Unreleased Deep Soul LP Acetate Defenders Big Dons Rebellion Chocolate Watchband

$

1,500

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Unreleased Soul Garage Rock LP Acetate Big Don's Rebellion Defenders Chocolate Watchband HEAR!

UNRELEASED Donald Bennett Ethan McElroy Big Don's Rebellion Defenders Wig/Wags Chocolate Watchband Garage Rock Deep Soul Acetate

This is an incredible and musically historic deep soul album acetate containing unreleased and alternate deep soul tracks written and performed by Donald Bennett and Ethon McElroy, two talented individuals who in the early to mid 1960s formed the core of the soul and garage rock bands Big Don's Rebellion, The Defenders and The Wig/Wags. The McElroy-Bennett team also wrote for the star garage band The Standells as well as wrote key songs for and arranged the first two albums of the classic 1960s garage rock psych band The Chocolate Watchband.

This highly unusual LP acetate has eight tracks in total, four tracks on each side. Each of the sonic sample windows stacked above the written description represent a sonic sample of each of the eight tracks on the acetate album. The sonic sample files are listed in the order that they appear on the album acetate. 

Judging from the content and label style, the acetate appears to have been recorded between 1960 and 1965. Part of the reason for this determination is that the very first song on side one of this acetate is the song "You Bother Me" Upon listening to the track, this song appears to be a deep soul garage version of the highly sought after 1966 garage rock 45 by The Defenders on the rare independent Sama record label (Sama 101). Donald Bennett and Ethon McElroy are credited for writing the song on the Sama 45 label, but the deep soul version of "You Bother Me" on this acetate is a much more basic soul track than this now highly prized garage rock track from 1966. This original version of "You Bother Me" on this unreleased acetate is deep soul music at its finest.

Tracks two and three on side one of this album acetate are "Trouble Is A Girl" and "Take Me Back" Both appear to be completely unreleased. (The assigned titles of some of the tracks on this acetate have been assessed by listening to the acetate. The actual titles may be different.) The fourth and final track on side one of the acetate is "The Sermon (When I'm Down)" A garage rock version of this song was released by The Defenders as the b side of Sama 101 aka "You Bother Me" "The Sermon(When I'm Down)" was also written by the same Bennett and McElroy team who recorded this acetate but the acetate version is a deep soul version that may have been deemed less marketable in 1966 than the garage rock version that was released by the Defenders on the Sama label in 1966.

On side two of the album acetate the side leads off with the unique soulful tracks "I'm Falling In Love Again" and "Oh No, It Just Ain't Right" I could not find released versions of either two of these songs so I am assuming that these songs have never been released. However the third song "Smokin" is a different story. On the album acetate there is a deep soul version of the song "Smokin". However, in 1967 there was another version of the song that was released as the B side of a now classic Northern Soul track called "It Was True" which was recorded by the band "Big Don's Rebellion" and released on the small independent label Ethon Records. 

Donald Bennett and Ethon McElroy seem to have made up the writing core of Big Don's Rebellion. Since the label bears the name of one of the writers of the song, Ethon , it is likely that Ethon Records was owned by both writers. This 45, like the one on the Sama label, had very limited distribution and now commands hundreds of dollars (USD) depending on condition of the record.

The song "It Was True" is not on the album acetate. Actually "It Was True" sounds a lot like a Phil Spector production but was recorded by a fellow producer, Murray Cohen, at the Gold Star Recording Studio in 1967. Since this acetate being offered was one of the acetates that Phil Spector discarded, it is possible and perhaps likely that Spector may have put Donald Bennett and Ethon McElroy in touch with Cohen after deciding that he did not want to produce the duo himself.

Cohen was obviously an admirer of Spector's recording techniques and Cohen obviously used the same studio as Spector and got similar results. The song "It Was True" is now a hugely popular Northern Soul track which is featured on at least two Northern Soul compilation collections of music. The song has multiple submission pages on the You Tube website and it is listened to on a daily basis.

The final song on side two of the acetate is "You Laughed All The Way Home" appears to be unreleased but it may be merely unknown to this writer.

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This album acetate contains some of the most brilliant and prototypical deep soul music ever and what is even just as remarkable is that this same duo then becomes part of the genesis for some of the most respected garage and psych rock and roll music of the 1960s.

After creating the music on this LP acetate and the early independent rock 45s already described, McElroy and Bennett together co arrange "No Way Out" and "The Inner Mystique" which were the first two albums released in the 1960s by the Chocolate Watch Band. 

Together they co-wrote the Chocolate Watch Band songs "Are You Going to Be There At the Love-In?" and "Gossamer Wings" as well as songs performed by the garage rock group Standells in the sixties.

Bennett and Mc Elroy created far more music than what I have described in these few paragraphs. This rare album acetate is both undiscovered deep soul music and the genesis of some of the most respected 1960s garage psych music.

Extremely rare. Probably less than three album acetates were cut of these tracks due to the expense of cutting an album acetate in the early 1960s, especially for then unsigned independent African American musicians in the early 1960s.

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This is one selection out of a highly important collection of acetates, test pressings, standard production records and entertainment awards from a media collection that ranges from the 1950s through the 1990s and was owned by a highly talented and diverse individual who served in a variety of jobs in the music and movie divisions of the entertainment industry most notably  Director in the Promotions Department in the Beatles record company, Apple Records. 

This individual also worked in the executive office of Phil Spector Productions in the early to mid 1970s. Most of the acetates and test pressings in this collection had standard record studio acetate and pressing plant test pressing labels but there are some from earlier in the audio review stage of record production that have no labels at all. Unlabled reference acetates have to be listened to on a record player in order to determine what they are. 

This particular acetate was one of Phil Spector’s personal  acetates. I would say that this acetate was used for making decisions about the final mixes of the songs on the album or 45.

As I said, The former Apple Records employee who owned this acetate also worked with Phil Spector on a regular basis. I was told by this employee that Phil Spector would frequently discard record production materials such as acetates and test pressings, recording equipment and regular production records once he no longer needed those items.  

This acetate came from the same collection of records and acetates as the A&M Studio Label Alternate Acetates that I sold earlier on Ebay that were used in producing the “The Concert for Bangladesh” three record box on Apple Records featuring George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Billy Preston, Ringo Starr and Leon Russell.

Check my past and present listings for more rare Philles and Apple Records records, acetates and awards. 

My name is Christopher Chatman of Beyond Records and I have been writing and dealing in test pressings, acetates, gold record awards and extremely rare music items since 1977. 

I wrote in the 1990s an article called "What is an acetate and why do they cost so much money? The article was published in the 1990 book "Goldmine's Rock N' Roll 45 rpm Record Price"