of Neil Sedaka. She was the inspiration for Sedaka's first hit, Oh! Carol. She wrote her first hit at 18 years old, which was a big hit for The Shirelles, "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow". (She later recorded it herself and added it to the Tapestry album). This prolific songwriter along with her former husband, Gerry Goffin, wrote 25 chart hits during the 1960s. By 1999, Carole had written or co-written an amazing 118 songs between 1955-99 that made the Billboard Hot 100 List.

As a recording artist, her 1971 Grammy-winning album, Tapestry, was #1 on the U.S. album charts for 15 weeks and stayed on the charts for over 6 years... still the record for longest stay at #1 on the charts by a female artist. Carole has recorded 25 solo albums, with her most recent a collaboration with James Taylor at age 68, Live at the Troubadour. It reached #4 on the charts in its first week, and has gone Gold with over 600,000 copies sold. Carole has won 4 Grammys and has been inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, Rock HOF and Hit Parade HOF.

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Earnest Tubb, 98

Happy 98th birthday to the "Texas Troubadour", Ernest Dale Tubb. Born on a cotton farm in Crisp, Texas, at 19 he took a job as a singer on KONO-AM, a San Antonio radio station but had to dig ditches for the WPA the pay was so low. His biggest career hit song, "Walking the Floor Over You" (1941), was the birth of the honky tonk style of music. Earnet, not Elvis, was the first to record a hit version of "Blue Christmas" in 1948.

Jimmy Short, Earnest's first guitarist in the Troubadours, is credited with the Tubb sound of single-string guitar picking in the mid-1940's. In the '60s, Tubb had one of the best bands in country music history. The band included Leon Rhodes, who later became the guitarist in TV's Hee Haw band. Buddy Emmons, the guitar virtuoso who will shortly appear in Guitar Maniacs' "Top 10 Pedal Steel Guitarists" chapter, began with Tubb in 1958. (Emmons went on to create a steel-guitar manufacturing company that still bears his name).

He contracted emphysema late in life but still managed to do 200 concerts a year, carrying an oxygen tank on his bus, until he was forced to retire in 1982. He passed away from the illness in 1984 in Nashville where he'd been a member of the Grand Ole Opry since 1943. Earnest was inducted into the Country Music HOF and the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame in 1999.

RIP, Earnest (1914 – 1984)

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We Fondly Remember Who Started it All....

Bill Haley (1925-1981)

31 years ago today a chapter of American Rock-n-Roll history was closed never to be re-opened again with the passing of William John Clifton "Bill" Haley. Born in Highland Park, Michigan on Jul 6, 1925, Bill got his first professional gig at the age of 13, playing at an auction for $1 a night. By 1940, he left home in Brooklyn, PA, guitar in hand with very little else, to seek his fame and fortune singing and yodeling with any band that would let him. (During the '40s Haley was one of the top cowboy yodelers in America, known as "Silver Yodeling Bill Haley").

He was working with a traveling medicine show when he hooked up with a group of musicians popular around the Hartford, CT area, the "Down Homers" then became musical director of radio station WPWA-AM in Chester, PA. He had formed his own Western Swing band, Bill Haley's Saddlemen. In 1953, Haley's recorded "Crazy Man, Crazy" which became the first rock and roll song on Billboard's charts at #15. Re-naming the band, Bill Haley and the Comets, he first recorded "Rock Around the Clock" in 1954 without success. It was his cover of Big Joe Turner's "Shake, Rattle and Roll" (1954) which went platinum in the US and became the first rock song in Britain to crack the charts.

When "Rock Around the Clock" appeared in the opening credits of the 1955 film Blackboard Jungle starring Glenn Ford, its re-release as a single went to #1 for 8 weeks in the US and became the first million seller in both the UK and Germany. The "Father of Rock and Roll" became the first major American rock singer to tour Europe and the rest is musical history. Haley continued to score hits throughout the 1950s such as "See You Later, Alligator", but nebver came close to the hysteria of Rock Around the Clock.

A self-admitted alcoholic, he continued to tour into the 1970's, performing for Queen Elizabeth II in 1979, then made his final performance in South Africa in June, 1980 after contracting an inoperable brain tumor. He passed away in 1981 at 56 years of age. He was posthumously inducted into the Rock HOF with the very first class in 1987. He also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.