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The Archies
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The Archies are a fictional garage band founded by Archie Andrews, Reggie Mantle, and Jughead Jones, a group of adolescent fictional characters of the Archie universe, in the context of the animated TV series, The Archie Show.
The fictional band's music was recorded by session musicians featuring Ron Dante on vocals and released as a series of singles and albums. Their most successful song, "Sugar, Sugar", became one of the biggest hits of the bubblegum pop genre that flourished from 1968 to 1972.
The fictional group
The Archies play a variety of contemporary popular music, consistent with the era in which the comic is drawn.
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Encyclopedia
The Archies are a fictional garage band founded by Archie Andrews, Reggie Mantle, and Jughead Jones, a group of adolescent fictional characters of the Archie universe, in the context of the animated TV series, The Archie Show.
The fictional band's music was recorded by session musicians featuring Ron Dante on vocals and released as a series of singles and albums. Their most successful song, "Sugar, Sugar", became one of the biggest hits of the bubblegum pop genre that flourished from 1968 to 1972.
The fictional group
The Archies play a variety of contemporary popular music, consistent with the era in which the comic is drawn. They seem to have a preference for rock and roll, however.
Betty Cooper and Veronica Lodge later also joined the group. Every member sings vocals, with Jughead handling the bass voice on a few tracks.
The roles the teens play in the fictional band were:
- Archie - Lead Guitar
- Reggie - Second Guitar (or Bass Guitar; see below)
- Jughead - Drums
- Betty - Tambourine/Percussion/Guitar (occasional)
- Veronica - Organ/Keyboard
- Hot Dog - mascot
Even though the band have soft, pop-like voices in their songs, their actual voices are much different.
An unusual distribution mode for their music was as cardboard records embossed directly onto the backs of breakfast cereal boxes so that the cardboard record could be cut out and played on a turntable (although it should be noted that their music was also available on standard issue LPs and 45s).
The Archies are sometimes jokingly compared to the seminal 60s rock band The Doors, as the Doors also had no bass player. However, there is some controversy over whether Reggie played bass or not; in most drawings, his guitar looks identical to Archie's, making him the band's second (or co-lead) guitarist. On the other hand, a number of drawings (including the one above) clearly show the instrument to have four tuning keys, the most common bass design. In addition, there are six-string bass guitars, and the recordings of the Archies' songs regularly featured a bass player, suggesting that Reggie in fact was the bass player. Also, it should be noted that for the product description for The Archies Christmas Album, Reggie was stated as the bass guitarist.
It should be noted that in a mid-90's story, a conversation between Jughead and Betty in the opening panels state Reggie as being the group's bass player, as well as a story edited in more recent issues. However, because storylines and hobbies/activities in the Archie world change from story to story, these two stories cannot be considered canon.
The fictional group was so popular that animated musical groups became a fad of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Most of these groups played bubblegum pop. Often, the cartoon characters of such shows were also teenaged detectives, as an attempt to recapture the success of both The Archie Show and Scooby Doo.
These animated groups included The Groovie Goolies, The Hardy Boys, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kids, The Banana Splits, The Cattanooga Cats, The Sugar Bears, The Chan Clan, and The Neptunes, as well as animated versions of The Jackson 5ive and the Osmond Brothers. One of the more well-known examples is Josie and the Pussycats, which was successful both as an animated series and as a comic book produced by Archie Comics. Other Archie Comics bands from this time included The Bingoes and The Madhouse Glads, but neither ever appeared in animated form.
The real group
A set of studio musicians were assembled by Don Kirshner in 1968 to perform various songs. The most famous is "Sugar, Sugar", written by Jeff Barry and Andy Kim, which went to #1 on the pop chart in 1969 and earned the group a gold record (in fact, in Billboard magazine's Hot 100, it was ranked as the number one song of that year, the only time a fictional band has ever claimed Billboard's annual Hot 100 top-spot). Other Top Forty songs recorded by The Archies include "Who's Your Baby?" (U.S. #40), "Bang-Shang-A-Lang" (U.S. #22), and "Jingle Jangle" (U.S. #10).
Male vocals for the fictional Archies group were provided by The Cuff Links' lead singer Ron Dante and female duet vocals were provided by Toni Wine. Wine, who was only paid for the recording session and quit the group when the song became a huge hit, was succeeded in 1970 by Donna Marie, who in turn was replaced on the final recordings by Merle Miller. The only Archies song not to feature Ron Dante on lead was 1971's "Love Is Living In You," sung by Richie Adams. The last single released 1972 was "Strangers in the Morning;" its B-side song was "Plum Crazy."
Jeff Barry, Andy Kim, Susan Morse, Joey Levine, Maeretha Stewart, Bobby Bloom and Leslie Miller contributed background vocals at various times, with Barry contributing his trademark bass voice (portrayed as being sung by Jughead in the cartoon) on cuts such as "Jingle Jangle," "Rock 'n' Roll Music", "A Summer Prayer For Peace" (which hit #1 in South Africa in 1971) and "You Little Angel, You." Musicians on Archies records included guitarist Hugh McCracken, bassists Chuck Rainey and Joey Macho, keyboard player Ron Frangipane and drummers Buddy Saltzman and Gary Chester.
Most of the Archies' songs were produced, written or co-written by Neil Goldberg & Jeff Barry.
The following list of 31 titles (being the beloved 'Giant Jukebox' songs from the 'Archies Funhouse' 1970 TV shows, featuring 'Mr Factory', the first ecology song to make major airwaves),
were all written, arranged, directed and produced in the studio, solely by Neil Brian Goldberg, who is still grateful to Jeff Barry for giving him the deal, (part of which was for Nancy Barry's name to appear on each song). Neil Goldberg played rhythm guitar and was session leader on all tracks. Neil also sang background on a number of these tracks.
Giant Jukebox Song list (1 title missing) All words & music Neil Brian Goldberg.
* "Anyone Can Be Anything"First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Ballad of 51st Street Park" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "The Big Boat" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Candy Kisses"
* "Comes the Sun"
* "Don't Let It Get You Down"
* "Don't Run from Love"
* "Falling in Love Is Fun"
* "Honey"
* "I'm Just a Puppet on a String"
* "Jungle George"
* "La-La-La-La-Love" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "The Laughing Song" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Little by Little" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Looks That Say 'I Love You'"
* "Lonely Cricket"First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Love Went Round" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Love Vibrations"
* "Lucky Me"
* "Monkey See, Monkey Do"
* "Mr. Factory" First ecology song to make major airwaves - a National Treasure
* "My Singing Guitar"
* "Oh Sweet Suzie"
* "Rowboat Ride"
* "Somebody Likes You"
* "Sunshine"
* "Sweet Saturday Night"
* "The Big Boat" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "The Ways I Love You"
* "We're One Big Family" First positive message on Kid's TV
* "Young Love"
The sound Engineer was Fred Weinberg, who was Jeff Barry's and Andy Kim's favorite, and who also recorded Barry and Kim's other hits "Be My Baby", "Baby I Love You", "Rock Me Gently" and many more. Fred Weinberg is an award winning composer and producer in his own right.
However, the music for The U.S. of Archie TV show which aired in 1975, was produced by Jackie Mills, a Hollywood producer, who also produced Bobby Sherman and the Brady Kids. The vocalist for these shows was Tom McKenzie, who also sang on some Groovie Goolie segments, and was a regular member of the popular singing group, the Doodletown Pipers.
Contrary to popular belief, although the verses of Jingle Jangle are supposedly sung by either Betty or Veronica (the only two female members of the fictional group), in reality, it was not performed by any female vocalist, rather it was Dante using a falsetto voice as evidenced by the lyrics "It's my true heart I'm showin'/or my nose would be growin'/you know that it gets longer when I lie".
Dante returned for a 2008 Archies album, The Archies Christmas Party, with singers Danielle van Zyl and Kelly-Lynn.
Discography
Albums
Everything's Archie (TV theme song) / Bang-Shang-A-Lang / Boys & Girls / Time for Love / You Make Me Wanna Dance / La Dee Doo Down Down / Truck Driver / Catching Up on Fun / I'm in Love / Seventeen Ain't Young / Ride Ride Ride / Hide & Seek
- Everything's Archie (1969)
Feelin' So Good (S.K.O.O.B.Y.-D.O.O.) / Melody Hill / Rock 'n' Roll Music / Kissin' / Don't Touch My Guitar / Circle of Blue / Sugar, Sugar / You Little Angel You / Bicycles, Roller Skates and You / Hot Dog / Inside Out, Upside Down / Love Light
Jingle Jangle / Everything's Alright / She's Putting Me Thru Changes / Justine / Whoopee Tie Ai A / Nursery Rhyme / Get on the Line / You Know I Love You / Senorita Rita / Look Before You Leap / Sugar and Spice / Archies Party
Sunshine / Who's Gonna Love Me / Mr. Factory / Love and Rock and Roll Music / Over and Over / Waldo P. Emerson Jones / A Summer Prayer for Peace / Dance Dance Dance / Comes the Sun / Suddenly Susan / One Big Family / It's the Summertime
- The Archies Greatest Hits (1970)
Sugar, Sugar / Jingle Jangle / Get on the Line / Sunshine / Bang-Shang-A-Lang / Who's Your Baby? / Feelin' So Good (S.K.O.O.B.Y. D.O.O.) / Over and Over / Seventeen Ain't Young / Waldo P. Emerson Jones / Everything's Alright
This is Love / Don't Need No Bad Girl / Should Anybody Ask / Easy Guy / Maybe I'm Wrong / What Goes On / Carousel Man / Hold On to Lovin' / This is the Night / Little Green Jacket / Together We Two / Throw a Little Love My Way
- The Archies Christmas Album (2008)
Here Comes Santa Claus / Up on the Housetop / Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree / Holly Jolly Christmas / Jingle Bell Rock / I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus / Run Rudolph Run / Santa Claus is Coming to Town / Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas / Sleigh Ride / Archies Christmas Party / Christmas in Riverdale
Singles
Love Is Living In You / Hold on to Lovin' (1971)
Strangers in the Morning / Plum Crazy (1972)
External links
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