Garage Rock Of The Sixties: The Skeptics - The Complete Early Years 1965-1969 (2012 Gear Fab Records) Flac & mp3@320

Finally, on compact disc and in digipak format, the great and legendary garage band from Bartlesville, Oklahoma were released in 2012. Featuring all their 45s, alternate takes, and a rare unreleased bonus track. Many collectors and enthusiasts of this period consider them to be the forerunners of the American Garage Sound of the 1960s!! These are the complete recordings featuring their lead singer Jerry Waugh.(unknown source)

While vocal harmony was not an integral component of the Skeptics’ overall mission statement (although they did demonstrate considerable acumen in that respect in Certain Kind Of Girl), the band nonetheless amassed an impressive repertoire in short order by focusing primarily on diverse and well constructed original material. Their capabilities in that respect were in evidence at the onset with the early 1965 release of It’s A New Thing To Me (Thrush 1001), for which author and front man Waugh received top billing. A contemporary of Dino, Desi & Billy’s like minded I’m A Fool (Reprise 0367), It’s A New Thing To Me also sports a trace of the savoir-faire that frequently graced the work of such duly inspired bands as the Quests and the New Colony Six. The Skeptics further asserted their commitment to originality with the Maynard Helmuth-penned Not Another Cloudy Day on the B-side, in which guest vocalist Nedra Price (who had worked with the Moonglows on their 1964 cover of Wanda Jackson’s Let’s Have A Party on Ponca 101) paints a curious and haunting tale of colliding Honda motorcycles and 1956 Chevrolets with a nonetheless happy ending, over a template that is best described as a customized reinterpretation of the Sonny James / Tab Hunter monster classic, Young Love.

From there, the Skeptics (with Waugh again receiving top billing) wrapped up their affiliation with the Thrush label with the release of two Waugh originals, For My Own / I Told Her Goodbye (Thrush 1002). Both sides find the band maturing remarkably in terms of interpretive skills, with Waugh’s capabilities as a first rate composer of high drama garage rock becoming increasingly evident. The B-side also suggests traces of the inspiration of Herbie Mann’s definitive rendition of Comin’ Home Baby, which speaks well for the band’s commitment to musical diversity.
A move to Kampus Records (which inadvertently reaffirmed the allegiance of both band and label to the basic tenets of rock and roll, given the latter’s striking similarity in layout and design to that of the vaunted Dore label) found the Skeptics taking sole billing, with the resultant Ride Child / Apple Candy single (Kampus K-814) demonstrating the continued camaraderie between Waugh as principal songwriter and the band as articulate statesmen in true garage / blues rock fashion (complete with a somewhat cavalier cold ending on the B-side not unlike that mastered in 1966 by the aforementioned New Colony Six in A Heart Is Made Of Many Things).
With the release of Stripes / Certain Kind Of Girl (Kampus K-815), the Skeptics had at last refined their own focus to perfection. Not only do both sides (again from the pen of Waugh) rank among the best of first generation garage rock overall, the A-side successfully ventures into that rare territory of chronicling the lowest depths of the human condition from a third person perspective with first person conviction. To their considerable credit, the band reaffirmed their commitment to the foundations of rock and roll with the Jimmy McCracklin / Little Walter Jacobs-inspired Certain Kind Of Girl (which in turn is reflected in the work of the Chicago Loop with their similarly inclined 1966 cover of the Coasters’ She Comes To Me on DynoVoice 226).

That most engaging of B-sides comes complete with the aforementioned tight vocal interplay that is equal parts Barbershop and Everly Brothers, and is rounded out by sympathetic and majestic keyboard work from Gary Shivel and a brief, Steppin’ Out-inspired rave up fade. Interestingly enough, the Kampus label followed suit with a basic color change from teal blue to dark red, which in turn suggested solidarity with the legendary Ribbon label (recording home of the Fireflies, the Scott Brothers, Frank Gari and others).
Upon switching their affiliations to the Scratch label, the increasingly self-assured Skeptics enlisted the services of legendary songwriter and Denver, Colorado native Wayne Carson Thompson, whose numerous writing credits include such venerable classics as Eddy Arnold’s Somebody Like Me (RCA Victor 47-8965), the Box Tops’ The Letter (Mala 565) and Neon Rainbow (Mala 580), and the late, great Donald Eugene “Johnny Paycheck” Lytle’s Slide Off Of Your Satin Sheets (Epic 8-50334). Thompson brought to the Skeptics the wry Bit O’ Honey (Scratch S-7823), which enabled the band to celebrate the unique (and yet familiar) metaphor based upon the popular candy bar of the same name, with a musical persona that embraced the increasingly ambitious side of first generation garage rock before it imploded in the onslaught of the self-indulgent bands that were championed by the FM contingent in the increasingly hostile AM/FM wars. Thankfully, the Skeptics were well prepared to weather the storm, evidenced by their solid interpretation of Thompson’s Box Tops/Joe South-flavored tale of woe, East Side Tennemant House (sic erat scriptum) on the flip side.
To their considerable credit, the Skeptics maintained their artistic integrity in that hostile environment with She’s A Gas / Turn It On (Sho-Boat 106). Thompson was again commissioned as composer for both sides, each of which finds the band reasserting their commitment to garage rock. They do so in Turn It On with a sublimely smug proclamation of self-assurance from Waugh, with the band once again rising to the occasion handsomely. That they were not averse to revisiting the relentless optimism of their 1965 Thrush label debut in She’s A Gas also speaks well for their unwavering commitment to their principles.

But by 1969, the aforementioned hostile forces were in full swing, with the surviving protagonists of basic rock frequently put on the defensive as a result. For some, the answer was compromise, while for others, the only feasible option was a reluctant sabbatical in anticipation of the tide once again turning in their favor with the advent of the so-called punk/new wave movement in the mid-1970s. The Skeptics bravely chose to meet the challenge head on with the aptly titled group composition, Down To The Bone, which firmly embraces the horn-driven rock concurrently embraced by such fellow garage rock survivors as Mandala, the Paupers, the New Colony Six, the Rugbys, and the I’des Of March. True to form, the Skeptics delivered with their usual intensity and rounded out that phase of their career with their scruples intact.
The Complete Early Years 1965-1969 is not only one of the highlights of the vaunted Gear Fab catalog to date, it is also certain to be one of the definitive reissues of the genre overall. Don’t miss it.(Excerpts by Gear Fab Records)

The Skeptics were really an outstanding band of the Sixties Garage Rock. I hope you like it.

Enjoy
         Frank    Flac   &   mp3@320