The book ENCHANTED and a Hawaiian girl walking away on a lonely beach in Hawaii.

Enchanted, Book 2 5-Star Review

ENCHANTED, the concluding second volume of Things We Lost in The Night by Larry J. Dunlap was awarded this seal for a 5-Star Review from the review site READERS FAVORITE. Available now on AMAZON in eBook and Print.

FIVE STARS! Enchanted: Things We Lost in the Night (A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thievesis the second book in a breathtaking memoir by Larry Dunlap, a veritable tour de force for readers who enjoy real-life adventures and what the life of a band feels like. Larry takes readers on a ride with the band as they continue to rise in popularity, exploring intense moments of performance, relationships, and disappointments. [In Hawaii,] Larry will face a life-threatening experience against the backdrop of the Vietnam War; and [Larry’s return with his band to]… his hometown… is not what he expected.  

The story is written in an engrossing, first-person narrative voice and the author captures very interesting dialogues and memorable moments in prose that is excellent, pulling readers into his worldview and compelling them to experience the hype surrounding a working band. [When they star in a major Las Vegas hotel,] we encounter legendary musicians like Elvis Presley, but what caught my attention most was the author’s romantic journey… and the surprising thrills of an endearing romance. It is filled with historical references and places readers would like to be.

Enchanted: Things We Lost in the Night is exciting, a narrative that holds a lot of surprises for readers who love exploring nightlife. From the writing to the panache of the narrative, from the interesting characters to the exciting romance, Larry Dunlap scores wonderful points in a work that both informs and inspires readers.
        
—Divine Zape for Reader’s Favorite

The Can Can Room – 1965 St. Louis, Missouri

REFLECTIONS: Larry, Dave, Les, & Mac

[This is from a collection of scenes, stories and little chapters that were left on the cutting floor now that Things We Lost In The Night is complete.]

In early 1965, before the guys in my vocal group, the Reflections, left for California in April, we’d tried to develop a little floor show to play in clubs around Indianapolis at Mac’s suggestion. Dave and I had been singing together since high school, but Mac, who had joined us a few months earlier, was already a professional performer. He’d been in the Casinos, a show band from Cincinnati when we met him. They later had a hit with the ballad “Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye.” A few weeks earlier, at our New Year’s Eve party, he told us he was sure we could make some extra money that way. He told us he knew how to perform on stage and could construct little shows for us to do. And though the rest of us shared one single left foot and a clumsy one at that, he swore he could show the rest of us how to do choreography to the songs we already knew. I had serious reservations about that. We’d rarely performed publicly, we didn’t play instruments, and my wife, Pat wasn’t thrilled about the idea… and I tended to freeze up in front of audiences. But for many of the guys, it made sense, especially when Mac called the agent for his ex-band, the Casinos, who later had a big hit with “Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye,” told him she could book the band if we would do a few out-of-town gigs to tighten up the band.

Les, who’d expected to be our guitar player, became our last-minute replacement bass singer a couple of weeks before our first booking in Birmingham, Alabama at some place called the Boom Boom Room. Since Les was going to sing with us and not play guitar, we needed musicians to back us up. Les found a little outfit called the Zeb Miley Trio playing in a downtown Indianapolis bar called Susie’s Twist Club. They agreed to go on the road with us for a few weeks to tighten up our show. We renamed the combined band and singers, the Checkmates, and ill-fated choice as it turned out, but that is a different story.

At some point I’ll post something about our adventures at the Boom Boom Room right in the middle of the civil rights marches going on at the time, about how dangerous it had been including threats from the audience for not playing the right music and accusing one or another of us of sleeping with somebody we shouldn’t have, and a bomb threat — but I thought I’d like to post this little bit from the Can Can Room, the next club we played in St. Louis, Missouri, first.

The Checkmates – The Can Can Room
Monday, March 1, 1965, St. Louis, Missouri

We walked out into the cold Missouri night to find Zeb Miley and Johnnie Lamb in a heated discussion with a portly older man in a navy blue suit with an open-collared white dress shirt. The heavyset man was poking Zeb in the chest while Johnnie was walking around in little circles looking at the ground. When I walked up the man was saying in a cloud of frosty breath, “. . . what were you thinking, that you could walk into this club on Union paper with non-union musicians in your band? What kind of idiot are you?”

“What’s happening?” I asked.

“Musician’s Union bullshit,” Zeb said. “The usual union crap. As usual, they do more to stop you and then help you get work.”

“You know,” the man said to Zeb, “you should be thanking me. I could yank all of you off the stand right now. Yes I could. Club operator would never have another union band in this joint if they didn’t comply.

“Half your band,” he went on, waving his hand around, “is behind in their dues and the other half,” waving his other hand, “don’t have any union cards at all.”

Zeb turned to me, frowning and said, “He’s the local union rep and he’s saying you guys ain’t union so you can’t go back on stage.”

“You,” the man said, turning to make me his center of attention. “Whatinhell do you think you are doing up there without a union card?” While belligerent, he also seemed a little perplexed.

“Why would I need a union card,” I said, even more perplexed. “Why would singers need to belong to a musician’s union? We don’t play instruments.” I looked at Zeb trying to comprehend what was going on.

“If you sonsabitches are on that stage, you gotta have a card, period.” Mr. blue suit insisted.

“We just played in Birmingham, Alabama last week, before we came here. No one said anything about union cards to us.”

“Do you know where you are, sonny? Do you now?”

“Yes sir. This is St. Louis, Missouri. And it’s a beautiful city,” I added.

“And, does that mean anything to you, music-wise? Ring any bells?” he continued smugly.

I looked around for a lifeline but no one else seemed to have a clue, either. “Nosir I don’t.

“Well, you ignorant SOB, this is Local #2 of the Musician’s Union of America. Now I suppose you’ll have to tell me that you don’t know what that signifies, won’t you?”

I shook my head no. I had failed so many classes in school and now here I was again, failing Musician’s Union 101 this time, dammit.

“No?” he said, continuing to rub it in. “No, you still don’t know? Well, I’ll tell you. We were the second local union formed, right after New York City. This is probably the strongest local in the United States. You do not fuck with St. Louis Union Local #2. Do you understand that?”

“Yes, but I don’t see …”

“No pissant city like Birmy-fucking-ham, Aly-fucking-bama decides whether you need a union card in St.-fucking-Louis. Is that clear?”

“Okay. Okay,” Mac said, “We get it.” By this time, Dave had joined us on the street. Drivers and passengers in the cars passing us by were looking at us. It was freezing out here. “But,” Mac continued, “We don’t play instruments. I don’t get how we have to belong to a union?”

“So you don’t play an instrument, you say, even though I say, if you step on the goddamn stage in there you got to be union. Well, let me ask you something sonny boy. What was that funny metal thing you was tootling around on while ago marching around that club like a loon? What was that anyway? Looked suspiciously like a saxophone, of course, I could be mistaken. Maybe you was playing the radio,” the Union rep grinned.

“Aw that was nothin’. I don’t really play sax. I just tote that thing around when we’re doing this dancin’ thing. Can’t play but two notes. You can’t count that,” Mac protested.

“And where’s that tall boy,” the rep continued. “Oh, here he is right here. I don’t suppose you play that trombone though you was pushing that slide back and forth like you knew what you was doing. You just another mummer, too?”

“Hell, I just got here,” Dave said, “I got no clue what’s going on. I play a little trombone. I’ll tell you how much though, damn little.”

“Damn little is plenty enough,” said the man as he turned to me. “And then there is you. Yes, you were banging two pieces of wood together so I expect you’re going to tell me you weren’t playing an instrument either. That so?”

“Yeah, I mean no, I don’t think so …” I said, wondering a bit.

“Claves,” he said. “those pieces of wood are called claves, they’re South American musical instruments my fine young friend so you and all the other guys without union cards, including the last guy who had a guitar strap on last time I saw him are not in compliance with union rules and regs. I can fine your asses up to $500 apiece.”

I went white. “Why that would end it for us. We’re just trying to get started. This is only our second job. That’s not fair. That can’t be what the union is for,”

“Fair, did you say. Well, fair is as fair does, and Zeb Miley here, well he’s the leader of this group. He knows the rules and he’s the one that broke ‘em. I’ll likely be pulling his card tonight and he’ll have to attend a hearing in a couple of weeks to find out how much it will cost to get it back. If he can get it back,” the rep said with finality.

We were all well and truly cowed and intimidated. “Is there some way we can make this right?” I asked. Zeb threw his hands down in disgust and turned away. “We weren’t trying to avoid anything. Really, we just didn’t know.”

“I dunno,” he said, looking around at us. “Some of you don’t seem so willing to see the error of your ways.”

“C’mon guys,” I said to everyone on the street. Scott and Les were still inside somewhere. “Please, Mr ….” I started. I didn’t even know his name.

“I am Jonas Lawndale,” he said, “and here is my card. ‘Bout time somebody asked if I was legit.”

“Mr. Lawndale, we are a young band, just trying to get a foothold. If you could see your way to give us some leniency and help us find a way through the mess we’ve made here, we’d appreciate it.” I said.

“Well sir, Mr. Miley,” Mr. Lawndale gestured in Zeb’s direction. “Does this fellow here have the right of it or do you continue to take exception to my pointing out your failings here? You are the rightful leader, signed onto this contract, and it is in your hands.” He stuck his chin out toward Zeb.

Our looks at Zeb must have conveyed enough fervor for him to get the message.

“Yeah, yeah, I know we’re in the wrong,” said Zeb with difficulty. He thought about it a bit and then said, “I didn’t rightly think these singer guys would have to be in the union especially as they don’t sing but 10 songs a night. But it’s so that a couple of us are late on our dues, so yeah, we need your help if you’d be offering.”

“Hmmm,” hummed Mr. Lawndale, seeming to figure what he would say to us. “First off those ‘singer guys’ as you call them, they ain’t going back on that stage tonight and not again ‘til they got union cards.

We didn’t say anything. Thank God, we’d finished our second show. There was one more set to go but we were finished for the night.

“Now I’m willing to forget about the fines for ya’ll since you’ve explained so nicely about where your confusions was, and I’ll forget about them late fees as well, but all you union guys got to have your cards up to date starting tomorrow night. And I am firm about that.

“By the way, it does seem that one Mr. Lamb does seem to be up to date so he can play it seems.”

“Mr. Lawndale,” I asked as gently as possible, “What does it cost to join Local #2 of the Musician’s Union of America?”

“Well son, I believe we can make you a member for $150 tomorrow down at the union house.” Jonas Lawndale beamed.

“Wow!” I said, stunned. “Wow!” I repeated since I couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“We belong to a different Local, Mr. Rep,” Zeb said, a bit sourly, so do we have to pay our fees on  Local #2’s schedule?” I think Zeb had already forgotten the union rep’s name.

“Well, Mr. Zeb Miley, we at Local #2 have a great fondness for our brothers across this great land and so, in token of that respect, we honor paying fees that we forward to those locals. So, in short, you must pay, down at the union house, the fees appropriate to your schedule at your home local.” Mr Lawndale added, “If you decided that you wanted to change your affiliation to the best and strongest union in this United States, while I’m sure we could get you a significant discount, however.”

“Well, then, Mr. Rep, we will get us into compliance first thing tomorrow. But I also reckon we better get ourselves into that club and finish our last set or we won’t have no job to save.” Seeing Mr. Lawndale’s look he added, “And that means without them singers. I know.”

“You will be seeing me tomorrow night, Mr. Miley. I give you fair warning, though, should you fail in any respect to meet the stipulations I have given you, I will not be so easily swayed as I have been tonight.” Mr. Lawndale turned without another word and walked into the night.

“Damn, where are we going to get $150 each?” I said to Dave and Mac despondently?

Before Zeb headed into the door, he said, “That’s not the hard part. You guys can run back to Indy tonight and get union cards for $35 in the morning and be back in time for your first show. The big problem is your guitar player. Boy is underage and I don’t know if he can figure a way to get hisself a union card. You better check with him about that.”

 

NIGHT PEOPLE, Book 1 – Things We Lost in the Night: A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves Kindle Edition

  • Kindle
    $0.00 kindle unlimited logo
    This title and over 1 million more available with Kindle Unlimited $5.99 to buy
  • Paperback
    $19.95
    13 Used from $5.32 19 New from $12.88 1 Collectible from $99.99

IN THIS FAST-MOVING ADVENTURE AND ROMANCE-FILLED MEMOIR THAT READS LIKE A NOVEL, A young Midwestern singer and his vocalist friends experience the transformative power of love, loss, and music in a chaotic West Coast adventure in the1960s. If you liked memoirs from Bruce Springsteen, Robbie Robertson, Carly Simon, Keith Richards, and Patti Smith, you’re sure to enjoy Night People.

“I didn’t want to believe how much you’ve changed, but you’re a different person here. You live at night here, your friends are night people and you’re becoming one, too. You hardly see daylight on weekends. Here it is, nearly dusk, and you’re leaving to play music all night again to entertain your new friends–your new girlfriend–all the new people in your new life.”

In 1965, Larry’s rock and roll vocal group is disintegrating along with his marriage to his high school sweetheart. Despite his resolution to turn his life around in Indianapolis, he finds himself reunited with his scattered-to-the-winds friends in distant San Francisco struggling to re-make themselves into a rock band in the dive clubs of the Bay Area.

Barely surviving the transformation, they struggle to avoid the dangers,temptations, and insecurities waiting to trip them up in their new life. As the band scrambles to overcome, or at least endure, every obstacle in its path, Larry faces a painful choice that will result in loss fort hose he loves no matter how he decides.

Their strong voices and new skills are a potent combination. Soon, Larry and his new band are plunged into a breathtaking journey through mob-run nightclubs, Las Vegas showrooms and backrooms, famous Hollywood night spots, top West Coast recording studios, celebrity managers–and passionate romance.Everything they’ve ever dreamed of is just around the next corner.

Night People’s adventure is set against the backdrop of the West Coast in the mid-60s: a historic era of tectonic cultural, political, musical, and sexual upheaval–and the draft. Everything Larry thought he knew about life, love, and himself is challenged in the tumultuous nights where things and people are too easily found and lost.

PRAISE FOR NIGHT PEOPLE

Dunlap’s sense of transcendence is similar to the sensation Keith Richards describes in his memoir, ‘Life: ‘ …you leave the planet for a while…‘ Reliving his rock and roll years in his wonderful memoir, NIGHT PEOPLE,’ Larry Dunlap, must have left the planet for a while, too.” I loved it, and highly recommend it. — Kiana Davenport, The Spy Lover, Shark Dialogues

“Whether or not you remember the swift intoxicating music of that era or theseismic shift of mores that burst from the free-love movement, [NIGHT PEOPLE] captures the beat of that misty time when the country suffered “agrowing thirst for individual freedom, a desire to escape from anever-darkening shadow of war, and a national hangover following thepublic murder of a young and popular president.” — C.D. Quyn, Steph Rodriguez, Manhattan Book Review

“Larry Dunlap lived it. His memoir ‘NIGHT PEOPLE’ is a frank, funny, frenzied chronicle of the 60’s West Coast music scene.” — Susan Shapiro, New York Times bestselling memoirist, FIVE MEN WHO BROKE MY HEART, GOOD AS YOUR WORD, OVEREXPOSED

WHAT READERS ARE SAYING

One of the best biographies written by a musician!
A Riveting, Mythic, Rock and Roll Memoir
Wonderful! Excellent Read!
Thoroughly Entertaining.
A Great Read
The Naked Truth!
A Window Into a Fascinating Era
Rock and Roll, baby!
A Must Read
A Great Read About An Exciting Life
Music Has Found Me Again
SO Worth Reading!
Night People Left Me Weak!
My Life Seemed Extremely Boring After Finishing “Night People
Lessons of Life, Love, and Sex in the 60s
Genuine, Exciting, Graphic and Memorable – life in the 60’s
Fantastic Coming of Age Memoir!
Compelling!
Music Reality!
Great Look At An Era
Couldn’t Stop Reading!

Death of an Aristocat

Chuck, Dave, Pat, & Larry - The Reflections 1964

Chuck, Dave, Pat, & Larry – The Reflections 1964

The doorbell on the side of our house next to the driveway rang. This doorbell, with its own higher pitched ring than the front doorbell, rang in the my bedroom in the basement, commonly referred to among my friends as the dungeon due to my insistence that it be painted battleship gray and because to get to it, you had to traverse the furnace room with it’s spooky tentacled maze of vents rising up from of the furnace’s heart to snake across overhead. In my teen years it had served as the bridge of a starship, the conning tower of a submarine, and clubhouse before becoming our rehearsal room. I went up the basement stairs and ushered in Hasty Smith and another guy who seemed to tumble down the open steps all elbows and knees. Chuck Tunnah, Hasty said, introducing him to Pat Baldwin and me, was an inch or two over six feet and kind of gawky like he hadn’t quite grown into his skeleton. He had dark hair combed back from a widow’s peak that made him look fiendish.
“Now listen you guys. Don’t start that “Charlie the Tuna” crap with me,” he said with a big grin, like the Joker’s in Batman, in reference to the Starkist Tuna cartoon spokesfish, “because I do taste great and unlike that cartoon Tuna, I have great taste. Just want to get that clear”

That was how I met Chuck Tunnah, the fourth singer of my original vocal group as we formed the Aristocats, in the Fall of 1957. On July 5, 2016, Chuck, Charles E. Tunnah, died peacefully at 75 years of age in an easy chair with the Indianapolis Star in his hands. As with so many of my friends and associates passing into their later years are beginning to disappear I fear my blog will become an obit page, so I will resist that except in special circumstances. Though Chuck and I had not been in touch for many, many years, this loss struck very close to home to me. Hasting Smith, Jr., mentioned above, and Chuck sang in our high school choir and the exclusive Madrigal singers, and both patiently taught Pat Baldwin and me, both complete neophytes, how to learn and sing the popular music we liked. Hasty soon left us to go to Purdue, and eventually to become a nuclear rock scientist in Los Alamitos, New Mexico, where he passed away prematurely and suddenly as he warmed up to begin an early morning run.

Chuck, Pat, and I found Dave Dunn and went on to become the Reflections, and to record and release our first two records in Indianapolis in 1964. One of them, In The Still of the Night, became a regional hit on Chicago’s WLS, outcharting the Beatles for a couple of weeks. Chuck is the bass singer who first started the bass line that brought that version of a classic to prominence for us.

In Night People though, Chuck is introduced and disappears in the same paragraph; he never made the trip to California and on to the adventure that turned us into Stark Naked and the Car Thieves. Though he could be generous and kind, he could also be loud and obstreperous and because of that, he ended up relegated to staying in Indiana. He, and Hasty, have now passed beyond the curtain of life. When Hasty died, I felt the harsh breezes of change whispering through the hole in my history he left behind. The wind has picked up.

NIGHT PEOPLE Book Party, Indianapolis, Oct 11

IRB-NP-102515 Flyer copy

Night People review – Readers’ Favorite

This is a review of NIGHT PEOPLE, Book 1 – Things We Lost in the Night, A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves from Readers’ Review. Thank you, Mamta!

Reviewed By Mamta Madhavan for Readers’ Favorite

Things We Lost in the Night: A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves by Larry J. Dunlap is an honest memoir in which the author has carefully depicted his years as a young and struggling musician, along with his friends as they strive for fame and fortune. The book also captures the essence of the 1960s when there was a cultural and musical shift. Their transformation from a small band to that of a famous one and their successes change Larry’s perspective on a lot of things in life. In a nutshell, the memoir exposes the 1960s, the music industry, vocal groups, R&B cover bands, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Hollywood recording studios, the nightlife, and the sexual revolution that happened during that period.

The memoir connects with readers intimately as the author shares every small detail of his life. Readers are taken into the author’s world of music, the problems they face as a band, and their struggle for survival initially. The rise of the band opens the way for many other things, and the author also speaks about the sacrifices they make on their way to the top. Many moments in the author’s life are poignantly mingled with misery, happiness, music and sex. I found the book interesting as it speaks about music, the band, recordings and many other things related with music. The challenges the author faces in his life and his love life and other casualties make this memoir a very exciting read.

NIGHT PEOPLE – ON SALE NOW thru JULY 23 – $2.99

Book Cover for NIGHT PEOPLE, Book 1 - Things We Lost in the Night, A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves

NIGHT PEOPLE

Book 1 – Things We Lost in the Night,
A Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s
with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves

ON SALE NOW for the next week – July 16 thru July 23 for $.299!

GET YOUR COPY NOW!

 

I won’t see TFiOS

Indianapolis writer, John GreenI was determined not to read this book or see this movie. I hate tearjerkers, I just won’t do it. Then I find out today that it’s set  in Indianapolis, and that author John Green is from Indianapolis, lives in Broad Ripple near where I grew up, near where many scenes in my book take place and realize I have to support a home town author! It’s a dilemma. I did read a blurb, and yes the dialog seems sharp and witty. The girl seems interesting, but no, I’m just not going to get invested.

My friends in Indianapolis tell me that there are all kinds of locations in Indianapolis in the book. It would be like visiting back there. All the kids like the book, they’ve given it a call sign, TFiOS, which must mean something. Many of the young readers say it has replaced Hunger Games in their affections, so that’s a positive. Well okay then, I’ll read the book, John Green, because it looks like you’re a fabulous writer, and I’d like to visit home. But that doesn’t mean I’m seeing the movie. I don’t cry in public.

A Lost Recording from 50 Years Ago!

The Reflections / Illusions '63 & '64

The Reflections / Illusions ’63 & ’64

For those of you who’ve been following along, Stark Naked and the Car Thieves began as an acappella vocal group back in Indianapolis. We called ourselves the Reflections when our very first recording was released in late 1963 on WLS radio in Chicago. Unexpectedly, our uptempo version of In The Still of the Night hit the Chicago charts in early 1964 at the same time the Beatles did with I Want to Hold Your Hand. If you can read the chart below you’ll see we arrived at #17 while the Beatles languished at #40. Our producer screwed up and lost or accidentally destroyed the master of In The Still of The Night so even though we got great airplay and were about to break out nationally, when the charts came out two weeks later, our record had fallen off into oblivion while the Beatles were on their way to number one.

WLS Chart Jan 17, 1964

WLS Chart Jan 17, 1964

What you don’t know is, and that’s because even I’ve never heard or seen a copy of the record since we recorded it 50 years ago, our producer rushed us into the studio to get another record out to try to take advantage of the tremendous interest in the Reflections up in the Windy City. Since we sounded a lot like the Four Seasons, he found a song by Larry Huff, who’d co-written Easier Said Than Done for the Essex, called In the Beginning. We tried to adapt to sound like it was from the original Jersey Boys right in the studio, recording literally overnight. By the time it was pressed, the Reflections who recorded (Just Like) Romeo and Juliet) had hit with their song, and our name and all the good will we’d built up with the previous record was lost.  He had to decide on the spot what we would be called so he decided we were the Illusions. But the record failed and soon the Indy Sound no longer existed.

Today, doing some research for Things We Lost in the Night, I ran across our recording on YouTube.  I can’t tell you how amazed and pleased I was. Made me glad I got up this morning. It’s the weirdest thing though, strangers have put almost all our records up on YouTube. I’m hoping the person who posted this knows where I can buy a copy of the original record.

OPEN HOUSE AT LARRYJDUNLAP.COM

Probably as good a time as any to invite you to the Open House at my new website! I’m halfway through my final draft and scheduled some time to get my site in order. Among other features, is a list of thirteen songs we recorded and that are an important part of Things We Lost in the Night. They’re listed in chronological order (excepting this one of course), and make something of a musical history of the band under its various names. It’s on the THINGS WE LOST page in the Songs from TWL tab here on this site. There’s also a First Chapter sample from the book and two audio excerpts as well as short blurbs from the book. Come one, come all! Look around. Log in , say hi. Let me know what you think.

Thanks – Larry