THE CASCADES

The Cascades were the darlings of the west coast music scene in 1963.  They scored one of the year's most recognizable songs - a song unique in its instrumentation and lovely in its harmony and melody.  It all started when a bunch of guys serving on the USS Jason in the Navy got together in San Diego in 1960.   The group was originally known as the Silver Strands and they were playing local shows.  The drummer in the group - Dave Wilson - had his office on the ship down the hall from a guy by the name of John Gummoe, originally from Cleveland, Ohio.  John, Dave and a third guy - Len Green - would get together and sing in Wilson's office doing a lot of Everly Brothers songs, Gummoe remembers.  The guys liked how Gummoe handled himself and asked him if he'd be their manager.  John had no prior group or performing experience but "little by little" Gummoe began going on stage and singing duets with Wilson.  "The guys in the group were very encouraging," remembers Gummoe, "and I started doing some songs on my own.  Once I was smitten with the bug of getting up there and doing it, I wanted to do more."
 

Subsequently, all the guys left the Navy and the group became the Thundernotes.  Len Green - the group's lead guitar player - had a vision for the group.  Gummoe says that Green "wanted to do rock and roll music with an exotic tone to it.  Along the lines of Arthur Lyman and Mark Denny."  To help capture this new sound, Gummoe went out and rented a set of vibes.  A year or so later, Gummoe got rid of the vibes and got an electric piano.   Green and Wilson kept pushing Gummoe to do more vocal work and eventually he became the group's lead singer.  "They kept pushing and I responded."  The group's first release was an instrumental on Bob Keene's Del Fi Records called Thunder Rhythm - their first attempt at the exotic rock sound.  The B side was another instrumental called Pay Day as Gummoe describes it "a rowdy raucous song that sounded like a bunch of guys celebrating after they got their paycheck on Saturday night."  It wasn't successful but it was a start for the group.

Dave Stevens and Dave Szabo subsequently joined the group along with Eddy Snyder who replaced Len Green.  The group was now Gummoe, Snyder, Wilson, Stevens, and Szabo.  Following the instrumental release, the group started to get more interested in doing vocal harmony.  They were influenced by the Beach Boys who were hitting big at the time.  "We thought they walked on water, their sound was incredible," remarks Gummoe.  Other musical influences that can be heard in the group's music were the Four Freshman, Four Aces and Four Lads.   The group met up with Don Blocker of Liberty Records.   "We were stupid enough in those days to be going around Hollywood knocking on doors, not realizing that we were not doing the right thing," says Gummoe.  Blocker encouraged the group to get a manager.  Blocker introduced the group to Andy Di Martino who took the group's demos.  "They demos were really really bad," says Gummoe.  Di Martino shopped the group to Valiant Records, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. that run by two guys - Barry De Vorzon and Billy Sherman.  De Vorzon was best known as a composer (he had done the hit Dreamin for Johnny Burnette and Angel on My Shoulder for Shelby Flint).  Valiant put the guys to work with De Vorzon and Sherman and their staff songwriters Body Chandler and Perry Botkin.  De Vorzon also decided the group needed a new name.  Story has it that De Vorzon happened to look over at the counter where a box of Cascade detergent was sitting.  The rest, as they say, is history.

De Vorzon listened to the group's demos and zeroed in on There's a Reason (a Gummoe composition) which became the group's first release (Valiant 6021) b/w Second Chance in the Summer of 1962.  De Vorzon heard Gummoe's voice and heard something he liked and he molded the group's sound from that.  There's a Reason was released and became a regional hit on the west coast.  "I think the big thing that There's a Reason did was to expose us all across the country to all the different jocks," says Gummoe.

Later in November 1962, the group would have their mega hit - Rhythm of the Rain b/w Let Me Be (Valiant 6026) also written by Gummoe.  On that record can be heard the famous studio musicians known as the "Wrecking Crew."  They worked for Phil Spector on his Wall of Sound recordings and for the Beach Boys on their Pet Sounds LP.  They were Hail Blaine on drums, Carol Kaye on bass and the one and only Glen Campbell on guitar.  Perry Botkin did the arranging and it was recorded at the famous Gold Star Studios (home to the Wall of Sound).  With Stan Ross behind the mixing board - it was an all star cast.  The distinctive sounding keyboard at the beginning of the record was a "celeste" combined with some sort of organ.  

In early 1963, it first broke in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and then started a wave of interest across the U.S.  The song went all the way to #2 on the Billboard charts and was kept out of the top spot by Walk Like a Man by Franki Valli and the Four Seasons.  Ironically, Gummoe would later become friends with Franki Valli and doesn't hold a grudge that Valli's record kept his from becoming #1.  Rhythm was a smash hit in many other countries as well, where it did hit #1.

Following the success of the record, the group hit the road and was part of the package tours of the time of rising musical stars.  The group performed with the Shirelles, Gene Pitney and the Beach Boys.  "Unfortunately, the management we hd was not all that great and they weren't pushing us in the right direction," says Gummoe.  "For example, we never played American Bandstand."  And the group never toured overseas, despite the success of Rhythm of the Rain in many foreign countries.
 

The group's next single was Shy Girl b/w The Last Leaf (Valiant 6028 - 1963).  It did well although not the smash hit of Rhythm of the Rain.   That was probably because both songs were getting airplay.  De Vorzon thought that by putting two good songs on the record it would get more airplay.  The group's success lead to an opportunity to record an LP for Valiant.  The LP contains There's a Reason and Rhythm of the Rain and no other material from the group.  This was the main reason why the group left Valiant.  "I have no regrets," says Gummoe, "but I wonder sometimes if we should have stayed with the label and whether De Vorzon would have let us do more of our own stuff."  The group when on to RCA Records where they did a number of singles.

The group stayed together until about 1975 when it disbanded.  John Gummoe left the group in 1967 and later formed Kentucky Express which had in LP in 1971 - "That's Not What Lovin Is."  He now lives in southern California and continues to compose and record in his own home studio.  Eddy Snyder continues to perform under the name Eddy Preston.  Len Green had a prosperous career in country music.  David Wilson past away in 2002.

CURRENT INFORMATION

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