Have a couple items here for you today that I may or may not eventually tie together but stay with me while I try and do so.
Remember my mentioning Doris Day the other day? My title above is a poor attempt at punning one of her movies. (And yes, I know, if you got to explain the pun then it’s not a good one.)
But as I was reading Doris’ bio, I learned that she had a son Terry Melcher who was a musician and a record producer. Early on in his career he was the lead singer of the Rip Chords who did the song Hey Little Cobra. Hence, the photo of the Bartmobile above. I’ll talk more about the Cobra in a bit.
Terry Melcher also worked with the Beach Boys and was eventually introduced to Charles Manson by Brian Wilson. Manson at the time was an aspiring musician hoping to get a record deal. Terry and his then girl friend Candace Bergen entertained Manson at their home in Benedict Canyon.
Somewhere along the line, Terry realized that Manson was nutso and stopped associating with him. Terry and Candace moved out of their place. When Charlie came around to try and talk to Terry about his record deal, the new occupants of the house Roman Polanski and Sharon Tate told him that Terry had moved. This pissed Charlie off and you know the rest of the story.
Terry continued working in the music business recording such groups as the Byrds, Paul Revere and the Raiders, Mamas and Papas etc.. He also produced T-V shows including his Mom’s Doris Day Show which aired from 1968 to 73. In 2004 he died of melanoma at the age of 62.
As for Terry’s lead singing on Hey Little Cobra, here it is:
OK? Are you with me so far? (Eager for action………)
Now for the rest of the story. Hey Little Cobra was written by Carol Connors and has a great backstory as to how she came to write it at the request of its designer Carroll Shelby.
Carol Connors also co-wrote and is probably more famous for the Rocky theme song Gonna Fly Now which I will include here because it’s such a great song. What I won’t be including however, is another famous oldie of Carol’s – To Know Him is To Love Him. She sang lead on this crapola of a song as a member of the Teddy Bears when she was just 16 years old. Phil Specter wrote the song and was also a member of the Teddy Bears. As you may have surmised, I always hated this song.
However, according to Carol, the song was responsible for her hooking up with Elvis because once he heard it, he wanted to meet her (click here for that story.) Obviously, unlike me, Elvis must have liked it. Now, how’s that for some rock star power? You hear a lady singing a song, you like how she sounds, you tell people you want to meet her and next thing you know you got her in bed with you. What did Aerosmith say? “Dream On.”