George "Shadow" Morton, 1940-2013

[rn57]

Mary Weiss and Janis Ian announced a few minutes ago on Facebook that George "Shadow" Morton died yesterday. He produced all those incredible Shangri-Las records (and Janis's "Society's Child," the early Vanilla Fudge records, the second New York Dolls album, etc) - and co-wrote many Shangri-Las classics.

 Though of course Brian would shake his head at such nonsense, I have always thought that Shadow was a more innovative and impressive producer than Phil Spector. His best records have an emotional force that Phil's just don't have for me.

And that's called...

RIP....

[hypehat]

This sucks. The man produced such incredible, death-defying records with The Shangri-Las, and not just Leader Of The Pack


I mean,


He Cried
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-V47lupTKE

Past, Present, And Future
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3hCZiTNric

The Train From Kansas City
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hP0aRVlWEuo

Could probably post the rest of them, tbh.

[rn57]

The way the drums come up, harbingers of doom, in the last verse of "Train From Kansas City"....

and the way the acoustic guitar chord crashes down at the end of "raise my glistening wings and fly" in "Society's Child," bringing in those last lines mixing despair and wistfulness...

are just two examples that display Shadow Morton's genius. He was always ready to credit Artie Butler, who did many of his arrangements, and engineer Brooks Arthur for their essential contributions - not to mention his singers and musicians and the supportive people at Red Bird Records. But in the last analysis, these records and songs emerged from his vision.

Indeed he may be more influential, right now, than Spector. Amy Winehouse's Back In Black would be just the tip of the iceberg. So many look to the NY Dolls or Blondie or the Ramones for inspiration, and because Shadow produced the Dolls, people knew of his impact on that group, but I think it took a while for people to realize how deeply he influenced the latter two groups.