Photo by Leon Kuzmanoff for the cover of GQ Magazine, April 1961
I wrote about the Get Ready to Fly psych-pop compilation a while ago, but one of my favorite songs from this record popped up as the Jukebox selection last night, so I'm going to write a little more about producer Norman Petty and his Clovis, New Mexico studio. One of the most talented young bands that found their way to Clovis was the Tyme of Day from Irving, Texas. Brothers Shelby and Chris Rogers and their friend Bob Anderson made up the group, who were the house band at the popular Dallas teen club Lou Ann's. The Rogers boys' mother had moved to Clovis and invited her sons to come up and record with Petty in his studio. They recorded a couple singles that were good enough to get picked up and distributed by Mercury, but the band fell apart when the band's frontman and songwriter, Shelby, was born again and formed the Christian rock band Joshua [Or maybe this isn't exactly what happened - see the comments below].
There are so many things that I like about "Listen to What Is Never Said", beginning with Bob Anderson's bass riff and its clean plucked sound. Shelby Rogers delivers a strong vocal with a weird "father's advice" lyric that has prescient Christian overtones. And Petty's production touches are great as well, including the rumbling one-note keyboard overdub he added after the band finished recording. It's hard to believe that this song ended up on the b-side of the Tyme of Day single with a bubblegum pop number called "I Wanna Know" as the a-side.
"Listen to What Is Never Said" by the Tyme of Day
3 comments:
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I believe your information is off. Bob Anderson actually left the band and was replaced by Larry Shaw a friend of the Rogers brothers.
Shelby and I were in a band in High School named The Brogues which played at Lou Ann's. At the end of the year Shelby and I drove out to Clovis and met his brother and sister. When I left for college at Texas A&M at the end of the summer, Shelby and Chris started the new band after The Brogues broke up. I think that's when Robert joined them. All four of us recorded songs together at different times at Norman Petty's studio in Clovis. When Robert left The Tyme of Day, Shelby asked me to come back so I took a year off from Texas A&M and about the time I went back to college is when Shelby accepted Christ as his Savior. I didn't know this until after college when I met Shelby and told him that I had become a Christian as well. I haven't seen Shelby or Chris in almost 40 years but still have fond memories of all the times we shared both in the recording studio and touring. One of my favorite memories was when we were all at Norman Petty's house that was above the old studio and he told us how that Decca Records had turned down Buddy Holly for a contract. I blurted out for him to get Decca to turn us down too because not only had Decca turned down Buddy Holly but they also had the chance to sign the Beatles and turned them down also!
Thanks for the additional information, Adam and Larry. I wrote this little post a long time ago, so it's hard for me to check on the facts I was relying on at the time, but I believe all the information was straight out of the liner notes of the Learning to Fly compilation where I found the song.
I've added a note in the post referring to your correction, though - thanks for the input, and it's always cool to hear from someone who worked with Norman Petty!
Post a Comment