November 6, 2020 —– Chart #64

Hello Musical Friends,

Welcome to this week’s edition of Chart of the Day. Today we go back to 1967 with a sunshine pop band from California. Betcha haven’t heard this one in  a while. “Windy” is a pop music song written by Ruthann Friedman and recorded by the Association. Released in 1967, the song reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in July of that year. Overseas, it went to No. 34 in Australia, and No. 3 in Yugoslavia. Later in 1967 an instrumental version by jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery became his biggest Hot 100 hit when it peaked at No. 44.

Not to be confused with The Beach Boys’ 1964 song “Wendy”, “Windy” was the Association’s second U.S. No. 1, following “Cherish” in 1966. Billboard ranked the record as the No. 4 song for 1967. The lead vocals were sung in unison by Russ Giguere and Larry Ramos. Ramos said Ruthann Friedman had written the song about a man, and that the Association changed the lyrics to make it about a woman. Friedman refuted the rumor on her website.

There are many explanations of who Windy actually was in Ruthann’s life. She would have you know, she being me, Ruthann Friedman, that none of them are true. Windy was indeed a female and purely a fictitious character who popped into my head one fine day in 1967 … During the recording session the Association members, sure that they were in the middle of recording a hit, called the songwriter, me again, in to sing on the fade at the end. I can be heard singing a blues harmony as the song fades out.

The Association is an American sunshine pop band from California. During the late 1960s, the band had numerous hits at or near the top of the Billboard charts (including “Windy”, “Cherish”, “Never My Love” and “Along Comes Mary”) and were the lead-off band at 1967’s Monterey Pop Festival. They are known for intricate vocal harmonies by the band’s multiple singers.

Jules Alexander (born September 25, 1943, Chattanooga, Tennessee) was in Hawaii in 1962 serving a stint in the Navy when he met Terry Kirkman (born December 12, 1939, Salina, Kansas), a visiting salesman. Kirkman grew up in Chino, California, and attended Chaffey College as a music major. The two young musicians jammed together and promised to get together once Alexander was discharged. That happened a year later; the two eventually moved to Los Angeles and began exploring the city’s music scene in the mid-1960s, often working behind the scenes as directors and arrangers for other music acts. At the same time, Kirkman played in groups with Frank Zappa for a short period before Zappa went on to form the Mothers of Invention.

Eventually, at a Monday night hootenanny at the Los Angeles nightclub The Troubadour in 1964, an ad hoc group called The Inner Tubes was formed by Kirkman, Alexander and Doug Dillard, whose rotating membership contained, at one time or another, Cass Elliot, David Crosby and many others who drifted in and out. This led, in the fall of 1964, to the forming of The Men, a 13-piece Folk rock band. This group had a brief spell as the house band at The Troubadour.

After a short time, however, The Men disbanded, with six of the members electing to go out on their own in February 1965. At the suggestion of Kirkman’s then-fiancée, Judy, they took the name “The Association”. The original lineup consisted of Alexander (using his middle name, Gary, on the first two albums) on vocals and lead guitar; Kirkman on vocals and a variety of wind, brass and percussion instruments; Brian Cole (born September 8, 1942, Tacoma, Washington) on vocals, bass and woodwinds; Russ Giguere (born October 18, 1943, Portsmouth, New Hampshire), on vocals, percussion and guitar; Ted Bluechel, Jr. (born December 2, 1942, San Pedro, California), from The Cherry Hill Singers, on drums, guitar, bass and vocals; and Brian Cole’s friend and bandmate from the group Gnu Fokes, Bob Page (born May 13, 1943), on guitar, banjo and vocals. However, Page was replaced by Jim Yester (born November 24, 1939, Birmingham, Alabama) on vocals, guitar and keyboards before any of the group’s public performances.

Their national break came with the song “Along Comes Mary”, written by Tandyn Almer. Alexander first heard the song when he was hired to play on a demo version and persuaded Almer to give the Association first dibs on it. The song proved controversial due to the fact that “Mary” was street slang for marijuana, but it went to No. 7 on the Billboard charts and led to the group’s first album, And Then… Along Comes the Association (July 1966), produced by Curt Boettcher and begun in Gary S. Paxton’s garage, with vocals done separately at Columbia. Another song from the album, “Cherish”, written by Kirkman, became the Association’s first No. 1 hit in September 1966 and one of a handful of the Sixties’s most popular “slow dance” ballads.

The group followed with their second album, Renaissance, released in November 1966. The band changed producers, dropping Boettcher in favor of Jerry Yester (brother of Jim and formerly of the Modern Folk Quartet and later, a member of the Lovin’ Spoonful). The album did not spawn any major hits (the highest charting single, “Pandora’s Golden Heebie Jeebies” stalled at No. 35), and the album only reached No. 34, compared with the No. 5 showing for And Then… Along Comes the Association.

In late 1966, Warner Bros. Records, which had been distributing Valiant, bought the smaller label and with it, the Association’s contract. In April 1967, Alexander left the band to study meditation in India and was replaced by Larry Ramos (born Hilario Ramos on April 19, 1942, Waimea, Hawaii; died April 30, 2014) on vocals and guitar. Ramos joined the band while Alexander was still performing with them after bassist Cole’s hand was injured by a firecracker; Alexander subbed on bass while Ramos played lead guitar. Ramos had previously performed with the New Christy Minstrels and had even recorded solo singles for Columbia Records. He went on to sing co-lead (along with Giguere and Kirkman) on two of the Association’s biggest hit singles, “Windy” and “Never My Love”.

With the lineup settled, the group returned to the studio, this time with Bones Howe in the producer’s chair. The first fruits of this pairing were the single “Windy”, written by Ruthann Friedman, topping the Billboard Hot 100 on July 1, 1967 and staying there for four consecutive weeks, preceded by the album Insight Out, which reached No. 8 in June.

On June 16, 1967, the Association was the first act to perform at the Monterey Pop Festival. (The Criterion Collection DVD of the festival includes their performance of “Along Comes Mary” on disc 3.)

The group’s success continued with its next single, “Never My Love”, written by Dick and Don Addrisi; it went to No. 2 in Billboard and No. 1 in Cash Box in October 1967. It became the group’s only double-sided charted record, as its B-side, “Requiem For The Masses”, made a brief showing on the Billboard chart. Like “Cherish” and “One Too Many Mornings”, “Never My Love’s” vocal arrangement was provided by Clark Burroughs, former member of the Hi-Lo’s. “Never My Love” has since been certified the second-most-frequently-played song in America during the 20th century.

In 1968, after turning down a cantata composed by Jimmy Webb that included the now-classic “MacArthur Park”, the group produced its fourth album, Birthday (March 1968), with Bones Howe again at the controls. This album spawned “Everything That Touches You”, the group’s last Hot 100 Top 10 hit, and the more experimental “Time for Livin'”, the group’s final Hot 100 Top 40 hit.

Later that year, the group released a self-produced single, the harder-edged “Six Man Band”. This song also appeared on Greatest Hits, released in November 1968.

Here’s a live 1967 TV performance:  https://youtu.be/RsY8l0Jg3lY 

Keep rockin’,

Stan