It was 40 years ago today....Jim Manolides, Andy Parypa, George Rudiger, Bob Hosko and Ned Neltner gathered in Ned's basement. They had all been in local name bands and were wanting to put something together to be a VERY Part Time thing. Just play a few of the tunes we loved. It got out of hand quickly.

Andy left early on and was replaced by the bassist for the Fabulous Wailers, Buck Ormsby. This unit got the Jr. Cadillac ball rolling. After seasoning the band in such remote locations as Bremerton and Rainier, we put together a 'showcase' at the Wintonia Tavern. From that came our regular gig at The Grapevine Tavern in Pioneer Square and, really, the beginnings of live rock 'n roll, country and R&B in the bars of the Northwest.

The first LP, "Jr. Cadillac Is Back" was recorded live at the Grapevine in the summer of '71 with Rube Tubin guesting on guitar. The LP was the template for the music to come from the band; originals, R&B classics, the odd country influence and lots of hot rock 'n roll.

There have been the sorts of mutations that any living thing goes through in that long a period of time, and as the time goes on this year, we will give you insights into those changes and happenings here at JrCadillac.com.....stay tuned. We will also welcome your stories, memories and factoids.

Part 2…

When the band hit Seattle one of those strange and (for us) wonderful things happened...we got popular. Our 'residency' at The Grapevine Tavern, under the Viaduct at the foot of Main St., Pioneer Square, Seattle. WA, drew the great and the near great 4 nights a week for months.

Suddenly other bands and taverns were seeing the success of this venture and a whole scene was spawned. Very quickly bars like the G Note, The Buffalo, The Lynnwood and in outlying areas, Goldies in Marysville, that one I can't remember the name ask George in Kent and like that were featuring local bands 5-7 nights per week. People were going out and paying 3 cover charges a nite 3-4 nights a week and packing the places. Sweat, loud music, all sorts of juices and substances flowing...that's what it was. And Jr. Cadillac was at the fulcrum, the pivot point of all this activity.

We were putting LPs out, selling 4 or 5 different kinds of T shirts in 6 colors...ladies cotton briefs, "Keep Your Nose Clean" hankies and on and on.

There weren't enough nights in the week, the month to cover all the places, parties, conventions, dances, concerts who wanted us to play. There was a time when we opened for just about every big show that went through the Northwest. The Kinks, The Beach Boys, ELO, Ten Years After, Yes, Jethro Tull, and on and on...We backed Chuck Berry over a dozen times, wrote songs ONSTAGE with Bo Diddley and, in general spread the Jr. Cadillac gospel of Good Time, Good Music Rock 'n Roll far and wide.

Part 3… New Installment 30 May!…

After our sit down at the Grapevine for several months, we were asked by Jim Napolitano and Ed Wilson to come play at their place in Interbay called, The Brotherhood. A two story, clapboard affair that was once an Odd Fellows Hall. Downstairs was a pizza parlor and up was the stage, bar and a dancing area which doubled as a basketball gymnasium. The stage was good sized and had a large backstage area. Just right for those between set safety meetings...

The owners, two enterprising lads, hit on the idea of a customer paying a cover charge which would include ALL the beer that person could drink! How they got around Washington's strict drinking laws, I'll never know, but they charged $2.50 for your insies AND all the beer. Throw in Jr. Cadillac's manic renditions of rock 'n roll favorites, and all the pieces were there for mayhem. Of a peaceful sort.

The crowd would arrive and literally be lined up down the street for a block!! We did this pretty much four nights per week for several months, maybe even a year or so. We recorded our second LP, "Volume 2" at the Brotherhood. There were nights when the floor of the place, after the show, looked like it was about 2 inches deep in mud. So much beer!!! So many people.

Fueled by the fruit of the hop and the all 'round frivolity, a few of the young ladies thought it would be a good idea to get up onstage and take their clothes off. We discouraged this activity in the guys, but certainly promoted it with the ladies. It got to be part of the weekly action on "Thirsty Thursdays". After this amateur stripping had been going on for a few weeks and the word spread, some professional hoochie coochie dancers from downtown Seattle's Palace Theatre came to "protest" the amateurs. They came and fashioned costumes from such things as aluminum foil and whatnot and came and paraded their wares in a more "professional" manner. Just way too much fun.

The music, oh, it was great, too. Jr. Cadillac was gaining momentum and a reputation that would follow us to this day of being THE party band. Good Time Rock ‘N Roll became our thing,...."Nothin' could be lackin' when you're out there Cadillacin’ " was the motto.

Part 4, added June 13…

The lineup of Jimmy on Wurlitzer piano and vocals, George on drums, Bob Hosko on tenor sax, Buck on bass and Ned, guitar and vocals, and often sitting in, Rube Tubin on VERY Northwest guitar would go on for most of 4 years. Getting more popular and spreading the gospel further was not especially to the liking of a couple of the lads. First Bobby bowed out and Ned’s old pal from Spokane, Les Clinkingbeard was a natural to fill that chair. All it took was a phone call from Ned and a one way plane ticket and Les was in the band the following weekend. Shortly thereafter Jimmy found that he'd had enough also. Now we're down to a 4 piece and went like that for awhile. Meantime we had picked up a new roadie, Tommy Katica. An on fire young man from Queen Anne. Les and he were living in the same house and Les showed Tommy some things on piano…slowly Tommy was included on more and more songs until, one night, he was just onstage for the whole show.

his was a change that would benefit the band a great deal in terms of growing our popularity. Tommy was a cutie pie and ALL the girls liked him a lot. He could also play, sing and was a natural showman. This band recorded what is regarded by some Northwest music fans as a classic LP, "Hamburgers to Go". Recorded at Rain Studio over a period of months in 1974 and released on our own, Great Northwest Records label, this record gave the band a legitimacy and a lot of confidence.

With the inestimable help of publicist, PR person unexcelled, Rhoda Mueller Jr. Cadillac was suddenly everywhere. One of the only bands to break out of the strictly ‘granola circuit’ clubs, which we dearly loved, and into the ‘bigger’ rooms, Pier 70, the Ad Lib in Kent, and on and on…meanwhile establishing a near residency at the Rainbow in the U District.

Part 5, added July 14…

We had the pleasure/pain of backing Chuck Berry many times in many locations. We played with the true King Of Rock n' Roll everywhere from Seattle, Portland, Salem, Boise, Anchorage, Fairbanks and back again. Always an interesting story surrounding any one of the shows with Chuck.

He had to have, and it was in his contract: Two Fender Dual Showman amp tops, with Two Single Showman speaker enclosures...not easy to find even then. And if you, the promoter, did NOT have this exact setup, he would hold up the show and hold YOU up for an extra $1,500 or so. Then, Chuck would come up on stage, while we were in the middle of a song, plug in 'dime' the amps and begin tuning up at full volume…

Once at the fabulous arena at Boise State College I was summoned to his dressing room. Chuck wanted to tell me that when he went 'like this' with his leg that meant we were to stop the song and then follow with a big chord. OK. I knew this having played behind him maybe 11, 12 times by then...He, of course, did NOT remember this white boy at all.

I told him that we had this new fangled machine with which I could TUNE his guitar and he wouldn't have to do that thing onstage this particular evening. He was up for that and trailed behind to our dressing room. I struggled with the old strings he had on that lovely bright red Gibson 335, but got the guitar in tune. We are all standing in the cement hallway just offstage waiting to be announced when the guitar…falls from his neck and hits the cement floor...flying way out of tune...so, same old...dime the amps and tune up at full volume, WHILE we're playing a song.

He went on to dazzle us and a capacity crowd, and invited 2 couples from the audience up to dance...this turned into about 40 people onstage cavorting. So many Chuck berry adventures.

Part 6, added Sept 1…

Here's info on some of our recordings over the years. As reported here, the first two Jr. Cadillac LP’s were recorded live. The first,"Jr. Cadillac Is Back" was recorded in a mobile truck outside the Grapevine, under the Viaduct downtown Seattle. The second album, "Volume 2" was recorded live at the infamous, Brotherhood Tav on 15th in Seattle. For our third album, Jimmy and Bob had left the band and we moved into Rain Studio downtown Seattle. The appropriately named, Tim Rock was the engineer on the project. At that time the band was only the four: Ned on guitar and vocals, Buck on bass and vocals, Les on sax and vocals and George on drums. Tommy was a part time piano man, but we brought Easy Eddie King in for his boogie woogie expertise on a couple songs, Barry Curtis and Steve Friedsen for their ‘rockability’. And once again, Rube Tubin was tapped to play some screaming NW guitar. That album, titled, "Hamburgers To Go" was released on our own, Great Northwest Records, to very little hoopla in 1975.

The next release was "This Time". We always wanted to push whatever frontiers we were up against and figured, ‘this time’ we'd get out there a bit. And we did. This album was begun at Rain, but when engineer, Tim Rock, went to The Music Farm, we followed. This was a much larger, more state of the art, 24 track facility. We could fill up LOTS more tracks. By now Tommy "Cadillac" Katica was fully onboard and contributing mightily. He plays keys all the way through this release, sang harmony parts and contributed the wonderful, "Get Lost Baby" as a writer.

Les and Ned became solidified as "The West Seattle Horns". On "Keep Your Nose Clean", a song written by Buck and Ned, Les is the lead vocal and the horns are featured in a dixieland jazz/rock ’n roll arrangement. The disc also included a ‘disco’ song we got from Rita Jean Bodine called, "That’s The Kinda Love I’ve Got For You", and sent the band down yet another creative path. We have been falsely labeled an oldies act for years, yet all of our recordings would indicate otherwise. The band has always resisted the barriers.

More on the records and the very limited personnel changes in the next installment of "as the stomach churns". Stay tuned.