50 YEARS AGO, A NEW ACT EMERGES

Published by Rick on Tagged Uncategorized

As May 1971 was drawing to a close, some things were becoming certain, though other things like, “how am I going to make a living” weren’t so certain. I knew that my future was in San Francisco, punctuated by one ride on a cable car earlier that month, after which I was totally sold. I was in a solid relationship with my partner and bandmate, but the band we were in had decided for many reasons to break up, as it became less fun and we were splintering into other interests anyway.

Monica, who already was using the name Ruby in the band, wanted to continue singing oldies with me, and since we were in a relationship, it seemed like it would be easy enough to take off from where the band had been and continue doing 50’s and early 60’s songs. We walked into a club that had just opened on Union Street in San Francisco, called Tarr & Feathers Saloon. We knew the club’s part-owner and namesake Wayne Tarr, who had been a fan of our band, and were in luck that when we dropped in, he was there. The club had only been open for about a week, so we asked if he had made any decisions about entertainment. We told him the band was breaking up, and he asked, “Do the two of you want to do something here?” It wasn’t supposed to be this easy.

Wayne offered to give us a paid audition for the following Saturday, give us $25 (plus a couple of drinks) for the night, and if it worked out, he’d hire us for a regular gig. We agreed to that, then when we left, I said to Monica, “Well, I guess we better work up an act.” We had all of about four days in which to do that.

The rehearsal was disappointing to me at first, though I can’t remember why it was. At one point I said, “I don’t know, maybe I should try going solo,” to which she said, “Oh, so I would just be your groupie?” My response to that rhetorical question wasn’t a particularly good one, and I almost cost myself a wonderful 15-year adventure in the process. What made us come together was when I asked her what songs she’d like to do. She ran off a couple of titles, and I immediately said, “We’re in business.” The one song I truly remember her suggesting was the Flamingos doo-wopp version of “I Only Have Eyes For You,” and I was pleasantly surprised with what the two of us could do vocally with songs like that. We kept that song in the act for many years.

We managed to put together about an hour’s worth of material, and I put in some solo stuff to start each set with. We hemmed and hawed our way through two hours, and I would be hard pressed to remember what songs we did. I’m sure we did “My Boyfriend’s Back” and “He’s A Rebel,” which we had also done with the band, but I’d say a good two thirds of our act was different. I was getting into the early 50’s R&B music, so I’m sure we did a few from that genre. Whatever it was, it worked well enough to persuade the owner to hire us for an indefinite run, playing every Tuesday and Saturday for the whopping fee of $50 for the two of us. Other gigs would come along, but for a while the $50 each of us was making per week was enough to live on 50 years ago. And pay rent on a studio apartment in San Francisco’s Mission District, plus have enough for us to eat dinner out a couple nights a week.

Oh yes, and before we did that paid audition, we needed to have a name. Wayne had made a poster which advertised our performance, but showed a cartoon drawing of himself saying “Be there” and billed us as “The Better Half of Rockin’ Ricky,” which we weren’t comfortable with. Since the guy who played the part of Ricky in the other band was probably quitting show biz anyway, I thought Ricky was a good name for myself too, so we told Wayne our name would be Ricky & Ruby. We kept that name for about two years until a misprint in one club’s listings in the newspaper had us down as Rick & Ruby, and our first manager decided he liked that better, so the name stuck.

I could never have imagined what would happen over the rest of the 70’s, and how we would meet and work with wonderful talented artists who thought WE were doing something spectacular. We tried to be all aw shucks about it, which was probably the right way to be, but we found that attitude so much easier to have in San Francisco than it would be at the end of the decade when we were dealing with Hollywood. By the end of the decade, we had toured the country as Robin Williams opening act, and had received offers from TV, film, and recording entities. None of those offers amounted to anything, but we did just fine along the way.

Still, the adventure began on that spring day in 1971, when a little bit of moxie, a little bit of luck, and maybe a little bit of talent combined to kick off a career. We may not have known what to expect, but that’s what made it so exciting.

May 24th, 2021



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