THE POWER OF SOURCE

[DartSmohen]

It seems funny that this theme has popped up again.

I am sure that the Appollo All Stars were well received when they played live, but clearly Hubbard was tone deaf and ultimately responsible for this cringingly awful "album", which, incidently made an excellent frisbee

Dart

[Zinjifar]

It seems funny that this theme has popped up again.

I am sure that the Appollo All Stars were well received when they played live, but clearly Hubbard was tone deaf and ultimately responsible for this cringingly awful "album", which, incidently made an excellent frisbee

Dart

Maybe we could consolidate some of the related posts to this thead? I think somebody posted a picture of the Apollo All Stars somewhere along the line, along with some ID on the people, but, it's a little hard to find nowdays.

On a slightly related note, the first time I heard 'The Road To Freedom' was in '98 when we picketed Elron Way. They'd tried to close off the street, but the LAPD finally bowed to constitutional liberty and agreed that the sidewalks were public property and we could picket there.

Across the street from ASHO was a Scientologist run bed and breakfast that I think they called 'Our House' (the building later got a false front as a 'little school house') and, possibly because they thought that the SPs could be driven off by unmitigated 'theta', they blasted 'Road' at high volume most of the time we were there. It was pretty bad, but, also very entertaining. I especially loved some of the children's chorus/chants.

Mark Ebner, who wrote an investigative piece for Spy Magazine and 'Death of a Nethead' about the suicide of Phil Gale, parked his beetle at the north end of the street and cranked up Isaac Hayes' 'Shaft' so, we had competing musical themes; 'Worried Being' and 'Shaft' as we wandered the street.



Zinj

Anyway, as SP repellant, it wasn't too effective.

[small steps]

Well I seem to have been thankfully spared the wonders of most of the music you've been speaking if on this thread! I will say this though. when ron music maker came out, and all the other "ron the..." books i too thought it was dumb! and as a musician myself i was somewhat confused by some of the things i read i seem to remember. there was a photo of him sitting behind a drum kit where to be honest i always thought he looked pised!! lol. i do remember buying one album although i forget what it was called. it had a track called State of Mind on it that was sung by Carl Anderson. i think that was the only good thing on it (I absolutely love that guys voice!). i saw him, and some others, perform at st hill doing the benifit concert to raise money for the life boat association i think. he was awesome.
ron the music maker....

[small steps]

sorry, still laughing!

[Tiger Lily]

This sure brings back memories.

I had to make my hubby listen to "Can We Ever Be Friends" when I was trying to "handle" him. . . . it "handled" him all right. I will never forget the look on his face. . . he was trying not to laugh because he knew I would get mad, combined with complete incredulity. No chance after that he'd even consider reading a book! (I notice that tape is no longer part of PTS "handlings")

"The Road to Freedom" -- or "State of Mind" -- can't remember which -- I tried to like that; I really did. I kept listening, thinking that the tunes would grow on me. The only one I could stomach at all was "Above it all" -- later found out that someone else wrote the music to that one, not LRH.

-TL

[Tom]

Hello Everyone,

Tom Rodriguez, former SO member 1971-1981 and original member of
"The Apollo Stars"

I read all the posts here re: "The Power of Source" Album

Firstly I'd like to "attempt" to quote LRH (I say attempt, because I am not sure of the exact words) but it's something I still strongly believe in:

"Goodness and Badness, Beautifulness and Ugliness are alike considerations and have no other basis than opinion" The key word being OPINION. They are not FACT.

How YOU view anything labeled as "art" whether music, paintings, sculptures, operas, poetry etc...is simply your opinion. Some people will agree with the opinions of others. Others won't.
Some will partially agree.

And everyone is most certainly entitled to their viewpoints and opinions.
I respect that totally. I enjoy hearing yours.

What many of you may not know is:
(and the following rambling is my experience, my viewpoint just my opinion...
(ONE band member out of NINE)

At least some of us (if not all) did not like (or even hated) the album cover.
Everyone on the cover appears stressed out, exhausted, unhappy, disgusted.
Even LRH, who is the only one directly looking at YOU, the album cover viewee appears to be thinking "Oh brother!" or "Say, can you please get me a replacement" LOL

The instruments balancing and recording quality was NOT up to any industry standard for that time period. Both LRH and Dan Auerbach had their hands on the mixing controls. One afternoon (in another recording studio -yeah we recorded other albums -see below-) LRH and Dan were disagreeing on some technicality. Dan expressed his thoughts on it and LRH replied (exact words) "Now, is NOT the time to pick an argument with me!"

We all varied as to our feelings about the songs themselves, the arrangements, the songs chosen, who could be heard the loudest.
Geez you can hardly hear me on the album (bongos)

Some of us liked some of the songs. Some of us disliked some of the songs.

And on that "note" (yes an intended pun) some of us didn't even much like each other, as much as we liked other members in the band.
There were mini clicks amongst us.

This stuff happens to many band. Look at The Beatles.
Do you question their music? They broke up over internal disagreements and external forces.

At the time of recording the album we were still struggling to 'find ourselves" and our "sound" as a group.

I read in some posts here in ESMB and on other web sites certain critical comments about LRH, SCN, FLAG...and that's fine. Again, we all had our individual experiences, good, bad combo of both and have our opinions.
but sometimes I think that just because we were Flag SO members, and worked with LRH, that SCN folks hold such extremely high standards and expected us to be perfect musicians, write perfect songs, perfect sound recording, perfect everything. Many expected or even demanded that LRH must be perfect...beacuse after all he is LRH!
Not so people. Even LRH , a human being just like you and me, had his good days and bad days, expressed all variety of emotions on the tone scale: anger, happiness, sadness, disappointment, elation etc...etc...

Tell you this though, for the most part we (Apollo Stars) had one heck of alot of fun. We even had groupies follow us port to port. but we couldn't interact with them (it would have been out 2D- darn it!)
So at first we sucked (see My Story post) but we progressively got better and better. The Power of Source album does NOT reflect what we evolved into. Being Flag SO members and working with LRH whose expectations and standards for our sound, tightness, music were as high as any of his others. Even LRH grew along with us. At times we'd be doing so well - we'd put all differences aside and were one happy group.

We became a really tight sounding group. I will compare us to (in my opinion)Chicago. (Chicago Transit Authority) - my favorite rock group -
We did radio, TV, parades played in many many ports of call. We received awards, placques, keys to cities. What could be a better life at that time?
Full time Flag SO member musicians.

What we denied all of you - much to all our regret- is that we didn't tour all the SCN Orgs at the peak of our success and musical talent. As I stated in MY Story...one of us asked LRH during a rehearsal "Why aren't we touring world-wide at all the Orgs? LRH's reply (exact words)
"Because none of you sent me a CSW" <to propose the mission>
Sure, LRH could have originated it himself, but PLEASE understand that the man was a single human being and could not think of everything nor do everything himself. which had he done would have take away all of the the responsibility, accountability and thinkability of everyone else.
SORRY PEOPLE FOR OUR STUPIDITY!

None of you ever got to hear any of the other incredible albums we recorded - that's right!" We recorded others. To this day I don't know why they never got mixed and put onto vinyl...and I so wish I had copies of those tapes for personal reasons. I wonder if they still exist and may one day surface as "The Lost Apoolo Stars tapes"
One cassette tape I recorded during a kick ass band rehearsal, which contained 15 of our later songs...I sent to my mom back in 1974...I got it back, but then I lost it sometime in the recent 2000's.
I hate myself for this.

I have a photograph of the band and LRH gathered all together in the PR lounge of the Apollo circa 1973-1974...all of us smiling...beautiful photo! THAT should have been put on the album cover. It doesn't even appear in LRH's photography book.
Quite possibly I own the only copy (but I'm reallynot sure)

As you read this, I still have, 38 years later, that photo and two other photos of the band. One in our SO Uniforms and the other in our Apollo Star uniforms- some of us even hated those uniforms- on my wall.

I'm very proud to have been and for me it was an honor and a real privilege being a full time musician and one of The Apollo Stars and to have worked with LRH in his role as Musical Director.

I hope this helps you all to know more a little more about the band.
Sorry you had to endure the 'torture" (if that was what is was for you) of listening to that record, repeatedly until you just wanted to smash it to smitherines. I can certainly understand that.

Best Wishes to all!

Tom R (bongos)

[mountainpeak]

Thanks for the story, Tom. Great to have you here.

[Div6]

Thanks for the data, Tom R. It would be great if you scanned those images and posted them for others to see.

As for touring, other albums, etc.....

Well, I appreciate your enthusiasm for wanting admiration for your creative endeavours. And I will keep an "open mind" (ooops, there goes my A to J check) about it.

But there is a bit of a PR Hill 10 to handle, as the first album was not very well received AT ALL.

On a completely different note, I saw on an old historical mellotron site that LRH was a mellotron owner at one point. Did he have his keys on the ship, or were they all left at St. Hill?

[DartSmohen]

Hello Everyone,

Tom Rodriguez, former SO member 1971-1981 and original member of
"The Apollo Stars"

I read all the posts here re: "The Power of Source" Album

Firstly I'd like to "attempt" to quote LRH (I say attempt, because I am not sure of the exact words) but it's something I still strongly believe in:

"Goodness and Badness, Beautifulness and Ugliness are alike considerations and have no other basis than opinion" The key word being OPINION. They are not FACT.

How YOU view anything labeled as "art" whether music, paintings, sculptures, operas, poetry etc...is simply your opinion. Some people will agree with the opinions of others. Others won't.
Some will partially agree.

And everyone is most certainly entitled to their viewpoints and opinions.
I respect that totally. I enjoy hearing yours.

What many of you may not know is:
(and the following rambling is my experience, my viewpoint just my opinion...
(ONE band member out of NINE)

At least some of us (if not all) did not like (or even hated) the album cover.
Everyone on the cover appears stressed out, exhausted, unhappy, disgusted.
Even LRH, who is the only one directly looking at YOU, the album cover viewee appears to be thinking "Oh brother!" or "Say, can you please get me a replacement" LOL

The instruments balancing and recording quality was NOT up to any industry standard for that time period. Both LRH and Dan Auerbach had their hands on the mixing controls. One afternoon (in another recording studio -yeah we recorded other albums -see below-) LRH and Dan were disagreeing on some technicality. Dan expressed his thoughts on it and LRH replied (exact words) "Now, is NOT the time to pick an argument with me!"

We all varied as to our feelings about the songs themselves, the arrangements, the songs chosen, who could be heard the loudest.
Geez you can hardly hear me on the album (bongos)

Some of us liked some of the songs. Some of us disliked some of the songs.

And on that "note" (yes an intended pun) some of us didn't even much like each other, as much as we liked other members in the band.
There were mini clicks amongst us.

This stuff happens to many band. Look at The Beatles.
Do you question their music? They broke up over internal disagreements and external forces.

At the time of recording the album we were still struggling to 'find ourselves" and our "sound" as a group.

I read in some posts here in ESMB and on other web sites certain critical comments about LRH, SCN, FLAG...and that's fine. Again, we all had our individual experiences, good, bad combo of both and have our opinions.
but sometimes I think that just because we were Flag SO members, and worked with LRH, that SCN folks hold such extremely high standards and expected us to be perfect musicians, write perfect songs, perfect sound recording, perfect everything. Many expected or even demanded that LRH must be perfect...beacuse after all he is LRH!
Not so people. Even LRH , a human being just like you and me, had his good days and bad days, expressed all variety of emotions on the tone scale: anger, happiness, sadness, disappointment, elation etc...etc...

Tell you this though, for the most part we (Apollo Stars) had one heck of alot of fun. We even had groupies follow us port to port. but we couldn't interact with them (it would have been out 2D- darn it!)
So at first we sucked (see My Story post) but we progressively got better and better. The Power of Source album does NOT reflect what we evolved into. Being Flag SO members and working with LRH whose expectations and standards for our sound, tightness, music were as high as any of his others. Even LRH grew along with us. At times we'd be doing so well - we'd put all differences aside and were one happy group.

We became a really tight sounding group. I will compare us to (in my opinion)Chicago. (Chicago Transit Authority) - my favorite rock group -
We did radio, TV, parades played in many many ports of call. We received awards, placques, keys to cities. What could be a better life at that time?
Full time Flag SO member musicians.

What we denied all of you - much to all our regret- is that we didn't tour all the SCN Orgs at the peak of our success and musical talent. As I stated in MY Story...one of us asked LRH during a rehearsal "Why aren't we touring world-wide at all the Orgs? LRH's reply (exact words)
"Because none of you sent me a CSW" <to propose the mission>
Sure, LRH could have originated it himself, but PLEASE understand that the man was a single human being and could not think of everything nor do everything himself. which had he done would have take away all of the the responsibility, accountability and thinkability of everyone else.
SORRY PEOPLE FOR OUR STUPIDITY!

None of you ever got to hear any of the other incredible albums we recorded - that's right!" We recorded others. To this day I don't know why they never got mixed and put onto vinyl...and I so wish I had copies of those tapes for personal reasons. I wonder if they still exist and may one day surface as "The Lost Apoolo Stars tapes"
One cassette tape I recorded during a kick ass band rehearsal, which contained 15 of our later songs...I sent to my mom back in 1974...I got it back, but then I lost it sometime in the recent 2000's.
I hate myself for this.

I have a photograph of the band and LRH gathered all together in the PR lounge of the Apollo circa 1973-1974...all of us smiling...beautiful photo! THAT should have been put on the album cover. It doesn't even appear in LRH's photography book.
Quite possibly I own the only copy (but I'm reallynot sure)

As you read this, I still have, 38 years later, that photo and two other photos of the band. One in our SO Uniforms and the other in our Apollo Star uniforms- some of us even hated those uniforms- on my wall.

I'm very proud to have been and for me it was an honor and a real privilege being a full time musician and one of The Apollo Stars and to have worked with LRH in his role as Musical Director.

I hope this helps you all to know more a little more about the band.
Sorry you had to endure the 'torture" (if that was what is was for you) of listening to that record, repeatedly until you just wanted to smash it to smitherines. I can certainly understand that.

Best Wishes to all!

Tom R (bongos)

Fair enough, but what you guys didn't get was the way this appalling racket was ENFORCED on us.

You may well have been a tight music group entertaining nice people around the Med and N. Africa, but what we experienced was this bloody row blasting out day and night, 8;30am through 10;30pm seven days a week. There was a record player outside the Cashier's office and the album was played full blast, on LRH Comm orders.

Even pc's were distracted in session by the noise. Several times the record was deliberately sabotaged, water poured on the record player, ( this blew the sockets for the tech building, records were thrown as frisbees down into the hollow.

This went on for WEEKS.

So, when Kenny C turned up at St Hill, expecting adoration for his part in the Appollo All Stars, what he got was a LOT of anger and told, very firmly, to FUCK OFF!!

Had the Appollo All Stars come to St Hill, they would have been underwhelmed by the reception for them.

I would imagine this was the same feeling in EVERY org around Europe; it certainly was in the UK

So, you see, there are two sides to the story. From you it was fun, creative, enjoyable.

From ours, thanks to the psychotic way this was pushed on us, we rebelled.

Finally, Chic Corea, who was coerced into performing on it, told us he did so on the STRICT legal understanding that neither his name or that of his record label were mentioned in any way.

I have no doubt that in most of the orgs, worldwide, this album was received in the same way we reacted to it.

Dart

[MarkWI]

[...]
I have a photograph of the band and LRH gathered all together in the PR lounge of the Apollo circa 1973-1974...all of us smiling...beautiful photo! THAT should have been put on the album cover. It doesn't even appear in LRH's photography book.
Quite possibly I own the only copy (but I'm reallynot sure)
[...]

Thank you for your story Tom.

Please scan and post these pictures on the net. Once on the net they will never get lost!

Love,
MarkWI