The Ravens: History

The Ravens History: 1966
by John Anthony

Todd's Supper Club

As the year opened we were working just about every weekend at Todd's Supper Club pulling in good sized crouds.

Around March Richie left for Army Basic Training and it would two years before any of us saw him again.

Not long after, we were the first band to play at The Trend discotheque on Federal Rd. in Danbury. It opened on a very foggy night and still they packed in like sardines. It was a fun to place to play with go-go dancers along side the band too.

The Ravens Have a Wild Time at The Zoo on the Jersey Shore

During the summer we had a booking down on the Jersey shore in Wildwood, NJ at a place called The Zoo for a couple of weeks. The owner had two bands on the ticket, and we alternated sets.

The Weeds were a good R&B band from Philadelphia. They had a very unique entry. On their way to the stage they wove around the dance floor in a line, and each guy had his left hand on the left shoulder of the guy in front. One of first tunes they did was real good rendition My Girl by the The Temptations.

I would've bet the farm we played at Todd's through the end of the year. But some old friends recently told me they remember seeing us play at Carroll's Barn in the summer. After running this by Joe, he too recalled friends coming to see us at the Barn in the summer. So sometime mid year we left Todd's, over disagreements about something I can't remember and found our way to Carroll's Barn in Putnam Lake, NY.

We had some funny moments as our time wound down at Todd's. At the end of the night, John Todd always gave away a door prize. As he called door ticket numbers from the front of the stage, we flashed signs taped to the backs of our guitars that said "Todd is Unfair." Jeff flashed signs he'd stashed on his toms that said 'Laugh','Boo' 'Clap' and so on. John Todd would turn and look at us in bewilderment, wondering why the audience was reacting in unexpected ways. It took everything we had not to burst out laughing.

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