THE SHARPS by Al Kelly There were several Sharps but this group made many records and with many labels too. Carl White (Sequins, Feathers, Lamlighters, Tenderfoots, Rivingtons, Buddies, Ebbtides and Unforgettables & others) was their lead singer. The group were all members of other groups and sort of latched onto each other and started playing clubs and were all based out of LA,CA. They had a club date for several weeks in San Francisco and worked on their singing , after their gig was over, they came back to LA and felt they would do some backup work, one of their first jobs was backing this young kid from Canada, Paul Anka, who made a record for the RPM label. They continued to do backup work for other LA artists. In '57, they hooked up with producer Lester Sill, who had just teamed up with Lee Hazelwood and they became the Sharps and Les was their manager. They did a couple sides and the producers leased it to RCA's sub. VIK label and RCA did nothing for the record so later that year, Sill & Hazelwood had a production deal with my old partner, Harry Finfer, who co-owned Jamie/Guyden. Their deal hit paydirt with Duane Eddy having several big million sellers and the Sharps doing the background vocals or hollering on some of them. Meanwhile Jamie re-released the Sharps record that was on VIK and again the record did nothing. Meanwhile the group got a contract with Aladdin's sub. Lamp records and they did an old Gershwin tune "Our Love Is Here To Stay", the tune got picks at many radio stations, Billboard had it as their Spotlight Record of the Week but the record didn't sell well. Meanwhile Eddie Messner, owner of the label asked the group to back up a singer, who was the group's old friend and recording buddy. The singer was Thurston Harris, who was a member of the Lamplighters with several of the group. Messner played Bobby Day's "Little Bitty Pretty One" for the guys and none like it but Messner wanted to cover the record. The day of the session Harris got drunk the night before and the police took him to the hospital 's psycho ward for treatment. The group did the backup work and somehow one of the Sharps posed as Harris' brother and got him released and brought him directly to the studio to record his part. Thurston's version became the big seller and the group never got any credit. Meanwhile the group had a new release on Aladdin in Aug. of '57 and again no action. After this they released a song on a small LA label, Tag, owned by a LA DJ, Dan Reveles, it was a dance style tune but cheaply made and many DJs felt the same. In early '58 they released this song on Jake Porter's Combo label. Next move was the Jamie label again and one record started to get action but there was a slurring of some words on the record and many thought it was an obsene and the radio plays stopped. Carl Whit took a break from the group and recorded a release on the Combo label as Carl Ell & Buddies and still another on Jan-Lar as the Ebbtides. In '61, they signed with producer Kim Fowley and released a couple more releases as The Four After Five, another few duds but good records. Kim got them signed to a contract with Warner Bros but as the Crenshaws and later in '62 they became the Rivingtons and they finally hit paydirt. Gosh, how long does a group have to record to get a break????? And I didn't really cover all the other groups they were part of, Wow!!