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New Memoir follows a young singer in a rock band as he negotiates the twists and turns of the recording and entertainment business and romance during the tumultuous last half of the 1960’s in San Francisco, Hollywood, Hawaii, and Las Vegas.
LOS ANGELES, CA — March 20, 2014 — A new memoir immerses readers in the adventures of a young Midwestern singer/musician and his three vocalist friends as they form a band that rises in the exciting, and often dangerous night life of California, Las Vegas, and Hawaii in the mid-sixties. A new American classic set in one of the most memorable decades in U.S. history, brings a unique perspective to coming of age during a time of tumultuous change in U.S. culture and history.
In THINGS WE LOST IN THE NIGHT, a Memoir of Love and Music in the 60s with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves, Book 1: NIGHT PEOPLE (Price $14.99 print, $8.95 eBook), Claremont Village Press, May 2015), author Larry J. Dunlap tells of leaving Indianapolis to emerge from a metaphorical rabbit hole into the musical stew of the San Francisco bay area of 1965, and the loss of his young family left behind. As the band gains confidence and begins to catch fire in the rough and tumble clubs of the east bay, Larry meets a Chicana girl who becomes his on-again, off-again, lover and companion over the next three years as he struggles to avoid romantic commitment. In their rise to local fame in a mob-controlled North Beach topless club in San Francisco, just four miles north of Haight Ashbury, the band learns stagecraft at the point of a gun. Performing and sharing a dressing room with topless girl performers, they adapt to rapidly evolving cultural changes vastly different from where they were raised. Though the band grapples with finding the right band members, the four original vocalists from the Midwest find a way to stick together through crises big and small.
In Hollywood, the band attracts celebrity managers and producers and begin their recording career, while playing at the infamous Pussycat A’ Go Go on the Las Vegas Strip, and becoming the first rock and roll group to play at Caesars Palace. As the band prepares for their first record release, Larry’s place in the band is suddenly jeopardized—he is inducted into the army with a sure ticket to Vietnam. Moments from boarding a bus to basic training, Larry is freed to return to his band. The response to their first record is strong enough that the record label and management team guarantee to go all out to make it successful. Larry finally faces the guilt he feels in taking advantage of his girlfriend’s affections—he is determined that this time their breakup must be final. The band’s upcoming engagement in Hawaii, halfway around the world, will separate them and allow time to heal. With their next record, Look Back In Love, already picked to hit the top of the Billboard charts, their managers are fielding requests for TV specials, talk shows, and the most influential Hollywood venues. The future seems certain—Stark Naked and the Car Thieves will soon take its rightful place in the pantheon of nationally famous recording artists.
In a close parallel arc to the historical, cultural, and political issues of the times, Stark Naked and the Car Thieves travel the west coast nightclub circuit rubbing elbows with celebrities from music, screen, and television, mob bosses and gangsters, showgirls and other memorable characters. The author’s authentic voice brings a unique perspective to the era of change impacted by the effects of the Kennedy assassination, the British musical invasion, moon landings, the Pill and the Vietnam war. The book is particularly timely as many of the memorable events during the memoir’s six years will begin experiencing their 50-year anniversaries as the book is introduced.
“This is a book I’ve wanted to write for the last forty years,” Larry said in a recent interview. “The group of vocalists who turned themselves into a band were from the Midwest where we hadn’t achieved much success in our lives. From the early years in San Francisco through our rise to prominence in the Las Vegas temples of entertainment, we learned how to work, self discipline, how to be professionals, and most important, that we could depend upon one another. We forced each other to grow up. I see this story as a view of a personal life and the relationships that enhanced or endangered it in a time of great cultural and social change.”
Larry J. Dunlap is a veteran of fifteen years in the music business, including ten years in Hollywood, several as an associate of mega-artist-manager Seymour Heller. Larry then opened his own Artist Management firm, BMB, and built and operated City Recorders, a recording studio in Paramount Studios on Sunset Boulevard. During those years he wrote Nightwork, a column for Affair Magazine, reviewing local club artists and commenting on the southern California entertainment scene. He later founded the first digital television network and has experience in film, music, and TV production. His music magazine cartoon strip, Frets, was published in a West coast trade music magazine. He’s a full-time writer living in southern California with his wife Laurie.
Things We Lost in the Night, a memoir of love and rock n roll music, with Stark Naked and the Car Thieves – Book 1: Night People. ($12.95, 380 pages, 7 x 9, paperback, ISBN:978-0-9906279-0-6; $5.99 eBook, ISBN:978-0-9906279) will be available in print and through most online bookstores. Book 2: ENCHANTED is projected for release later in the year.
Claremont Village Press is a small independent publisher of extraordinary literary manuscripts. For more information, please visit www.ClaremontVillagePress.com