The Four Seasons |
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The Four Seasons (or the 4 Seasons, as they were numerically billed in their heyday) were among the most successful pop singles artists of the rock era. With 46 hits on the
Despite this massive and long-lasting success and their 1990 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, however, the Four Seasons did not, for most of their career, enjoy the kind of critical approbation and media profile of many of their peers. In seeking to understand why, it may be useful to compare the group with a friendly rival act with which they have many parallels. Like the Four Seasons, the Beach Boys were a band known for their harmonies and influenced by such predecessors as the Four Freshmen. Despite essentially being vocal groups, both the Four Seasons and the Beach Boys were also real bands in which the members also played musical instruments. They both featured distinctive lead singers while also including another group member who was the major creative force, acting as primary songwriter and producer. (In both cases, that member eventually retired from performing to focus on writing and producing for the band.) Both groups entered the charts with their first major hits in the same month, August 1962, and went on to enormous success in the next several years. Both were among the few American performers who managed to withstand the British Invasion led by the Beatles in 1964. As the '60s went on, both adapted their music to changing styles, but ultimately suffered a decline in popularity by decade's end. Both enjoyed major comebacks in the mid-'70s, and in subsequent decades, extending well into the 21st century, both continued to perform regularly on the oldies circuit and record (at least occasionally) while undergoing extensive personnel changes such that only the lead singer remained from the original lineup. In the 2000s, both had their hits performed in Broadway "jukebox" musicals, for the Beach Boys, the flop Good Vibrations, for the Four Seasons, the hit Jersey Boys. Yet the Beach Boys, who have been immortalized in a small library's worth of books, are critically revered, while, as of 2007, not a single biography had been written of the Four Seasons, who are denigrated by some music journalists as a sort of overachieving doo wop group. Why? One possibility, of course, is simply that the rock critics are right. Another is that the Beach Boys were more media savvy, hiring a publicist who succeeded in planting the idea in the press that their songwriter/producer, Brian Wilson, was a "genius," while the Four Seasons' counterpart, Bob Gaudio, was content to do his work behind the scenes without giving many interviews about it. Then, too, the Beach Boys' story, which centered on the troubled Wilson family with its Oedipal complexes, rivalries, drugs, and sex, was made for media attention, while the Four Seasons kept their problems to themselves. (As was revealed only decades later, however, their career was hardly carefree.) It's also worth noting that the Four Seasons' financial independence -- they owned all of their master recordings and controlled all of their publishing from their work of the 1960s -- while probably advantageous to them monetarily over the long term, meant that there was no major label or major publisher that stood to gain by continuously promoting them and that their classic recordings spent long periods of time out of print. As of the early '70s, the band's commercial nadir and the era when rock critics really began weighing in on what was good and bad, it was hard to find a Four Seasons album in a record store, while discs by the Beach Boys and other of the Four Seasons' '60s contemporaries enjoyed frequent reissue campaigns, accompanied, of course, by fresh reassessments in the press cultivated by record company publicity departments. Probably, however, the real reason for the Four Seasons' low critical standing has more to do with a crucial choice made at a key moment in their career. One of the important changes in emphasis during the late '60s was the transition from the 45 rpm single as the major element in a recording act's work to the album. Typically, that was a change pioneered by the Beatles, but it was recognized by Brian Wilson immediately, leading to his conception of 1966's Pet Sounds, which stands as the bedrock of Beach Boys worship. At the same time, however, the Four Seasons' brain trust was laboring to launch Valli's solo career as a middle-of-the-road pop singer while trying to maintain the group's popularity almost exclusively through successive hit singles. There was no Four Seasons concept album to compare with Pet Sounds or Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band during the mid-'60s; indeed, at a time when most popular recording artists released two new albums a year, there was no new Four Seasons LP at all (at least, none billed as such) between the appearance of Working My Way Back to You and More Great New Hits in January 1966 and The Genuine Imitation Life Gazette a full three years later. The latter was Gaudio's belated entry in the concept-album sweepstakes, and some revisionist critics have ranked it as one of the best. But at the time of its appearance, it was too little, too late. As a result, the Four Seasons' status as album artists ranks far below that of their peers, and their critical standing has suffered accordingly. Without an album masterpiece for critics to latch onto, they are condemned as a singles act, albeit one of the best and most popular in music history. As might be expected, both the Four Seasons' massive success and their career missteps were engendered by who they were as people. The story inevitably begins with Valli, born Francis Castelluccio in Newark, NJ, on May 3, 1934. (Most biographies incorrectly cite 1937, but the correct date finally appeared in the press in the mid-2000s.) He began to sing in his youth, and was heard by vocalist Texas Jean Valley, who took him to auditions. Valli acknowledged Valley by adopting the same name, though it took him a while to decided how to spell his version. In 1953, while still in his teens, he was signed to the Corona subsidiary of Mercury Records and released a revival of the Georgie Jessel hit "My Mother's Eyes" as his debut single under the name Frankie Valley. It was the first of a series of records he would cut, mostly without success, over the next nine years. The only exception was "You're the Apple of My Eye," by the Four Lovers, released by RCA Victor Records in April 1956. Valli was joined in the group by Tommy DeVito (born June 19, 1928, in Montclair, NJ; vocals and lead guitar), his brother Nick DeVito (vocals), and Hank Majewski (vocals). Valli had joined the group, previously known as the Variety Trio, in 1954, and they then became the Variatones; in addition to singing lead, he sometimes played bass and maracas. They became the Four Lovers when RCA signed them up. "You're the Apple of My Eye," their first release, peaked at number 62 on Billboard's Top 100 chart on June 16, 1956. Unfortunately, that turned out to be the peak of the Four Lovers' success on records, despite more single and EP releases in 1956 and 1957, and even an LP, Joyride, released in September 1956. Between 1958 and 1961, Valli and the group continued to perform primarily in clubs in New Jersey and around the New York metropolitan area while also getting chances to record, together or separately, under a variety of names (Frankie Tyler, Frankie Valli & the Romans, Frankie Vally and the Travelers, Hal Miller and the Rays, the Village Voices, Billy Dixon and the Topics), all without success. Not surprisingly, there were personnel changes during this period. In 1961, Majewski dropped out and was replaced by Hugh Garrity and then Nick Massi (born Nicholas Macioci on September 19, 1926, in Newark, NJ; died December 24, 2000), who also served as vocal arranger. Nick DeVito departed and was replaced briefly by Charles Calello (who would continue to work with the group as musical arranger), then, in a key shift, by singer/keyboardist Bob Gaudio (born Robert Gaudio on November 17, 1942, in New York, NY [The Bronx]). Gaudio had been a member of the Royal Teens and had co-written their Top Five 1958 hit "Short Shorts." Meanwhile, the former Four Lovers had been signed to a personal services contract by songwriter/producer Bob Crewe, who used them as demo singers and as backup vocalists and musicians on some of his productions as well as recording them on their own. In November 1961, Valli, Tommy DeVito, Massi, and Gaudio first recorded for Crewe under a new name, the Four Seasons, taken from a bowling alley in Union, NJ, that also had a lounge where they'd auditioned. The track was a revival of the Bell Sisters hit "Bermuda," released by Gone Records, and it was yet another failure. By his account, Crewe went to New Jersey to see the group perform one night and was impressed by Valli's ability to ascend effortlessly from his high tenor range into falsetto. Crewe suggested to Gaudio that he write a song taking advantage of that ability, and the result was "Sherry," which they then recorded, and which Crewe sold to Vee Jay Records, the independent black-owned, Chicago-based label known for R&B artists like Jerry Butler. Released in July 1962, "Sherry" entered the charts in August and peaked at number one in the pop charts in September, as well as topping the R&B charts in October. (It is notable that only one of the Four Seasons, the 19-year-old Gaudio, was under 28 when "Sherry" took off, while the Beach Boys ranged in age from 15 to 21 when "Surfin'" hit the charts the same month, and the Beatles were between 19 and 22 when their first hit, "Love Me Do," charted in the U.K. two months later.) The Four Seasons quickly followed with the Crewe/Gaudio composition "Big Girls Don't Cry," released in October, which repeated the success of "Sherry," hitting number one pop and R&B in November. Also in October, Vee Jay released the LP Sherry & 11 Others, which peaked in the Top Ten in December. Taking advantage of the group's popularity, the label also rushed out a Christmas album, The 4 Seasons Greetings, along with a holiday single, "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town," which reached the Top 40. The group's next regular single, Crewe and Gaudio's "Walk Like a Man," appeared in January 1963 and was number one pop by the start of March. (It only went to number three R&B.) It lasted on top for three weeks, meaning that for the 27-week period between September 15, 1962, and March 16, 1963, the Four Seasons had spent 13 weeks -- nearly half the time -- at number one with their first three singles, an unprecedented run of initial success. Vee Jay quickly put out another LP, Big Girls Don't Cry and Twelve Others, and it rose into the Top Ten. Naturally, this popularity led to a heavy concert schedule, which may help explain why the next single was a revival of the Fats Domino hit "Ain't That a Shame!," rather than a new, original song. Released in April 1963, it broke the group's string of chart-toppers, peaking only in the Top 40 in May. The LP Ain't That a Shame and 11 Others, released in May, reached number 47. Its lead-off track was "Candy Girl" (written by Larry Santos), which became the next single, peaking in the Top Five in August, with B-side "Marlena" (by Gaudio) also reaching the Top 40. By this time, relations between the Four Seasons and Vee Jay had cooled, as the group felt they were owed royalties that were not forthcoming. They appear to have done only one more recording session for the label, at which they cut the uncharacteristic tracks "Starmaker" and "Silver Wings," neither of which featured Valli's falsetto. Vee Jay included these previously unreleased recordings on a compilation LP, Golden Hits of the 4 Seasons, released in August, which reached the Top 20. In September, the company pulled "New Mexican Rose" (written by Calello and Crewe) from the Ain't That a Shame LP as the next single; it peaked in the Top 40 in November. Meanwhile, the dispute between the group and the label became the subject of litigation. Declaring themselves free of their Vee Jay contract, the Four Seasons re-entered the recording studio on November 20, 1963, to cut their next single, "Dawn (Go Away)" (co-written by Gaudio and Sandy Linzer). It was released on Philips Records, a European firm distributed in the U.S. by Mercury, in January 1964. It entered the charts on February 1, 1964, and would have hit number one if not for the Beatles, whose initial American hits "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and "She Loves You" held it at number three for three weeks. The song had an unusual class consciousness; the narrator is a lower-class boy who tells a girl from a higher social strata that she should break up with him and stick with a boy from her own income bracket instead. "Think what your family would say," he advises. "Think what you're throwing away. Now, think what the future would be with a poor boy like me." Vee Jay countered the Four Seasons' defection by embarking on an extensive repackaging campaign that included compilation albums drawn from its existing catalog of the group's tracks as well as singles. For example, "Stay," a revival of the Maurice Williams & the Zodiacs hit that had first appeared on the Ain't That a Shame LP, was issued as a single in January 1964 and peaked in the Top 20 in April. Vee Jay had also come out with a compilation LP called Folk-Nanny, attempting to take advantage of the folk music fad; the label quickly retitled the disc Stay & Other Great Hits and got it into the Top 100. The group, meanwhile, had had the same idea; their February 1964 LP release Born to Wander, subtitled "Tender and soulful ballads (folk flavored)" and showing them strumming acoustic guitars on its cover, also nodded toward folk music. Lacking any hit singles, however, it struggled to reach the Top 100 and was quickly followed in March by Dawn (Go Away) and 11 Other Great Songs, which rose into the Top Ten. The same month saw the release of the group's next new single, Crewe and Gaudio's "Ronnie," which peaked in the Top Ten in May. Vee Jay soon countered with a single release of a revival of the Shepherd Sisters hit "Alone" culled from the Big Girls Don't Cry LP that peaked in the Top 40 in July. Vee Jay continued to put out albums and singles of old material over the next year and a half, notoriously including the double-LP The Beatles vs. the Four Seasons (which combined Introducing the Beatles and Golden Hits of the 4 Seasons), but disc jockeys had gotten wise to the subterfuge and tended to stick with actual newly recorded Four Seasons discs instead. The next newly recorded single was Crewe and Gaudio's "Rag Doll," released in June 1964. Inspired by his encounter with a young female street urchin begging money after cleaning the windshield of his car while he was stuck at a stoplight, Gaudio turned the tables on "Dawn (Go Away)." This time, the narrator is the well-off one, and his folks are telling him to give up a poor girl. (A young Billy Joel no doubt took notice of the boy's reply: "I love you just the way you are.") "Rag Doll" returned the Four Seasons to the top of the charts for the first time in 16 months, hitting number one in July 1964; in August, it became the group's first gold single. The inevitable LP named for the song made the Top Ten. The Four Seasons continued to score with successive hit singles released during the remainder of 1964 -- Crewe and Gaudio's "Save It for Me" (Top Ten, September), Gaudio's "Big Man in Town" (Top 20, December), Crewe and Gaudio's "Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby, Goodbye)" (Top 20, February 1965) -- assuring that they would rank second only to the Beatles as the most successful singles artists of the year. It is significant, however, that their focus seemed to be almost entirely on singles; there was no new LP for the lucrative Christmas market in 1964. The next album release came in March 1965 with The 4 Seasons Entertain You, released simultaneously with a new single, Crewe and Gaudio's "Toy Soldier," that was added to later editions of the LP. Both were disappointing sellers. The album only reached the Top 100, while the single was their first to miss the Top 40 since they had broken through with "Sherry." Crewe and Gaudio's "Girl Come Running," released in May 1965, marked an uptick, peaking in the Top 40 in July, and the Motown-influenced "Let's Hang On!" (written by Crewe, Linzer, and Denny Randell), released in September, became the Four Seasons' biggest hit in 19 months, reaching number three in Billboard in December. (In Cash Box magazine, it went all the way to number one.) But there were changes in the offing for the group. Frankie Valli decided to launch a solo career, albeit while remaining at the helm of the group. He cut a new Crewe/ |