THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,512) Los Shakers — “Nunca Nunca”/”Never Never”
From the Uruguayan Beatles (see #906) — no joke — this infectious ’66 number is a “[w]onderful song, a mix of bossa nova, British invasion rock & roll and Latin rhythms”. (dnlllm (courtesy of Google Translate), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJbso_FZjKg) I’ve played songs that I’ve called Beatlesque, and I’ve played a song that I called “the greatest early Beatles imitation I have ever heard” (see #849). But hands down, Los Shakers were the greatest Beatles fascimile of all time — “the Realest Fake Beatles to ever record” (Gaylord Fields, https://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/07/fake-beatles-no.html), “one of the most uncannily Beatlesque bands from anywhere, at any time” (Richie Unterberger, https://www.allmusic.com/album/por-favor%21-mw0000102599). They led what Wikipedia cheekily calls “the Uruguayan Invasion” of Latin America. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Shakers)
Mike Stax tells us:
[I]n 1964 [Los Shakers] . . . began to peddle the new Mersey Sound — Montivideo style. This was a potentially embarrassing recipe, to be sure — other bands around the world certainly made fools of themselves trying — but [Los] Shakers proved to be an entirely more convincing proposition. Not only did they have the musical smarts to pull off the sound, but in the Fattoruso brothers they also possessed a strong songwriting team who could dash off Beatles-flavored original material with disarming ease. Their first single in 1964, . . “Rompan Todo” . . . . became a massive hit all over South America, and the group toured across most of the continent to rapturous receptions.
liner notes to the CD comp Nuggets II (Original Artyfacts From The British Empire And Beyond 1964-1969)
Richie Unterberger writes:
The concept of a Uruguayan band in the mold of the Hard Day’s Night-era Beatles may seem absurd, but it did happen in the mid-’60s. . . . [T]he Shakers . . . were fairly successful in mimicking the jangle of the early Beatles sound, writing most of their material with a decent grasp of the British Invasion essentials of catchy tunes and enthusiastic harmonies. . . . [S]oundwise the Shakers were actually superior to many of the bona fide Mersey groups . . . . The group was formed by brothers Hugo Fattoruso (lead guitar, keyboards) and Osvaldo Fattoruso (rhythm guitar), who as a team wrote most of their material. Like so many combos around the world, the specific motivation to form the group came from watching . . . A Hard Day’s Night. The band remained extremely influenced by the Beatles throughout their career . . . . [It] became very big in both Uruguay and Argentina, and also toured in several other South American countries. There was never a concerted effort on the band’s part to invade the English-speaking market, and they never played in North America. However, a small New York label, Audio Fidelity, took the unusual step of issuing a Shakers album, Break It All, in the States in early 1966. This LP actually consists mostly of re-recordings (and good ones) of songs from their debut Uruguayan long-player, as well as songs that had appeared on singles. . . . The Shakers continued to follow the Beatles’ lead through 1968, introducing Revolver-like guitars and backwards effects, and then some Magical Mystery Tour-type psychedelia, as well as some occasional influence of their native South American rhythms and musical styles. . . . The Shakers broke up toward the end of the 1960s, with the Fatturoso brothers recording an album for Odeon in 1969 before moving to the United States for a few years to work with Airto Moreira, and then forming the Latin rock group Opa.
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/los-shakers-mn0000360089/biography
Gaylord Fields adds:
Hugo, Osvaldo, Pelin and Caio . . . were as uncannily accomplished at bringing forth the psychedelic Pepperisms as the Merseybeat. . . . [T]he language they actually sang in . . . was a charmingly imperfect English. [They cast a] magical spell . . . . The group . . . play[ed] . . . jazz[] when they contracted Beatlemania after a screening of ¡Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Paul, John, George y Ringo! (or A Hard Day’s Night, as it’s known to the gringos). Signed to EMI’s Odeon label in Argentina, Los Shakers issued three spectacular LPs in their 1965-68 recording lifespan (actually, four, if you count their U.S. only re-recordings of their early songs . . . ).
As to Uruguay’s place in rock history, Eric Zolov writes that:
Squeezed in between mighty Brazil and Argentina, Uruguay has historically served as a geopolitical buffer zone, a nation whose own political and cultural identity has been overshadowed by its powerful neighbors. Yet during the 1960s this small country generated some of the most original rock found anywhere in the hemisphere. Foreign influences abounded, from the Anglo-rock invasion by the U.K. and the U.S., to the commercialized pop of Argentina and the cultural remixings of the Brazilian tropicalistas. Uruguayan rockers chewed on these influences and spat them back, mockingly at first and more somberly as the night of political repression fell. Uruguay was long known as the Switzerland of South America. It had a stable, two-party political system with a large middle class. The military had stayed out of politics and wasn’t expected to come back. When Beatlemania hit the Western Hemisphere, Uruguayan youth were especially ready to join in the revelry. “Discódromo,” a freewheeling radio program (and, later, TV show) started by Rubén Castillo in 1960, had already exposed the youth of Montevideo, Uruguay’s capital, to the teen culture emerging abroad. . . . [With] Los Shakers. . . . Uruguay’s era of English-language música beat had begun. Other groups soon followed, notably Los Mockers, whose artful impersonation of The Rolling Stones was the counterpart to Los Shakers. . . . By the mid 1960s, scores of so-called “beat bands” were performing across Uruguay. They did so in spaces ranging from the semi-underground cuevas (caves), as they were known, to the ritzy hotels and private clubs that dotted the country’s beach resorts. Except for Los Shakers . . . these bands essentially performed covers of foreign hits. Moreover, they all sang in English. They did so not sheepishly but with unabashed exuberance . . . . As Esteban Hirschfield, organist for Los Mockers, later remarked in an interview, there was “no shame” in imitating the Stones “as closely as possible.” “On the contrary,” he reflected, “we were proud of it.” Singing in English seemed the obvious ticket for staking a claim to a world beyond Uruguay. . . . By 1968, the cultural climate for making music was undergoing a radical shift. A self-confidence established over the previous years had laid the foundations for greater experimentation. The political situation had shifted as well. Los Tupamaros, an urban guerrilla group, captured the headlines with a spate of kidnappings in the name of revolutionary justice. . . . In June 1968, the president declared a state of emergency, suspending numerous constitutional protections. Uruguay was now on a slippery slope that lead to direct military rule in 1973. . . . [But] for a brief period, English-language Uruguayan rock dominated the South American pop charts.
Here in Spanish:
On TV, they even look like the Beatles!
Again on TV:
“[T]his is the second of the two shorts that Carlos Tato Ariosa made in Uruguay based on film material that Osvaldo gave him (mostly fragments of Rodolfo Corral’s filming and home movies).” (danielgrigera7125, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C34ij9IhsJk):
Documentary on the band, in Spanish:
Pay to Play! The Off the Charts Spotify Playlist! + Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock Merchandise
Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).
The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 1,000 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.
All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.
When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.
Just click on the first blue block for a month to month subscription or the second blue block for a yearly subscription.
Brace for the Obscure (60s rock)! / Off the Charts: 60s Rock Revelations😊 