George 'Shadow' Morton: Trash Pop King Of NYC

George 'Shadow' Morton: This guy wrote wrote & produced, among other melodramatic teen-pop masterpieces, 'Walking In The Sand' and 'Leader Of The Pack', by The Shangri-Las. 'Leader Of The Pack' - featuring talky gossipy girl bits, motorcycle sound effects bits and lasting 2:53 minutes is: The Perfect Pop Song. Then the other day I learnt that he produced proto-heavy rock combo Vanilla Fudge's first two LPs, including their insane hammond powered psyche-soul version of 'You Keep Me Hanging On', and even though Der Fudge couldn't write a decent tune for toffee, I've always thought their SOUND was just incredible, massive drums, loadsa overdriven organ, fuzz guitar, I mean, it's like a PASTICHE of that sorta sound almost, it's a huge, OTT sound, and when I learnt 'Shadow' Morton was the architect of this sound I was like "Oh, MAN! This guy's A TOTAL GENIUS! Of COURSE he produced the first two Vanilla Fudge LPs! The Shangri-Las and Vanilla Fudge! WHAT ELSE DID HE DO?"

Then I wikipedia the guy and find he produced 'In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida' by Iron Butterfly! OF COURSE HE DID! I mean, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida is pretty much the shlockiest, dirgiest hunk of boneheaded hippyspoiltation psychedelia ever produced, even more so than der Fudge, I mean it's like, what, 17 minutes long or whatever, BUT - like Der Fudge's 'You Keep Me Hanging On' and 'Leader Of The Pack' - it is Pure A1 High Trash of the finest quality, has that ace, if incredibly over-repeated riff, and has earnt a special place in American Pop Culture. Then I read on a bit further and it turns out he produced THE SECOND NEW YORK DOLLS RECORD! Which, to be fair, sorta sucked. But that wasn't George's fault. And producing The New York Dolls even if the album sorta sucked is still really cool, plus the LPs got all sortsa Shangri Las references littered all over it ("I think I'm in love, L-U-V!") so it all works on a postmodern camp level anyway. George 'Shadow' Morton is The King Of The Really Great / Dead Trashy American Pop Record! AND his name is SHADOW MORTON! The COOLEST name EVER! I'm gonna start a Shangri-Las meets Vanilla Fudge garage-soul band and call 'em The Shadow Mortons! "THEY'RE LIKE THE SHANGR-LA'S...ON ACID!" I'd go and see a Shangri-Las meets Vanilla Fudge band called The Shadow Mortons! Wouldn't you? (Paul Fuzz)