There are quite a few sidebars to this Pittsburgh favorite. The story is that the lyrics came to manager Joe Rock in his car at a stoplight shortly after his girl had dumped him, and Jimmy Beaumont wrote the music the next night.
The group did a rough a cappello cut on a reel-to-reel as a demo, and Janet Vogel, thinking the tape was off, ad libbed her soaring high C crescendo at the end. The group wisely kept it in. But singing a song is only half the battle; getting it on wax is an entirely different animal.
Rock shopped the song around, and thirteen national labels passed on it. One said it was too negative and should be “Since I Have You” while another mocked the 13 “you” finale. So it was off to local label Calico, owned by Lenny Martin and Lou Guarino.
They were this close to blowing that audition. On the way to the studio, they had a head on collision while jammed into a ‘52 Dodge. Fortunately, cars were a lot tougher back then, and they got to Calico shaken but in one piece. They were signed on the spot.
Martin took the group to New York’s Capitol Studios for a recording session. He backed them with 18 musicians, the first time a full orchestra had been used with a “rock” group. Other performers like the Drifters and Duprees quickly picked up on the strings for their arrangements.
Also listening in on the recording session was a member of the Teddy Bears named Phil Spector, who later cited “Since I Don’t Have You” as an influence on his “wall of sound” productions during the sixties.
The record was so soulful that the Skyliners were thought by many to be black artists. They became the first white group to top the Cashbox R&B charts, played the Apollo eight times and performed on the “chitlin’ circuit.”
They also found a name after the recording session when the master came back without an artist credit. The singers were a mixture of the South Hills Crescents and El Rios groups, and Rock, with their input, christened them “The Skyliners” after the 1945 Charlie Barnet hit song (although Jackie Taylor told Ed Salamon it was for the Ford Skyliner popular during that car-crazy era. Rolls the dice and take yer chances.)
Lotta action for one studio session. It was worth it, though. Art Pallan of KDKA broke "Since I Don't Have You," followed quickly by a Dick Clark "American Bandstand" appearance. The song hovered just outside the top ten nationally while the Skyliners went on to become one of Pittsburgh's iconic vocal groups.
Hey,
did you ever wonder how some of the local groups picked up their names?
In the course of researching the blog and some other projects, Google
has given us some answers:
The Del Vikings:There
are several stories behind their name. One claims that the group members were fans of the
tales of the old-time marauding Vikings; another says that they were
fond of the paperback books published by the Viking press that so many servicemen read to pass the off-duty time, and another believes the name was taken from a Brooklyn club/basketball team called
the Vikings that Clarence Quick belonged to, and that’s the more likely
tale of the three.
The Mellows - Four Dots - Four Troys:
The late Fletcher Williams & The Four Dots started out as the
Mellows in 1950, about as generic a group name as one could imagine.
They were eventually represented by Don DeCarlo, who suggested that they
change their name to the Four Dots, piggybacking on the hot-selling and
eminently bookable Ink Spots.The Four Dots played the area hops &
club circuit while releasing a couple of singles on the Bullseye label
In
1959, just about at the end of their career, the group inked a deal
with Freedom Records, who already had a California-based Four Dots as
part of their roster. Because of that, the Four Dots released their last
wax as the Four Troys (no one remembers how that name was chosen). Did
that end the confusion? Nah. The West Coast Four Dots released “Pleading
For Your Love,” a ‘Burgh favorite. The local Four Dots hit the oldies
circuit, and guess what their top request was? “Pleading” became part of
their play list.
The Houserockers:Many
remember Joe Grushecky’s Brick Alley Band, named after a McKeesport red
light district, taking off as the Iron City Houserockers, a name given
to them by Pittsburgh native and Cleveland International Records head
Steve Popovich. Cleveland International was of course based in Ohio and
Popovich had the band tour the midwest to support their records. But the
Pittsburgh-Cleveland rivalry extended beyond football. Their name
caused some problems when touring outside their hometown, and when they
played Cleveland their van tires were slashed. So they switched in the
early eighties to the region-neutral Houserockers brand.
Lugee Becomes Lou:
Born Lugee Alfredo Giovanni Sacco, the stage name of Lou Christie
wasn’t Sacco’s choice; it was more or less foisted on him. When “The
Gypsy Cried” was released in 1962 on the local Co&Ce label, the
record was credited to “Lou Christie” without Sacco's knowledge or
permission. Sacco had been working on his own list of stage names, and
said "I was pissed off about it for 20 years. I wanted to keep my name
and be a one-named performer, just 'Lugee'." We’re glad he’s finally
over it.
The Marcels: When the Oliver High gang first formed and was rehearsing, the group was coined "The Marcels" by Fred Johnson's little sister
Priscilla. She was inspired by a popular hair style of the day, the marcel wave, sported by lead singer
Cornelius Harp.
The Skyliners:They collectively came up with their name after the 1958 Capitol Studios "Since I Don't Have You" recording session when the master came back
without an artist credit. The singers were a mixture of the South Hills
Crescents and El Rios groups, and manager Joe Rock, with their input, christened
them “The Skyliners” after the 1945 Charlie Barnet hit song according to their official history, although we're told by Ed Salamon that they were named for the car per Jackie Taylor.
The Vogues:
Originally known as The Val-Aires (a combination, we’ve been told, of the names of the two high school groups the members had first sang with), the Vogues got their name from manager Elmer
Willett’s nightspot and studio, East McKeesport’s Vogue Terrace. The group didn't have a vote; when "You're The One" was released, it was credited to the Vogues by the Co&Ce label. At least one member, Hugh Geyer, didn't find out about the name until he heard the song on the radio.
OK, we're gonna try something a little different today. Old Mon is posting five oldies - the cut off date is 1961; only fifty year-old+ songs need apply - and letting his readers select the top one. Three were chart busters; two were purely local hits. The voting box is on the right; here are the tunes:
The Chaps (Sonny DiNunzio) "They'll Never Be" 1960
The Del-Vikings (Norman Wright) "Come Go With Me" 1957
The Marcels (Cornelius Harp) "Blue Moon" 1961
The Skyliners (Jimmy Beaumont) "Since I Don't Have You" 1958
The Splendors (Herb Marshall) "The Golden Years" 1958
Joe Rock with James Darren and the Jaggerz from Jaggerz.com
On May 16th, 1936, Joseph Vincent Rock made his first appearance in the world, the youngest of five kids. By the time he left this vale of tears, the South Sider's career as a songwriter and promoter were firmly established, hitched forever to the Skyliners, but extending further afield than you may think.
Joe had the music in him, and was a member of the Marquees (a session group that did backing vocals for Willett Studios) and a session singer early on. But his true calling was as a tunesmith and tub-thumper, and that's how he left his mark on Pittsburgh music.
He used to haunt the local hops, checking out the area talent. Rock listened to a group from St. George's in Allentown called the Crescents as a favor to their manager, and took them under his wing. Later, while at a hop hosted by KTV's Al "Nickels" Noble of "Jukebox" fame, he was wowed by a singer from the Monterey's, Brentwood's Jimmy Beaumont.
He added him to the mix, along with South Hill's High guitarist Jackie Taylor, and the Crescents were ready to rock. Rock wrote his first song, "Be Mine," for the group, and it took off locally. It was recorded (no, we couldn't find the label) and became a Pittsburgh hit. The Crescent's had a fan club of some 2,000 members after that song hit the 'Burg airwaves, and they were starring at clubs all over the region.
Striking while the iron was hot, Rock sent the demo to ABC Records. The story is they offered the group a contract, but the Crescents dallied over the terms and ABC threw up its hands and withdrew the offer. Somehow, another contract, this one with Atlantic, who had promised to have Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller pen songs for the group, also slipped through their fingers. Some guys would kill for a contract. Rock and the Crescents weren't apparently among them.
The likeliest explanation for the bumbled deals was that there was an internal debate over which offer was a better fit for the Crescents down the road, but eventually both labels tired of the wait and moved on. We'll never know for sure, though Rock's management cred was a little shaky at that point.
Rock would find the road to promotion becoming even, well, rockier. He brought in an advance man from Specialty Records to hear the Crescents audition in person. Only three of them - Beaumont, Taylor, and original member Wally Lester - bothered to show up. The others were allegedly out joyriding, demoralized over the blown deals.
Rock made sure they had all the cruising time they needed. He canned the AWOLs and brought in a pair of El Rios, Janet Vogel and Joe Verscharen, to replace them.
Then, according to Pittsburgh R&B legend, lightning struck. Rock had driven out to see his squeeze, and she told him it was over - she was headed to stew school in Tulsa. His broken heart kicked into songwriter mode on the way back home, and while he was stopped at a red light, the lyrics for "Since I Don't Have You" popped into his head.
He had jotted down some words at every stop - God knows there are enough traffic lights in Pittsburgh to give a guy time to write an opera - and showed them to Beaumont. He came up with the music, and one of the City's signature tunes was born.
This time, the contracts didn't flow. Rock sent a capella tapes out to thirteen labels (maybe on review, he could have picked a different number than 13), including Chess, RCA, Imperial, and the now gunshy ABC. They all said "no thanks," citing everything from negativity to too many you's at the end. Ouch.
But Rock had his local contacts on speed dial, or whatever its 1958 equivalent would have been, and got in touch with Lenny Martin of Calico Records. He arranged an audition that almost never came off - the group was so revved up that they crashed their car on the way to the try-out, but still managed to make it on time - and sang "Since I Don't Have You" and "One Night, One Night," selling Martin.
The gang went up to Capital Record's studio in New York City in December, cut the songs, and the rest is history. He even gave the group its new name, based on a 1945 Charlie Barnet hit, "Skyliner." Rock got the group on Dick Clark's "American Bandstand" and eight dates at the Apollo Theater. They charted on both pop and R&B charts. Now he was managing in high gear.
Now some say Rock couldn't take the group to the next level, and he did have a fairly bitter split with Calico Records in 1960. But the truth of the matter was that not many groups broke out of Pittsburgh, much less white R&B performers. The Skyliners went further than most.
He managed the Skyliners until his death, and formed a strong writing team with Beaumont, who scored Rock's lyrics on "This I Swear," "I'd Die," "Lonely Way," and "It Happened Today," along with every original song the group did on Calico and many beyond that time.
But the Skyliners weren't Rock's only claim to fame. In 1963, he produced "Let's Be Lovers" on ATCO 6272, a local hit that reminded listeners of New York's Flamingos. And it should have; Rock brought in Nate Nelson and the group to record under the alias of "The Starglows," earning them both a few bucks under the table.
He also penned the Joey Dee and the Starliters song "Lorraine," their first release in 1958.
He was the manager for the Jaggerz when their song "The Rapper" hit #2 nationally in 1970 on the Kama Sutra label. He also represented soul man Johnny Daye, and landed him a gig with Stax Records. In fact, he co-wrote "I've Got Dreams To Remember," the Otis Redding classic. He was out with Redding the night before his fatal plane crash.
Eventually, Rock moved away from R&B in Memphis to country in Nashville during the early 1990s. Plagued by failing health, he died in Baptist Hospital after quadruple bypass surgery on April 4, 2000.
It's been said that as long as the Skyliners are remembered, so will the memory of Joe Rock. But his passing marks a countdown to the end of the R&B era in Pittsburgh music, one of the town's craziest and most creative periods.
In 1958, Jimmy Beaumont (formerly of the Montereys), Wally Lester and Jack Taylor, who were singing with promoter Joe Rock's Allentown group, The Crescents, combined with Joe Versharen and Janet Vogel from South Hill's based El Rios. The resulting mash would become the Skyliners.
The way they got together was a little odd. Rock had talked a promotion man from Specialty Records into coming to Pittsburgh to hear the original Crescents, but half of them decided to go joy riding rather than sing for him. The three who kept the appointment were Beaumont, Lester, and Taylor.
Vogel and Versharen were recruited as replacements for the AWOL Crescent cruisers who were booted out of the band by Rock. The rest, as they say, is history.
The song that would lead to their success was inspired by a secretary that broke up with Rock. Driving away from the encounter, Rock's head filled with the lyrics for a jilted lover song. Beaumont provided the music the next night. (Which, btw, was a formula they stuck to - Rock doing the lyrics and Beaumont the scoring and arrangements.)
The song, of course, was "Since I Don't Have You," a timeless 1958 ballad of love gone astray. But not everyone saw its' potential.
Rock sent the demo tape to 13 big time labels, including Chess, ABC, Imperial, and RCA. All 13 rejected the song. One said it was too negative and should have been “Since I Have You.” Another wrote, “A song with 13 ‘yous’ at the end will never sell!” Not exactly Nostrademus, that guy.
Rock and the Crescents finally had it recorded by Pittsburgh's Calico label, which was owned by Lou Caposi and Bill Lawrence.
Legend has it that Vogel ad libbed the song's memorable ending in high C as a joke during rehearsals. The guys liked it so much they kept it as part of the song's studio arrangement.
Whether that's so or not, she added it after the third and final take during the NY taping, and the song wouldn't be the same without that last note. Vogel was ensured a spot in rock history with that one final, seemingly never ending "you."
“Since I Don’t Have You” was recorded on December 3, 1958, at Capitol Studios in New York. 18 musicians were used, a huge number for a teen vocal group at the time and the first time a full orchestra had been used with a pop group.
Phil Spector was there with the Teddy Bears and he later cited “Since I Don’t Have You” as an influence on his "wall of sound" style of the 1960s.
When the test pressing came back there was no group name on the label, which prompted Rock and the Crescents to think about a new nom d' plume. They came up with the title of an old 1945 Charlie Barnett hit, “Skyliner.”
Vogel's wail, Beaumont's blue-eyed soul delivery, the Skyliner harmony and the string background combined to make "Since I Don't Have You" a runaway hit.
Credit for breaking "Since I Don't Have You" was given to Art Pallan of KDKA - Radio. Dick Clark was also an early fan of the group and featured them on American Bandstand on Friday, February 13, 1959, a lucky Friday the 13th for the Skyliners if ever there was one.
Within three days of the Dick Clark performance, “Since I Don't Have You” charted on Billboard’s Top 100 and had sold 100,000 records. The Skyliner's debut single did better on the R&B (#3) than Pop (#12) charts, and the group began to perform on the chitlin' circuit.
In the early days stunned silence usually greeted them in the black halls until they began singing and gradually converted the audiences into Skyliner fans. They became the first white group ever to top the R&B charts of Cashbox.
"Since I Don't Have You" has since been covered by Chuck Jackson, Don McLean, Guns N' Roses, The Brian Setzer Orchestra, Ronnie Milsap, and Buckaroo Banzai.
Alan Freed invited the Skyliners to New York to appear on his 1959 Easter show with Jackie Wilson, Fats Domino, and Bobby Darin. They also made eight appearances at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem.
Dick Clark took them on his "Caravan of Stars" tour, which stopped at the Syria Mosque in the fall with the Drifters, Paul Anka, Lloyd Price and Duane Eddy, and featured them on Bandstand and his Saturday night television show numerous times.
In 1960, Calico released its first album, "The Skyliners", with twelve tracks, including both sides of the group's first two singles, "Since I Don't Have You", B/W "One Night, One Night", and "This I Swear," B/W "Tomorrow". What a pair of singles to start a career with!
“This I Swear” also did better on the black charts than pop (#20 R&B to #26 Pop.) The LP charted in the top fifty.
After the album, the singles "Lonely Way" B/W "It Happened Today" and "How Much" B/W "Lorraine From Spain" were released by Calico. Their sixth and final Calico single was "Believe Me" B/W "Happy Time".
In 1961, The Skyliners moved to the larger Colpix label. They did three records for them, most notably "The End Of A Story."
The Skyliners then recorded "Comes Love," written by Johnny Jack and released it on the local Viscount Label. It was backed by "Tell Me." Many consider "Comes Love" to be the equal of "Since I Don't Have You" and "This I Swear." Though it didn't do much on the charts, today it's still a hot 45.
By 1963 the group had signed with Atco Records, which released "Since I Fell For You." Lenny Welch had the national hit with his version that same year. It was a case of a good song with bad timing for the local band.
The B side, "I'd Die", was rediscovered in the mid-70's by 13-Q DJ Don Bombard and remains a popular request among oldie stations to this day.
But the fun was running out, and by the mid-1960s they had gone their separate ways. Touring and near miss songs were taking their toll on the group.
In 1965, Jack Taylor, with Rock's permission, fronted a faux Skyliner group which recorded "The Loser" on Jubilee Records. This ballad, written by Taylor and Rock, became a popular slow drag at area hops and charted Top 40 nationally, both on pop and R&B lists, and was covered by Sonny DiNunzio's Racket Squad.
But collectors beware - the Jubilee sessions are not Beaumont, Vogel, and the guys, but the Taylor group.
The original Skyliners finally got back together, but they didn't satisfy themselves by just riding along the oldies circuit. They added some new material, too. Their Capitol recording of "Where Have They Gone" became a Number 1 hit in the Pittsburgh market in 1974.
But the Skyliner era had run its' course. On New Years Day, 1976, Lester and Verscharen retired permanently from the group.
Taylor became an Army captain during Vietnam and then went into computers. Lester is a VP for the Clairol Corporation and Verscharen bought a motel in North Carolina and went to rock 'n' roll heaven last year.
Janet Vogel-Rapp, wife, mother, and soprano songbird, passed away on February 21, 1980, at the age of 37. She died of carbon monoxide poisoning in her car, a victim of suicide. Her boy, Gavin, graduated from Central Catholic HS and Pitt, and went from computer whiz to indy film maker.
Rock continues to manage the band with Beaumont's pipes still soundin' sweet at its' lead.
Beaumont, along with Nick Pociask, Dick Muse, Mark Groom, and Donna Groom carry the Skyliner banner. They tour pretty regularly, especially in the East and Midwest, hitting the odd cruise, and pop up on PBS with the other great acts of old.
The Skyliners were inducted into The Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2002.
