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CANNON, Freddy
Amerikaans zanger
Active decade: 65 85
Born 12/04/1940 in Lynn. MA Genre -ROCK
No one would claim that Freddv Cannon was one of the great early rock & roll singers. His throaty rasp rated much higher for enthusiasm than impressive chops, and his 17 hit singles were often repetitious variations of his most successful tunes. Yet he did his own small part to keep the rock & rol! spirit burning in the late '50s and early '60s, a time at which it sometimes seemed in danger of being extinguished. He was an unabashed rock & roller, for one thing, even when he was fed ancient Tin Pan Alley standards to retool for teenagers. And he was not one to let the lack of top-notch skilIs stand in the way of putting his heart into his vocals for all he was worth. His enthusiasm is infectious, though much of his material cannot be rescued by enthusiasm alone. Sometimes categorized as a teen idol, he was in fact too raw to fit comfortably into that mold (not to mention not quite good-Iooking enough). As ludicrous as it sounds, he was something of an early prototype of rock & roller as Everyman, where spirit and fun counted more than conventional skill.
Cannon made his first record as part of the Soindrifts, a Boston group that went nowhere. In 1959, he hit the Top Ten with his first solo outing, "Tal!ahassee Lassie," a downright raw number with pounding piano, handclaps, and a raunchy guitar solo that was his best single. The Uttle Richard-esque shouts of "Woo" that punGtuated the song would beGome his most familiar vocal trademark, and in fact was recycled a little too often for comfort over the next few years. "Way Down Vonder in New Orleans" (1959) made number three, and Cannon recorded other ancient pop tunes like "Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy" and "Muskrat Rambie" with much more middling success --on these, he can sound something like Bobbv Darin's evil doppelganger. For in-house material, he relied on Swan Records producers Bob Crewe (who would later oversee the 4 Seasons) and Frank Slav, and these were usually formulaic, if exeGuted with spirit. His biggest hit,
"Palisades Park" (which reached number three in 1962), was not written by Crew/Slay but by, of al! people, future "Gong Show" host Chuck Barris.
Cannon lef! Swan for Warner Brothers in 1963. While the British Invasion should have spelt near-instant death, Freddv in fact managed to land a couple of his biggest hits, "Abigail Beecher" and "Action," in the mid-'60s. The latterwas cut with top L.A. session men Hal Blaine, Leon RusselI, James Burton, Glen Camobell, and David Gates, a far cry from the simpier fare of his Swan days. An artistiG rebirth was not in the making, though, and Cannon never hit the charts a2ain after "The Dedication Song" in early 1966.
