Ok, probably not gonna be an immensely popular thread but there's a lot of interesting trivia behind that Happy Together pop group from the 60's.

They were pimpin' that clean cut sunshiney shit for the bucks. Beneath the surface they had a nasty yet playful sense of humor that they were able to take the wraps off of when after a dispute with their label (who owned the name and even the lead singer's personal names! Always read the fine print) they were hired by Frank Zappa to front his band.

Ah yes, The Turtles, top 40 hitmakers... what an unbelievable transformation when the Turtles joined Zappa and became Flo (short for the Phlorescent Leech) and Eddie. Frank put them front and center and wrote a pornographic opus for them to act out based on a supposedly true story about The Vanilla Fudge and John Bonham from led Zeppelin doing a groupie with a mudshark they caught off the balcony of their bayside motel in Seattle.

The album is called Mothers Live at the Fillmore East June 1971 but the opus is generally just known as The Mudshark.

I saw the Mudshark show in Chicago at the Auditorium Theater and OMF'ngG!!!

Here's a little taste for you:

More arcane knowldege about The Turtles can be found at: http://www.theturtles.com/floeddie.html and guess what?

Somehow they got the rights to their name back and are touring nationally right now with a handful of other top 40 acts from the era. See article at:

http://newssun.suntimes.c...ether.html

And somehow they find time between these dates to jet out to reprise some of these classics with Dweezil on the current Zappa Plays Zappa tour.

[Edited 8/14/11 0:06am]

I'm kinda interested in what happened too...

DakutiusMaximus said:

Ok, probably not gonna be an immensely popular thread but there's a lot of interesting trivia behind that Happy Together pop group from the 60's.

They were pimpin' that clean cut sunshiney shit for the bucks. Beneath the surface they had a nasty yet playful sense of humor that they were able to take the wraps off of when after a dispute with their label (who owned the name and even the lead singer's personal names! Always read the fine print) they were hired by Frank Zappa to front his band.

Ah yes, The Turtles, top 40 hitmakers... what an unbelievable transformation when the Turtles joined Zappa and became Flo (short for the Phlorescent Leech) and Eddie. Frank put them front and center and wrote a pornographic opus for them to act out based on a supposedly true story about The Vanilla Fudge and John Bonham from led Zeppelin doing a groupie with a mudshark they caught off the balcony of their bayside motel in Seattle.

The album is called Mothers Live at the Fillmore East June 1971 but the opus is generally just known as The Mudshark.

I saw the Mudshark show in Chicago at the Auditorium Theater and OMF'ngG!!!

Here's a little taste for you:

More arcane knowldege about The Turtles can be found at: http://www.theturtles.com/floeddie.html and guess what?

Somehow they got the rights to their name back and are touring nationally right now with a handful of other top 40 acts from the era. See article at:

http://newssun.suntimes.c...ether.html

And somehow they find time between these dates to jet out to reprise some of these classics with Dweezil on the current Zappa Plays Zappa tour.

[Edited 8/14/11 0:06am]

My boy Frank as for the turtles... aside from there few hits back in the day i have not heard ANYTHIGN about them last few years...

Hibernation?

AlexdeParis said:

Hibernation?

Timmy84 said:

AlexdeParis said:

Hibernation?

Hey, be lucky I didn't say to ask Splinter.

AlexdeParis said:

Timmy84 said:

Hey, be lucky I didn't say to ask Splinter.

The breadth of these guy's career and experience is surprisingly deep and rich.

U2 opened for them touring behind their first album. They sang backup for Marc Bolan in T Rex. and have sung for John Lennon, Bruce Springsteen and The Ramones.

They sued Ice Cube for sampling them without permission on his rap Jackin for Beats.

Mark Volman is currently an award winning college professor teaching entertainment in Nashville and in the summer he tours with Howard Kaylan as the Turtles along with other 60's pop rock acts, The Association, The Grass Roots, The Buckinghams, a Chicago group that started out playing as the house band for WGN, and Mark Lindsay, former lead singer for Paul Revere and the Raiders.

You can bone up on all sorts of interesting trivia on the Turtles news page at:

http://www.theturtles.com.../news.html

*burp*

[Edited 8/16/11 9:35am]

Nice thread.




...From their radio show discussed in the link provided, a 1989 conversation with Frank Zappa.




Music for adventurous listeners

tA

Tribal Records

theAudience said:

Nice thread.




...From their radio show discussed in the link provided, a 1989 conversation with Frank Zappa.




Music for adventurous listeners

tA

Tribal Records

Enjoyed it very much... and here's the big takeaway piece of trivia gleaned:

Frank owned the guitar that Jimi set on fire at Monterey. For a long time he had it hanging on the wall of his basement rehearsal space>

Then when Adrian Belew was in the band Frank had the guitar restored to playable condition and Adrian played it on tour and related to it as if it were a magic amulet of sorts.

When Adrian left the band Frank took the famous guitar back and Belew went out and got another one just like it and actually had someone set it on fire with lighter fluid and then restore it.

I wonder if he got his mojo back?

Does anyone know why the Turtles' albums are mostly out of print? There are a ton of compilations but if you want the actual albums they are very expensive. I think they only had five albums plus a compilation of stray tracks (Wooden Head). Seems like the perfect amount of material for a box set.

DakutiusMaximus said:

Enjoyed it very much... and here's the big takeaway piece of trivia gleaned:

Frank owned the guitar that Jimi set on fire at Monterey. For a long time he had it hanging on the wall of his basement rehearsal space>

Then when Adrian Belew was in the band Frank had the guitar restored to playable condition and Adrian played it on tour and related to it as if it were a magic amulet of sorts.

When Adrian left the band Frank took the famous guitar back and Belew went out and got another one just like it and actually had someone set it on fire with lighter fluid and then restore it.

I wonder if he got his mojo back?

As good as Adrian Belew is, if he only got half of it back he'd have more than most.

Music for adventurous listeners

tA

Tribal Records

rialb said:

Does anyone know why the Turtles' albums are mostly out of print? There are a ton of compilations but if you want the actual albums they are very expensive. I think they only had five albums plus a compilation of stray tracks (Wooden Head). Seems like the perfect amount of material for a box set.

Not sure about that one.

Wouldn't mind seeing The Turtles Present the Battle of the Bands reissued...



...Buzzsaw & Elenore


Music for adventurous listeners

tA

Tribal Records