Tommy James
| Tommy James | |
|---|---|
Tommy James in 2010
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Thomas Gregory Jackson |
| Born |
April 29, 1947 Dayton, Ohio, US |
| Origin | Niles, Michigan, US |
| Genres | Rock, pop rock, rock and roll, psychedelic rock |
| Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter, guitarist |
| Instruments | Vocals, guitar, tambourine |
| Years active | 1958–present |
| Labels |
Roulette Records, Fantasy Records, Millennium Records, Rhino Records, Aegis Records, Aura Records |
| Website | Tommy James and the Shondells |
Tommy James (born Thomas Gregory Jackson; April 29, 1947) is an American pop rock musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, widely known as leader of the 1960s rock band Tommy James and the Shondells.
Born in Dayton, Ohio, James and his family moved to Niles, Michigan. He was a child model at the age of four. In 1959, at the age of twelve, he formed the band, "The Tornadoes". A year later the band changed its name to The Shondells. By 1964, Jack Douglas, a local DJ at WNIL radio station in Niles, formed his own record label, Snap Records. The Shondells were one of the local bands he recorded at WNIL studios. One of the songs was the Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich ditty "Hanky Panky", which the pair had recorded under the name The Raindrops. The song was a hit locally, but the label had no resources for national promotion, and it was soon forgotten.
In 1965, a local dance promoter, Bob Mack, found a copy of "Hanky Panky" in a used record bin and started playing it at his Pittsburgh dance clubs. Soon after, a Pittsburgh area bootlegger made a copy of the song and began pressing copies of it, speeding it up slightly in the process. Sales of the bootleg were estimated at 80,000 in ten days. It became number one on Pittsburgh radio stations in early 1966. Douglas heard about the record's sudden popularity in Pittsburgh because his name and location always appeared on Snap Records labels. Numerous calls from Pittsburgh convinced James to go to Pennsylvania, where he met Mack and Chuck Rubin, who handled the talent bookings for Mack's dance clubs. Before long, all three major music trade papers, Billboard, Cashbox and Record World, were listing "Hanky Panky" as a regional breakout hit. Rubin, who had music industry connections, said it was a good time for the trio to travel to New York City in search of a record deal.
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Wikipedia