Motown - Surf Music Pioneers ?

What with releases from The Biscaynes and Nick and The Jaguars, Berry Gordy seems to have been on the ball in releasing pre-surf surf music where you can hear the genesis of tunes like "Pipeline" by The Chantays via these "rockabilly" sides.

Surfing the web reveals that Dick Dale as probably the first self-proclaimed surf guitarist and coined the name for this genre but others pre-dated such as The Bel Airs and The Fireballs.

Interesting period in Motown's history but I'll leave it for the more knowledgable American folks who maybe able to tease out further info on these Motown releases.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLUd7TRn6VY

Nick and The Jaguars with some sort of Japanese connnection since ichiban means number 1 in their language I believe. The Group was formed in Pontiac. Believe it or not this tune was covered in 1992 [[badly) by a band called The Gories.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jCnfwYSPDc

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Originally Posted by mysterysinger

What with releases from The Biscaynes and Nick and The Jaguars, Berry Gordy seems to have been on the ball in releasing pre-surf surf music where you can hear the genesis of tunes like "Pipeline" by The Chantays via these "rockabilly" sides.

Surfing the web reveals that Dick Dale as probably the first self-proclaimed surf guitarist and coined the name for this genre but others pre-dated such as The Bel Airs and The Fireballs.

Interesting period in Motown's history but I'll leave it for the more knowledgable American folks who maybe able to tease out further info on these Motown releases.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLUd7TRn6VY

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I say that Motown should've reissued both "Ich-I-Bon #1" & "Mis-Beat" in the early '60s when surf music instrumentals were riding high on the charts. Both songs predate [[and sound good alongside) efforts by Dick Dale, The Ventures, The Surfaris & others.

Yes I think that would have been a good idea as the sides may have been ahead of their time. Wonder if there was any thought of issuing an album back then on them. As I understand it The Biscaynes and Nick and The Jaguars were the same group. Also the first white group to record for any of the Motown family of labels.

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Originally Posted by mysterysinger

Yes I think that would have been a good idea as the sides may have been ahead of their time. Wonder if there was any thought of issuing an album back then on them. As I understand it The Biscaynes and Nick and The Jaguars were the same group. Also the first white group to record for any of the Motown family of labels.

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Attachment 16949
Yes, they were. And Berry new them and their [[manager) father, before he started Tamla Records. They were first called The Biscaynes, and they had come to Berry's and Raynoma's RayBer Music Co., to have them publish their songs, produce and record demo records for the, and to market them to record labels, and get them a recording deal with one. The succeeded with that, getting them a deal with Detroit's local, Ridge Records, who had previously recorded mainly C&W records. Berry also got a deal with Ridge for Don McKenzie. Later, he recorded both for his own Tamla and Miracle labels, respectively. Nick was lead guitar player, Nick Ferro. I think Ron Hillerand was another of the group's members.

The web site below has a photo and some information on The Biscaynes [[and states that The Biscaynes were not from Detroit and did not change their name to Nick and The Jaguars). That seems to be borne out by the names of the group members viz:

The Biscaynes - Billy Price, Ken Rudio, Alex Dedes, Ray, Ron Hildebrand

Nick & The Jaguars - Johnny Ferro and Marv Weyer [[guitar), Nick Ferro [[drums).

For The Biscaynes single on RIDGE, side 1 "Mis-Beat" was written by Ronald Hildebrand [[spelt incorrectly as Hilarand on the label) and side 2 "Out Of Order" was written by Alex Dedes.


https://www.buckeyebeat.com/biscaynes.html