In an earlier post about the Belairs, I mentioned The Challengers. It’s almost impossible to find a video by these guys, but I did it.
One.
Well, sorta. I think. Actually, I’m not sure they’re even IN there anywhere.
From 1965: a cover of The Chantays’ “Pipeline.”
The Belairs were an early and influential surf rock band from Southern California, active in the early 1960s.
They were best known for their 1961 hit Mr. Moto, an instrumental surf rock song that featured a flamenco inspired intro and contained a melodic piano interlude.
On splitting up, the guitarist Eddie Bertrand formed Eddie & the Showmen.
The members were:
Paul Johnson (guitar)
Eddie Bertrand (guitar)
Richard Delvy (drums)
Chas Stuart (saxophone)
Jim Roberts (piano)
—Quoted from Wikipedia
You might notice that in the title of the video, different members are listed. There is an interesting article about it on Wikipedia. The article is actually about another group, The Challengers, which was formed by members of The Belairs.
The Surfaris were one of many instrumental groups that sprang up in the early ’60s heyday of surfing music. They were pretty good, too. They’re probably best known for the smash hit, “Wipe Out!” but they had a few other goodies, too, such as “Surfer Joe.”
This video I found presents The Surfaris in a recent (I don’t know how long ago) mini-concert. In it they perform “Wipe Out!” along with a couple other hits of the day: “Hawaii Five-0,” originally by The Ventures, and “Pipeline,” which was a hit for The Chantays.
I hope you enjoy it!
What can I say about the Beach Boys? I lived in Inglewood, CA at the time of their rise to fame, just a couple of miles from Hawthorne, where the Wilson’s lived. One of their earliest performances was at the Grand Opening of the Crenshaw-Imperial Shopping Center, in Inglewood. They set up in the parking lot and played to a small, but enthusiastic crowd of fans-to-be. It was neat!
Here’s a video of another early performance of “Surfin’ U.S.A.”
The very first time I tuned my little transistor radio to a “rock ‘n’ roll” station, back in 1960, I heard “Walk, Don’t Run,” and I was hooked! These four guys from Seattle (yeah, WAY before grunge!) had a new lifelong fan. This video is recent, as the group is now, over 40 years later.
Ok, understand… I make no bones about it: I Love The Ventures! There are millions of people around the world who feel like I do. Yet, The Ventures never really had a huge following in the United States. I never could understand why, because they were GREAT! They’re in their fifth decade of making music history. This is an early performance of a cover of The Surfaris’ “Wipe Out!”
Man, playing surf music back in the ’60s was pure and simple. No light shows; no explosions; no hyped-up gimmicks. And we danced in our socks in the gym!
Here’s Dick Dale much as he is and performs these days. Man, that guy is great! Notice he plays a right-handed guitar left-handed without reversing the strings. He’s done it that way ever since he first started out.
Dick Dale & His Del-Tones performed at my high school back in about ‘63 or so. He was a modest guy, and the performance was outstanding, to say the least. It was Dale who inspired me to learn to play guitar. This is NOT that performance, but typical of what it was like back then.