Monday, November 05, 2007

Building a better boy band.....

As somebody that's never given 2 shits about Boyz 2 Men, or N'Sync, or any of the other made up bands, I feel that I have every right to bring you this post.

I was innocently searching ebay, trying to get prices for a stack of records (yes actual vinyl) when I came upon the following album:



I turned it over, as I did with each of the 50 or so albums, and was stunned to find out that these 4 guys (only frat brothers btw) had put out 5 albums in 3 years.

I mean, just wow. Think they were pounced upon and exploited?

I was just as impressed with the brief history of the band which was printed on the back cover. I have reproduced it here in it's entirety. If you want to actually see the back of the album, let me know. I have a pic of that as well.

Greatest Hits can mean any number of things. In the case of The Brothers Four, it means another recording milestone in a fast three-year climb to success.

In July of 1959, I heard a very exciting group from the University of Washington. I listened, then I got very excited and we hurried to sign The Brothers. A recording date was set and Columbia Records proudly issued the first album by The Brothers Four.

A radio station in San Francisco discovered a song in this LP that spelled "hit" to them. This led to the release of Greenfields as a single. It spread like wildfire and became the most popular song in the United States, and such faraway places as Spain, France, Japan and Australia. It sold well over a million copies.

That's pretty much how it started. Today, The Brothers Four head the list of star concert performers. Name a college, and The Brothers have probably played there. They have also received acclaim from the toughest audience of all, a New York nightclub crowd at Basin Street East. Chances are, if you haven't seen them in concert or at a nightclub, you've probably seen them on one of the many major TV shows on which they've appeared.

It gives me great personal pleasure after three short years to tell you the story of The Brothers Four, and to introduce this, their first Greatest Hits album.


Oh, and by the way, judging from this pic:



all four of them are gay as a maypole.

They all look ready to gobble some man meat. Oh, and look at the covers of their other albums:



Now, I consider myself pretty well versed (heh versed) in the field of music. With the exception of rap, which I personally don't consider music, I'm pretty well rounded. I listen to country, both old and new. I listen to Punk. I eat, sleep, and breathe Rock and Roll. I love Classical music, and even a surprising amount of 70's soft rock is on my list of tunes I'll listen too.

One of the buttons on my radio is also set to the oldies station (which increasingly plays songs released when i was a kid which pisses me off), and I've never heard of these geeks.

Or is that Greeks, as they were frat brothers?

I don't know what's sadder, the outfits they're wearing on that album cover, or the fact that they're still at it.

Ok, I'll leave you now, and hope that this brought a little sunshine to your dreary lives....or something like that.

Buenos con queso,

T.

3 comments:

Princess Sparkle Pants said...

Too funny. My favorite post of the day, for sure...

T.J. said...

Why thank you.....

T.

Beth said...

That is rather disturbing, I must say.

Great. I need to go pour salt in my eyes to get rid of the pain.

Ciao babe.