“America’s Lost Band.” will be screened at the Chicago International
Movies and Music Festival, Sunday March 8 at 1pm;
the SENE Film, Music,
and Arts Festival in Providence, RI on Friday night, April 3 at
9:30pm--
The Remains will perform several songs "unplugged" after
the screening; the Ponderosa Stomp in New Orleans on April 27 or
28
The Remains will also be performing at:
- the
BeatlesFest at the Regent Theater in Arlington, MA on Sunday afternoon,
May 17;
There has also been strong interest from the Nashville Film
Festival--
The Remains will be performing a gig in Nashville on
April 23 (and the screening may take place on April 22).

Below are excerpts from some of the reviews--

“America’s
Lost Band is a fascinating retelling of one of the great
what-might-have-been stories of American music of the ‘60s….it’s all
but guaranteed to have a long and well deserved success on DVD.”
Steve Simels, BOXOFFICE MAGAZINE

“A great documentary.”
Abby Kingston, SUFFOLK JOURNAL

“America’s
Lost Band does an excellent job of proving…The Remains were—indeed
still are—very significant players in rock’s storied history….The
closing montage of a present-day Remains’ concert interspersed with
black and white clips of each member from the Hullabaloo performance
provides a touching, sentimental and more than fitting denouement to a
band, and a film, that very ably demonstrates the true power of music.”
Mike Dugo, 60sgaragebands. com

“America’s
Lost Band is a labor of love and as such is a breath of fresh air.
Where as most of the documentaries and books about 60s rock ‘n’ roll
bands are chock full of overdoses, lawsuits, and long festering
resentments, ALB is a charming, heartwarming story about four close
friends who enjoy making great rock ‘n’ roll together more today than
ever before.”
Nancy Foster, MUSIC BUSINESS MONTHLY

The Remains set to appear at Ponderosa Stomp 2009

January 7th, 2009

The Remains will appear at the Eighth Annual Ponderosa Stomp, in New Orleans, Louisiana. The internationally revered Ponderosa Stomp is an American roots festival. The Stomp traditionally takes place between the two weekends of the city’s world-famous New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.
The dates are April 28 & 29, 2009.

Festival locations: The House of Blues and The Parish, New Orleans.

The Remains will also participate in the Ponderosa Stomp Music Conference taking place at the Louisiana State Museum at the Cabildo, New Orleans.

For more information, visit Ponderosa Stomp

To many sixties pop 'n' rock hounds, Boston's Remains are primarily known as the band who opened for the Beatles during the Fab Four's 1966 American tour. (How's that for a thankless assignment?)
For lovers of that fecund musical era's garage sound, the band also has the distinction of appearing on Lenny Kaye's groundbreaking retrospective collection of psychedelic "artyfacts," Nuggets, with its rousing performance of Billy Vera's "Don't Look Back." That the Remains could gain a fervid underground rep without ever once cracking the singles' charts is a testimony to the ferocity with which their regional fans (a young Jon Landau among 'em) carried the band's banner. It's not as if the group did itself any favors: when their one and only Epic label long-player saw its first release, the boys had already disbanded.

But cult legends die hard, and the Remains' one-and-only sixties LP has at long last been reissued by Sony Legacy, with ten bonus B-sides and studio tracks added to the set. Are Sony's archivists doing these guys any favors by making more than one or two selected tracks from their catalog available for collector consumption? Short answer: yup!!! Too often, when you dig into full albums by so many of the Nuggets's "artyfactors," you find an overabundance of crap fillers. Not here.

The Remains still stands as an example of solid sixties rockin' at its most energetic. Led by guitarist/lead vocalist Barry Tashian, the band was as adept at Kinks/Stones-styled blues based stompers as it was more harmonic Beatle-y frug-&-shouters. "Don't Look Back," the group's last released single remains a high point – a masterful pop single that breaks into a glorious "Shout"-styled piece of sermonizing by Tashian right in the middle – but the track which follows it on the album, the band's first single entitled "Why Do I Cry" is the one that I'd wager got 'em the Beatles gig. Sweet melody, great cavernous vocals, a slick tempo shift in the middle of the track (negotiated by the band's first drummer Chip Damiani) – why the hell wasn't this a hit single?

Elsewhere, the boys beautifully revamp Charlie Rich's "Lonely Weekend" into a mildly spooky slow song and take on Bo Diddley's "Diddy Wah Diddy" (also being weirdly reinterpreted around the same time by Captain Beefheart, amusingly enough). At times, the band's revolving door series of producers (among 'em, Nashvillian Billy Sherrill) don't do 'em any favors by mixing Tashian's fiercely economical guitar squonks further back than they should be.

But crank this puppy up and that probably won't matter. According to early Remains booster (and later MC-5/Springsteen producer) Landau, none of the group's studio cuts came close to matching their loud excitement in concert. But, you know, that doesn't matter either 'cuz until someone invents a time machine, this collection of the Remains' studio work sounds plenty fine on its own. The CD's bonus material – which includes more-than-respectable garagey covers of blues standards like Willie Dixon's "My Babe" (neat harmonica plaint) & Chuck Berry's "I'm Talking About You" – is almost as strong: proof that this band could've beaten the sophomore slump if it'd stayed together long enough.

In sum: a great reissue. If you at all care for sixties rock, you owe it to yourself to get this disc and blast it through every open window in your home.

Written by Bill Sherman
Published May 29, 2007

The rock'n'roll scene in New England is rather confusing. Right now there are a great number of Cantabridgians getting involved in rock'n'roll; but most of them seem to think that to see good rock, you have to wait till Butterfield graces Club 47with his band, or, maybe, until the Club gets another Koppelman Rubin group up from the Village for a couple of days. It may even be alright to go down to the Unicorn and see the Chambers Brothers,Barry Goldberg, or the Magicians.
In my opinion an insufficient number of these fans have been apprised of the fact that one ot the best hard rock bands in the world has been performing almost exclusively in the local area.This group is, of course, The Remains.

They could be a musical insane asylum. To begin with, they're loud, so loud that it often nears the thereshold of pain(124 decibels, I think) ,far louder than Paul Butterfield,The Blues Project,etc. Unlike many groups in the folk-rock field, they have spent incredible amounts of money to insure a perfect instrumental-vocal amplification sysytem:their total expenses in this area have exceeded $6000. No matter how loud they play, their vocal can be heard.

The group is made up of Barry Tashian, lead guitarist, Vern Miller, bass player, Billy Briggs, piano player, and Chip Damiani, drummer. Barry is one of the great lead guitarists. While he can play with the speed of mike Bloomfield, he is not really into that style and prefers to sound more like Keith Richard or Jeff Beck. On stage he'll do anything from playing his wildly driving solos to bottlenecking with the mike stand to scratching his strings with a pick (creating a horribly grating sound).

Vern Miller is the best rock bassist I have ever heard. He plays proportionately louder than most bassists do, and his driving runs have a way of getting right under the sound and bringing the whole thing to a take-off. If anything makes the Remains fly, it's Vern's bass. One of the great things he does, which represents somewhat of an innovation for rock bassists, is to tie his runs into the drum breaks, which tends to create an exciting tension in the sound. He is especially good on "I'm Free", "Mystic Eyes", and "Empty Heart."

Billy Briggs is just Briggs. He doesn't play piano spectacularly. He certainly is no Al Kooper. But he's the kind of guy who has just to stand on stage to add something to the sound. It's all visual --Briggs is the rock'n'roll image personified --but he is nonetheless an indispensable part of the magic of the Remains.

Chip is a fine hard rock drummer. His short, choppy snare rolls, and his powerful high-hat work (the cymbal that has the clickety sound) provides a perfect rhythmic basis for the Remains. I might note here that many rock enthusiasts have set Sammy Lay up as a prototype of good rock and rhythm and blues drumming. I disagree strongly. Sam, when he was with Paul Butterfield, was constantly exhibiting his technical proficiency, but seldom supplied the kind of firm rhythm that a high-flying group requires. Face it--when a band is playing really loud, hitting the drum cowbell or bass tom-tom is not even going to dent the sound. You have to base your work on the snare drum and the closed high-hat. You have to learn what will be effective. (Good drummers on records:Ken Butterey, Blonde on Blonde, Keith Moon, The Who album, Dino Danielli, The Young Rascals album.)Needless to say, Chip has learned to do all the right things. Plus, he is really spectacular on the group's wild rhythm and timing changes, expecially when doubletiming.

Barry's vocals are good, constantly improving; it's sort of Jaggerish style, with Morrison overtones (Van Morrison is lead singer for Them). Briggs' attempts at back-ups on vocals are generally unsuccessful, but Vern has been developing strongly in this department.

A Remains' performance? "Baby Please Don't Go" opens it. The first verse is sung over a simple bass and drum figure; the second verse features the piano and guitar crashing in, opening up the whole sound. The number is one of their best. They'll do "Why Do I Cry" because their fans love it and will never understand why it wasn't a hit. (In case anyone wants to know why, there are two very good reasons: 1. The gentleman who produced the record had never produced a record before in his life. 2. Epic did nothing to promote the record. The demo that Tashian himself produced of this song is far superior to the version that was released.) They do the song unbelievably well live, complete with breaks, rhythm changes--the works.
They'll do "Louie, Louie". I realize that this will turn off legions of hippies. Too bad. I think it's beautiful. What they do is sing a verse or two and then bring the instruments way down and Barry will tell this amazingly stupid and seemingly unending little joke.You keep waiting for it to end because you know that when he finished talking, the band is going to blow your mind, and it's more than you ever imagined. Then they finish the number, almost, and before it's over, they break into "All Day and All of the Night," and by this time you just can't believe they're happening.

They do some old rhythm and blues and lots of Stones material, done without exception better than the originals. (If you don't believe it, go see for yourself.)"I'm Free" and "Empty Heart" represent the height of their ability. There's so much more to these songs than you'd realize from the Stones' recordings. Finally, they'll close with "Mystic Eyes". For this, all I can say is that you have to be strong. The sound becomes so total that people can actually become frightened. Barry always outdoes himself expecially in his guitar work on this number, their version being almost the equal of Them's. Then they play their little theme music, dance around, and run off stage.

During the entire performance they proceed as tightly and professionally as possible. They run on stage, waste no time between songs; visually, they're constantly moving, throughly engrossed in their music. They treat their audiences with respect.

Right now, the Remains are suffering from the same problem as the Blues Project. Neither has been able to find a way to get their incredible live sounds down on record. The Remains' "Diddy Wah Diddy" was nothing (nor is the Blues Project's single"Where There's Smoke There's Fire"). It's very difficult for the wildness and spontaneity of both these groups to penetrate the technique of multitracked recording. (Billy Sherrell, the Remains' producer, didn't hear the group in its entirety until after he had produced " Diddy Wah Daddy." ) But things are looking up for the group.They have a fantastic 18 minutes of "I'm a Man" on tape. They're on the Beatles tour. They've had a recent change in management which may (or may not) work to their advantage. A month ago they moved to N.Y., although they will be making frequent local appearances as N.E. is the center of their popularity. But most important, Epic is, for the first time, fully behind them on their next single. Unfortunately, Chip has just quit the group, which will slow things down a little (although his replacement is supposed to be spectacular). Anyway, when a group has as much going for them as The Remains, it is inevitable that they'll succeed. How could they fail?

Barry Tashian/Remains
From Boston, Massachusetts, the Remains were one of the great 1960s US rock groups. Although they never achieved the status they probably deserved, the Remains have become a cult band whose records have stood the test of time. Band leader Barry Tashian describes the ups and downs of this classic band.

The Remains were formed in 1964 and consisted of Barry Tashian (vocals, guitar), Vern Miller (bass), Bill Briggs (keys), and Chip Damiani (drums) (Damiani was later replaced by ND Smart). "We were in the same dormitory at Boston University," exclaims Tashian. Their exciting live performances gained them a quick and loyal following in the Boston region.

The Remains made enough of an impression in their region that they got a deal with Epic Records. Explains Tashian, "A Columbia staff producer named Robin McBride signed the group. Don Law was instrumental in getting McBride up to Boston to see us play. McBride later worked for Mercury in Chicago for many years and he is now in the stock and bond business, I believe."

Before the Epic album came out, Epic released four singles: "Why Do I Cry", "I Can't Get Away From You", "Diddy Wah Diddy" and "Don't Look Back". Although these sides did receive regional airplay in the New England area, they were not national hits. The first two releases were band originals, but "Diddy" was written by Willie Dixon and "Don't" was written by Billy Vera. Tashian states that the reason for the last two singles being covers was that "we were looking for a big national hit, and since we didn't seem to be connecting with the original songs we decided to put out some covers and see if maybe that would do the trick."

In early 1966, the Remains relocated to New York City. Says Tashian, "New York was the place to be if you wanted to be a star. We did. A guitarist by the name of Monte Dunne suggested it. We lived at the Gorham hotel, and in the East 80's and West 80's. Damiani did not want to leave Boston. Smart picked up the sticks at this point.

The Remains were managed by John Kurland (with assistance from Don Law in Boston). Recalls Tashian, "John Kurland came to Boston as a public relations man to do some work for us. He wanted to see us play. After he saw us he said, 'If you ever come to New York, let me know.' So we did. He was mostly a publicist in the fashion world, I believe, with some clients in the music business: Noel Harrison and Mama Cass. He passed away some years back. He also managed Bobby Fuller and was involved with Todd Rundgren, I think."

Although the Remains were Epic recording artists, it is interesting to note that they also had an audition with Capitol Records. Expounds Tashian, "we were signed to Epic and already had three singles out on that label. Our manager, John Kurland, set up the Capitol audition. It was in May of '66. We were not happy with Epic at the time. Our manager wanted to check out the lay of the land, so to speak, with other labels. In Boston, Capitol's rep up there, Al Coury, had initially expressed a great deal of interest in the band. Our relationship with the head of A&R at Epic, Bob Morgan, left something to be desired. At Epic, our unhappiness stemmed from the fact that, promotion-wise, we felt like we were the poor cousins to Bobby Vinton, Ed Ames, and the Yardbirds, Epic's biggest selling artists at the time. Our manager (Kurland) apparently just went ahead and set up this little audition with Capital. There was no offer forthcoming from Capital, so nothing changed for us at the time. Nothing happened, other than the fact that we have a nice 'live' tape." ("A Session with The Remains" CD on Sundazed).

Although their records did not set the work on fire, the Remains did rack up some worthy achievements. They performed on the national television shows Hullabaloo and the Ed Sullivan Show. In addition - and the feather in their cap - was scoring an opening slot on the Beatle's 1966 US tour (along with the Cyrcle, Ronettes, and Bobby Hebb). "The man who got The Remains on the Beatles tour was Bob Bonis, a friend of John Kurland's. He worked for GAC the agency that put the Beatles Tours together," remembers Tashian.

Although the Remains were enthusiastically received on the Beatle's tour, they broke up when it was over. According to Tashian, "it was right after the tour I decided to break the band up because I figured we were never going to be as big as the Beatles. At the time, I didn't realize success in the music business was accumulative - I expected everything to happen instantly. Our one album ('The Remains') came out on Epic in September of '66, after the Beatle's tour. Epic did not promote the album because the Remains were broken up by the time it was released," declares Tashian. Consequently, the Epic album was a flop. (It would be over a decade before producer Bruce Patch re-released some of the Remains tracks on his indie Spoonfed label which kept the spirit of the group alive, at least on vinyl. The Epic album is also available on CD on Epic/Legacy.)