First Psychedelic Band - VANILLA FUDGE

Finally i found this gig record. This band is firs which played psychedelick rock and roll. They are great! If you wanna read about them. It is good start to learning about psycho-rock.


VANILLA FUDGE biography

Stein and Bogert played in a local band called Rick Martin & The Showmen and were so impressed by the sound of The Rascals (swinging and floods of organ) that they decided to form their own band with Martell and Rick Martin's drummer, Joey Brennan. Originally calling themselves The Pigeons, they changed the name to Vanilla Fudge in 1966, after the replacement of Brennan by Appice. A recording of the Pigeons was released in Germany in 1973 under the title of 'While the World was Eating Vanilla Fudge'. The group was then "discovered" and managed by reputed Luchese crime-family member, Phillip Basile, who operated several famous L.I. clubs — the Action House, Speaks, Channel 80, Industry — three of which were the same club (on Austin Boulevard, in Island Park, New York) with different names.

They had a number of popular songs, their biggest being their hit cover of "You Keep Me Hangin' On", a slowed-down, hard rocking version of the song originally recorded by The Supremes. This version also featured Appice's energetic drumming. One follow-up to this hit, "Take Me For A Little While", had a quite different lyric message from the former.

The members of Vanilla Fudge were great admirers of The Beatles, and covered several of their songs including "Ticket to Ride", as well as "Eleanor Rigby". The self-titled debut album quotes "Strawberry Fields Forever" at the end, with the line "there's nothing to get hung about".

Their rendition of "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)" was featured in the 2007 film Zodiac.

On March 14, 1970, Vanilla Fudge played a farewell concert at the Phil Basille's Action House. After that, Bogert & Appice departed to form another group, Cactus (In 1972, they left Cactus and formed Beck, Bogert & Appice with guitarist Jeff Beck). Stein, left on his own, tried to keep the group going with two new players, Sal D'Nofrio (bass) and Jimmy Galuzzi (drums) (both of whom had been members of a Poughkeepsie, New York group known as 'Dino & The Cavemen'). But when nothing came from this, Stein ended up forming a new group, Boomerang, instead with Galuzzi.

Following the band's breakup in 1970, the band has reunited several times. In 1982, they reunited in support of the Atco Records release, Best of Vanilla Fudge. This resulted in another album of fresh material in 1984 called Mystery. Martell was not included in this initial reunion and Ron Mancuso played guitar on Mystery instead, along with Jeff Beck, who guested under the moniker "J. Toad". Two reunion tours followed in 1987/1988. with Paul Hanson on guitar. Lanny Cordola was guitarist when the band took the stage on May 14, 1988 for the Atlantic Records' 40th Anniversary Celebration. After that, the individual members went their separate ways once again to pursue other projects.

In 1991 Appice revived the Vanilla Fudge name for a tour with former Ted Nugent's player Derek St. Holmes (guitar, vocals), Martin Gerschwitz (keyboards, vocals) and Tom Croucier (bass, vocals), which resulted in the album The Best Of Vanilla Fudge - Live.

Then, in 1999, three of the originals (Appice, Bogert & Martell) reunited with vocalist/organist Bill Pascali replacing Mark Stein to record a "greatest hits" album, Vanilla Fudge 2001/ The Return / Then And Now, with all new recordings of previous songs and three new songs. 2002 had bassists Pete Bremy and T.M. Stevens subbing on bass for an ill Bogert and 2003 saw a release of Vanilla Fudge's live album, The Real Deal - Vanilla Fudge Live, recorded on tour in 1987 with Paul Hanson on guitar. Martell overdubbed his guitar and vocals later. That same year (2003) the group toured with Teddy Rondinelli standing in on guitar for Martell.

In 2005, Vanilla Fudge reformed with all the original members for a tour with members of The Doors (now touring as Riders On The Storm) and Steppenwolf. Pascali returned in place of Stein for some 2005 and 2006 shows before leaving to join the New Rascals.


The band then went back into the studio to record Out Through the in Door, a Led Zeppelin cover album released in 2007 only in Europe. Led Zeppelin had opened for the band in 1968-1969. The band performed "You Keep Me Hangin' On" for the PBS fundraising program My Music: My Generation - The '60s for the March 2008 pledge drive.
Out Through the in Door was released in the U.S. in 2008.

In the spring of 2011, Vanilla Fudge embarked on what was announced as their farewell tour. The lineup for the tour was: Carmine Appice, Mark Stein, Vince Martell and Pete Bremy(bass).