Jan & Dean: Official Message Board for Jan Berry

Mark raises a very interesting point about the credits, and one which suggests that they might not always be accurate. "Old Ladies Seldom Powershift" is credited to both Jan and Dean, but it is an instrumental. Which bit of it did Dean write then?

Several possibilities come to mind. Dean came up with the title, it made Jan laugh, he gave Dean a credit. Alternatively, Dean's contributions were real but scattered across the songs, and Jan credited him with the instrumental because he deserved some songwriting royalties from the album, so why not credit him with this one.

I raise the second possibility because Dean has suggested several places that the atmosphere was collegial, with people throwing in ideas and contributing in an ad hoc way. This might suggest that th credits were not always shared in a musically accurate way, but on a much looser basis.

Of course its always possible that Dean came up with the melody to the instrumental and Jan expanded upon it and it WAS a completely musically accurate credit. Maybe.

In some good news, or bad news, depending on how you see things: the package with the Jan & Dean book has already sold out!

Rob said

Jan made the re-recordings of his hits at the suggestion of Lou Adler, who advised him it's possible to license his own versions of the songs to companies looking to create new compilations.  I didn't like the idea and thought those recordings detracted from the album as well, but Jan was intent on having them be part of the project.

That makes perfect sense, I suppose. Or it would do if Jan had been able to resist fiddling with them.

With the extra lyrics and the new arrangements they sound much more like remakes than Dean's cover versions to me, and thus far less likely to be picked up by people wanting tracks for compilation albums.

I have been waiting for a proper release of Filet of Soul since I first found out that side four of the Anthology album was edited from the rejected tapes - and that was forty something years ago

I understand that Jan submitted two different versions to Liberty. I assume that this is the longer first version.

Owen

I think the entire 6 song Jan & Arnie career should be included. Also, a lot from early Jan & Dean. Those were very important songs to the development of California pop. They may have been top 100 nationally but they were top 10 in LA. Of Course, some were bigger nationally. The 60's stuff is a must. The 70's? I'd be satisfied with just a couple of songs. Maybe Sing Sang a Song and Fun City.

FWIW I think Mother Earth is the best single Jan made after the accident, so I would have to see that

I bought the orange CBS single in England when it first came out. It was being played on a number of the pirate ships at the time, which is how I found out that it was out.

Owen

I will go for Three Window Coupe backed with Hot Stocker.

Three Window Coupe is one of my favourite J&D car songs 

Cheers
owen