Category Archives: United Audio

Mickey Kalis and the Bakersfield Blues Band

Mickey Kalis & the Bakersfield Blues Band, United Audio 45 Got No TimeMickey Kalis self-produced this unusual 45 from 1969 with two of his original songs. The A-side is a western-type shuffle with trumpet “2:10 to Yuma”, with backup vocals by Linda Kalis.Much more arresting to my mind is the flip, the tough “Got No Time”, featuring a neatly picked intro, crude-sounding rhythm and long guitar solo. Mickey alternately drawls and shouts out the lyrics:

“Aint got no time for rainbows, ain’t got no time even for love,
Ain’t got no one I can really talk to, ain’t got no one I can try to love!”

The Bakersfield Blues Band may not have existed except as a pickup group for this session. I don’t know who any of the members were.

United Audio was a Youngstown, Ohio vanity label formerly known as WAM, with recordings and pressings paid for by the artist. This record is from August, 1969. It was probably engineered by Gary Rhamy, who bought the United Audio operations in 1971 and changed the name to Peppermint Productions.

Mickey had at least one other 45, “Fortune Lady” / “Florida Cowboy Man” released on the Peppermint label (#1277) in 1982, and produced with Jack Saunders and Art DeBaise and engineered by Larry Repasky.

Sources include: Buckeye Beat.

Mickey Kalis & the Bakersfield Blues Band, United Audio 45 2:10 to Yuma

The Next of Kinn

Next of Kinn 1966: L-R Steve Brajak, Paul Softich, Jerry Centifanti, Joe Centifanti
The Next of Kinn, 1966, from left: Steve Brajak, Paul Softich, Jerry Centifanti, Joe Centifanti

Joe Centifanti, guitar
Jerry Centifanti, guitar
Steve Brajak, bass
Paul Softich, drums

The Next of Kin United Audio 45 A Lovely SongThe Next of Kinn’s “A Lovely Song” is a favorite of mine. Buckeye Beat has the full story on the band, including the photo above – below is a quick summary of their story:

The Centifanti brothers were from Youngstown, and Steve Brajak and Paul Softich other members were from nearby Struthers and Boardman respectively. These kids were young! No older than 10 when they started, and all of 10-14 when they cut “A Lovely Song” at WAM/United Audio studios in the fall of ’67.

Pete Pompura, bassist for the Pied Pipers (who cut the wild 45 “Stay in My Life” on Hamlin Town) contributed the lyrics for “A Lovely Song” and helped the Next of Kinn write “Nosey Rosie”. Jerry Centifanti sang lead on both songs, with Pied Piper vocalist Dennis Sesonsky on backup.

However the band went back into the studio, and the feedback-laden “Nosey Rosie” was dropped in favor of a good version of “Mr. Soul” for the record’s release in January of ’68, with the band’s name abbreviated to Next of Kin on the labels.

I finally heard a dub of the WAM acetate of “Nosey Rosie” not long after I first wrote this post about the Next of Kinn. Let me say it’s all that I had hoped it could be – three minutes of tough feedback layered over a simple backing with vocals similar to “A Lovely Song”. Wow! I can’t think of any other examples of guitar sounds this wild before the second side of the Velvet Underground’s White Light/White Heat, released several months later in early ’68! Time to rewrite music history again!

The Next of Kinn – Nosey Rosie

Huge thanks to MTM for Nosey Rosie.