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| Sort of like that, but with a dude. |
The Hit
“Judy in Disguise (with Glasses)” a late-60s novelty pop song, if you’ve ever heard one, but it has a better back-story than you’d think. It had two inspirations. First, it’s a nonsense spin on The Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky (with Diamonds),” with lyrics cobbled together from snippets of TV shows (notably The Monkees). Second, during a show in Florida, the songwriter, John Fred Gourrier (who I’ll mostly refer to as “Gourrier”), saw a girl wearing large sunglasses “getting hustled” by a guy, only “She took off these glasses, and she could stop a clock” (that is, the big glasses hid a beautiful face.)
Or, you could just roll with this tidy summary from Way Back Attack:
“The arrangement, all horns and strings and an infectious bass line with some oddly-placed moans and groans, makes it all add up to a peculiar-but-catchy late-'60s hit.”
My only personal memory of the song comes from an old commercial for one of those old rock collections they used to sell over the airwaves. It featured a guy dressed as a nerd (and wearing glasses) bouncing up and down between two girls in a record store, and it just didn't look right. Anyway, that note’s dead-right on the “moans and groans” (what were they going for?)…still, that’s a fair take on that bass line…
The Rest of the Story
When I started this project, I went in expecting to run into an act like John Fred & His Playboy Band (yes, name inspired by Hef’s famous product). It took some digging to find it, but Gourrier feels seems to think of “Judy in Disguise (with a Glasses)” as a turn into a cul-de-sac. As he put it:
“Judy in Disguise (with Glasses)” a late-60s novelty pop song, if you’ve ever heard one, but it has a better back-story than you’d think. It had two inspirations. First, it’s a nonsense spin on The Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky (with Diamonds),” with lyrics cobbled together from snippets of TV shows (notably The Monkees). Second, during a show in Florida, the songwriter, John Fred Gourrier (who I’ll mostly refer to as “Gourrier”), saw a girl wearing large sunglasses “getting hustled” by a guy, only “She took off these glasses, and she could stop a clock” (that is, the big glasses hid a beautiful face.)
Or, you could just roll with this tidy summary from Way Back Attack:
“The arrangement, all horns and strings and an infectious bass line with some oddly-placed moans and groans, makes it all add up to a peculiar-but-catchy late-'60s hit.”
My only personal memory of the song comes from an old commercial for one of those old rock collections they used to sell over the airwaves. It featured a guy dressed as a nerd (and wearing glasses) bouncing up and down between two girls in a record store, and it just didn't look right. Anyway, that note’s dead-right on the “moans and groans” (what were they going for?)…still, that’s a fair take on that bass line…
The Rest of the Story
When I started this project, I went in expecting to run into an act like John Fred & His Playboy Band (yes, name inspired by Hef’s famous product). It took some digging to find it, but Gourrier feels seems to think of “Judy in Disguise (with a Glasses)” as a turn into a cul-de-sac. As he put it:
“Andrew Bernard, our sax player, did most of the arrangements. We burned. We got some hot cuts put out before ‘Judy’ got us typecast.”
He didn’t hate the song, by any means (and he sticks up for it all the way to an anecdote about Paul McCartney saying how much he liked it), but, after (fer reals) starting at age 15, Gourrier had been in the game nearly a decade by the time he and Bernard wrote “Judy.” Moreover, he didn’t write many songs like that before it, and he didn’t want to keep writing songs like that after (though the bass line in “No Good to Cry” echoes a bit). One more quote to drive it home, then I’ll get to their story:
“Here we were doin’ tight Wilson Pickett…. We were a white R & B band. We wanted to do what was happening, but didn’t get the chance to show our roots. We got cast and put on tours as this bubble-gum thing that we weren’t.”
To flesh out the “we,” at the time “Judy” dropped in 1968, the rest of His Playboy Band featured Harold Cowart on bass, Tommy “Dee” DeGeneres on keys, Joe Maceli on drums/percussion, Jimmy O’Rourche on guitar, and Charlie “Spinn” Spinosa on trumpet. That looks like the second iteration of the band. The original started all the way back in 1959, a single called “Shirley,” and Gourrier (et. al.?) recording with Fats Domino’s session players. The single caught Alan Freed’s ear and got John Fred and His Playboys (as they were called then) up north, and on the radio. They floated a couple other singles into the world – e.g. a cover of John Lee Hooker’s “Boogie Chillen’” (re-christened “Boogie Children" by John Fred) and a soft, wounded number called “Wrong to Me” – on Southern regional labels (e.g, En-Joy for the former, Jewel the latter).
Based on the limited material I read, they hung around the same level until Gourrier took time off for college (photos explain the basketball scholarships). He reformed the act when he got out – the one noted above, presumably – and kept plugging till that hit half-lucky, all-weird with “Judy.” They kept plugging away afterwards too, but the only thing that cracked the Top 100 after “Judy” was the follow up, “Hey, Hey Bunny.” In a moment, I’ll cherish, Gourrier recalled the following from his later career:
“Everytime we put out another record, they’d go, ‘Oh, man, this ain’t no ‘Judy in Disguise.’ Well, shit no, of course it wasn’t.”
"Shit, no, of course it wasn't." (God, that's perfect.) I can’t speak to what happened with the rest of the band, but “John Fred” put out a solo album as late as 2001, and he did some local radio and stage work to his end – which, since I have it handy, came to him in April 2005. As I’ve worked through this project, I’ve come across plenty of stories to like, and some weird shit, but there’s this great story with John Fred & His Playboy Band; the career makes it a little extraordinary, but also tragicomic in a very human way.
About the Sampler
Spotify has two albums from John Fred & His Playboy Band’s glory days – Agnes English and Permanently Stated, both from ’68 – so the rest of the sampler – with the exception of “I Miss Y’All” from 2001’s I Miss Y’All - from there. Neither album really juiced my dopamine, but, a couple exceptions aside, there's nothing to insult your ears. Judging from the sampler, I rate Agnes English at least twice as highly. To hold up one ear-catching single, “Out of Left Field,” has a certain composed quality to it.
To just list and link the songs I haven’t already listed above, I pulled “Lonely Are the Lonely” (decent, tres late-60s; no audio, dammit) and “Tissue Paper” from Permanently Stated, the latter only because I think it’s genuinely terrible. Agnes English gave me more to work with – e.g., the (hokey AF) title track, a drawling tune called “Most Unlikely to Succeed,” a solid pop-rock number called “Off the Wall,” and, a second favorite, “Sometimes You Just Can’t Win,” which seems sophisticated enough (the phrasing of Gourrier’s vocals just fit so well) to make you wonder what they could have done with a third album, or without “Judy.”
Oh, in another fun touch, Gourrier’s had some complaints about marketing in general, and the cover of Agnes English in particular (“then that album cover made us look like some drum and bugle corp”).
Source(s)
Wikipedia
Way Back Attack
One Hit Wonders, No. 60
Stereogum (who did not like "Judy," no sir.)
He didn’t hate the song, by any means (and he sticks up for it all the way to an anecdote about Paul McCartney saying how much he liked it), but, after (fer reals) starting at age 15, Gourrier had been in the game nearly a decade by the time he and Bernard wrote “Judy.” Moreover, he didn’t write many songs like that before it, and he didn’t want to keep writing songs like that after (though the bass line in “No Good to Cry” echoes a bit). One more quote to drive it home, then I’ll get to their story:
“Here we were doin’ tight Wilson Pickett…. We were a white R & B band. We wanted to do what was happening, but didn’t get the chance to show our roots. We got cast and put on tours as this bubble-gum thing that we weren’t.”
To flesh out the “we,” at the time “Judy” dropped in 1968, the rest of His Playboy Band featured Harold Cowart on bass, Tommy “Dee” DeGeneres on keys, Joe Maceli on drums/percussion, Jimmy O’Rourche on guitar, and Charlie “Spinn” Spinosa on trumpet. That looks like the second iteration of the band. The original started all the way back in 1959, a single called “Shirley,” and Gourrier (et. al.?) recording with Fats Domino’s session players. The single caught Alan Freed’s ear and got John Fred and His Playboys (as they were called then) up north, and on the radio. They floated a couple other singles into the world – e.g. a cover of John Lee Hooker’s “Boogie Chillen’” (re-christened “Boogie Children" by John Fred) and a soft, wounded number called “Wrong to Me” – on Southern regional labels (e.g, En-Joy for the former, Jewel the latter).
Based on the limited material I read, they hung around the same level until Gourrier took time off for college (photos explain the basketball scholarships). He reformed the act when he got out – the one noted above, presumably – and kept plugging till that hit half-lucky, all-weird with “Judy.” They kept plugging away afterwards too, but the only thing that cracked the Top 100 after “Judy” was the follow up, “Hey, Hey Bunny.” In a moment, I’ll cherish, Gourrier recalled the following from his later career:
“Everytime we put out another record, they’d go, ‘Oh, man, this ain’t no ‘Judy in Disguise.’ Well, shit no, of course it wasn’t.”
"Shit, no, of course it wasn't." (God, that's perfect.) I can’t speak to what happened with the rest of the band, but “John Fred” put out a solo album as late as 2001, and he did some local radio and stage work to his end – which, since I have it handy, came to him in April 2005. As I’ve worked through this project, I’ve come across plenty of stories to like, and some weird shit, but there’s this great story with John Fred & His Playboy Band; the career makes it a little extraordinary, but also tragicomic in a very human way.
About the Sampler
Spotify has two albums from John Fred & His Playboy Band’s glory days – Agnes English and Permanently Stated, both from ’68 – so the rest of the sampler – with the exception of “I Miss Y’All” from 2001’s I Miss Y’All - from there. Neither album really juiced my dopamine, but, a couple exceptions aside, there's nothing to insult your ears. Judging from the sampler, I rate Agnes English at least twice as highly. To hold up one ear-catching single, “Out of Left Field,” has a certain composed quality to it.
To just list and link the songs I haven’t already listed above, I pulled “Lonely Are the Lonely” (decent, tres late-60s; no audio, dammit) and “Tissue Paper” from Permanently Stated, the latter only because I think it’s genuinely terrible. Agnes English gave me more to work with – e.g., the (hokey AF) title track, a drawling tune called “Most Unlikely to Succeed,” a solid pop-rock number called “Off the Wall,” and, a second favorite, “Sometimes You Just Can’t Win,” which seems sophisticated enough (the phrasing of Gourrier’s vocals just fit so well) to make you wonder what they could have done with a third album, or without “Judy.”
Oh, in another fun touch, Gourrier’s had some complaints about marketing in general, and the cover of Agnes English in particular (“then that album cover made us look like some drum and bugle corp”).
Source(s)
Wikipedia
Way Back Attack
One Hit Wonders, No. 60
Stereogum (who did not like "Judy," no sir.)
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