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| I can think of many worse states of mind, honestly. |
The Hit
Yessir, the One Hit No More project has definitely entered into a personal blind-spot, the space between what one hears on “oldies stations” - say, The Outsiders’ “Time Won’t Let Me” - and a tune like 1971’s chart-topper, “Precious and Few,” by a band called Climax. A sensual ballad that threatens to tumble into sappy for the length of its playing time, built around tones warm as wrapping yourself in a blanket in front of a smoldering fire (those strings, those horns!), the song has a powerfully intimate feel to it. The languor in the vocals suggest either seduction or its aftermath…but even that flirts with parody. Still, it communicates a mood you can’t miss.
I mentioned “Time Won’t Let Me” in the same thought as “Precious and Few” because they came from the same band - or at least members of both. The singer was the same - Sonny Geraci, a Cleveland, Ohio native, who had the (semi-)rare honor of posting chart-toppers with two different bands - and (for lack of a better word) dated as his vocals sound in both projects, that’s a question of phrasing, not quality. Geraci had range to spare…and he looked like a solid showman.
The Rest of the Story
It started in Cleveland and ends in Los Angeles, for one, and with yet another band, The Starfires. Geraci recalls most of that band as “old, older than I – 22, 23 – and tired of the game,” but he heard the promise of a number by Tom King and Chet Kelley (“Time Won’t Let Me,” as it happens). Based on what he told Classic Bands (when? don’t know; those are always undated), he sort of took over the band, replacing the drummer and a guitarist with people who shared his enthusiasm. They released the single as The Outsiders (there’s a fun, minor dispute as to why) and the #5 hit sent them on their way to weeks-long tours, first with Paul Revere and the Raiders, then on one of a Gene Pitney package tours that included bands like ? and the Mysterians, The Shadows of Knight and a west coast act called The Seeds (that was the second of two Pitney tours, both in 1966?).
The Outsiders released four albums, three of which sold well, and they posted a couple more hits (e.g., “Girl in Love” and “Respectable”), but, like a lot of bands from that era, management pinched a little more than its share. Per a quote attributed to Geraci on One Hit Wonders the Book:
“That was our big year, 1966, but it was all over for us. By the end of the year, our manager had a Porsche; we didn’t. We could see that we weren’t getting our money, and it just tore us apart.”
After a little time out of the business, Geraci headed to LA with Outsiders guitarist Walter D. Nims and tried to get something started out there. They updated the sound of the new project, but kept the name long enough to release several singles as “The Outsiders featuring Sonny Geraci,” including “Lovin’ You”/”Think I’m Fallin’” and “Changes”/”Lost in My World.” Whatever they called themselves, one couldn’t miss the change in the music (from Geraci's obit on Best Classic Bands, btw):
“’Time Won’t Let Me,’ a frenetic dancefloor rocker, written by Tom King and Chet Kelley, incorporated popular soul music elements and was consistent with the garage-band trend of the mid-’60s. ‘Mersey meets Motown,’ was how Geraci once described it. ‘Precious and Few,’ credited to Walter D. Nims, was a sweet ballad characteristic of the soft-rock emerging at the time from the West Coast. Together they showed the diversity of which Geraci was capable.”
Back in Cleveland, King had reformed another version of the old band - “The Outsiders (featuring Jon Simonell)” - and once he caught wind of the Nims/Geraci project, he sued to reclaim “The Outsiders” name. He won too, but that didn’t hurt the new project, obviously, who released their first big hit, “Precious and Few” as Climax. It ultimately out-performed “Time Won’t Let Me,” as a single at least, topping out at #3 on the Billboard (and #1 on Cashbox). As for what happened after…
Climax kept plugging away - in Geraci’s words, “we had two or three stiff records in a row that didn't do anything for a lot of reasons” - but they did try for a follow-up…only to miss, and arguably with an assist from their label and/or management. They’d originally signed with Marc Gordon, who ran a label under various names (Carousel and, later, Rocky Road), who guided the release of “Precious and Few.” Unfortunately, Gordon both managed and was married into The 5th Dimension by way of Florence LaRue; after 5th Dimension (and LaRue, one imagines) complained that he’d neglected them, Gordon took them to the Bahamas for a couple months to rekindle…whatever needed rekindling. That happened to coincide with the time when Climax’s second stab at a hit single, “Life and Breath,” hit the charts. Without promotion (or, alternately, through lack of interest), it stalled at #52 on the Billboard.
The second miss might have hurt worse. Jon Stevenson, Climax’s keyboardist at the relevant time, invited Geraci to listen to a song called “Rock and Roll Heaven” that he’d written with him in mind. As he recalled for Classic Bands, Geraci thought it needed some goosing to play better to his strengths, but he still raved about the chorus/hook years later (e.g., "If you believe in forever /life is just a one night stand / If there's a rock and roll heaven / they've got a hell of a band”). Together, they got hold of Gordon, who called in a guy named Alan O’Day to help finesse the single. Stevenson didn’t hold publishing rights to the song, however; Warner Brothers did and, after hearing it a couple times, they got other ideas about who should sing it. Shortly thereafter, The Righteous Brothers got back together and Warner Brothers dropped a gold-record hit meant for Geraci in their laps.
The band limped on for a while - they even had a string of massive hits in Hawaii for some reason (e.g., their two hits, plus “Caroline This Time” and “Walking in the Georgia Rain”) - but they folded by 1976. There’s very little on most of the band, particularly as pertains to Climax, but, as you can read at the bottom of that One Hit Wonders the Book link, several of the members kept plugging away in the business. Geraci had the strangest coda - and one with a funny little wrinkle in it. In the Classic Bands interview, he talked about checking out of the industry from 1980-1985, finding God (that might have been his obit), and working a straight job, but his Wikipedia page mentions a 1983 project called “The Peter Emmett Story,” which featured Geraci as “Peter Emmett” and with Donny Iris’s back-up band, The Cruisers, as his back-up band. That project died after a couple shows, but there was all kinds of weird on that, including putting yet another band (North Coast?) on the album sleeve.
Geraci returned to the stage after 1985 and, by the time that Classic Bands interview rolled around, found steady gigs. I don’t know how long he kept that going, but he passed in 2017, five years after an aneurysm. Nims passed from a stroke in 2000. I can’t speak to Nims, but Geraci had made plenty of friends over the years. Naturally, someone (a dude from The Buckinghams) talked about sending him to “Rock and Roll Heaven.”
About the Sampler
I covered/linked to a fair amount of it above and, based on everything I read, most people who noticed Climax tuned in for their ballads; that said, let the record show that at least two songs listed above - “Rock and Roll Heaven” and “Lost in My World” qualify as “rockers,” and major rockers against the rests of Climax’s oeuvre. As I listened to the rest of their output, it was the “rockers” that caught my attention - e.g., a funky number titled “If It Feels Good Do It,” a borderline prog-rock number (both in structure and (superficially) content), “Merlin,” and…swear to God, a straight-rock tune called “Park Preserve” that, I have to admit, is pretty damn passable.
I rounded out the playlist with a couple more ballads, “I Got Everything” and “Rainbow Rides Are Free,” the latter mostly because I found its name funny.
To put the best bow I can on all this, Climax was quintessential post-60s, fuck-politics, easy-listening music. It had very real technical quality and ambition that borrowed from what came before - e.g., the smooth, layered production - but with the edges dulled and the fuzz bled out of the sound mix. The sounds and themes, at least at a glance, focused on intimate and romantic themes. I can’t say I blame them for any of that (my personal urge to check it is strong), but it didn’t produce a lot of truly memorable music.
Yessir, the One Hit No More project has definitely entered into a personal blind-spot, the space between what one hears on “oldies stations” - say, The Outsiders’ “Time Won’t Let Me” - and a tune like 1971’s chart-topper, “Precious and Few,” by a band called Climax. A sensual ballad that threatens to tumble into sappy for the length of its playing time, built around tones warm as wrapping yourself in a blanket in front of a smoldering fire (those strings, those horns!), the song has a powerfully intimate feel to it. The languor in the vocals suggest either seduction or its aftermath…but even that flirts with parody. Still, it communicates a mood you can’t miss.
I mentioned “Time Won’t Let Me” in the same thought as “Precious and Few” because they came from the same band - or at least members of both. The singer was the same - Sonny Geraci, a Cleveland, Ohio native, who had the (semi-)rare honor of posting chart-toppers with two different bands - and (for lack of a better word) dated as his vocals sound in both projects, that’s a question of phrasing, not quality. Geraci had range to spare…and he looked like a solid showman.
The Rest of the Story
It started in Cleveland and ends in Los Angeles, for one, and with yet another band, The Starfires. Geraci recalls most of that band as “old, older than I – 22, 23 – and tired of the game,” but he heard the promise of a number by Tom King and Chet Kelley (“Time Won’t Let Me,” as it happens). Based on what he told Classic Bands (when? don’t know; those are always undated), he sort of took over the band, replacing the drummer and a guitarist with people who shared his enthusiasm. They released the single as The Outsiders (there’s a fun, minor dispute as to why) and the #5 hit sent them on their way to weeks-long tours, first with Paul Revere and the Raiders, then on one of a Gene Pitney package tours that included bands like ? and the Mysterians, The Shadows of Knight and a west coast act called The Seeds (that was the second of two Pitney tours, both in 1966?).
The Outsiders released four albums, three of which sold well, and they posted a couple more hits (e.g., “Girl in Love” and “Respectable”), but, like a lot of bands from that era, management pinched a little more than its share. Per a quote attributed to Geraci on One Hit Wonders the Book:
“That was our big year, 1966, but it was all over for us. By the end of the year, our manager had a Porsche; we didn’t. We could see that we weren’t getting our money, and it just tore us apart.”
After a little time out of the business, Geraci headed to LA with Outsiders guitarist Walter D. Nims and tried to get something started out there. They updated the sound of the new project, but kept the name long enough to release several singles as “The Outsiders featuring Sonny Geraci,” including “Lovin’ You”/”Think I’m Fallin’” and “Changes”/”Lost in My World.” Whatever they called themselves, one couldn’t miss the change in the music (from Geraci's obit on Best Classic Bands, btw):
“’Time Won’t Let Me,’ a frenetic dancefloor rocker, written by Tom King and Chet Kelley, incorporated popular soul music elements and was consistent with the garage-band trend of the mid-’60s. ‘Mersey meets Motown,’ was how Geraci once described it. ‘Precious and Few,’ credited to Walter D. Nims, was a sweet ballad characteristic of the soft-rock emerging at the time from the West Coast. Together they showed the diversity of which Geraci was capable.”
Back in Cleveland, King had reformed another version of the old band - “The Outsiders (featuring Jon Simonell)” - and once he caught wind of the Nims/Geraci project, he sued to reclaim “The Outsiders” name. He won too, but that didn’t hurt the new project, obviously, who released their first big hit, “Precious and Few” as Climax. It ultimately out-performed “Time Won’t Let Me,” as a single at least, topping out at #3 on the Billboard (and #1 on Cashbox). As for what happened after…
Climax kept plugging away - in Geraci’s words, “we had two or three stiff records in a row that didn't do anything for a lot of reasons” - but they did try for a follow-up…only to miss, and arguably with an assist from their label and/or management. They’d originally signed with Marc Gordon, who ran a label under various names (Carousel and, later, Rocky Road), who guided the release of “Precious and Few.” Unfortunately, Gordon both managed and was married into The 5th Dimension by way of Florence LaRue; after 5th Dimension (and LaRue, one imagines) complained that he’d neglected them, Gordon took them to the Bahamas for a couple months to rekindle…whatever needed rekindling. That happened to coincide with the time when Climax’s second stab at a hit single, “Life and Breath,” hit the charts. Without promotion (or, alternately, through lack of interest), it stalled at #52 on the Billboard.
The second miss might have hurt worse. Jon Stevenson, Climax’s keyboardist at the relevant time, invited Geraci to listen to a song called “Rock and Roll Heaven” that he’d written with him in mind. As he recalled for Classic Bands, Geraci thought it needed some goosing to play better to his strengths, but he still raved about the chorus/hook years later (e.g., "If you believe in forever /life is just a one night stand / If there's a rock and roll heaven / they've got a hell of a band”). Together, they got hold of Gordon, who called in a guy named Alan O’Day to help finesse the single. Stevenson didn’t hold publishing rights to the song, however; Warner Brothers did and, after hearing it a couple times, they got other ideas about who should sing it. Shortly thereafter, The Righteous Brothers got back together and Warner Brothers dropped a gold-record hit meant for Geraci in their laps.
The band limped on for a while - they even had a string of massive hits in Hawaii for some reason (e.g., their two hits, plus “Caroline This Time” and “Walking in the Georgia Rain”) - but they folded by 1976. There’s very little on most of the band, particularly as pertains to Climax, but, as you can read at the bottom of that One Hit Wonders the Book link, several of the members kept plugging away in the business. Geraci had the strangest coda - and one with a funny little wrinkle in it. In the Classic Bands interview, he talked about checking out of the industry from 1980-1985, finding God (that might have been his obit), and working a straight job, but his Wikipedia page mentions a 1983 project called “The Peter Emmett Story,” which featured Geraci as “Peter Emmett” and with Donny Iris’s back-up band, The Cruisers, as his back-up band. That project died after a couple shows, but there was all kinds of weird on that, including putting yet another band (North Coast?) on the album sleeve.
Geraci returned to the stage after 1985 and, by the time that Classic Bands interview rolled around, found steady gigs. I don’t know how long he kept that going, but he passed in 2017, five years after an aneurysm. Nims passed from a stroke in 2000. I can’t speak to Nims, but Geraci had made plenty of friends over the years. Naturally, someone (a dude from The Buckinghams) talked about sending him to “Rock and Roll Heaven.”
About the Sampler
I covered/linked to a fair amount of it above and, based on everything I read, most people who noticed Climax tuned in for their ballads; that said, let the record show that at least two songs listed above - “Rock and Roll Heaven” and “Lost in My World” qualify as “rockers,” and major rockers against the rests of Climax’s oeuvre. As I listened to the rest of their output, it was the “rockers” that caught my attention - e.g., a funky number titled “If It Feels Good Do It,” a borderline prog-rock number (both in structure and (superficially) content), “Merlin,” and…swear to God, a straight-rock tune called “Park Preserve” that, I have to admit, is pretty damn passable.
I rounded out the playlist with a couple more ballads, “I Got Everything” and “Rainbow Rides Are Free,” the latter mostly because I found its name funny.
To put the best bow I can on all this, Climax was quintessential post-60s, fuck-politics, easy-listening music. It had very real technical quality and ambition that borrowed from what came before - e.g., the smooth, layered production - but with the edges dulled and the fuzz bled out of the sound mix. The sounds and themes, at least at a glance, focused on intimate and romantic themes. I can’t say I blame them for any of that (my personal urge to check it is strong), but it didn’t produce a lot of truly memorable music.
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