Siren Song_My Life in Music

by Gareth Murphy

  It was actually George Goldner who talked me into buying that apartment. He needed a safe house for a rendezvous with his latest flame, and he put $3,000 toward the purchase, although I paid the rest, which was not very much more, and did the furnishing. George took the nicer room and would call ahead to warn whenever he’d be coming with company. I was to stay in my room, hear no evil, and above all, play dumb if his crazy wife ever cornered me. With his first two wives, George had already fathered six kids that he knew of, but at the office, we received photos of a smiling child sent by a lady in Cuba claiming George was the padre. He obviously had a penchant for Spanish beauties, especially the hot-blooded diva types, like his stunning wife, Susan. She knew his corrupt ways and watched him like a detective.

  George Goldner was a serial lady-killer. Lethally handsome and always sharply dressed, he radiated a charm that made women melt, even when he wasn’t trying. He accepted a few invitations from my parents to join us for Shabbat supper in Brooklyn, and I could even see my aging mother getting all hot and flustered as she served him. George wasn’t religious, but he loved her chicken soup and homemade latkes. “He’s so handsome,” she once whispered to me in the kitchen like it physically hurt. Coming to my folks’ place was probably George’s way of staying out of trouble on Friday evenings—or who knows? Maybe he was feasting up before his real night of excess began. You never could tell what George Goldner was up to. He wasn’t a heavy drinker or a coke fiend, but his private life had more dark secrets than a rabbit’s warren.

  His most dangerous vice of all was gambling at the racetrack. I’d heard rumors, but I didn’t take them too seriously until I bumped into him at Hazel Park in Detroit. I was still working for Red Bird but happened to be in Detroit helping Andrew Oldham’s partner in Immediate Records to meet people in Motown. I offered to play matchmaker and, through a series of mishaps, wound up spending an afternoon with a black beauty named Joanne Bratton, whose sweetheart was the numbers king of Detroit, Ed Wingate. Joanne dragged me to Hazel Park and told me to put two-dollar bets on this and that horse, which, to my delight, kept winning or coming second. That’s when I spotted George Goldner in the crowd with the city’s top promotions man, Sammy Kaplan. I ran over and raved about my inside source, but when George turned and saw Joanne Bratton, he laughed in my face. “I’m not taking advice from no woman!” Famous last words. I kept winning all day as George squandered hundreds of dollars on his own supposedly hot tips.

  George Goldner should have stuck to records. For a guy who could spot winning songs with such pinpoint accuracy and, in essence, pull money out of thin air, his passion for horses was a curse. As we’d all soon learn, Red Bird was probably George’s last chance of a clean slate. Although Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller had heard the jokes about George’s bad habits, they’d walked in innocently thinking that if they owned their own label, they’d net eleven cents a hit, not just two as songwriters. Getting an old pro like George Goldner seemed like such a dream team, and in fairness, it was in the first year. Unfortunately, they had no idea how much deep shit George had gambled himself into. Nobody really did, except for one man watching from the shadows.

  I’ll never forget walking into 1650 Broadway one morning, when two goons appeared on the sidewalk. “Morris Levy wants to talk,” said one. I had no idea who they were or why they’d picked on me. All I could feel were my legs going weak.

  “You’ve got the wrong guy,” I told them. “My name is Seymour Stein.”

  “Yeah, you’re the guy he wants. C’mon.”

  “But I don’t know Morris Levy.”

  “Tell him yourself. You’re coming with us.”

  They escorted me to Roulette Records where its boss, the notorious Morris Levy, was on the phone. I’d never seen him in person, but the face fit the reputation. He had that Mussolini jaw and piercing eyes that fit every mug shot and Wanted poster you’d ever seen. He even had the husky Crooklynese voice. I’d been told by George Goldner that Morris Levy had started out in the fifties with Birdland and acquired other clubs like the Roulette Room, the Roundtable Lounge, and the Peppermint Lounge. His brother, Zachariah, was shot and killed in Birdland, mistaken for him. Officially, he owned various labels and a chain of record stores called Strawberries, but Morris Levy’s main business was money laundering. Nobody knew the full reach of Morris Levy, but it eventually transpired that he’d been a childhood friend of Genovese don Vincent “the Chin” Gigante, otherwise known as “Demented Don” or “the Odd Father” for the way he feigned mental illness when questioned by the law.

  I sat there with my guts in a shivering knot until Levy placed the receiver on its cradle and turned to me. “Relax,” he said, unaware that I was one small relax away from crapping all over his lovely chair.

  “Mr. Levy, there must be a misunderstanding,” I whimpered.

  “Hang on,” he said. Then, through an adjoining office door, in walked a character whose psychopathic eyes made Levy look like a choirboy in comparison. “This is Dominic,” announced Levy. If there was any last faint glimmer of hope my invitation to Roulette Records wasn’t about Mafia business, the mystery Italian peered straight into the back of my skull and asked me a distinctly nonmusical question. “What date is it today?”

  It had been my twenty-third birthday two days previously, so even though I was terrified, I knew the answer. “April 20!”

  “Yeah, so what wuz five days ago?”

  “The fifteenth?”

  “Right. The day you wuz meant to help me pay my income taxes.”

  “Income taxes? I dunno know what you mean.”

  “George Goldner said you’d gimme ten grand to help me pay my income taxes.”

  “What? I don’t have that kind of money.” This wasn’t exactly true, because I’d been such a good little piggy banker since long before my bar mitzvah. But George didn’t know that. “There must be some mistake,” I pleaded. “George never mentioned any of this to me, I swear.”

  “Wait a minute,” interrupted Morris Levy. “Something ain’t right here.” He then swiveled his phone around toward me. “I want you to call George and tell him you’re here.” Levy then picked up an ear extension so that he could listen in but gestured with his fat finger to not let George know. Like a good boy, I dialed Red Bird. Under the circumstances, I would have shot George in the face had Morris Levy ordered me to.

  “George, it’s me, Seymour.”

  “Where the fuck are you? I got a lot of stuff for you to do. We’re going on the road.”

  “I’m over at Morris Levy’s.”

  “What! Get the fuck out of there! Right now!”

  Levy grabbed the phone and barked at George, “I’m sending him back over, but you better get here, right now.”

  Back at Red Bird, I continued shaking like a leaf all day, and when George arrived back from Levy’s, he wasn’t looking too rosy either.

  “I hope nothing bad happened?” I asked.

  “Nah, nuthin’. Forget about it,” was all George ever said about the entire incident. Over the next days, however, I could see the crippling pressure in his behavior. George Goldner was a hard pusher by nature, now he needed to sell records like never before, and sadly, the atmosphere in the office would never be the same. It was like that old saying, “When poverty knocks at the door, love flies out the window.” Or, in George’s case, when Dominic knocks at the door, poverty jumps out the window.

  It wasn’t the last I ever heard from Morris Levy about George’s spiraling debts. Several months later, I got an unexpected call. “Hey, Seymour, it’s Morris Levy. I’d like you come over to my office right away.”

  “Mr. Levy, I don’t understand. I hope there hasn’t been another misunderstanding.”

  “No. I just wanna show you that I’m really a nice guy. I’ve got something for you. And there’s someone here I want you to meet.”

  “Not Dominic, I hope?”

  “No, a fella your age.”

  You never said no to Morris Le
vy, especially when he was being friendly. When I got to Roulette Records, I saw a vaguely familiar face looking terrified in the same seat I’d almost shat in.

  “This is Micky, who’s a program director at a New York station,” said Levy. “Micky, why don’t you tell Seymour your little story about George Goldner.”

  The overweight young man, actually wobbling with fear, proceeded to unload this story about our latest release, “The Boy from New York City” by the Ad Libs. The saga started innocently a few weeks previously when our main R&B promotions man, Johnny Brantly, presented the record. The program director didn’t really like it, so George telephoned personally. “Hey, Micky, Johnny tells me you don’t like the record.”

  “Well, it’s okay,” replied Micky, a bit caught off guard. “But we’ve got so much stuff at the moment.”

  “Listen to it again,” pleaded George. “It’s gonna be a hit.”

  Micky gave it another spin and phoned George. “Okay, I’ll try to add it next week.” When the song didn’t air, George called back. “Sorry, still no room,” apologized Micky. “Hopefully next week.”

  This routine repeated as the record began breaking in other parts of the country. Eventually, Micky felt so bad about not keeping his promise, he called George, which was earlier that day. “George, I’m sorry, but we’ve just got in the new Marvin Gaye record and we have to add it. I’m doing what I can, but there’s no room for yours this week.”

  This time, however, George’s voice turned to ice.

  “Micky, do you work out front, or do you have your own office?”

  “I have my own office. It’s small, but I need my own privacy. Why?”

  “Does it have a window?”

  “Yeah, a little one.”

  “I hope you have a nice view.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I want you to stand at the window, Micky. And look out. Take in everything you can.”

  “Uh, all right.”

  “Now, tell me what you see.”

  “I see a building, a parking lot. Not much. Why?”

  “Because it’s the last thing you’ll ever fucking see, Micky. Dominic is coming over to your office right now. And he’s gonna pull your eyeballs out of your head.”

  Levy and I both knew George couldn’t get Dominic to clip anyone’s toenails. The only connection George had to the Mafia was owing them money. He was just so desperate, he was turning his own hell on other people.

  “Micky, why’d ya come to me?” asked Levy, keeping a straight face.

  “Because everybody knows you’re connected!” exploded Micky in tears. “I need your protection, Mr. Levy. Please help me!”

  Holding in his smirk like a true pro, Levy then turned to me. “See what George is capable of? I hope you’re paying attention, Seymour.” He then turned back to Micky. “Let’s listen to this record and see what got George so mad.”

  Micky had brought along a copy of “The Boy from New York City,” which Levy placed on a turntable beside his desk. After the first chorus, Levy shouted, “What d’ya think?”

  “Loved it the first time I heard it,” I began to explain.

  “Shut up!” interrupted Levy with a stingray glare. “Let him speak.”

  “I just don’t like it that much,” said Micky, turning to me for support.

  “Okay, well, let’s keep listening,” said Levy, putting the needle back to the start. “Are you starting to like it now?”

  “Yeah, it’s growing on me,” said Micky, getting the message.

  “See? George does know a hit. So, just add it, Micky. And I’ll tell George to mind his manners, okay? Everything will be fine; just play the record and forget about it. We’re all friends.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Levy,” said Micky, taking back the record and looking a whole lot better.

  “And this is for you, Seymour,” said Levy, handing me a card. It was an invitation to the United Jewish Appeal, an annual music business gala. “I just want you to know that I’ve got heart,” said Levy in his best puppy dawg voice.

  As I’d later learn, every year Morris Levy would buy a stack of invitations for this dinner and order people to buy them any way he could. It was his sin-absolving ritual, his own personal equivalent of Yom Kippur, except with food, liquor, and jokes. Its official purpose was to raise money for charity, but what all the big Jews couldn’t miss were the hilarious comedy speeches. Every year without fail, at least one Mafia gag was fired at Levy from the stage, and like a good sport, he’d laugh out loud in front of everyone. This was his way of telling the business, “I ain’t so bad, fellas. Look, you can mock me. I’m wunna yooz.” For sure, Morris Levy wasn’t like anyone else in the room, and everyone knew it, but we all had to stay on his good side, half thinking we might need a favor one day.

  Two Jews who wouldn’t be laughing at any Morris Levy jokes that year were Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. Red Bird had scored a string of hits in just eighteen months, but poor Jerry and Mike were getting very concerned about all these Dominic characters hanging around the office. In the bitter end, the only way out was to “sell” Red Bird to George for a symbolic dollar and for George to clear his debts by signing everything over to Morris Levy, who miraculously made the bookie debts disappear.

  We all should have seen it coming. Since the late fifties, George had watched his entire life’s work get appropriated by the same people, chapter after chapter after chapter, until it and not the music became George Goldner’s legacy. In total, Morris Levy wolfed down all seven labels George had ever been involved with: Tico, Rama, Gee, Roulette, Gone, End, and Red Bird—fifteen juicy years of hit records, artist contracts, and publishing deals. You couldn’t have made it up. Every time a polo-necked beatnik bought a copy of “Oye Como Va” by Tito Puente, another dollar rolled into Levy’s piggy bank; the same with “Why Do Fools Fall in Love” by the Teenagers and “Gee” by the Crows. Airplay, store sales, international licenses, covers, every spin-off imaginable on scores of Latin and doo-wop standards. Hundreds of thousands of dollars kept pouring out of George Goldner’s past straight into Morris Levy’s paws.

  People said George Goldner was his own worst enemy, which he was, but I always felt sorry for him. Morris Levy and his bookie pals preyed on George’s weakness like a pimp uses drugs to enslave a woman. It was a tragedy that slowly condemned George to an early grave. He’d survive all the dagger-wielding Latinas, he’d retain his golden ears and movie-star looks, but George Goldner would die of a broken heart. There’s only so many times a man can fuck up so much winning. By the time he was forty-nine, George was broken inside.

  As for me, I was twenty-four and out of work, but ever since my ice cream days on Coney Island, I’d managed to keep adding to my stash with every job I’d ever done. I was the guy who really did have the first dollar he’d ever earned. I’d built up a pot of about fifty grand, an absolute fortune for a young man in 1966. For me, the Cyclone ride of life was only just cranking its way up to the top.

  The music business was at a major crossroads, and it wasn’t just all the psychedelic music pouring out of London and California. Now, young people everywhere were trying their luck as managers, promoters, and independents. Some of them, like Phil Spector and Andrew Oldham, were already driving around in limousines, building million-dollar empires. I was sick of hustling for jobs and getting very curious about the alternatives. It was time to just do it myself.

  3. SIRE FOR HIRE

  Before our Red Bird got stuffed and caged inside Morris Levy’s filing cabinet, I kept bumping into a character who worked from an office on the tenth floor of the Brill Building. His name was Richard Gottehrer, one of the Gs in the FGG songwriting and producing trio alongside Bob Feldman and Jerry Goldstein.

  Richard was just two years older than I was, but in professional terms, he was playing in a league above. His gang had written some major hits like “My Boyfriend’s Back,” a number one for the Angels, and “Sorrow,” a UK hit for the Merseys, which Davi
d Bowie would immortalize seven years later. They’d produced the colossal smash “Hang On Sloopy” by the McCoys and were now calling themselves the Strangeloves, three mop-topped Jews pretending to be a family of Australian sheep breeders.

  When I met Richard, his group had just appeared on TV banging on zebra-skinned bongos to their latest hit, “I Want Candy.” He was something of a pop star, but what interested me were his all-round talents: musician, songwriter, producer, he’d even done a year of law school, so he was smarter than the average musician. Above all, Richard Gottehrer had that special something I trusted most in creative people; he was a fan who followed music business events and listened to other people’s records with appetite, zeal, and affection.

  His gang was drifting separate ways, so, with the help of Tom Noonan—who had left Billboard and was running a Columbia imprint called Date—we decided to set up a production company. Richard would be the producer, I’d be the A&R and promoter, and together we’d combine our contacts as a hustling duo. All we needed was a name. Mixing up initials to create label logos was something of a tradition. Phil Spector and Lester Sill had Philles Records. A cleverer example was Bang Records, set up in 1965 by Burt Burns, Ahmet Ertegun, Nesuhi Ertegun, and Jerry Wexler, whose real name was Gerald, hence the word bang. We quickly hit upon Sire by mixing up the first two letters of Seymour and Richard. In this era of frilly shirts and British accents, what I loved about the word Sire was that it was a theatrical, British-sounding variation of King.