It didn't take me a second to choose a record for my first upload. I can't seem to find much information about the band (a far more detailed entry in the Canadian Pop Music encyclopedia doesn't seem to be there anymore) so I will try as best as I can to explain the group and the single.
The Big Town Boys were from Toronto, Ontario. They were originally the backing band for a well-known Toronto singer at the time named Shirley Matthews who in 1963 recorded the hit 'Big Town Boy' which peaked at #4 on the Canadian CHUM charts. The Big Town Boys were major players in Toronto's R&B scene in the early 1960's along with acts such as Robbie Lane & the Disciples, Jackie Shane who in April 1963 climbed all the way to #2 on the CHUM charts with the song 'Any Other Way', and the Shays featuring David Clayton-Thomas who would later gain success with the jazz-rock group Blood Sweat and Tears. Signed to RCA Victor (and also Capitol records), the Big Town Boys recorded their first hit 'Put You Down' in late 1964 or early 1965 which peaked at #40 on the CHUM charts. They continued to record and tour scoring a few more hits into the CHUM charts like: 'Hey Girl Go it Alone', 'It was I' (Which was their biggest hit peaking at #9 on the CHUM charts), and 'Jack Rabbit' which the band released under the name 'BTB-4' on Yorkville records. The Big Town Boys also appeared on Bell Records for US distribution. In 1966 a full length, self-titled LP was released containing all their hits up to that point as well as other tracks including a cover of the Beach Boys' 'Little Honda'. With a few more tours and television appearances on CBC's 'Let's Go!' the band finally called it quits in 1968.
There are at least two different RCA Victor labels for the 'Put You Down' single. The one pictured to the right (which I believe is the rarest of the two) and the red label version.
Their Capitol singles were the typical yellow and orange swirl design.
Their self-titled LP was one of the revered 6000 series of Capitol records recorded in Canada.
So that's basically my knowledge of the group. This tune has been a long time favourite of mine. I remember hearing it played on CHUM as well as other AM radio stations such as CKOC (Oldies 1150) and CKDO (back when they were AM1350). The sad thing is I did not find out who recorded it until about 4 years ago. It is still sad to see the neglect of Canada's music history in this day and age. The Canadian music recorded during this period was some of the best ever made. These records (although they may have been influenced by American styles) were unique with a sound that was honest and sincere. Bands like the Big Town Boys left behind a significant but widely ignored legacy in Canada's music history. While it is true that Canadian bands sold out many times to their neighbours to the south to make ends meet, they never compromised making great music.
Update: You can read about the leader of the band, Tommy Graham,
here.
So here it is. The Big Town Boys in their first wave of glory.
I have packaged the tunes in a .rar file. You will need a program like to
WinRAR to unpackage it.
The package also includes large scans of the labels and the picture sleeve.
As always the rips will be in .FLAC format which is a completely lossless format to preserve the best possible sound. You will have to download and install the
FLAC codec. You will also need
Winamp Media Player to play the files once the FLAC codec is installed.
It is possible to play FLAC in Windows Media Player but since FLAC is an open source codec not supported by Microsoft you will have to install something like the
K-Lite Codec Pack to get them to play. There may be other codec or codec packages that you can use but I find that the K-lite package provides all the codecs I need.
Big Town Boys - Put You Down (RCA Victor 3339) *UPDATED*
DivShareIf for some reason the link is broken or the file was deleted from Rapidshare, contact me and I will upload it again.
