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 Latest News NEWS UPDATE NOVEMBER 2005 The following information is adapted from newsletters mailed to Fan Club members in April, June, August, September, and November 2005. To receive Fan Club mailings - your source for detailed and accurate information about The Everly Brothers - please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site and click on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" sign that is there. We post information in our web site only after it has been mailed to our Fan Club members, and we post only a portion of what members have received in the mail. There are still quite a lot of our members who do not have Internet access. They appreciate our mailings and we do not want to become an Internet based fan club.
NEW EVERLY BROTHERS RELEASES BY JOHN HOSUM Today, some 50 years after their first studio recordings were made, the music of Don and Phil is appreciated as much as ever, if not more so. The year 2005 will be remembered as the year when more of their recordings were released on CD than any other year. The Warner Bros. reissue project by Warner Strategic Marketing (WSM) in England began in 2001 with the release of It's Everly Time / A Date With The Everly Brothers and Both Sides of An Evening / Instant Party. These "twofers" - in addition to combining two albums on one CD - include singles and previously unreleased recordings as bonus tracks with liner notes by Andrew Sandoval. Two more "twofers" were mastered and scheduled for release in 2002: Sing Great Country Hits / Gone, Gone, Gone and Rock 'n Soul / Beat & Soul. A new album - From Nashville To Hollywood - was created that combines singles and unreleased tracks, mostly from 1962, and it too was mastered and scheduled for release in 2002. However, the WSM project stalled for several reasons and these next three CDs in the series are now scheduled for release in England on June 27, 2005. The Everly Brothers releases in the WSM reissue project are available worldwide from amazon.co.uk, Tower Records, HMV, and all other music outlets.  This ad has appeared in England in several music magazines this month.
Varese Sarabande Records has created a new album - Too Good To Be True - which is a collection of 18 unreleased Everly Brothers recordings from the 1950s. The release of this CD was announced and described in the Fan Club's November 2004 issue of the Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter. These are acoustic demo recordings including three solo tracks by Don and three solo tracks by Phil. The eight-page booklet includes rare photos provided by our Fan Club and liner notes by Andrew Sandoval. This CD will be available from www.varesesarabande.com, www.amazon.com, www.towerrecords.com, and all other music outlets on June 14, 2005. However, Varese has granted Collectors' Choice Music exclusive distribution rights for the 60 days prior to the album's release date so - starting in April - it can be ordered from www.collectorschoicemusic.com. On this CD, you will hear Phil sing a ballad version of "When Will I Be Loved" and Don sing a version of "It's All Over" that are far more heartbreaking than the previously released versions. You will especially enjoy hearing their harmony when they sing "I Didn't Mean To Go This Far." Here's the complete track listing for the CD:
As a companion to the Too Good To Be True album, on September 27, 2005 Varese released another 18-track compilation of previously unreleased studio tracks called Give Me A Future. Here is the complete track list for this CD:
The finale for this year's release of Warner Bros. recordings is the 7-CD box set The Price Of Fame (1960 - 1965) (BCD 16511) released by Bear Family Records in Germany on November 7, 2005. This box set's 231 tracks are in chronological recording order and include outtakes, rarities, foreign language singles and spoken word promos. The box comes with a 188-page LP-size hardcover book containing many rare and previously unpublished photos, with liner notes written by Andrew Sandoval. The Fan Club announced the box set's 231 tracks in a special mailing sent to Fan Club members in September. The complete track list can be viewed at the Bear Family Records site (www.bear-family.de). This box set can be ordered from Bear Family Records and all other music outlets including www.deepdiscountcd.com.  Next year, Bear Family will release Chained To A Memory (1966 - 1972) (BCD 16791) which will include the rest of the Warner Bros. studio recordings plus all of Don and Phil's recordings for the RCA label. This 7-CD box set will include a DVD and a hardcover book of rare photos. The two box sets from Bear Family (and the individual album releases by CCM) effectively make the WSM reissue project redundant so no more WSM releases are planned after the three CDs that were released in October. However, Bear Family Records is planning to release one more CD of previously unreleased Everly Brothers studio recordings called The Outtakes (BCD 15931). It is scheduled for release in January or February 2006 and will be packaged in a cardboard box resembling an original Cadence Records tape box. As announced in the Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter mailed in early November to Fan Club members, the CD's 34 tracks are:
OLD FRIENDS: LIVE ON STAGE Five pages of the Fan Club's November 2004 issue of the Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter were devoted to accounts of Don and Phil's participation as "Special Guests" on the 2003 - 2004 Simon & Garfunkel tours. The following information is adapted from that issue of the newsletter. A deluxe double CD and DVD package capturing the historic 2003 - 2004 Simon & Garfunkel "Old Friends" tour was released on November 30, 2004 by Warner Bros. Records. Old Friends: Live On Stage spans the duo's unparalleled career and features a bonus audio track, "Citizen of the Planet," which NBC played while running the credits at the close of its broadcast of the 2004 Olympic Games opening ceremony on August 13, 2004. Originally written by Paul Simon in the early '80s to be a part of the duo's repertoire, it was never recorded until Art Garfunkel added vocals especially for this release. "'Citizen of the Planet'" was a demo that Paul made some years ago," Art remarked during an NPR radio interview in June 2004. "I always liked it, but we'd never put it on anything. I came across it in my kitchen just last year, played it again and loved it again. I'm a big protagonist of 'Citizen of the Planet.'" The package has a treasure of extras including liner notes by acclaimed music journalist David Wild, a photo gallery, and rare footage from a 1970s Simon & Garfunkel television special. Also included on the DVD are performances of "Wake Up Little Susie" and "All I Have To Do Is Dream" by special guests The Everly Brothers. "Bye Bye Love" is both on the CD and the DVD, and is performed by the Everlys with Simon & Garfunkel. Material for both the CD set and the DVD was taken from the duo's five standing-room-only performances at New Jersey Meadowlands' Continental Airlines Arena and New York City's Madison Square Garden, from December 2 through December 8, 2003. NEWS UPDATE OCTOBER 2003 The following article - about Don and Phil's participation as "Special Guests" during the Simon & Garfunkel "Old Friends" Concert Tour 2003 - was mailed to Fan Club members in late August. The following review of "The Essential Cadence Singles" CD was an article in the June 2003 issue of the Fan Club's Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter. To receive Fan Club mailings - your source for detailed and accurate information about The Everly Brothers - please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site and click on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" sign that is there.
ON THE ROAD WITH PAUL AND ART
BY JOHN HOSUM Don and Phil - The Everly Brothers - are scheduled to be "Special Guests" during the Simon & Garfunkel "Old Friends" Concert Tour 2003. The tour starts in October and there will be shows in major cities throughout The United States - including Madison Square Garden in New York City - with the tour ending in Florida just before Christmas. Don and Phil are scheduled to perform at every concert. As "Special Guests" at the shows, The Everly Brothers will sing three songs by themselves and then one or two songs with Simon and Garfunkel. For a complete list of tour dates and venues, please go to www.simonandgarfunkel.com - you may also want to check out the www.paulsimon.com and www.artgarfunkel.com web sites.  Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon performed several songs at their September 9th press conference after announcing their "Old Friends" concert tour. Speaking on behalf of The Everly Brothers - "Dad and Don" as he calls them - Phil's son Jason recently said, "We were thrilled and flattered to be asked." The idea to include Don and Phil on the tour came from Art Garfunkel's and Paul Simon's management, and Jason has been involved in the planning for the tour. Following the unexpected success of "The Sound of Silence" which entered the charts in December 1965 and reached # 1, Simon and Garfunkel had a run of hit singles during 1966 and 1967 - including "Homeward Bound," "I Am A Rock," "A Hazy Shade Of Winter," "Fakin' It" and "At The Zoo." "When we first became hits, we came out of the folk movement," Paul Simon said during a 1986 interview. "But you have to remember that we started to record when we were 15 - it was rock and roll, Everly Brothers imitations." Like Don and Phil, Simon and Garfunkel are graduates of American Bandstand - they actually appeared on that show in 1957 singing their debut single, "Hey, Schoolgirl" (which they had recorded under the name of "Tom and Jerry"). Throughout their careers, both have repeatedly acknowledged their debt of inspiration and influence to the original rock and roll vocal groups of the 1950s, especially Don and Phil. In fact, The Everly Brothers' 1957 hit single, "Bye Bye Love," was a feature of Simon and Garfunkel's live shows during the 1960s and they included that song in 1970 on their final studio album together, Bridge Over Troubled Water. A previously unreleased live recording of "Bye Bye Love" - from one of their 1968 concerts - was included on their 1997 triple-CD box set called Old Friends - Simon & Garfunkel. Although inspired by The Everly Brothers, they're actually not too much younger than Don and Phil. Paul Simon was born in Newark, New Jersey on October 13, 1941. Art Garfunkel was born three weeks later, on November 5th in Forest Hills, a middle-class neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens. When Simon and his family moved to Forest Hills shortly after he was born, they settled into a house only three blocks away from where the Garfunkels lived. Fate and proximity brought the two boys together, and a shared love of rock and roll made them stick together... but not forever. After a triumphant homecoming concert in Forest Hills in the summer of 1970, Simon and Garfunkel broke up. Like Don and Phil when they were apart for 10 years, Paul and Art lived under a "will-they-won't-they" cloud of speculation. It reached a feverish peak in 1975 when the duo unexpectedly issued a new single, "My Little Town," which reached # 9 in the charts. But hopes of a reunion weren't realized until September 19, 1981. That day, some 500,000 people gathered in New York City's Central Park to hear Simon and Garfunkel sing together again. The Everly Brothers' 1957 hit single, "Wake Up Little Susie," was one of the songs they performed that day and it was the single they released from The Concert In Central Park album. Don and Phil, after their reunion concert in September 1983, continued to perform together for the next 18 years until they "retired" from the road in September 2001. Simon and Garfunkel, on the other hand, went their separate ways shortly after their 1981 reunion and have only occasionally performed together since then. The upcoming "Old Friends" tour will be their first tour together in 20 years. To see and hear Simon and Garfunkel sing together in concert once again - with The Everly Brothers as their "Special Guests" - would certainly be a spectacular moment in your life, and I hope you'll be able to go to one of the shows.
THE ESSENTIAL CADENCE SINGLES
BY JOHN FERREL Although there is not exactly a big shortage of Everly Brothers Greatest Hits CD packages on the market, the newest one, released on April 15, 2003 by Varese Sarabande Records, is a very well done and excellent introduction to the music of Don and Phil. These 21 tracks, issued chronologically, virtually trace the history of early rock & roll from the groundbreaking Bo Diddley meets Beaudleaux Bryant "Bye Bye Love" to the gorgeous, fully orchestrated "Let It Be Me." Thrown into the mix is a bit of a rarity, the alternate version of "Poor Jenny." Released to the English market, it has the teen party ending at 1 a.m. with one heck of a fight, as opposed to the American version that breaks out at the far more civil time of 10 p.m. The first 11 tracks are presented in the original mono and then track 12, "Take A Message To Mary," jumps off the disc in the guise of that new-fangled phenomena: "stereo!" Wait a minute ... you mean you can have TWO speakers?? Every song is strong, every song was a hit and every song is a classic. Especially welcome are the somewhat more obscure "Should We Tell Him" and "Brand New Heartache" which - while not big hits - are nonetheless great performances of great material. The CD's eight-page booklet contains a colorful history of this era written by Bill Dahl, and there are numerous excellent photos and picture sleeves that were contributed by John Hosum. The CD's cover is especially inviting. It's a concert close-up shot that was used on an early Cadence EP and shows "the boys" impeccably groomed but ready to rock. 21 classic Cadence tracks. What more can I say?
NEWS UPDATE DECEMBER 2002 Although we've been busy the past two years assisting Warner Bros. with its reissue of Everly Brothers recordings, that work slowed down and stalled during summer 2002, mostly due to staff changes within the Warner Bros. organization. We anticipate that the project will get back on track in early 2003. As we've said before, there are no prescheduled release dates for these CDs - they simply get released once they are completed - so there is no need to preorder them. When you find them available from Tower Records, then you'll know it's time to order them from Tower or your favorite local record shop. Meanwhile, this past summer, we began assisting Donny Marrow with his dream to create a first-class vinyl records box set of Cadence 45 rpm hit singles. This project is now finished and the box set is available for purchase. And, the reissue of the 1983 Everly Brothers Reunion Concert on VHS and DVD is scheduled for release on January 21st, as described below. The following two articles - about the new vinyl records box set and the reissue of the 1983 Reunion Concert - are excerpts from the December 2002 issue of the fan club's Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter. To receive fan club mailings, please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site and click on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" sign that is there. NEW VINYL RECORDS BOX SET To honor Don and Phil Everly for their many years of recording and performing for their fans, a new limited edition collector's box set has been released. It features the 12 very best recordings from the Cadence era on six 45 rpm grey vinyl records. Each comes in a faithful reproduction of the original brown Cadence paper sleeve with maroon printing. The records were faithfully mastered - from the original tapes - by Gavin Lurssen at the Mastering Lab in Los Angeles, and they were pressed at Bill Smith Custom Records in Los Angeles, featuring the original Cadence Records label graphics.
Each numbered box set comes with a full-color montage poster that includes photos, sheet music, Cadence record sleeves, and album covers. Measuring 14 inches by 21 inches, the poster was created by Ron Bomba, an award-winning artist. He also created the cover art for the box which is a colorized version of the photo appearing on the "Wake Up Little Susie" picture sleeve. Katie Abrams provided the graphic design for the project. On the reverse side of the poster is the definitive story of The Everly Brothers written by John Hosum, adapted from the story that he wrote for the 1997 UK tour book. Select quotes from industry legends, such as Chet Atkins, and former Everly Brothers band members also appear on the reverse side of the poster. For example, Pete Wingfield says: "Now all you collectors out there can not only revisit this great music in all its analog glory, you also get to watch those classy maroon and silver labels once again spinning 'round at 45 rpm - the way it was meant to be!" Included in each box set is an authentic Everly Music Company "Star" guitar pick from Phil's guitar string business in California. All in all, this box set is a fitting tribute to Don and Phil, and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to the scholarship trust fund of The Everly Brothers Foundation in Central City, Kentucky. Each numbered box set costs $49.95 plus shipping, and may be ordered at www.timepools.com or by calling 1-800-522-3774 in North America or calling 805-545-7806 worldwide (for example, from the UK, dial 0-01-805-545-7806). You may also order additional unfolded posters for $9.95 each. Fan club member Donny Marrow financed the cost of creating this limited edition box set. A personal friend of Bob Mater (the drummer in the Everly Brothers band for many years), Donny has toured as a professional drummer with Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Kidd Afrika and other artists. He shifted from live performances to studio production in 1987 and formed "Disk Eyes Productions" which was the primary music provider and A&R consultant to Muzak for 14 years. An Everly Brothers fan since the beginning, Donny finally had a chance to meet Don and Phil in 1984. Since this past summer, THE BEEHIVE fan club has been working with Donny to see this project through to completion, and we provided "The Everly Brothers" logo for the box set's cover and poster and the text for the definitive story on the reverse side of the poster. The fan club also provided the quotes from industry legends and former Everly Brothers band members THE 1983 REUNION CONCERT After someone shouted from the audience, "You never grow old with rock 'n' roll," Don Everly quickly replied, "I agree with that - I agree with that - and they said it wouldn't last - that's the part that thrills me most!" Soon, you'll be able to hear those words in pristine 5.1 Dolby Digital Stereo sound. On January 21, 2003, Image Entertainment (www.image-entertainment.com) is releasing in the US and Canada the 1983 Everly Brothers Reunion Concert on VHS (NTSC format) and on DVD (Region 1 format). This is the original 65-minute show with 21 songs that was previously released - there is no additional footage added - but the audio has been transferred to the highest quality digital.
"This incredible moment in musical history is truly an inspiration - a shining example that legendary talent can and will stand the test of time." The Reunion Concert will be released in the near future on VHS (PAL) and DVD (Region 2) format which is compatible with video and DVD players in Great Britain, Scandinavia and Europe, but it has not yet been scheduled for such release. So, fans in those parts of the world will have to be patient for a little while longer. The reissue on VHS and DVD coincides with American Public Television purchasing the rights for public broadcasting stations to televise the Reunion Concert several times between August 2002 and July 2004, and many PBS stations in North America (such as WNPT Channel 8 in Nashville) aired the concert last August. When the concert is aired in the future, between now and July 2004, many stations will be offering their viewers The Everly Brothers Reunion Concert on VHS and DVD as a "gift" for pledging their financial support to the local PBS station. On compact disc, the Reunion Concert tracks have been issued in many forms - the most recent release in 2002 being called A Night at The Royal Albert Hall (Stardust Records CLP 1224-2). However, The Complete Reunion Concert (Snapper Music SMDCD 216), released in 1999, is a two-CD set that restores to their original running order the songs that The Everly Brothers sang on September 22 and 23, 1983 - something with which the original double album and subsequent reissues have taken liberties. Also, the Snapper Music's eight-page booklet includes the original LP liner notes by Tim Rice.
The following information about the Warner Bros. CD reissue project is adapted from an article that appeared in the Spring 2002 issue of the fan club’s Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter which was mailed to members in early March. To receive fan club mailings, please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site and click on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" sign there. When Snowflakes Fall In
The Summer
By John Hosum The much-anticipated new CD of tracks from The Everly Brothers’ 1961 to 1963 Warner Bros. recording sessions, called From Nashville To Hollywood, was mastered the first week of March and it joins two other CDs set for release this summer. The Rock ’n Soul / Beat & Soul CD was mastered in January and it’s reviewed by John Ferrel in the Spring 2002 issue of the Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter. The third CD, Sing Great Country Hits / Gone, Gone, Gone, was mastered in February. The track details for these three new CDs appeared for the first time anywhere in the fan club’s Spring 2002 newsletter. The fan club has advance copies of these three upcoming releases for review purposes, and John Ferrel is now preparing a review of the other two new CDs. His thoughtful review will be in the Summer 2002 issue of the fan club’s newsletter. The bonus tracks on the new CDs are in stereo – many for the first time. In addition, From Nashville To Hollywood brings us some tracks that are different versions of some songs previously released on The New Album in 1977 and on the Nice Guys and Susie Q albums in the 1980s. When Don and Phil recorded songs for Warner Bros., they kept recording the song until the last complete take was considered to be “the best” and, therefore, it was chosen to be released as a single or as an album track. But, often, the other takes are quite interesting and different. For example, “Nancy’s Minuet” was recorded on January 27, 1963 and released as a single (WB 5346). Version #1 of the song (recorded on September 4, 1962) was included on The New Album that was released in 1977. However, take 5 of Version #1 has different lyrics and is a different arrangement, so it’s included on the From Nashville To Hollywood CD. No tape could be located for Version #2 (listed in the Warner Bros. files as being recorded on January 24, 1963). The flip side of the "Nancy’s Minuet" single was also recorded on January 27, 1963. However, there’s a ballad version of "(So It Was... So It Is) So It Always Will Be" that sounds a bit like the song "Torture," and so it’s included on the From Nashville To Hollywood CD. Similarly, "I’m Afraid" (WB 5362) was recorded on January 28, 1963. Before that version was selected to be the released version, Don and Phil recorded an interesting, almost James Bond sounding version of the song, and we hear that take for the first time on this new CD. Work has now begun on the liner notes and the booklet designs for these three new CDs to be released mid-year. After they’re completed, work will begin on the next set of releases, which includes In Our Image / Two Yanks In England, Hit Sound / The Everly Brothers Sing, Roots, and The Everly Brothers Show. Like the other CDs in the series, these too will have related bonus tracks. For the numerous songs recorded by Don and Phil in the late 1960s that did not appear on an album at the time (including those that did not get released), a CD similar to From Nashville To Hollywood will be created. There is no pre-planned release schedule for the CDs in the Warner Bros. reissue series – they simply get released once they are completed – and there is no need to pre-order these CDs from anyone because they’re widely available once they come out. For example, the first two CDs in the Warner Bros. reissue series (described below) have been readily available at major record stores throughout the United States and Canada since a few weeks after they were released in England in July 2001. Anyone telling you that the Warner Bros. CDs are not available in the USA is simply someone trying to get your money. However, if you want copies sent to you on the actual day of release, all you have to do is keep in touch with Tower Records. If you order your copies of the new Warner Bros. CDs once you see them listed in the Tower Records database at www.towerrecords.co.uk, your copies will be mailed to you by Air Mail from Tower Records in London on the day of release. For example, It’s Everly Time / A Date With The Everly Brothers was released in England on July 23, 2001 and fans in the United States who ordered that CD from Tower Records received their order by the end of July. Anyone who has been telling you that the upcoming three CDs were scheduled to be released on April 8th (and then, later, blaming Warner Bros. for a "delay") is, again, simply someone trying to get your money. So, be skeptical about any advertising you may see. To get the new Warner Bros. releases as soon as they come out, it’s best to stick with Tower Records or your favorite local record shop. Once they are available, the new Warner Bros. CDs can be ordered simply by calling Tower Records at 1-800-648-4844 in North America, 0870-380-7490 in the UK, and 916-373-3050 worldwide, or by visiting www.towerrecords.com or www.towerrecords.co.uk on the Internet. When you call Tower, the new CDs will first appear in their UK database since it will take a little while for copies to be imported to the US and be available from their US distribution center. Likewise, you will find them first at www.towerrecords.co.uk on the Internet, and then later they will also appear at www.towerrecords.com. To supplement the release on CD of the Warner Bros. recordings by Don and Phil – and to help generate interest in their music – Warner Music International will be releasing a “Greatest Hits” package. It will be called The Definitive Everly Brothers and it will be 50 songs spanning their career from “Bye Bye Love” to “On The Wings Of A Nightingale” (see complete track list below). The mastering for this double-CD set occurred on April 29th and 30th. Several songs are presented in their original mono mixes, including “It’s My Time,” “Empty Boxes,” “Lord Of the Manor,” “Milk Train,” and “Yves,” but collectors will be pleased that “It’s Been Nice (Goodnight)” is presented here in stereo for the first time ever. This double-CD set will be released before the upcoming three new Warner Bros. CDs and, in addition to being available from stores throughout the world, it will be telemarketed in Europe. Following are the track details for the
three new Warner Bros. CDs that will be released in mid-year. These
details appeared for the first time anywhere in the fan club’s Spring 2002
Heartaches
& Harmonies newsletter that was mailed to members in early
March. To receive fan club mailings, please go to the “Fan Club Information”
section of our web site and click on the “Yes, Sign Me Up!” sign there.
Country Music Hall of Fame A short film with highlights of their careers was shown for each of the 12 acts as they were inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on October 4, 2001 during a special ceremony at a dinner in Nashville. The induction of The Everly Brothers was the finale of the evening so their film was the longest, lasting about nine minutes. Their film was narrated by Mark Knopfler - an Everly Brothers fan and a close friend of Chet Atkins - and traced the story of The Everly Brothers, starting in Kentucky. It recognized Don and Phil individually as songwriters, and also was a tribute to Ike Everly who sacrificed his own musical career to help his sons make it in the music business. Work on the film began in August. As we've done since 1995 for all major projects that honor "the boys," THE BEEHIVE Fan Club provided advice, story ideas, photos, audio, video, and other reference materials to help create this tribute film. In an E-mail message that was received a few days before the ceremony, Rusty Wilcoxen, the producer for The Everly Brothers induction, wrote, "You need to know that I could not have done the job on The Everlys without you." CBS-TV used some of Rusty's film during
its November 7th broadcast of the "35th
Annual CMA Awards" plus some footage filmed at the October 4th
induction ceremony. It is estimated that the show had 25 million viewers
worldwide.
Meanwhile, in late September, Don and Phil made it known that they will be taking a year off from doing live shows. They are feeling the strain of touring, and both have personal projects to work on. This means that all previously advertised concerts - in Atlantic City and Las Vegas - have been canceled, with their last performance to date being in Central City on September 1st at the Homecoming Music Festival. When Don and Phil began touring in 1984 - after their reunion the previous year - Don had predicted, during an interview for the TV show "Entertainment Tonight," that people would still want to hear "Bye Bye Love" 20 years from then. And Phil added, "We'll still be doing rock 'n' roll - it may be from a rocking chair, but we'll still be rockin'." Today - almost 20 years later - they are still rockin', and we're rockin' with them and wish them well for the coming year. Those lucky enough to have seen an Everly Brothers concert this past summer will have very happy memories. And, of course, what we're all hoping for is to hear Don and Phil in concert again - and in the not too distant future. Looking ahead, we have three or four more Warner Bros. CDs coming out during 2002, with the third CD in the series being called From Nashville To Hollywood. It will include tracks recorded in 1962 plus some tracks from 1961 that did not fit onto the first two CDs in the series. It will contain many previously unreleased tracks, such as a version of "Burma Shave" with different lyrics. Like the other CDs in the series, it will be available from Tower Records and all other stores that carry imports from England, The Warner Bros. CDs can be ordered by calling Tower Records (1-800-648-4844 in North America, 0870-380-7490 in the UK, and 916-373-3050 worldwide) and by visiting www.towerrecords.com or www.towerrecords.co.uk on the Internet. The first two CDs were released in England on July 23, 2001 and fans in the US who ordered them from Tower Records received the CDs by the end of July. The Warner Bros. CDs can also be ordered from any record shop. Also, the November 2001 issue of MOJO magazine has an interview with Phil featured in their "All Back To My Place" article for which THE BEEHIVE Fan Club provided a recent color photo of Phil. All of the above news about Don and Phil was contained in the October 2001 Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter from THE BEEHIVE Fan Club. That issue also included, among other things, articles by Marcy Aschenbrenner, Tricia Wales, John Firminger, John Grant, and Glen Johnson - with photos contributed by Tim Staubitz, David Roll, and Kathy Costello, plus two photos of Don with Chet Atkins provided by Tim Campbell. If you are not receiving our mailings, you're missing out on a lot of news about Don and Phil as well as background information about the Warner Bros. recordings and the CD reissue project. We understand there are a lot of fans who are only on the "fringe" - willing to go to concerts if they are nearby and willing to buy CDs when they come out, but not willing to support Don and Phil in any other way. Perhaps the time has come for you to join their fan club. We send news to fan club members first - later, we put some information in our web site for the general public. To sign up to receive fan club mailings,
please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site. Click
on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" headline there and it will take you to a coupon
to complete and mail in. There also is some merchandise that fan club members
can order. When your membership payment is received, we'll start your subscription
with the October 2001 issue of the Heartaches & Harmonies
newsletter.  These are exciting days for fans of The Everly Brothers! As announced in THE BEEHIVE Fan Club's Summer 2000 Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter, all of the recordings which Don and Phil made for Warner Bros. Records from 1960 to 1970 will be released on compact disc. The recordings will be issued in chronological order, including all previously unreleased tracks. Andrew Sandoval and Bill Inglot are doing the tape research and mastering, and Warner Music International in London is responsible for the reissue project. The CDs will be released in England and easily available in The United States and throughout the world as an import. They can be ordered from Tower Records (1-800-648-4844 or www.towerrecords.com), Tower Records UK (1-800-648-4844 or www.towerrecords.co.uk), and from other stores that carry UK imports. The first two CDs are being released on July 23, 2001. The 24-page, full-color booklets that come with the CDs include essays by Gavin Martin and Andrew Sandoval, and both Don and Phil have contributed interviews. "What I'd like," says Phil in the liner notes for the second CD, "is for people to go back and take another listen to some of the things we recorded." The first CD in the series combines the two albums recorded in 1960 - It's Everly Time! and A Date With The Everly Brothers - with seven bonus tracks (Warner Bros. 9362 47869-2). The second CD in the series combines the two albums recorded in 1961 - Both Sides of an Evening and Instant Party - with eight bonus tracks (Warner Bros. 9362 47870-2).
It's Everly Time
Both Sides Of An Evening
The third CD in the series will be called From Nashville To Hollywood and it will include tracks recorded in 1962 plus tracks from 1960 and 1961 that didn't fit onto the first two CDs. For sure, Rock 'n Soul will be coupled with Beat & Soul, but whether the other albums will be combined or released individually will depend upon how many bonus tracks would be appropriate to include on the CD. For example, there is a multitude of possible bonus tracks to include with the Roots album, so it'll be released by itself. For previously unreleased songs like "Casey's Last Ride" (recorded August 27, 1969), there will probably be a CD entitled The 1969 - 1970 Sessions. Retailers would only want to stock the 1962 Christmas With The Everly Brothers album during the holiday season, so it will be issued by itself. The planned bonus tracks on the Christmas With The Everly Brothers CD are their 1946 Christmas Day performances on radio station KMA in Shenandoah, Iowa. A snippet from that live broadcast was included in TNN's "The Life and Times of The Everly Brothers" (that first aired in 1996) and A&E's Biography show "Brothers In Harmony" (that first aired in 1999). As we did for both of those TV shows, THE BEEHIVE has contacted KMA and obtained permission for the 1946 recordings by Don and Phil to be included on the upcoming Warner Bros. CD. There are plans for a radio and TV documentary to air in the UK during the period when the CDs are being released by Warner Music International, and there are plans for a boxed set to be released after all of the individual CDs have been released. What will be in the boxed set is yet to be decided, but it will include bonus tracks and rarities that didn't fit onto the individual CDs. This project is "enthusiasm driven" by everyone working on it and, for sure, there'll be many surprises along the way. THE BEEHIVE Everly Brothers Fan Club will keep members informed about all that happens, through its Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter and other mailings, and we will try to give members as much behind-the-scenes detail as possible. Later, some information will be added to our web site for the general public. To sign up to receive mailings from THE BEEHIVE Fan Club, please go to the "Fan Club Information" section of our web site and click on the "Yes, Sign Me Up!" headline. That will take you to a coupon to complete and mail in, and there also is some merchandise you can order.
Another project that Andrew Sandoval, Bill Inglot, and THE BEEHIVE have been involved with is the two-CD set that was released on April 3, 2001 entitled The Complete Cadence Recordings 1957-1960 (Varese Sarabande Records 302 066 217 2). The set includes every song from every recording session and features a previously unreleased version of the pre-Cadence demo "Give Me A Future" taken from a tape source. You can clearly hear Don's guitar intro to this song which he later used at the beginning of "Bye Bye Love." Four previously unreleased tracks, recorded by Phil in the late 1950s, are included at the end of Disc One. Disc One
Disc Two
By John Ferrel
First, a brief history lesson. There was a time (about 30 years ago) when vinyl records ruled the land. And there was a time, from about 1962 to 1970 - known to Everlyologists as "the great drought" (longdryspell-ocene period) - when NO recording from their first hit era, the Cadence Records days, was available in the U.S. If you happened to want to hear, say, "Wake Up Little Susie," you could try to find a used LP record or a dreadful sounding 45, or you could do without. But, there is good news. We are now in the CD (tunes-aplentious era) and we're seeing fabulous reissues of material long out of print or, in a few cases, heretofore unknown. The Complete Cadence Recordings 1957-1960 - released in the U.S. on April 3, 2001 - is a wonderful chronological issue of every song from every recording session by Don and Phil on their first hit label. One surprise is the opening track, "Give Me a Future," which is a previously unreleased version of an early demo tape which: a) helped gain the brothers their chance to record for Cadence Records, and b) contained the open-tuned guitar riff that Don grafted onto "Bye Bye Love" - which was a key ingredient toward making that song a hit and which paved the way to creating the "Everly Sound." Not bad for a 1:45 demo. All the familiar hits, B-sides and album tracks are here in crystal clear sound. It's wonderful to hear lesser known tracks like Little Richard's "Keep A-Knockin'" sublimely sung, wonderfully played - a joy to hear. Ending Disc One of the two-disc set are four never-heard Phil Everly solo demo tracks from this time frame: "Sally Sunshine," "You Can Bet," "I Can't Recall," and "Wishing Won't Make It So." Though none of the tunes was ever recorded by Don and Phil, "You Can Bet" was recorded in the '80s by the Shakin' Pyramids. Disc Two opens with the complete LP Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, probably the single best non-rock recording by anyone in the early rock era. To hear long haired rockers sing "Down in the Willow Garden," performing it with such feeling and integrity, is beyond compare. After the 12 superb folk tunes, the CD wraps up with 12 more rockers, ending with February 1960's "When Will I Be Loved," their last Cadence waxing. Three weeks later they were back in the same studio with the same musicians - but this time under the wings of a new label, Warner Bros. By early 1960, Don and Phil Everly were "hot, hot, hot" with a string of nine Top Ten U.S. hits in two and a half years and a bright future ahead of them. Their Cadence contract had run out. The new West Coast label, Warner Bros., had offered the Everlys a staggering sum of money for a ten-year period. The Everlys signed and began a wonderful string of recordings similar in style and success to their Cadence days, but now the "boys" were afforded a little more room to experiment, working with new sounds as the recordings became a little more album oriented. But they also still released killer singles: "Cathy's Clown," "So Sad," etc. Based on song quality, performances, and hits generated, the first two Warner Bros. albums - It's Everly Time and A Date With The Everly Brothers - were the absolute peak. With the reissue of these two albums on compact disc, we hear in gorgeous stereo the hits, but also the undeservedly obscure "Sigh, Cry, Almost Die" and "It's Just Too Much," both penned by Don and Phil and every bit as strong as the more well known hits. "Filling out" the CD are seven non-album tracks recorded at the same time as the albums: "Ebony Eyes," "Walk Right Back," and "Temptation," plus a couple of alternate takes and my all-time favorite unreleased gem, "The Silent Treatment." This was recorded during the Date With sessions and only issued on the hopelessly obscure (for U.S. fans) New Album in 1977. "Treatment" bemoans a girlfriend "ducking" (i.e., avoiding) one's boyfriend - or, as Don so sublimely sings, "We've been apart so long I've forgotten how you look." Oh, the pathos. It's a GREAT track! This lead us to Both Sides Of An Evening and Instant Party. Prior to recording these two albums, the Everlys had parted with their management team. One element of the breakup was no more access to the songs written by the incomparable Boudleaux and Felice Bryant, who had contributed approximately one-third of all the prior Everly releases, with a very high percentage of those being hits. The Brothers decided to record two albums basically comprised of standards. Most of the material on Both Sides are songs dating from the 1920s and 1930s, with one side of the LP "for dancing" and the other side "for dreaming." Even by 1960 standards, these were odd songs - sort of Songs Our Daddy Taught Us meets Tin Pan Alley. Now we all have our biases and here's mine: I LOVE this album. My dear Aunt Marilyn gave it to me for Christmas, and I played it until you could see through the plastic. Then I played it some more. I don't care if they were covering Al Jolson ("Mammy") or suggesting that teens would actually want to dance the Charleston ("Mention My Name in Sheboygan") ... these tunes ROCK! The singing and arrangements somehow blend with the rather weird song choices. "My Grandfather's Clock" is a masterpiece of syncopation and the ballads ("for dreaming," remember) are sung with conviction. Listen to this with an open mind and ENJOY! Less can be said for Instant Party. The obvious standouts are two traditional tunes arranged by Ike Everly ("Long Lost John" and "Groundhog") plus Don and Phil's "Step It Up and Go." These have a great "country" feel to them. But the rest of the tunes are largely standards taken at a snail's pace, "Autumn Leaves," "Bye Bye Blackbird," and "The Party's Over" (no kidding!). The arrangements are less spirited and inventive than Both Sides though "True Love" is nicely handled and Frankie Laine's "Jezebel" is an up-tempo winner. Ending this CD are great bonus tracks: hits "Crying In The Rain" and "That's Old Fashioned," the non-hit "It's Been Nice," and exotic out-takes "Hernando's Hideaway" and Don's take on "The Sheik of Araby" ("from old Kentucky," nonetheless). Overall, these two albums are filled with many outstanding performances, even though they lead into new ground, musically. The musical backing is consistently superb. Chet Atkins, Hank Garland, Ray Edenton, Lightning Chance, Buddy Harmon and many others provided the essential sound to let Don and Phil do what they do best: show off some of the greatest singing talent in the history of pop music. 
By John Hosum
Once you see the packaging and booklets and hear the first two Warner Bros. CDs, you will be eagerly looking forward to getting the other CDs in the series that will be released during the next two years! Since summer 2000, Janet and I have been working with Andrew Sandoval, Gavin Martin, and Stuart Batsford of Warner Music International. We've been providing information, reference materials, and ideas for the WB project - it's fan club work done behind the scenes and it helps to keep the project moving forward. In February, I made a couple of phone calls and, the next day, Phil called Gavin Martin in London to be interviewed for the liner notes for the first two CDs. The next day, Don called Gavin and was interviewed. When you read Gavin's and Andrew Sandoval's essays in the 24-page booklets that come with the CDs, you'll gain new insight about - and appreciation for - the Warner Bros. recordings which Don and Phil made in 1960 and 1961. The tracks included on the first CD were listed in an article in the Summer 2000 issue of the Heartaches & Harmonies newsletter, and the tracks on the second CD were listed in the April 2001 It's Everly Time! mailing that we sent out. "What I'd like," says Phil in the liner notes for the second CD, "is for people to go back and take another listen to some of the things we recorded." The sound quality, of course, is absolutely pristine on these Warner Bros. compact discs. All of the songs, except one, are in gorgeous stereo, and it's very interesting to listen all the way through and not hear any pops or clicks or other sounds that are common to vinyl records. "It's Been Nice (Goodnight)" is the one song that's not in stereo. There is a multi-track of this recording but it's not possible to make a satisfying stereo mix because the backing track is on one channel, Don and Phil are on another channel, and the backing vocals are on a third channel. So, the second CD includes this song in its original mono mix. During the past few months, Janet and I have been working with Andrew, Stuart, and Gill Massey (Project Co-ordinator), proofreading the text and reviewing the designs of the 24-page, full-color booklets that come with the releases. The first CD - It's Everly Time/A Date With The Everly Brothers - was originally scheduled to be in stores on March 26th but the design of its booklet wasn't quite right, so the release was delayed. The re-design also had some things that needed to be changed, and some other things added, so it wasn't possible to meet the next scheduled release date of May 28th. But now, the third version of the booklet is brilliant so the CD will be in stores on July 23, 2001. The booklet design for the second CD in the series - Both Sides Of An Evening/Instant Party - has now been completed as well, so that CD also is scheduled to be in stores on July 23rd. It's been a real pleasure working with Andrew, Gavin, Stuart, and Gill - their enthusiasm for the music by Don and Phil is the driving force behind the unsurpassed quality of the Warner Bros. releases. Janet and I are looking forward to working with them on the other releases that will be coming out during the next two years. The new two-CD set from Varese Sarabande Records, The Complete Cadence Recordings 1957-1960, should not to be overlooked with all the excitement about the upcoming Warner Bros. releases. It's a "must have" for all diehard Everly fans and takes its place alongside the 1992 Bear Family box set, Classic Everly Brothers, and the Rhino Records CD of alternate takes, All They Had To Do Was Dream. The new Varese set includes four previously unreleased tracks from the late 1950s that were recorded by Phil alone, which come to us from a private collector's tapes, and the eight-page booklet includes liner notes by Andrew Sandoval and photos from THE BEEHIVE. Enjoy the new music!
The new album is an appropriate gift for friends to give to friends - and for lovers to give to lovers - whether the occasion is Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, or someone's birthday. To order the new CD, go to www.varesesarabande.com or www.towerrecords.com or www.discol.com or visit your local record store. The tracks on the CD are: Devoted To You - Like Strangers - All I Have To Do Is Dream - Oh True Love - When Will I Be Loved - Love Of My Life - Take A Message To Mary - Oh, So Many Years - Life Ain't Worth Living - ('Til) I Kissed You - Oh, What A Feeling - Brand New Heartache - Since You Broke My Heart - Maybe Tomorrow - I Wonder If I Care As Much - Let It Be Me This 16-track CD has been selling quite well. Favorable reviews have appeared in Now Dig This, Country Music People and Record Collector magazines in the UK, in Jamboree in Italy, and in Blue Suede News, Goldmine and Rock 'n' Blues News magazines in the US. The May 2000 issue of Country Music People features the CD as one of only four albums in the "spotlight" out of a total of 27 albums reviewed in that issue. John Tobler gives it "five stars" which is the highest possible rating. He ends his review by saying, "...this is wall-to-wall fabulous, so if you haven't already got these tracks, just go and get the album now, OK?" The review of the CD by Tower Records is in their web site. Here's what Tower Records says about the album: "Devoted To You is a very interesting collection of early Everly Brothers ballads recorded between 1957 and 1960, during the Everlys' tenure at Cadence Records. This material arguably represents their peak creative period. Devoted mixes familiar hits ("Devoted To You," "All I Have To Do Is Dream," "When Will I Be Loved") with B-sides and with outtakes and demos previously unreleased in America, including the exquisite "Life Ain't Worth Living." Interestingly, the less familiar material tends to skew more toward the Everlys' country roots. "I Wonder If I Care As Much," for example, is one of the very few Everly Brothers songs graced with pedal-steel guitar." The eight-page booklet that comes with
the CD has comments by both Don and Phil about the songs. THE BEEHIVE
Everly Brothers Fan Club provided the photos for the CD's booklet which
resembles an old-fashioned, leather-bound photo album. An essay about love,
written by John Hosum, is the foreword to the liner notes written by Andrew
Sandoval.
In Guitarist Magazine The May 2000 issue of Guitarist, Europe's biggest selling guitar magazine which is printed in England, featured a three-page article about Phil Everly. "At first I just couldn't get the harmony at all," says Phil in the article. "I kept falling off my line and getting onto the lead, which Donald was singing. "We were living on a farm in Iowa at the time and I was in the third grade I suppose. I clearly remember Dad and everyone coming back from town one day and I was sitting on a bed spring that we'd slung between two trees like a hammock. Dad called me in and we started singing, and I could suddenly do it. And I could do it from then on, with no thought, no mental process at all. Something clicked in my brain I guess and it's something I've always marvelled at. The thing is, I couldn't sing you my part in any song that we do, because Donald and I just sing and it's different every time." Regarding another UK tour, Phil says, "We'd
like to come and play one more time before we retire, because we love working
there."
Featured In Acoustic Guitar The August 2000 issue of Acoustic Guitar
magazine had a 14-page feature article about The Everly Brothers including
a guitar transcription for "Wake Up Little Susie." THE BEEHIVE Everly
Brothers Fan Club provided photos and reference material to the magazine
in support of the article. To read "Rock Foundation - How The Everly Brothers
Helped Pave The Way For The '60s Musical Revolution," go to www.acousticguitar.com.
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Just
in time for Valentine's Day last year, Devoted To You - The Everly
Brothers' Love Songs (Varese Sarabande Records 302 066 096 2) was
released on February 8, 2000. It's a unique collection of 16 early tracks
including "Oh True Love" and "Life Ain't Worth Living (If I Can't Live
It With You)."