Guest Reviews - 8

Walk Don't Run, Vol. 2

[EDITOR'S NOTE: Here's an eighth guest review of Ventures albums, by fellow Ventures fan Tony Meloche.]

The Ventures were on a roll - two of their best albums immediately behind them, and a brand-new top ten hit in "Walk Don't Run '64", and they probably could have filled out this album with almost any throwaways they chose - but they stayed "The Ventures" and released this disc in the fall of 1964 true to their established form - overwhelmingly solid music, with very little filler in it. In fact, many people consider "Walk Don't Run Vol. II", the subject of this review, to be a high water mark for the group. What was all the excitement about? It begins with track one:

The album opens with an "only-as-The-Ventures-could-do-it" version of the then-popular "House of the Rising Sun". I have considered what makes this version such an attention- grabber from the opening chords, and I believe it is the no-nonsense approach of Mel Taylor to the drum part. Bob Bogle and Don Wilson are in perfect form, too, and Nokie enters on the melody with prominent fuzz (a device he was having a happy love affair with at this point in the Ventures development). A very full organ (performer not credited) also lays down a killer blues lecture. Nokie's solo is wonderful, but, unusually, he repeats it almost exactly - something he rarely did. Nonetheless, it works fine! Excellent choice for an opening track.

Track two was (if I recall correctly) the flip side of the "WDR64" single - a Danny Hamilton tune called "Diamond Head". The Hawaiian feel is very good in this song, almost a precursor of the "Hawaii Five-0" theme a few years down the road. The bird call sounds (fingernail on string) from "Apache" return for this number, too. Not difficult to play for the lead guitarist (the bass guitar is another story - kudos, Bob!), this was a garage band favorite.

Track three is an example of how the Ventures were not afraid to reach back - way back - to find good material to record. From the same philosophy that bred their recording of "Caravan" comes another dated but excellent jazz standard called "Night Train". This is one of the best examples extant of how Nokie could take a lead line written for *voice* and make it sound like it was originally written for *guitar*. And only a guitarist can appreciate his tremendous skill here - there are passages in it that still leave me scratching my head, and I've been playing for 35 years. A tremendous read of this old tune by the group.

Ever Ventures fan has album tracks that they consider among their favorite Ventures tracks of all time. Your reviewer has many, and track four is an excellent example. A Ventures original cleverly titled "Peach Fuzz" (a very mild fuzz is used by Nokie throughout), it requires a coin toss at the end to decide who turns in the more astonishing performance here - Nokie or Don Wilson. Wilson slashes his way through the absolute most *killer* rhythm guitar part I have ever heard, and not to slight Nokie, who blisters the fingerboard with his solo melody, which builds, and builds, and builds some more right to the end. Great, great number.

Need to be impressed further? (this was, indeed, a great album!) In track five, the Ventures turn to *classical* music for their inspiration! Called "Rap City" (the title is a clever pun), this is actually Brahms Hungarian Dance #5. Amazingly faithful to the original, considering it is rock and roll, this is a beautiful rock interpretation of a classical standard. It is also the first appearance on this album of the soprano sax recorded through a Leslie speaker that was a trademark of the Ventures sound for several albums during this period. It may still be one of rock's best-kept secrets. I meet lifelong Ventures fans regularly who are astonished to find that it is not an organ in these passages.

In track six, we must bow to the Ventures willingness to experiment. They had guts. But not all experiments work, and this one, (and track 12 in particular), did not work, in this reviewers opinion. Titled "Stranger on the Shore", it was another chestnut that the Ventures or Dick Glasser (or both) decided to use steel guitar on. The hired gun for this session was not recorded to history, though Don Wilson remembers that he was "a fellow named Shorty". The playing is excellent, if you can stomach slurpy Hawaiian-style steel playing, which, as you have easily guessed by now, I can't.

Side two opens with their top ten hit of the time, "Walk Don't Run '64" As a side note, The Ventures remain to this day the only group ever to have a top ten hit twice with two different versions of the same song! And it was a very well thought out second version, indeed. The "hook" in this number, as I see it, is the very effective use of *deep* "splash" reverb. The ear follows it, mesmerized. The sax/Leslie effect is used to good advantage again, too. Owners of some CD transfers of this tune get to hear Bob Bogle's count-off of the take, also.

Track two is a Ventures original called "Night Walk". Conventional Hammond organ leads this one off, with a great Nokie solo line being most of the song's substance. This is the first place that I recall hearing Nokie's trademark "cat-yowl" riff that he used frequently at that time in his career, most noticeably in the second solo on "Caravan" from the "Live on Stage" album. Good album track - very fluent bass work by Bob!

Track three is another "goldie-oldie" standard called "One Mint Julep". The Ventures all play this beautifully, especially considering that they recorded it in two unfriendly keys for the guitar - F and Bb, unless the tape was speeded up for the master, which is possible. I am always struck listening to this one by how *good* the entire group is - professional musicians all the way. Excellent playing - and listening - here.

Track four has a tale in it! Nokie (a gear freak) had just purchased his first expression pedal, and was experimenting endlessly in the studio with it, as Don and Bob relate the story. They convinced him to try a new tune he was noodling with as a take using the expression pedal, and that take - with some work - became a minor Venture's hit - "Pedal Pusher", another pun title, and the type of pants that the model on the *original* "Walk Don't Run" album was wearing! As a tune, it's a dandy, with organ and drums playing a prominent role, too.

Track five is a pulse pounder! Mel opens "The Creeper" with a jungle frenzy of heavy drumming, and Nokie enters on a super-simple - but none the less powerful - melody using very heavy fuzztone this time. The "creepy" atmosphere is helped tremendously by Nokies lunges from the deep during the organ solos, achieved by heavy-duty use of the marvelously responsive Moseley vibrato arm on the Mosrite guitar. A solid argument could be mad that this was the first inkling of a technique that would be used to the point of absurdity by young guitarists 30 years later - dive bombing. The Ventures enjoyed playing with this tune - they returned to it on the "A Go-Go" album, re-doing it in jazz- fusion style (reviewed by this author earlier).

And, truthfully, the worst was put off till last on this album - the sappy theme from a movie of the time called "Medic", again using Hawaiian guitar. The less said the better here. But as I said above - they had the guts to experiment, where many groups found a formula and steadfastly refused to budge from it.

Ten very, very good to *astonishing* songs on a 12 cut album. It was a trick the Ventures could pull out of the hat time and again, but never any more beautifully than they did here. It is a very worthwhile way to spend an hour and a half by listening to the original "Walk Don't Run" album and this album back-to-back. The growth and flowering of the Venture's musical excellence in that five year period is astonishing. And it's damned good listening, too - which I wish you, as always.

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Last Updated: January 1, 2003