Records and Compact Discs
All about our "permanent records" with a few reviews
Discography The New Arrivals’ recordings 1964-2005
Singles
Pam Pam 1963 Amy Mala Records (Initial Release on Another Loser Records)
Night Theme 1964 Dot Records (Initial release on Warped Records)
Moonracers 1965 South Bay Records
Take Me For What I Am 1965 South Bay Records
Let’s Get With It Baby 1966 Macy’s/Seven Up Records
Scratch Your Name 1967 South Bay Records
The Goin’ Thing 1968 Macy’s/7UP Records
Albums
Finally 2002 TAJ Stone Records
Let’s Get With It Baby 2004 TAJ Stone Records
The Road Back 2005 TAJ Stone Records
Reviews for albums & singles by The New Arrivals
Phil Dirt (KFJC) from Reverb Central says this about The New Arrivals
The New Arrivals Let’s Get With It, Baby!
Label: TAJ Stone TAJSTONE1965 CD
“From San Jose back in the days when there was actually a San Jose scene, the Preps a.k.a. the New Arrivals were contemporaries to the Syndicate of Sound, the Rocky Jenkins Echo Four, the Count V, the Chocolate Watchband, the Other Side, the Van Slyke, and so many more. Members of the New Arrivals included Bill Smith – guitar, Dick Robitaille – marimba and percussion, Tom Muller – keys, Larry Syres – bass, and Andre Meschi – drums, and on some sessions Rod Bibino – guitar. The Preps also included Victor Malatesta, Rich Correll(Happy Days music genius), Mike Mezaros, Jim Harville and Kevin Henker at different times.
The Preps and the New Arrivals issued a handful of singles under both names before disbanding at the hands of the newly unleashed psych sounds. They recorded with the legendary Leo de Gar Kulka at Golden State Recorders and Coast Recorders, where a number of instros were captured.
One of San Jose’s best surf instros is here, the amazingly cool “Moon Racers.”
Five stars for the Preps’ “Moon Racers” alone, and add to that there fine pop single “Take Me For What I Am” and the moody “Night Theme,” and it’s a win-win. Some tracks date from the seventies and eighties, but for me it’s vintage stuff that really matters.
Picks: Night Theme, Moon Racers
“Night Theme”
“Night Theme” is a moody number with chamber reverbed drums and haunted organ in the lead. It’s a pretty simple song, but it sure does stand up well over time. The Chantays covered this on their first album. This was a successful track for the Preps, issued on Dot nationally. Sly Stone is the bassist on this track. Originally cut by the Mark II.
Rock Instrumental Mono
“Moon Racers”
“Moon Racers” is a stunningly cool surf instro, and as the band says in the liners, it reflects their roots in instros and surf. The soaring whammy chords, the space surf feel, the dramatic production, and the well thought out mix all contribute to this fine instro. It’s the kind of track raises the hair on the back of your neck. Rumor had it back then that a very large number of takes was required to get the sound and performance they wanted, and for my money it was very much worth the effort. This track alone is worth the price of admission. Interestingly enough, it was written by Herb Alpert and Scott Turner!
I first came to it from KLIV’s tendency to use it as a bumper in 1965, and later in that year while visiting friend and DJ-mentor Squeaky Martin during his overnight weekend shift there, I was fortunate enough to pull the acetate they had discarded from their junk barrel, a source for many surf singles still in my collection, along with many great garage punk singles.
Surf Instrumental Mono
“..........................Finally by the New Arrivals.
The disc starts off with an interesting combination of fuzz guitar and multi part vocal harmony with “Scratch your Name”. Sort of a strange concept, wanting to scratch a gal’s name above his bed so thoughts of her will come and fill his head.
The New Arrivals sort of touch on a few different styles, all pop, but touching a bit of almost everything. According to the liner notes, they started as an instrumental group [ala Ventures], and their twangy assed version of “Goldfinger” shows that they were adept at this, regardless of how essentially simple twangy assed guitar can be. It does strike me as odd that they harmonize as well as they do as an instro outfit. Perhaps there is more to it than I know, but the vocals are good here.
Other highlights include “Wake Me Shake Me” ,”Funny Feeling”, and a pretty good [a little nicer perhaps] cover of “Time Won’t Let Me”, which itself is no small feat. “God Help the Teenager” is good for a laugh, being one of your real hip pre-protest songs [though it was dated at 1967], and “When I Needed You” is a real nice love song,
“Hey Little Girl” [not the one by another San Jose band, the Syndicate of Sound] sounds like a bit of a Beach Boys rip, but why wouldn’t someone want to borrow the early sound of Brian Wilson and Co.? At least it isn’t about a car or surfboard.
The cd is rounded out by “Just Outside My Window”, which is damn near worth the price of admission by itself. Some tasty McCartney bass runs, primitive electronic keyboards, and lots of drum fills make this one of the best overlooked sugary pop gems of the 60’s.”
The next was written about The New Arrivals’ 45 rpm releases in Fuzz Acid and Flowers by Vernon Joynson availabe at borderlinebooks.com. It reflects the historical signifigance involved with The New Arrivals.
“The New Arrivals
45s:
1
Take Me For What I Am / You Know You’re Gonna Be Mine
(South Bay SBM 102)
1966 (actually 1965 ed. note)
2
Scratch Your Name / Just Outside My Window
(South Bay SBM 103)
Nov 1966
3
Just Outside My Window / Let’s Get With It
(South Bay SBM 104)
1967
NB: (3) also issued on Macy’s 7-UP (104) 1967.
The second 45 is a superb stompin’ fuzz – punker in a folk – rock vein, from the San Jose area, complete with a great rave-up outro in the Count Five Psychotic Reaction style for good measure. The ‘B’ side is lighter pop, but is still good harmony ‘n’ jangle folk – rock full of California sunshine vibes. Recorded at the now – legendary Golden State Recorders, this is a nugget of some pedigree. Scratch Your Name was written by Tom Talton – yes, he of We The People fame, confirmed by Alec Palao: “the bands manager was a friend of We The People’s producer Tony Moon, hence their access to the song”.
Compilation appearances include: Let’s Get With It on Acid Dreams, Vol. 3 (LP).
(Max Waller/Alec Palao) ”
The next review is from www.torpedopop.com in Sweden
“The New Arrivals WERE what their name says, way back in 1966, and it still took more than 35 years for the world to take notice.
An article (found on the back cover of the CD) called them “good looking, clean-cut, sharp dressers, collegiate, talented …” wondering “how they’ve never made it, with all that going for them”... if the writer only knew how wrong he was, because they had never actually made it … until now … kind of.
Thanks to band member Tom Muller getting hold of the original tapes, San Jose’s New Arrivals recorded legacy has finally been compiled onto one album, showing that they SHOULD have made it, even though their looks wasn’t suggesting so (?).
To hear both sides of their second South Bay single (Scratch Your Name / Just Outside My Window) is enough a reason for this and there’s also enough unreleased material for a chart-topping album.
The sunny side of the mentioned single is a Tom Talton (of We the People) written combination of fuzzy garage riff and an authentic west-coast harmony pop, complete with the psyched-out rave up finale, while the b-side finds them “searching” for the perfect 12-string jangle in a Brummel-ish way.
God Help The Teenager continues the “search” in the similar folk-rocking vein, Wrong Slant Óf Life takes it back to the garagey r’n’beat, Funny Feeling is another piece of sunshiny harmony pop of the highest order, the way it was done by The Cryan’ Shames or The Buckinghams, trying to warm up the “windy-city”.
Hey Little Girl is a surfy little love song, shooting the same curves as Jan & Dean and the heartbreaking beat-ballad When I Needed You is another Tom Talton “gift”.
The New Arrivals have “finally” arrived … again. Make them feel more welcome than the first time!”
Goran Obradovic POPISM
Our thanks to Goran and torpedopop.com for their support. Maybe we can gig in Malmo, Sweden or Croatia or wherever sometime…..in summer.
From a recent issue of Ugly Things Magazine reviewd by David Bash of the International Pop Overthrow Festival:
The New Arrivals
Finally
(TAJ Productons-CD)
Ugly Things readers, we’ve heard this tale all too many times before. Band records many good songs, label is very interested, album is slated for release, and then…either a) label folds, b) band breaks up or, and this one is particularly pertinent to ‘60s bands, c) band gets drafted. The last scenario was the unfortunate fate of The New Arrivals, a San Jose-based band who recorded several fine sides in the mid ‘60s and was able to get one of them released as a single, only to have several members whisked away to Vietnam. Fortunately, there is a happy ending, with which Ugly Things readers are thankfully becoming more familiar. New Arrivals main man Tom Muller has resurrected these recordings and compiled them for release on the appropriately titled Finally, and although it’s been almost 40 years since these songs were originally recorded, it was definitely worth the wait!
Finally is a nice blend of originals, covers, and songs written exclusively for The New Arrivals by established songwriters like Tom Talton (of We The People) and Sal Valentino. The CD opens with the song that had been released as a single, “Scratch Your Name,” and with its fuzztones and groovy, Choir-esque harmonies, it could have fit perfectly on the Highs In The Mid Sixties series or any of the Cicadelic compilations. The same could be said of band originals like “Funny Feeling,” and “Wrong Slant On Life”, as well as the disc’s other Talton-penned tune “When I Needed You” and the Sal Valentino (credited under his real name, S.W. Spaminato) gem “God Help The Teenager” (what a great title!). The band also does a credible job on their cover of The Blues Project’s “Shake Me, Wake Me,” and with a cool surf instrumental take on “Goldfinger,” and while their versions of “The Nazz Are Blue” and “Time Won’t Let Me” are a bit lightweight, they’re certainly pleasant enough.
In tandem with the release of Finally, The New Arrivals have made definite plans to get back together. So you better get ready, they may be coming to your town!
The Road Back (from album liner notes)
“The Road Back” is just that. In 1962 The New Arrivals Band formed in San Jose, California and had a whirlwind career on the West Coast. If you go to our CD presentations (see the titles on bottom left side of this site) on CD Baby you’ll get the complete story. Last year (2004) the original band members got together and decided that it was time after 37 years to write and produce a new album. No easy chore. Real life was esconced in their everyday world and the challenges which were to be faced tested the dedication to complete the project. But complete it they did and now it is presented here first. The journey of time started when they played their initial Beach Boy concert and now has re-arrived in 2005 with The New Arrivals band back together and performing. There aren’t many stories like this in the world of music.