The Cowsills are an American singing group from Newport, Rhode Island, six siblings noted for performing professionally and singing harmonies at an early age, later with their mother.
The band was formed in early 1965 by brothers Bill, Bob, and Barry Cowsill; their brother John joined shortly thereafter. Originally Bill and Bob played guitar and Barry played the drums. When John learned to play drums and joined the band, Barry began playing bass. After their initial success, the brothers were joined by their siblings Susan and Paul along with their mother, Barbara. A seventh sibling, Bob's fraternal twin brother Richard, was never part of the band during its heyday, although he occasionally appeared with them in later years.
The band's road manager for most of their career was Richard "Biggie" Korn. When the group expanded to its full family membership by 1967, the six siblings ranged in age from 8 to 19. Joined by their mother, Barbara Cowsill (née Russell), the group inspired the 1970s television show The Partridge Family.David Cassidy, C'mon, Get Happy: Fear and Loathing on the Partridge Family Bus (Grand Central Publishing, 1994)):51-52, 60.
Origins and early successes
The Cowsills' musical interest started while their father, William "Bud" Cowsill, was stationed in Canton, Ohio, in the late 1950s, as a US Navy recruiter. Bill and Bob taught themselves how to play the guitar. As the boys' musical and vocal abilities developed they began performing at church school dances in Stark County, Ohio. These, and other performances, led to the boys' first television appearance on the Gene Carroll Show on WEWS in Cleveland.
After Bud retired from the Navy, he and his wife managed their children's career until 1967.
In late 1965, the Cowsills were hired as a regular act on Bannisters Wharf in Newport. The group performed many of the popular songs of the day including the music of the Beatles. A handful of singles were released on JODA Records, a label owned by Danny Sims and Johnny Nash (of "I Can See Clearly Now" fame), and Philips Records in 1965 and 1966, to only modest success. After Leonard Stogel took over management of the band, they were signed to MGM Records in 1967. Barbara, who would become known to their fans affectionately as "Mini-Mom" due to her diminutive stature, joined the group just in time to record the band's first album, including the hit single "The Rain, the Park & Other Things" with Bill on lead vocals. It sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold record. With the success of "The Rain ...", the band quickly became a popular act in the U.S., and achieved significant airplay in Britain and other parts of Europe. "The Rain, The Park and Other Things" reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Bob Cowsill is quoted as follows on the band's early days: Although Bill and I performed at a very young age, and Bill, I, Barry and John did a lot of frat parties at Brown University and clubs in Newport ... the most memorable performance of what I would view as the precursor of what The Cowsills would be was at Kings Park in Newport (right at the foot of Halidon Hall) at some carnival. The family angle just evolved ... first Bill and me, then Bill me and Barry, then Bill, me, Barry and John, then Bill, me, Barry, John and Mom, then Bill, me, Barry, John, Mom and Paul, then later, me, Paul, John, Barry, Mom and Susan, then back to Bill, me, Barry and John (very briefly in the end) and then to me, Paul, John and Susan. Our first real break came when we were playing the MK Hotel in Newport (in the basement there) and a guy from the "Today Show" saw us and asked if we wanted to be on the "Today" show. We weren't famous or anything but we were young and we were related and we were quite good. So we went on "The Today Show" (I doubt a tape exists of that but if it did it would be priceless to see) and someone from Mercury Records saw us, which ultimately led to our signing with that label and putting out "Most Of All" (a great "school's out" song that should have been our first hit in my opinion), which led to Artie Kornfeld and Steve Duboff. Mercury dropped us, but Artie and Steve had written "The Rain, The Park and Other Things" and we went in and recorded that song at A&R studios in New York and took the whole package to MGM, who decided wouldn't it just be terrific if their mother performed with them and, voila, the rest, as they say, is history.
The Cowsills released five albums in all for MGM records between 1967 and 1970. Following the success of "Rain" and their eponymous album, the title track from their second album, "We Can Fly", peaked at No. 21 in the spring of 1968; by that time Susan was added to the group. Later that same year they scored another Top 10 hit with the song "Indian Lake", produced by Wes Farrell, which reached No.10 on the US charts. "Captain Sad and his Ship of Fools", the album it appeared on, was produced by Bill and Bob and had added Paul to the group.
In September 1968, after the group's summer tour, the family relocated to Santa Monica, California. Shortly after arriving, they received a copy of the "Hair" Broadway cast album in the mail from the famed writer-producer-actor Carl Reiner, who was putting together a special for television called "Wonderful World of Pizzazz". The special was to be a celebration of the hippie fashion and music of that time. Reiner wanted the group to appear on the show performing "Hair", the title track from the current hit musical, and indicated that their performance would also have a satirical edge thanks to the juxtaposition of the squeaky-clean family group performing a song about long-haired hippies. At that time, the group had not heard of the musical and considered the request from Reiner as more of an assignment.
Following rehearsals at their home, and demo sessions at SIR Studios on Santa Monica Boulevard, The Cowsills' version of "Hair" was recorded over two days in early October 1968 at TTG Studios in Hollywood, where the TV company producing the special were regular clients. A key attraction of TTG was its custom-built 16-track recorder, the only such machine available in Los Angeles at the time, which attracted leading rock acts like Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa. Working with house engineer Angel Balestier, the track was arranged and produced by Bob and Bill, who made sure that each member of the group got to contribute an individual vocal part to the recording, both in lead and background vocals, ensuring that each of the group's members would feature on screen when they performed it for the TV special.
Interviewed in 2018, Bob Cowsill recalled the intensive recording process, which was complicated by the fact that the group had not been in a recording studio for several months. The basic rhythm track was laid down first by Bill, Bob, John and Barry, but John (who was only 12 at the time) had difficulty mastering the time changes in the song, especially during the bridge ("Oh say can you see") section, and it reportedly required over 100 takes to achieve a satisfactory version. The group then proceeded to record the elaborate backing and lead vocal tracks, which were intricately arranged and engineered. The backing vocals were all double-tracked, and Balestier added additional "sparkle" to each vocal pass by sending the signal from the vocal microphone first through a Leslie speaker, then to the TTG echo chamber. The clean vocal signal, the "Leslie-ed" vocal signal and the Leslie-plus-echo signal were then all separately fed back to the console and mixed onto one track of the master. Each section of backing vocal was then double-tracked onto a second track, using the same setup of Leslie and echo, creating a very dense and lush sound. Another notable feature of the arrangement was dictated by the purpose of the recording - the network was concerned that some lyrics in the song might be problematic for viewers in the more socially conservative areas of the United States, so the group omitted the original final verse (which mentions God, Jesus and the Bible) and replaced it with a repeat of the first verse.
Balestier mixed the mono track for the group to use during the filming of the special at the end of the final day of recording, but MGM records had no interest in releasing the song at that time. Bill had an acetate of the song cut at DCT Recorders which ended up being played for a DJ at WLS (AM) in Chicago where it generated significant attention. The TV special was taped on January 5, 1969, in San Francisco. As the air date of March 18 approached, MGM changed their minds and released the single. The band had a No.2 US hit and million seller with this version of the title song from the musical Hair. A stereo mix of this elaborate studio version of "Hair" subsequently became the opening track for "The Cowsills in Concert" album, which was released in May 1969. The remainder of "The Cowsills in Concert" (which ended up being the band's best selling album) was in fact actually recorded live.
From 1968 through 1972, the band played an average of 200 performance dates per year. They had their own comic book published by Harvey Comics in 1968.
Breakup and reunions
According to the documentary, Family Band: The Cowsills Story, Bill was fired by his father during the group's tenure at the Flamingo Las Vegas in February 1970 after they had an argument over Bill's association with Waddy Wachtel (whom Bud did not approve of) which ended with a physical confrontation, with Bud being arrested for assault. The band continued without Bill, and Bob took over as the leader. The album II x II was released just a few weeks after's Bill's departure. Musically, it heavily featured Bill since he'd been present for the recording sessions, but aside from a couple of songwriting credits, his name does not appear on the album. The title track was written solely by Bill, but it was credited to his pseudonym, David W. Ray. II x II spawned three singles, two of which were minor hits, but the album as a whole failed to get into the Billboard 200.
The group parted ways with MGM in 1970, and On My Side, their next release (and their first without Bill), was released on London Records in February 1971. This album did get into the Billboard 200, but just barely: it peaked at No. 200. Bill came back later in 1971, and the band subsequently released two non-album singles, neither of which were hits.
In 1971, the non-musical Cowsill, Richard received an Undesirable Discharge from the Army for drug use and other misconduct. He struggled with addiction and other issues for many years, and was arrested several times.
By 1972, Barbara, Paul and Susan had left the group. A lucrative deal for some casino appearances was abruptly canceled after the group refused to perform their hits. Shortly afterward, The Cowsills stopped playing together as a band altogether. The individual members went on to various career attempts in and out of the music industry, but they did appear at Madison Jr. High School in Tampa, Florida as "The Cowsills" for one performance during the mid-1970s. Some produced albums and performed from time to time, albeit not as The Cowsills, during the remainder of the 1970s. One project in particular was a band called Bridey Murphy, which was formed in the mid-'70s and featured Paul, Bill, Barry, and Waddy Wachtel, and performed to varying degrees of success.
In 1978 several of the Cowsills—including Paul, John, Barry, Bob and Susan—recorded an album called Cocaine Drain with producer Chuck Plotkin. In October 1978, they played a show at Blackie's Bar in Los Angeles which was favorably reviewed by Billboard in the weekly "Talent in Action" column. The 37-minute show opened with "a sultry rocker" titled "Cocaine Drain." The band had reportedly signed with Columbia Records and "were setting the stage for a nearly completed album."