Ventures Musical Band

Ventures Musical Band
The Band That Inspired a Thousand Other Bands.
@Asim Deb

Title Photo:
The Ventures: Nokie Edwards, Bob Bogle, Howie Johnson, Don Wilson.
Photo by Richards Studio, April 6, 1960, courtesy of Tacoma Public Library.

The Ventures, founded in 1958 by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle in Tacoma, Washington was an instrumental rock band. With over 150 million albums sold till date, the group is the best-selling instrumental band of all time and now running for the 66th year. The band, which was a quartet for most of its existence, helped to popularize the sound of electric guitar across the world since the 1960s.

In 2008 on their 50th anniversary, the Ventures were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Their instrumental virtuosity, experimentation with guitar effects, and unique sound laid the groundwork for innumerable new groups, regarded as founder guide for many generations.

Who Are the Ventures:
In 1958, Bob Bogle went to buy a car from a used car dealership in Seattle owned by Don Wilson’s father. Finding a common interest in guitars, the two decided to play together. Bogle at that time was a masonry construction worker. They bought two used guitars in a pawn shop for about $10 each. Initially calling themselves the Versatones, the duo played at small clubs, beer bars, and private parties throughout the Pacific Northwest. Wilson played rhythm guitar, and Bogle played the lead.

In 1959, they recorded a demo tape that was rejected by the Liberty Records subsidiary Dolton. So, the duo founded their own label Blue Horizon, and their single “Walk-Don’t Run” became a big local hit after being aired as a news lead-in on a Seattle radio station (thanks to a friend with connections). In an ironic twist, the Dolton Records came back and licensed the single for national distribution. By the summer of 1960, it reached to number two in the US charts, behind only “It’s Now or Never” by Elvis Presley. They released one vocal single (“Cookies and Coke”). When they went to register the band name, Wilson’s mother suggested the name “The Ventures”, upon which they eventually agreed in 1959.

After watching Nokie Edwards play at a nightclub, they recruited him as bass player. Bogle owned a Chet Atkins LP, Hi-Fi in Focus, on which he heard the song “Walk, Don’t Run”. Soon, the group was in a recording studio playing the new song, with Bogle on lead, Wilson on rhythm, Nokie Edwards on bass, and Skip Moore on drums (later Skip Moore opted out of the group to work at his family’s gas station).

On July 18, 1960, their “Walk Don’t Run” hit Billboard’s Singles Chart and peaked at #2, with a sale of one million copies. When “Walk, Don’t Run” was recorded, Skip Moore had already opted out of the royalties from the recording, taking $25 for the session instead. He later sued to collect royalties but failed because of his prior opt-out. “Walk, Don’t Run” sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the RIAA. The rest is history.

Needing a permanent drummer for the group after George T. Babbitt, Jr. dropped out because he was not old enough to play night clubs and bars, they hired Howie Johnson The lineup of Bogle, Wilson, Edwards and Johnson remained together until 1962. In 1961, Nokie Edwards suggested that Bogle’s lead guitar abilities were being stretched, and Edwards didn’t want to continue on bass. Bogle agreed, allowing Edwards to take lead guitar. The change proved the band’s remarkable success in an ever-changing market.

Since that spectacular beginning, The Ventures – later joined by Mel Taylor, then Gerry McGee, and more recently Bob Spalding and Leon Taylor – have gone defining the new styles of melodies based on guitars. With record sales of 40+ albums at 150 million plus – with 14 songs that hit the Singles Charts – with 38 LPs that hit the Album Charts.

Johnson had an injury in an auto crash, which caused irreversible spinal damage. This forced him to play with a neck-brace. He could not spend so much time away from his family and so left the band. Johnson continued to play locally in the Washington area with local groups until his death on May 5, 1987, at the age of 54.

At the time Johnson quit the Ventures, Bogle and Wilson already knew Mel Taylor, house drummer at The Palomino in North Hollywood (the venue where they would play numerous shows during their resurgence in the 1980s). Taylor was known for a hard-hitting style of drumming. The group invited him to some recording sessions, and then Taylor became a regular member of the Ventures band.

Nokie Edwards left the Ventures in 1968 to pursue his interest in horse racing, and was replaced by Gerry McGee; though he returned by 1972, Mel Taylor left the group that year for a solo career, to be replaced by Joe Barile. Taylor also returned in 1979. By the early ’80s, the Ventures’ core quartet of Wilson, Bogle, Edwards and Taylor could boast of playing together for over 20 years. Though Nokie Edwards left the band for good in 1984 (replaced again by Gerry McGee) and Mel Taylor died mid-way through a Japanese tour in 1996 (replaced by his son Leon), the Ventures continued to pack venues around the world.

The Ventures then:
On March 10, 2008, the Ventures were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with John Fogerty as their presenter. In attendance were original members Don Wilson and Nokie Edwards, late 1960s member John Durrill, current guitarist Bob Spalding, and current drummer Leon Taylor who, along with Mel Taylor’s widow, Fiona, accepted on behalf of the Ventures’ late drummer. Bob Bogle and Gerry McGee were unable to attend the ceremony. Fiona Taylor gave special mention to her husband’s predecessor drummers Skip Moore and Howie Johnson. The Ventures performed their biggest hits, “Walk, Don’t Run” and “Hawaii Five-O”, augmented on the latter by Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame musical director Paul Shaffer and his band.

Bob Bogle lived in Vancouver, Washington, for years and died there on June 14, 2009, of non-Hodgkin lymphoma; he was 75. Don Wilson continues to record with the band, but retired from touring at the end of 2015.

The band was live even after 50 years, and in 2008 the team was
Don Wilson, Rhythm Guitar, co-founder in 1958
Gerry McGee, Lead and Bass Guitar, joined in 1968,
Bob Spalding, Lead and Bass Guitar, joined in 1981
Leon Taylor, Percussion, joined in 1996 after his father’s (Mel Taylor) death.

Despite the deaths of the founding members of 1969, the Ventures still continue today (2023), with
Bob Spalding, the 5th Venture on lead guitar,
Ian Spalding on rhythm guitar,
Luke Griffin on bass, and
Leon Taylor, the son of drummer Mel Taylor on drums.

Legacy:
With over 150 million albums sold worldwide, the group remains the bestselling instrumental rock group of all time. Thirty-eight Ventures albums (including a seasonal Christmas album) charted in the US, and six of fourteen chart singles made it into the Top 40, with three making it into the Top 10.

The Ventures were the first to place two different versions of the same song in the Top 10, those being “Walk, Don’t Run” (#2) and “Walk, Don’t Run ’64” (#8).

Their catalog of music, including more than 1,000 compositions and 3,000 song recordings, remains enormously popular. The Ventures currently have 162,000 followers and 700,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and their music is widely available on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and the other major streaming platforms. The 2020 documentary film by Staci Layne Wilson (daughter of Don Wilson) The Ventures: Stars on Guitars, tells the history of the band and features some of the legendary guitarists and groups who they have influenced.

Sources:
ventures.com,
allmusic.com,
historymusic,
Wikipedia

http://theventures.com/about-us/
http://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-ventures-mn0000921965/biography
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ventures