During the time of the VCR sales explosion, RS found itself in need of some type of company-wide authorized demo material that could be played in our VCR's to show them off to our customers. I came up with the idea of showcasing current music videos playing on MTV and then being able to offer the video tapes for sale in the store. Well, it worked or sorta worked. The first MTV video was called MTV Video To Go and the second was MTV Live Video To Go. You can read more here including quotes from me.
Radio Shack & MTV To Go Please be sure to increase the page size so you do not miss my quote.
I am sorry to say that the MTV venture did not go over with the buying public so not many copies of the videos ever got sold. The idea was dropped and I had to come up with something else. I bought a bunch of music performance videos from RCA and others and had little luck in selling them to RS customers but it did give the stores something to use to demo our VCRs. I had one video by the Pointer Sisters that I got a lot of negative feedback from because of a purported nude segment in a song. So I was about to be kicked out of the business when I asked Chuck if he would help me develop something that we could use in the store as a VCR demo. I had seen a tape that featured an emerging technology call Computer Graphics (CG) and because the graphics were colorful and had a lot of movement and no nudity, I thought that this might be something we could use and Chuck agreed. I contact Steven Churchill who had been showing this computer materials at a show he put on in California somewhere (I have forgotten where in CA) and we began to work together to create a video demo tape for the stores. The results were called The Mind's Eye. Chuck and I spend hours and hours going over the CG's that were submitted by Steven. We picked the best and worked to make a story out of the CG clips. I must say that without Steven and Kip Kilpatrick at Miramar Productions who tied the clips together, added the music and made the duplicates, we would never have gotten this project off the ground. Just to be very clear there are two versions of the "The Mind's Eye" one made for RS exclusively, and one that Miramar released. Chuck and I were involved with both releases but only take credit for the RS version.
The sweet smell of success. Not only was the VHS tape a hit with the stores but RS customers bought the tape to take home. It was not long before the pressure to come up with a second tape was heaped on Chuck, Steven, Kip and myself. So back to the drawing board for the second in the series. Beyond The Mind's Eye. Again I must remind the reader that there are two versions the RS version and the Miramar Productions version. [Side Note: If you watch the end credits you will see both Chuck and my name. End Credits] Ok, now it is beginning to be like work, as the pressure again mounted for a third VHS in The Mind's Eye series. The last Mind's Eye that Chuck and I were involved in was The Gate To The Mind's Eye . Chuck lost interest, and it was very time-consuming and our boss BBM was not very happy about all the hours [over 30 per show] we were spending away from our day jobs, so we both just dropped out. Steven went on to produce more Mind's Eye but I had no involvement with the projects any longer. I received several awards for the Mind's Eye series and have them on my wall to this day. Please go to YouTube if you want to see any of the segments of the videos or Amazon if you would like to buy any of the tapes or DVD versions that are still left. As my creative juices were still flowing I got interested in a VHS tape I saw call "The Planets" music by Gustav Holst. The problem was that it was incomplete as far as the planets are concerned and while the idea was good it did not have the pop it needed for an in store video demo. I contacted Don Barrett who was involved in the The Planets video and asked if he would be interested in working with me to develop a videotape for in store demo at RS. He said yes, and we started one of the most fun video projects I ever had. [except for the end] I decided to use the flight of the Voyager I and II Spacecraft and their journey to the planets for the video. Don did most of the work assembling the NASA pictures, and the computer graphics to tell the story of their flight from earth to deep space. The Voyager I left earth on September 5,1977 and was headed toward the outer Solar System (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) and the interstellar medium to study same. Voyager II left earth on August 20, 1977, headed in the same general direction as Voyager I. NASA used the different planets that the spacecraft passed by to help each one move on to the next planet. Well, we had the story and we needed sound to go with the pictures. Surround Sound was just getting started and I decided that we needed to use this technology in this video. I had to twist Don's arm but he did it and that is how the surround sound got added on to the soundtrack. The sound you hear as the spacecraft pass through the asteroid belt was another idea of mine, of course, in reality, it never really happens. No sound in space because, there is no air.
My last contribution to the video was the Carl Sagan shot at the end. Mr. Sagan had wanted NASA to have Voyager to look back at our Solar System and take a picture as the spacecraft left our solar system for deep space. As always, at the time the NASA budget did not allow for that to happen. I convinced Don to add that shot to the video and he used CG to do that. Well the rest is history, the video won many awards and accolades but, yours truly was never given credit anywhere for my contribution. Now you know why the credits for major motion pictures are so long. Everyone who has anything to do with the film gets credit. I really wish I had. If you ever see Don you might ask him about me and see what he tells you.
Well, there was a Laserdisc that I was responsible for producing for RS when we got into selling the players and Pioneer used a part of my demo during a Consumer Electronics Show to highlight their LD players. I do have a funny story about the LD. I was in a Mall with my Son and we stopped by Video Concepts just to look around and the Store Manager recognized me as the author of the Laserdisc he was using as Demo and asked me to autograph it for him. You should have seen my Son's face as I signed the disc. I will never forget the proud look he had. When audio CD's came along I produced three demo CD's as well, with the help of Goodnight Dallas, a production company in Dallas TX.
Saturday, May 18, 2013
Thursday, November 19, 2009
I returned from the Army in June of 1969 and when back to working at the diary I had left when I was drafted. The diary is how I managed to fund my record business. I also went back to college at Western Michigan University and in August 1971 I graduated with a degree in Business Management.
I am often asked why I did not return to Broadcasting and restart StingRay Productions and Discotheque Records? The answer is, everything changed. I was changed by the Vietnam War and was no longer interested in Broadcasting. The recorded industry had changed because Garage Rock was as good as gone.
I did receive several phone calls from Bands around Michigan who wanted me to bring back Discotheque Records but I always doubted that AQ and RAG would have been willing to get back into it in any fashion.
It was time to move on.
I went to work for a trucking company call PreFab out of Farmer City, IL. I worked in their offices in GR.
I was there only a short time when I decided to go to work for RadioShack as a store manager. My first store was in Battle Creek, MI. I suppose I could write about my time as a RS store manager but there would not be much to tell. I worked a lot of hours and moved around Western Michigan from store to store.
I did receive a Leaders Club Diamond Ring, for meeting store sales goals which later helped me get the job a corporate HQ that allowed me to continue to create.
Moving ahead in time to my time at RS HQ. My first experience at true creativity was the 10 dB In-Line Amplifier with Phantom Power. This little in line amplifier would amplify an RF signal and send it up the coax. Seems as if it was no big deal right? Well, at the time this type of device was not marketed to the DIYer or anyone else for that matter. This little amplifier made for RS by Goodmind Industries originally, has sold in the 10's millions of units and 100's of millions of dollars in profits industry wide. Used in many of the early consumer satellite systems and TV antenna installations this little bullet amplifier is still in use today.
The next big item for me was the Pre-learned Universal Remote Control. Of course the story is never a straight line. GE had developed a learning remote control that you took several remotes and taught the IR (infrared ) signals from each remote to the GE remote and then you had one remote control, the GE, that controlled up to four different things. (i.e.TV, Cable Box, Stereo system, etc) RS decided to get into the remote control business and using the GE system and developed several learning remote controls.(i.e. 15-1901, 15-1902, 15-1903) The problem was that the store people were spending too much time with the customer showing them how to teach the learning remote control all of the commands from the customers remotes. BA (Bernie Apel, President of RadioShack) was getting complaints from Store Management that these remotes were taking up too much of the sales-makers time. The learning remotes were selling OK but they were not a big deal and BA and BBM (Bob Miller, Vice President of Merchandising) were not happy about the complaints. I asked them, that if I could come up with something better would they give it a chance. BA said that if I could he would let me buy 20K pieces of them. Ah the challenge. I attended a Consumer Electronics Show that year and met Tom Tyler from Universal Electronics. Tom showed me a computer program that would program a learning remote. All the person had to do was enter the brand and the model number of the product that had the remote and the computer would program the learning remote control. Seemed simple enough. The problem would be for a large retail chain like RS is that each store would have to have a dedicated computer for use with the learning remote and that update disks would have to be sent out often as the number of remote controls coming into the market at that time was very large. That would not work.
I stayed in touch with Tom over the next few months, he really wanted to sell something to RS. Much later he told me he was reaching near desperation because the company seed money was running out. I remember the phone call that started the pre-learned remote like it was yesterday. I said to Tom if you can get me a remote that has all your remote control codes already built-in I'll order 20K pcs. Folks, in those days that was a huge number. The phone was silent for a long time and Tom's voice showed his disappointment. He said he would see what he could do. I did not hear back from Tom for weeks. When he finally called back, he said that his engineer had found an Integrated Circuit that might be able to hold the codes but how would the user interface with the code library? I told Tom to have his engineer call me and we would work it out.
I can't remember the engineers name but he and I spend 12 hours on a long distance call defining how a user would interface with the pre-learned remote control. For example you had several electronics manufacturers that had different names on their remote control buttons that effectively gave the consumer the same end result when pushed (ie Fast Scan Forward and Fast Jump Forward) We had to define how the Universal Remote Control[URC] (pre-learned) would handle this. If you for example were controlling a remote control CD player with the URC and pushed the power button for the CD player to turn off before you pressed stop how would the URC handle that. I am happy to say that we defined all that stuff and much more and today most all of the URCs in the market place use the URC rules that were set up in that 12 hour phone call.
Steve Wozniak, from Apple calls RS with a new idea for a remote control. I attended another Consumer Electronic Show and had Steve show me how an Apple computer could program a learning remote control. I did not have the heart to tell him I had already passed that and my new remote control had all of the programing and control codes built-in to the remote.
The RS 15-1904 URC hits the market and starts selling much to BA and BBM surprise. The sales at first were small but steadily growing each month. What we found from talking to customers is that consumers were not consolidating many remotes into one but replacing a lost or broken remote with our URC. Manufacturers of equipment that used remote controls were charging as much as $100.00 to replace a lost or broken remote and the 15-1904 was less than $25.00. What a savings. Sales the first full year we had 15-1904 exceeded 100K units and it was not long before we sold half a million units and the rest as they say is history.
Today 100s of millions of units are sold and I am proud to say I was there at the very beginning and put my two cents in.
As a side note, during the 3rd year of selling the 15-1904 George Stevenson the founder of X-10, who builds most of today's remote controls under private label, said "that while I had created a nice little business for RS in remote controls, that over all the category would never amount to much". Just goes to show you.
Years later and several remote control models later my good friend Chuck Collison who was the industrial designer for RS and myself created the ITZA line of remote controls. Those very colorful remotes aimed at kids. And to the lady whose name is and was Itza, thank you for the very nice letter you sent Chuck and I. And you thought you would never be famous. As Chuck would often say to me privately, What a ITZA? ITZA remote. (Sorry Chuck).
Chuck was the guy a RS that helped me with design. Many of the button lay-outs used in today's remote controls came from ideas Chuck had. The fact that you press the red record button twice to get the remote control to start the recorders record function came from Chuck. The first full key board light up URC idea came from my wife and Universal Electronics made it happen. Universal Electronics and RS were quite a force in the early years of URC development. Thanks Tom and your team for all the great help, and for making me look good to RS Management at the time.
I am often asked why I did not return to Broadcasting and restart StingRay Productions and Discotheque Records? The answer is, everything changed. I was changed by the Vietnam War and was no longer interested in Broadcasting. The recorded industry had changed because Garage Rock was as good as gone.
I did receive several phone calls from Bands around Michigan who wanted me to bring back Discotheque Records but I always doubted that AQ and RAG would have been willing to get back into it in any fashion.
It was time to move on.
I went to work for a trucking company call PreFab out of Farmer City, IL. I worked in their offices in GR.
I was there only a short time when I decided to go to work for RadioShack as a store manager. My first store was in Battle Creek, MI. I suppose I could write about my time as a RS store manager but there would not be much to tell. I worked a lot of hours and moved around Western Michigan from store to store.
I did receive a Leaders Club Diamond Ring, for meeting store sales goals which later helped me get the job a corporate HQ that allowed me to continue to create.
Moving ahead in time to my time at RS HQ. My first experience at true creativity was the 10 dB In-Line Amplifier with Phantom Power. This little in line amplifier would amplify an RF signal and send it up the coax. Seems as if it was no big deal right? Well, at the time this type of device was not marketed to the DIYer or anyone else for that matter. This little amplifier made for RS by Goodmind Industries originally, has sold in the 10's millions of units and 100's of millions of dollars in profits industry wide. Used in many of the early consumer satellite systems and TV antenna installations this little bullet amplifier is still in use today.
The next big item for me was the Pre-learned Universal Remote Control. Of course the story is never a straight line. GE had developed a learning remote control that you took several remotes and taught the IR (infrared ) signals from each remote to the GE remote and then you had one remote control, the GE, that controlled up to four different things. (i.e.TV, Cable Box, Stereo system, etc) RS decided to get into the remote control business and using the GE system and developed several learning remote controls.(i.e. 15-1901, 15-1902, 15-1903) The problem was that the store people were spending too much time with the customer showing them how to teach the learning remote control all of the commands from the customers remotes. BA (Bernie Apel, President of RadioShack) was getting complaints from Store Management that these remotes were taking up too much of the sales-makers time. The learning remotes were selling OK but they were not a big deal and BA and BBM (Bob Miller, Vice President of Merchandising) were not happy about the complaints. I asked them, that if I could come up with something better would they give it a chance. BA said that if I could he would let me buy 20K pieces of them. Ah the challenge. I attended a Consumer Electronics Show that year and met Tom Tyler from Universal Electronics. Tom showed me a computer program that would program a learning remote. All the person had to do was enter the brand and the model number of the product that had the remote and the computer would program the learning remote control. Seemed simple enough. The problem would be for a large retail chain like RS is that each store would have to have a dedicated computer for use with the learning remote and that update disks would have to be sent out often as the number of remote controls coming into the market at that time was very large. That would not work.
I stayed in touch with Tom over the next few months, he really wanted to sell something to RS. Much later he told me he was reaching near desperation because the company seed money was running out. I remember the phone call that started the pre-learned remote like it was yesterday. I said to Tom if you can get me a remote that has all your remote control codes already built-in I'll order 20K pcs. Folks, in those days that was a huge number. The phone was silent for a long time and Tom's voice showed his disappointment. He said he would see what he could do. I did not hear back from Tom for weeks. When he finally called back, he said that his engineer had found an Integrated Circuit that might be able to hold the codes but how would the user interface with the code library? I told Tom to have his engineer call me and we would work it out.
I can't remember the engineers name but he and I spend 12 hours on a long distance call defining how a user would interface with the pre-learned remote control. For example you had several electronics manufacturers that had different names on their remote control buttons that effectively gave the consumer the same end result when pushed (ie Fast Scan Forward and Fast Jump Forward) We had to define how the Universal Remote Control[URC] (pre-learned) would handle this. If you for example were controlling a remote control CD player with the URC and pushed the power button for the CD player to turn off before you pressed stop how would the URC handle that. I am happy to say that we defined all that stuff and much more and today most all of the URCs in the market place use the URC rules that were set up in that 12 hour phone call.
Steve Wozniak, from Apple calls RS with a new idea for a remote control. I attended another Consumer Electronic Show and had Steve show me how an Apple computer could program a learning remote control. I did not have the heart to tell him I had already passed that and my new remote control had all of the programing and control codes built-in to the remote.
The RS 15-1904 URC hits the market and starts selling much to BA and BBM surprise. The sales at first were small but steadily growing each month. What we found from talking to customers is that consumers were not consolidating many remotes into one but replacing a lost or broken remote with our URC. Manufacturers of equipment that used remote controls were charging as much as $100.00 to replace a lost or broken remote and the 15-1904 was less than $25.00. What a savings. Sales the first full year we had 15-1904 exceeded 100K units and it was not long before we sold half a million units and the rest as they say is history.
Today 100s of millions of units are sold and I am proud to say I was there at the very beginning and put my two cents in.
As a side note, during the 3rd year of selling the 15-1904 George Stevenson the founder of X-10, who builds most of today's remote controls under private label, said "that while I had created a nice little business for RS in remote controls, that over all the category would never amount to much". Just goes to show you.
Years later and several remote control models later my good friend Chuck Collison who was the industrial designer for RS and myself created the ITZA line of remote controls. Those very colorful remotes aimed at kids. And to the lady whose name is and was Itza, thank you for the very nice letter you sent Chuck and I. And you thought you would never be famous. As Chuck would often say to me privately, What a ITZA? ITZA remote. (Sorry Chuck).
Chuck was the guy a RS that helped me with design. Many of the button lay-outs used in today's remote controls came from ideas Chuck had. The fact that you press the red record button twice to get the remote control to start the recorders record function came from Chuck. The first full key board light up URC idea came from my wife and Universal Electronics made it happen. Universal Electronics and RS were quite a force in the early years of URC development. Thanks Tom and your team for all the great help, and for making me look good to RS Management at the time.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
My senior year and first year of junior college did not go well for me. As far as StingRay Productions and Discotheque Records were concerned it was a slow time as well. A young man by the named of Ray Hummell III stopped by the Lafayette Radio Studio and asked me to copyright his songs Fine Day and Gentle Rain. I have to this day his demo record of those two songs. I never heard them get much air play but, I am not sure what happened.
The Go Show Dances were a big success for GR and Friday through Sunday night you could find kids dancing to the latest Top 40 Hits. I spend a lot of weekend nights there playing records or just watching the kids dance. When a group showed up to play for the dancers I was busy with StingRay Productions recording reel after reel of audio tape that later was to be edited into a live LP record. Well it never happened and all of the reels of tape disappeared. Talk about a disaster. We had tape recordings of some of the biggest Regional Bands of the Midwest. Lyn and The Invaders, The Tempests, Me & Dem Guys, The Quest, The Shadows of Night, oh well you get the picture. To this day I have no idea where the tapes when and many people searched for them. Over the years I was offered a lot of money, if I could have produced those tapes.
Second year of Junior College things began to pick up. Both AQ and RAG were gone for the most part and I was really StingRay Productions and Discotheque Records. I had the chance to record a group called The Bel-Aires the members of this band when to school with my sister. She wanted me to record them and put out a record. I agreed. We first tried to record them in the Lafayette Radio Studio but with-out much luck. The sound was just not there for some reason. I found a recording studio on the NW side of GR and my next attempt to record the group was there. A four track machine was used and was considered a big deal back then. As I sit here writing this Blog the groups record sits next to me. The recording secession went very well and with the echo and reverb that was added to the secession later, I remember the drummer commenting that I made him sound like he was playing triplets during his drumming which he could not play.
I always wanted to make the record sound more like a Motown record but, I did not have the bass guitar on a separate track and could not afford to bring the guys back to lay down more tracks. I was insistent that we try and make this record different than what "Fenton Records" had been putting out up to this time. I added an ocean sound and the sound of a lonely Seagull to the If You Love Me side (a few months later the Shangra-Las added some Seagulls to Walking In The Sand one of their records. Just to set the record straight I was first.). I added a trailing 6 echo sound to the Ya Ha Be Be track all in an effort to make it have a different sound. I even brightened up the label colors to make the record display better on the turntable and in the stores. To this day I think it was my best work and Discotheque Records best effort.
I was shocked to be offered a drive time DJ job at WGRD Radio, the number two radio station in GR at the time. AQ and I would have had a great time trying to figure out who had the most listeners because he was at the number one station at the time WLAV. (it never came to be, keep reading). I guess I should tell you that I used a stage name during my radio days. I was known as Lee Allen Davis LAD for short. So when you look to try and find me try L.A.D.. My Mom was so proud of me being on the radio and having my own show but she could never understand why I did not use my real name. Oh Mom.
Back to my story.
It was in May 1967 when everything crashed for me, my production company, and my record label. Uncle Sam called. Up to then I had had a student deferment from the military but, between the Spring Semester and Summer Semester I was reclassified and drafted. Dad was furious and wanted to go to court and fight it. I knew it would just postpone the inevitable. This was nearing the height of the Vietnam War and Local Board 42 was way short on their quota of strong young men. So I told Dad not to fight the re-classification. I never thought on not going so running to Canada never crossed my mind. Dad served in WWII so I figured it was my turn and got my affairs in order.
I had just a few weeks to finish editing The Bel-Aires record and get it off to RCA Custom Records. I made it but with very little time to spare. I left for boot camp on June 10, 1967. RAG tried to handle the record business but he had little time and his heart really was not in it. The record was a success by all accounts and reorders for more were placed. I really do not know much beyond that. My DJ days were over and my record label and production company were in shambles.
Just for the record I could spend pages on my Army career but not now. Lets just say it was an experience that would make a great book or movie. (I plan on telling the story later in this Blog. It will make for interesting reading)
I came back from the Army a changed man. No longer a boy with a dream of making it big in the record business but a man who wanted to move on with his life.
The Go Show Dances were a big success for GR and Friday through Sunday night you could find kids dancing to the latest Top 40 Hits. I spend a lot of weekend nights there playing records or just watching the kids dance. When a group showed up to play for the dancers I was busy with StingRay Productions recording reel after reel of audio tape that later was to be edited into a live LP record. Well it never happened and all of the reels of tape disappeared. Talk about a disaster. We had tape recordings of some of the biggest Regional Bands of the Midwest. Lyn and The Invaders, The Tempests, Me & Dem Guys, The Quest, The Shadows of Night, oh well you get the picture. To this day I have no idea where the tapes when and many people searched for them. Over the years I was offered a lot of money, if I could have produced those tapes.
Second year of Junior College things began to pick up. Both AQ and RAG were gone for the most part and I was really StingRay Productions and Discotheque Records. I had the chance to record a group called The Bel-Aires the members of this band when to school with my sister. She wanted me to record them and put out a record. I agreed. We first tried to record them in the Lafayette Radio Studio but with-out much luck. The sound was just not there for some reason. I found a recording studio on the NW side of GR and my next attempt to record the group was there. A four track machine was used and was considered a big deal back then. As I sit here writing this Blog the groups record sits next to me. The recording secession went very well and with the echo and reverb that was added to the secession later, I remember the drummer commenting that I made him sound like he was playing triplets during his drumming which he could not play.
I always wanted to make the record sound more like a Motown record but, I did not have the bass guitar on a separate track and could not afford to bring the guys back to lay down more tracks. I was insistent that we try and make this record different than what "Fenton Records" had been putting out up to this time. I added an ocean sound and the sound of a lonely Seagull to the If You Love Me side (a few months later the Shangra-Las added some Seagulls to Walking In The Sand one of their records. Just to set the record straight I was first.). I added a trailing 6 echo sound to the Ya Ha Be Be track all in an effort to make it have a different sound. I even brightened up the label colors to make the record display better on the turntable and in the stores. To this day I think it was my best work and Discotheque Records best effort.
I was shocked to be offered a drive time DJ job at WGRD Radio, the number two radio station in GR at the time. AQ and I would have had a great time trying to figure out who had the most listeners because he was at the number one station at the time WLAV. (it never came to be, keep reading). I guess I should tell you that I used a stage name during my radio days. I was known as Lee Allen Davis LAD for short. So when you look to try and find me try L.A.D.. My Mom was so proud of me being on the radio and having my own show but she could never understand why I did not use my real name. Oh Mom.
Back to my story.
It was in May 1967 when everything crashed for me, my production company, and my record label. Uncle Sam called. Up to then I had had a student deferment from the military but, between the Spring Semester and Summer Semester I was reclassified and drafted. Dad was furious and wanted to go to court and fight it. I knew it would just postpone the inevitable. This was nearing the height of the Vietnam War and Local Board 42 was way short on their quota of strong young men. So I told Dad not to fight the re-classification. I never thought on not going so running to Canada never crossed my mind. Dad served in WWII so I figured it was my turn and got my affairs in order.
I had just a few weeks to finish editing The Bel-Aires record and get it off to RCA Custom Records. I made it but with very little time to spare. I left for boot camp on June 10, 1967. RAG tried to handle the record business but he had little time and his heart really was not in it. The record was a success by all accounts and reorders for more were placed. I really do not know much beyond that. My DJ days were over and my record label and production company were in shambles.
Just for the record I could spend pages on my Army career but not now. Lets just say it was an experience that would make a great book or movie. (I plan on telling the story later in this Blog. It will make for interesting reading)
I came back from the Army a changed man. No longer a boy with a dream of making it big in the record business but a man who wanted to move on with his life.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
My Blog Entry One
What will follow is thoughts, ideas, and articles of interest. My life so far has covered everything from music and video production, to consumer product inventor. So this written journey may seem a bit disjointed but here goes.
While in junior high school I got hooked on being involved in the "creative process". I was involved in 4 man singing group that sang during the lunch period. I soon discovered that I could not sing very well and needed a basket to carry the tune. I think we covered an old Stereo's tune "I Really Love You" ,but after so many years who is to say. The only kid from the group that I remember is Tom Geistert. Needless to say the group never left the junior high school.
In high school I got involved with way to much. I was a radio DJ during my junior and senior year. You could have heard me on WJEF FM, or a fine arts FM station that I can even remember the call letters for, and of course WERX AM 1530. I worked Sundays and had the pleasure of playing Rock music. I also spun records at the "Go Show" Dances at the local National Guard Armory during the weekends but that is another story for another day. It was during this time that StingRay Productions was born and Discotheque Records came about. But I get ahead of myself. I also worked on the high school stage crew with my two best friends AQ (Allan Quandee) and RAG (Robert "Bob" Granstra) along with the incredible William "Bill " Morris. I assure the reader we were a force to be reckoned with. Bill was a electronics genius and had a pirate FM radio station in high school that lots and lots of kids listen to but had no idea who was responsible. Who can forget the call-in contests that the station had that were impossible to win. Hey, who could afford prizes in high school? Bill was one of a handful of people that I remember that hated the Beatles when they first hit the airwaves. But we had fun. We were not part of the In Crowd but we controlled a lot of what they heard and saw during the high school years.
While in junior high school I got hooked on being involved in the "creative process". I was involved in 4 man singing group that sang during the lunch period. I soon discovered that I could not sing very well and needed a basket to carry the tune. I think we covered an old Stereo's tune "I Really Love You" ,but after so many years who is to say. The only kid from the group that I remember is Tom Geistert. Needless to say the group never left the junior high school.
In high school I got involved with way to much. I was a radio DJ during my junior and senior year. You could have heard me on WJEF FM, or a fine arts FM station that I can even remember the call letters for, and of course WERX AM 1530. I worked Sundays and had the pleasure of playing Rock music. I also spun records at the "Go Show" Dances at the local National Guard Armory during the weekends but that is another story for another day. It was during this time that StingRay Productions was born and Discotheque Records came about. But I get ahead of myself. I also worked on the high school stage crew with my two best friends AQ (Allan Quandee) and RAG (Robert "Bob" Granstra) along with the incredible William "Bill " Morris. I assure the reader we were a force to be reckoned with. Bill was a electronics genius and had a pirate FM radio station in high school that lots and lots of kids listen to but had no idea who was responsible. Who can forget the call-in contests that the station had that were impossible to win. Hey, who could afford prizes in high school? Bill was one of a handful of people that I remember that hated the Beatles when they first hit the airwaves. But we had fun. We were not part of the In Crowd but we controlled a lot of what they heard and saw during the high school years.
The sadist day of high school was the day JFK was shot. I was in chemistry. Enough said about that.
I was working at the local Lafayette Radio Associate Store part time and being exposed to electronics as well as retail. I must say I enjoyed both. It was a bit prior to this that SingRay Products was born. A good friend of mine Steve Beak designed the logo for the company it was an awesome custom StingRay car that never really existed except on the company letter head. I never really knew what I was going to do with the company but I had business cards and a letter head and that is all that counted during that time. I am not sure of the date or time but AQ suggested that we record some garage rock bands and make some records. I guess we were looking for a way to make some extra spending money and because we were all DJ's at local radio stations and we knew that getting air play for our records was no problem.
Of course you had to hook-up with a record company of some sort to press the records. CD's were a long way off in the future. I remember sending out letters to several companies that we thought might be willing to press our records but with no response. (ie Motown, Fujimo, Fenton, Captital) I was just about to give up and RCA in Chicago responded. They asked for a meeting and RAG and myself headed to Chicago by train. I am sure RAG's could tell a better story about what really happened during the meetings, all I remember is I was so sick and running a high fever. I remember signing a contract with them and I was not even 18years old yet. But we had ourselves a record pressing company and we were off to the races.
The first group we recorded was from Travers City Michigan and were called the The Rainmakers
I am sorry to say the record did not sell well and the air play was poor. We re-recorded the record for the guys at WMAX radio and tried again with the same results, it just did not sell. Back to the drawing boards.
I think it was RAG that suggested we build our own recording studio to save money and have a place to record the groups we would find. I might say at this point that all of us thought we could create another Motown on the Western side of the state. Fenton records was already well established in GR (Grand Rapids) but we felt we could do better. Also we all were on the radio and could get air play for our records so we where sure we had the wining formula. We built the studio in the back of the local Lafayette Radio store that I worked at, now part time. The owner of the Lafayette Store (Leo Tobian) was sure he saw dollar signs in what we were trying to do so he also jumped into the partnership. We finished the studio and recorded our next group "The Masters Of Stonehouse".
Several of my high school friends decided to start a Rock band and called themselves The Masters Of Stonehouse I got involved as the sound man and all around grunt. We had a blast during assemblies, high school dances, and during the Senior year stage production. Again AQ came up with the idea of recording them and trying to make a record. You know it is funny I do not remember anything that happened during that recording session. I do remember that after the session was over we though we had a hit. The record got air play and the group got several play dates from the record but it never sold more than the first pressing by RCA. But Discotheque Records now had two records out and we were on a roll. (or so we thought) StingRay Productions was doing well recording groups that appeared at the Go Show Dances for a future LP to be released later. AQ was moving up in the DJ world and was off to college. RAG and I hung around together but he also left for college and I was finishing high school and about to enter Junior College.
I think it was RAG that suggested we build our own recording studio to save money and have a place to record the groups we would find. I might say at this point that all of us thought we could create another Motown on the Western side of the state. Fenton records was already well established in GR (Grand Rapids) but we felt we could do better. Also we all were on the radio and could get air play for our records so we where sure we had the wining formula. We built the studio in the back of the local Lafayette Radio store that I worked at, now part time. The owner of the Lafayette Store (Leo Tobian) was sure he saw dollar signs in what we were trying to do so he also jumped into the partnership. We finished the studio and recorded our next group "The Masters Of Stonehouse".
Several of my high school friends decided to start a Rock band and called themselves The Masters Of Stonehouse I got involved as the sound man and all around grunt. We had a blast during assemblies, high school dances, and during the Senior year stage production. Again AQ came up with the idea of recording them and trying to make a record. You know it is funny I do not remember anything that happened during that recording session. I do remember that after the session was over we though we had a hit. The record got air play and the group got several play dates from the record but it never sold more than the first pressing by RCA. But Discotheque Records now had two records out and we were on a roll. (or so we thought) StingRay Productions was doing well recording groups that appeared at the Go Show Dances for a future LP to be released later. AQ was moving up in the DJ world and was off to college. RAG and I hung around together but he also left for college and I was finishing high school and about to enter Junior College.
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