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Emitt Rhodes\u2019 pre-pre-fame band The Palace Guard gets a career-spanning compilation<\/i><\/b><\/p>\nEmitt Rhodes\u2019 pre-pre-fame band The Palace Guard gets a career-spanning compilation<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Emitt Rhodes was something of a cult figure in music. The singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer never achieved widespread commercial success or fame, but his music inspired and influenced many who would follow him. Hailed in his early solo artist years as a \u201cone-man Beatles,\u201d Rhodes released a superb run of albums in the early \u201870s before virtually disappearing for more than 40 years.<\/p>\n
Even before his solo period, Rhodes was the central figure and primary songwriter in The Merry-Go-Round, a Los Angeles psychedelic pop group. But The Merry-Go-Round wasn\u2019t his first professional group. That honor goes to The Palace Guard, a Hollywood outfit that existed for a few years in the middle \u201860s. The young group featured three singing brothers \u2013 Don, John and David Beaudoin \u2013 backed by guitarist Chuck McClung, bassist Rick Moser and 15-year-old Rhodes on drums.<\/p>\n
The band recorded a clutch of quality tunes, but The Palace Guard never made an album. In 2021 Grammy-winning label Omnivore Recordings collected the group\u2019s entire body of recorded work \u2013 12 songs \u2013 and released it as All Night Long: An Anthology 1965-1967<\/i>.<\/p>\n
The Palace Guard many have never achieved national prominence, but they were successful nearly right from the start. Formed in 1964 as The Emerals, the group was based in Hawthorne, California, the L.A. suburb that was also home to another pop group featuring three brothers: The Beach Boys. The group landed a prized gig at Reb Foster\u2019s Revelaire in Redondo Beach. \u201cWe got in there as The Emerals,\u201d says Moser. \u201cWe wore our green jackets and skinny little ties.\u201d They became part of a rotating cast of acts playing the venue, along with The Crossfires. That group would soon change their name, becoming The Turtles.<\/p>\n
That Revelaire gig led to others, including dances in Hawthorne and Torrance. And in a somewhat cynical and hamfisted attempt to jump on to the British Invasion bandwagon, the group’s management \u2013 the Beaudoins\u2019 father and a controversial character named Gary Bookasta \u2013 put the band in vaguely military-styled uniforms, and they changed the group\u2019s name as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were told to speak with accents and tell everybody we were from Middlesex or something,\u201d Moser says. \u201cBecause we wanted to be known as part of the British Invasion.\u201d The management duo pushed the band hard, insisting that they practice six days a week. \u201cThe only day we had off was Sundays,\u201d Moser says. Those practices took place in garages at the succession of homes in which the Beaudoins lived. \u201cWe constantly moved,\u201d Moser says, \u201cbecause of [Beaudoin\u2019s] failure to pay the rent.\u201d<\/p>\n
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The hard work paid off, but connections made the real difference. In 1965, Bookasta and popular radio deejay Dave Hull joined forces to open a music venue on Sunset Boulevard. Dave Hull\u2019s Hullabaloo Club was situated directly across the street from the Hollywood Palladium. By December \u201865 The Palace Guard was installed as the Hullabaloo’s house band.<\/p>\n
West Covina resident Mike Baker was about the same age as the members of The Palace Guard, and he saw them many times onstage at the Hulabaloo. He recalls the band\u2019s dramatic method of opening a show. \u201cThe stage curtain would be closed, and the band would start playing \u2018I\u2019m a Man,\u2019\u201d Baker says. \u201cThe curtain would open to reveal a rotating stage. By the time the band finished the song, they would be facing the audience.\u201d They\u2019d play their set \u2013 a mix or originals and popular covers \u2013 and then two additional acts would follow.<\/p>\n
Gary Bookasta\u2019s aunt, Trudy (sometimes spelled Tudy) Hudgings had started a record label, Orange-Empire Records, in 1964. After some unsuccessful singles by artists including Mickey Rooney Jr., Hudgings signed The Palace Guard to her label. The group\u2019s first single was \u201cAll Night Long,\u201d a Don and John Beaudoin original. \u201cTheir songs got priority,\u201d Moser says. The jangling pop of \u201cAll Night Long\u201d was wedded to a (by \u201865 standards) mildly racy lyric. With an arrangement by Phil Spector associate Jack Nitzsche, the song gained local airplay. Many decades later it would be featured on the Rhino boxed set Where the Action Is!: Los Angeles Nuggets 1965\u20131968<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Moser has few recollections of working with Nitzsche, though. \u201cHe never came around until we went into the studio,\u201d he says. \u201cI do remember him working with the Beaudoins on their own. Sometimes, we would come into the studio after they had been there for hours. Then he would be there during the recording.\u201d By the time Moser, Rhodes and McClung arrived at the studio, most decisions about how the songs would be played and arranged had already been made. \u201cThere was a lot of behind the scenes stuff before we showed up,\u201d Moser says. \u201cWe were treated like the bastard stepchild.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trudy Hudgings wrote songs, too, and insisted that the band records some of them. \u201cWe had to deal with Trudy, because Gary was getting money from her,\u201d Moser explains. The band cut Hudgings\u2019 \u201cPlaygirl,\u201d which was issued as the B-side of \u201cAll Night Long.\u201d Hudgings\u2019 soft-pop lyric and the song arrangement owes more to the East Coast girl-group sound than the British Invasion or the emerging West Coast pop aesthetic. \u201cWe all hated that song with a passion,\u201d Moser says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe used to spend a lot of time at Trudy\u2019s house practicing her songs,\u201d Moser recalls. \u201cWe were sick of her, and we started screwing around with that \u2018Playgirl\u2019 song. She got pissed at us, sent us all home, and threatened to cut Gary off.\u201d Moser says that an enraged Bookasta confronted the band. \u201cHe was screaming and yelling, \u2018You’ve got to stop acting like kids! She\u2019s funding all this!\u2019\u201d But the boys in The Palace Guard were<\/i> kids. \u201cI was 17 years old,\u201d Moser says.\u201dWe finally ended up doing that song, but we never played it on stage. Because it sucked<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n