Rick & the Ravens-Henrietta on Aura 1965 pre-Doors HEAR

$

69

Rick & the Ravens-Henrietta/Just For You (Aura 4506) strong VG+ STOCK copy. Super-rare 1965 pre-Doors single featuring the Manczarek brothers, Ray and Rick. "Henrietta" is the second of their three 45's, and this blue/gray stock copy is much harder to find than the white label DJ pressing since this single was primarily used to promote the band rather than being sold.

You can hear "Henrietta" (and see a photo of the band) at this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezP1rJ9wWi4

Rick & the Ravens founded in 1961, was the band Ray Manzarek was in before he joined The Doors. The band recorded three singles on Aura Records before splitting up and reforming as The Doors in early October of 1965.

Discography

Release year

Name

Publisher

Release Number

1965

Soul Train / Geraldine

Aura Records

Aura Records 4511

1965

Henrietta / Just For You

Aura Records

Aura Records 4506

1965

Big Bucket "T" / Rampage

Posae Records

Posae Records 101

Please note the singles were meant as promotional material only. They were never in wide circulation, nor were they even meant to be published outside the promotional circuits. On the "Soul Train / Geraldine" single, the artist is labeled "Ray Daniels feat. Rick & the Ravens", with "Ray Daniels" double billed. The last singles were initially meant as vehicles to promote Ray Manczarek (billed as "Ray Daniels") as lead artist, with the Ravens merely a backing band. Promotional material presented the artist as "Rick & the Ravens featuring the Voice of Ray Daniels". These plans were discarded when Morrison joined the line-up.

The band initially consisted of Rick Manczarek on guitar, Jim Manczarek on organ and harmonica, Patrick Stonner on saxophone, Roland Biscaluz on bass and Vince Thomas on drums. The drummer and bass player were initially not permanent members, but asked to join whenever a gig was upcoming. The moniker "Rick" in the band name was Ray Manczarek's brother Rick Manczarek.

In 1962 Ray Manczarek, having moved to Los Angeles from Chicago, joined on vocals and occasional piano. At the time the Manczareks wrote their name Manczarek, with the letter "c", as did Ray. He changed the spelling upon joining The Doors.

Because of his voice, with a timbre closer to the traditional blues delivery than rock and roll, Manzarek was also known as "Screamin' Ray Daniels" (Manzarek's middle name is Daniel), "Screamin' Ray", "the Bearded Blues Shouter", or simply "the Screamer".

The band used to perform on weekends for college crowds, mostly from UCLA Film School, at a bar on 2nd Street and Santa Monica Blvd. in Santa Monica, California, called the Turkey Joint West[1], a British pub operated by the Santa Monica Soccer and Social Club[2], since 1974 known as Ye Olde King's Head[3]. Their setlist consisted of their own originals, padded with standards such as "I'm Your Doctor, I Know What You Need," "Louie, Louie," Smokey Robinson's "Money" and Willie Dixon's "Hoochie Coochie Man."

In an interview conducted by Rainer Moddemann, Manzarek stated the first song Jim Morrison performed with Rick & the Ravens was Richard Berry's "Louie Louie." Morrison was not officially part of the band at that time; Manzarek simply invited his former college colleague on stage, much to everyone's surprise. Morrison was reportedly not prepared for this -- his first public performance -- and sang himself hoarse[4]. Morrison and Manzarek had met previously and found each other sharing a lot of musical and artistic interests. Later Manzarek asked Morrison to join the band; Morrison accepted.

In other words, the songs were cut before both of Ray's brothers left the band and Robby Krieger joined from the Psychedelic Rangers in October 1965[9]. Psychedelic Rangers drummer John Densmore had joined Rick & the Ravens earlier the same year, in August. Krieger never played in Rick & the Ravens, though. At Morrison's suggestion[10] the band changed its name to The Doors a month after they had recorded the demo, shortly prior to Krieger joining the line-up. The Doors was thus initially a quintet, but when Manzarek decided to handle the bass duties with the newly introduced Fender Rhodes PianoBass, Pat Sullivan was dropped from the line-up[11] in December 1965, ultimately ending up with the "classic" quartet.

 (the above was taken from Rick & The Ravens Wikipedia entry)