Talk:Louie Louie

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I made some changes which reflect the fact that different sources say different things about this song (particularly the Kingsmen's recording), rather than the

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[edit] Headline text

other changes which have favored one or the other. For example, the cost of the session is agreed to be $50 everywhere except the Kingsmen's Web page, which says $36. The "boom mike" story is only disputed by Robert Lindahl, who isn't credited with being the sound engineer - the only source that seems to place Robert Lindahl in that booth is Lindahl himself (the only one I'm unclear about is Dave Marsh's book; the previously included Web site mentioned nothing about Lindahl at all). Plus, if he was involved, Lindahl would have reason to place the blame on Ely for the recording quality rather than his own engineering. (He may point out that the Raiders' version sounded different, but it can also be pointed out that the Kingsmen's other recordings also sounded much clearer than "Louie, Louie".)

Until something more definitive comes along, it's best to leave in all the possible sources. - Scooter 23:56, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)


[edit] Edit based on Direct Experience

The boom mic story is not disputed by anyone else because Robert Lindahl was the only person from NWI present. How do I know? I am his daughter. The boom story always makes my father roll his eyes. Those familiar with the advertising business in Portland, Oregon during the late 50s and 60s knew that Northwestern was known for high quality broadcast radio and television ads, corporate films (United Good Neighbor, Louisiana Pacific, Georgia Pacific, Weyerhauser, PGE) and radio shows (Stories of Pacific Wonderland sponsored by Pacific Power and Light), symphony recordings, and on a more infrequent basis, they also produced records for a wide variety of musicians and genres. Along with this body of professionally esteemed work, they had a reputation for providing a studio equipped with what was at the time considered high quality equipment. A Neumann U47 condenser mic (now at the Seattle Music Experience)on a correctly positioned stand was used for vocals and a RCA 44BX was used for the bass. My father had the dubious honor of taking on that recording session as he had sent everyone else home for the night. As he put it, "it was a nothing thing.. I didnt think any more about it until the Raiders came in and recorded the same song a couple of days later." And as he summarized the event, he was eager to get home to his dinner and his family and be done with "some itinerant band that just wanted to hear themselves". But regardless of his feelings about this job, it is extremely unlikely, given my father's expertise and excruciating attention to detail, that the session equipment was set up in a slipshod manner.I suspect that the Kingsman (unlike the Raiders) weren't clear on which microphones were actually 'live' as opposed to which were just "in the vicinity" not to mention how to sing into a recording studio mic. There were alot of mics there that night.. on stands.. against the wall...sitting around the floor and they had a half hour to figure it out. Obviously they didn't. If their recording quality improved on later records it was probably due to their becoming more savvy and sophisticated about equipment and being able to afford more than a half hour of time.

In the 90s, Robert "Bob" Lindahl, as the sound engineer on that record and original owner of NWI, was invited to attend, along with the Kingsman and others, a ceremony held by the Oregon Historical Society marking the anniversary of Louie Louie. A plaque was placed on the outside wall of the original site of Northwestern Inc Studios at SW 12th in downtown Portland. (the plaque was stolen within the week) Eric Proedahl, founder of louielouie.net and who is now finishing a documentary on the history of Louie Louie also attended and met with my father at his home and interviewed him on camera. As for Dave Marsh, he never contacted anyone connected with NWI but relied solely on the memories of the Kingsman. He died before I was old enough to care about Louie Louie and the nonsense attributed to my father or his studio. The Snopes website people, when contacted by me, weren't interested in any first hand accounts of the recording. My father pretty much summed up the irony of the controversy in a early 90's phone interview he had with columnist Phil Stanford, then of the Oregonian. "Hell.. I gave them a hit record. What more did they want?"

Im my editing I have restored some links and taken out skeptical remarks concerning Bob Lindahl's role and observations as sound engineer. Rain1222

Certainly an authoritative source, if not an unbiased one. I'm content to leave it as is, with a slight change to make the source clear. - Scooter 21:21, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Rights

How can lyrics have been "introduced into the public domain by David Spector"? It is still a derivative work, deriving from work to which he would not have rights. At the very least, we should be giving a an accurate fair use justification rather than this patently false claim. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:00, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Lyrics Wrong?

the smoking gun had an article stating these http://www.thesmokinggun.com/louie/louiereal1.html were indeed the real lyrics (closer to the '65 FBI files) Are the lyrics in the article the one the Kingsman sang? http://www.thesmokinggun.com/louie/louie.html

[edit] Other Northwest recordings

We really don't make clear here the extent to which the song was a "required figure" for Northwest bands from about 1963 to at least 1971. There must be 40 or so recordings from the region. The current structure doesn't really let me get at this, and I'm not sure how I would want to restructure, but if anyone takes a shot at it, one worth mentioning is The Topics from Bremerton, Washington a soul band and mostly a lounge act, whose one and only album, 1971's self-released Living Evidence, has a great 6-minute version of "Louie, Louie", re-released recently on the Wheedle's Groove compilation (Light in the Attic, 2004). Probably the one and only mention they deserve in Wikipedia. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:50, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article Has Wrong Title?

Richard Berry stated in a September 1988 interview for Esquire magazine that the proper title for the song was "Louie Louie", with no comma. - Chadbryant 20:23, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

(attack removed

Pwned! Seriously, "Louie Louie" seems to be common on the internet - both the Straight Dope and the Smoking Gun omit the comma - and I would support a move to that name. But it's not likely to happen, though. -Ashley == Pomeroy 18:41, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bad Info

Edited out some erroneous statements regarding my father, Bob Lindahl, being "locked out of the control room by Ken Chase". And they would have walked out of the place with a tape?? C'mon...get real people. Rain1222 04:55, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Re: the "Louie Louie Riff"

"Riff" may need to be more clearly defined for this section. The "Sloopy" variants as well as "You've Lost that Lovin' Feelin'" do use the same harmonic progression, but the rhythm is different even though the phrase is of a similar length. May not matter to most, but it was immediately clear to this musician, and depending on how strictly "riff" is defined, these songs might not belong in such a list (at least, not without a proper notation of the difference). Furthermore, there are probably a lot of omitted works as well, but that's for someone a lot more bored than me ATM. Renaissongsman 03:44, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Status in Washington State

According to the State's own list of official symbols, Louie Louie is NOT the state's official rock song. There was a move to make it such, but it apparently died in the legislature. I changed the first line and reference of the "Legacy" section to make the uncertainty clear. It would certainly be true to say that "Louie Louie" is often regarded as the state's unofficial state rock song, but I don't have a reference to support the assertion, so I have gone tentatively with uncertainty. --Haruo 19:50, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

It's not (although I wish it were), so I've removed it. See Washington State Symbols]. Travisl 22:52, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Guitarist breaks drumstick?

In paragraph 7 of section: Version by The Kinsmen Quote: "About :54 into the song the guitarist broke one of his drums sticks" I don't know how a guitarist would be able to break one of his drum sticks. Is this line supposed to be "...the drummer broke one of his drum sticks" or "...the guitarist broke one of his guitar strings"? I don't know so I will leave it up to someone else to fix. Darth vader 007 21:11, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Louie Lou-eye

I don't see anything in the article about the Kingmen's singer pronunciation of the name as "Lou-ie Lou-eye" (other than a mention of that fact that the lyrics are practically unintelligible throughout their entire rendition). Was this close to the original pronuciation by Chuck Berry, or was it a contrivance by Jack Ely? — Loadmaster 22:18, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

RICHARD Berry, not Chuck...! He sings Lou-ie Lou-ie throughout, not Lou-eye. And you can make out what he's singing. Ghmyrtle 00:46, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 10:50, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Toots and the Maytals

This article has no reference to the version by Toots and the Maytals. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.192.234.167 (talk) 20:15, 4 January 2008 (UTC)