The Association

The Association
The group in 1968 Top row, from left: Jim Yester, Brian Cole, Ted Bluechel; bottom row, from left: Russ Giguere, Larry Ramos, Terry Kirkman
Background information
Origin	California, United States
Genres	Sunshine pop
Years active	1965–1978; 1979-present
Labels	Jubilee, Valiant, Warner Bros., Columbia, Mums, RCA Records, Elektra
Website	The Association official website
Members	Jules Gary Alexander Jim Yester Bruce Pictor Del Ramos Jordan Cole Paul Holland
Past members	Larry Ramos† Russ Giguere Terry Kirkman Brian Cole† Ted Bluechel Jr Bob Page Richard Thompson Wolfgang Meltz Mike Berkowitz Maurice Miller† Art Johnson David Vaught† Jerry Yester Dwayne Smith Andy Chapin† Larry Brown Jay Gruska David Morgan Cliff Woolley Ric Ulsky Russ Levine John William Tuttle† Joe Lamanno Keith Moret Brian Puckett Donni Gougeon Chris Urmston Bob Werner David Jackson Blair Anderson Godfrey Townsend †Deceased

The Association is an American pop band from California in the folk rock or soft rock genre. During the 1960s, they had numerous hits at or near the top of the Billboard charts (including "Windy", "Cherish", "Never My Love" and "Along Comes Mary") and were the lead-off band at 1967's Monterey Pop Festival.

Jules Alexander (born September 25, 1943, Chattanooga, Tennessee) was in Hawaii in 1962 serving a stint in the Navy when he met Terry Kirkman (born December 12, 1939, Salina, Kansas, who had grown up in Chino, California, and attended Chaffey College as a music major), a visiting salesman. The two young musicians jammed together and promised to get together once Alexander was discharged. That happened a year later; the two eventually moved to Los Angeles and began exploring the city's music scene in the mid-1960s, often working behind the scenes as directors and arrangers for other music acts. At the same time, Kirkman played in groups with Frank Zappa for a short period before Zappa went on to form The Mothers of Invention.

Eventually, at a Monday night hootenanny at the Los Angeles nightclub The Troubadour in 1964, an ad hoc group called The Inner Tubes was formed by Kirkman, Alexander and Doug Dillard, whose rotating membership contained, at one time or another, Cass Elliot, David Crosby and many others who drifted in and out. This led in February 1965 to the forming of The Men, a 13 piece "folk-rock band", reportedly the very first use of this hybrid term. This group had a brief spell as the house band at The Troubadour.