You may know Bob Eubanks at the long-running host of The Newlywed Game or Rose Parade, but you may not know that he got his start in rock ‘n’ roll – first as a radio disc jockey in the 1950s, and then as a concert promoter, nightclub owner, and artist manager, working with everyone from Dolly Parton and Merle Haggard the Rolling Stones (as the Stones’ promoter during the first two years of their American tour). And he made rock history when he first brought a little rising band called the Beatles to Los Angeles for their first Hollywood Bowl concert in 1964 — mortgaging his house to do so — and for their second Bowl appearances on Aug. 29 and 30, 1965.
And Eubanks all changed my rock ‘n’ roll life, in a much smaller way. So, celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Beatles’ 1965 Bowl shows, I’ve decided to celebrate Eubanks by running this delightful, never-released interview I did with him. He had so many fabulous rock ‘n’ roll stories to tell! It was more fun than makin’ whoopee, and highly educational (yes, that infamous Newlywed Game answer was discussed). The man is a legend.
LYNDSANITY: I’m very excited to talk to this man today. You were a big part of my musical discovery as a child, because my parents were on The Newlywed Game…
BOB EUBANKS: And did they stay married?
They’re still married!
Oh my God. I let one get away. Did they win a toaster?
No, and that is the point I was trying to make: They won a record player! So, the stereo that I listened to all my childhood records on was this huge record player. It was one of those big, lacquered, ‘70s ones that was like the size of a car and played 78 RPM and had wire-covered mesh speakers..
Do you know why we gave away such low-value prizes? We figured that if we gave away big prizes, the couples would try to cheat. But if the prizes were no big deal, then they would play fair. Very pure.
My parents have ironically said that a record player wasn’t what they wanted to win. They wanted to win the washer and dryer, because they needed one. Now they were stuck with this record player about the size of a couch. But it was a formative thing for me. I mean, I’ve been a music fan since I was a toddler.
So, I donated to your career.
Yes! I honestly can say my love of music, that has led me to now be sitting here with you, really came from listening to all those records on this massive record player that they won on The Newlywed Game. So, I thank you for that. I did ask them if they had to answer any “makin’ whoopee” questions on the show, but I don’t think they had to do. They didn’t tell me.
I don’t think we ever did a show without a “whoopee”!
Well, you know which question I really want to ask about. It’s an urban myth…
It never happened. What happened was worse! There was a little lady named Olga, and what she said was worse than, “In the butt, Bob”. And so, they decided to do a movie about [Newlywed Game co-creator] Chuck Barris called Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, and they called her and she lived in Pennsylvania and they said, “Olga, we’re going to put the clip in the movie.” She says, “No, please don’t! I’m a grandmother now!” And they said, “Well, it’s worth $5,000.” Then she said, “Oh, go right ahead and put it in!” So, they did. But she used the A- word.
You actually have a rich musical background outside of your TV hosting. You might’ve been part of a very specific musical memory for me, but you were instrumental in a lot of people’s musical memories as a DJ, concert promoter, club owner. Some people don’t know all about that. Didn’t you manage some big acts too?
Yes, Dolly Parton. Barbara Mandrell, one Everly Brother — they couldn’t get along. And Marty Robbins and Andre Crouch.
I understand you were instrumental in Dolly Parton’s early career.
Yeah, she was with Porter Waggoner and I wanted to buy some dates on Porter Waggoner [tour] and I flew to Nashville and I met with the agent. And the reason I wanted Porter is because Dolly was with him. …But the first date out with Porter, while Porter was onstage, Dolly came to me and she said, “I’m leaving Porter and I want you to manage me.” Oh man, the fit hit the shan! I said, “I’ll take it!” Porter got pretty upset, but I managed Dolly for two years.
What was she like in those early days?
She was wonderful. She could write the beautiful music, play a little bit of guitar. Barbara Mandrell could play six instruments and couldn’t write a note. So, you know, it was really like managing really two different acts. Dolly and I had a falling out after a couple of years, and it was my fault. And for that, I apologize. Oh, I just told some stories I shouldn’t have told! I don’t know, I haven’t seen her or talked to her in many years, but she’s a sweetheart. She is a sweet lady, I’ll tell you that.
And then there was perhaps your biggest contribution to music history. You were instrumental in bringing the Beatles to the States.
Yes, after they did The Ed Sullivan Show and 70 million people watched, they decided they were going to tour. And they finally had a No. 1 hit, even though the president of Capitol Records’ mother had said it was the worst piece of crap that she’d ever heard. But anyway, they decided they were going to tour and they signed with the GAC, the General Artists Corporation, and they went to their regular promoter, a fellow named Lou Robin here in [Los Angeles]. He ended up managing Johnny Cash, by the way. But Lou turned them down because he was used to buying Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald for $10,000, and these four long-haired guys from England wanted 25 grand. He said no, so I borrowed $25,000 on my house. I was a disc jockey and we had these young adult nightclubs, so I was a talent buyer also, and that helped. And the Beatles did the Hollywood Bowl in 1964, and then we did two shows in ‘65 and then Dodger Stadium in ‘66.
Wow. What are your early memories of the Beatles? Obviously really believed in them and knew they weren’t a fly-by-night thing, if you were willing to mortgage your house.
They were wide-eyed and inquisitive. Paul wanted to meet Jayne Mansfield, and the second year, they wanted to meet Elvis. And so, Colonel Parker and Brian Epstein, the managers, got together. It was going to be kind of like Larry the Cable Guy meeting Albert Einstein. But anyway, they set up the meeting and they went over to Elvis’s house. And one of my favorite stories is they just kept looking at Elvis, just staring at him. There were no photographers and no cameras. And they just sat there and looked at Elvis. Now, Paul, however, had this thing in his hand that he had never seen before and it just blew him away: He could change the television channel by pushing a button, and he just thought that was the greatest thing that ever happened. In England they didn’t have [remote controls] yet. So anyway, they invited Elvis to the Hollywood Bowl, but he didn’t show up.
Elvis was famous for shooting TVs. That was another urban legend.
Yes, when he was singing at the Hilton in Vegas later, he would get mad and would shoot the television. They would call up and say, “Elvis really likes this television. Can we buy it from you?” So, when he would get off an airplane in Memphis, you could tell what kind of a mood he had been in by how many televisions they were unloading off of the airplane.
How many TVs did he shoot at, on average?
I don’t know, but at one time he bought three Cadillacs through a telescope from his room there at the Hilton, at a car dealership. [He spotted the cars and] bought three Cadillacs for his staff. … I’ll tell you another interesting story about Elvis: Elvis never sang outside of the country. Really it’s because Colonel Parker was here illegally. He was from the Netherlands and he was afraid that if he went out of the country, he couldn’t get back in. So, Elvis never sang out of the U.S.
Even when he was in the military overseas?
That’s different, when he was in the service. But when it came back and his career restarted and everything, he never did concerts [overseas]. And Colonel Parker was very, very heavy into gambling at the Hilton, so he would have Elvis sing a lot at the Hilton to pay back his gambling debts.
That’s crazy! Tell me more about working with the Beatles. The first time they were at the Bowl, in August 1964, Beatlemania was just exploding. I also know their second-to-last official concert, not counting the Apple Corps rooftop performance in 1969, was that Dodger Stadium show you mentioned. They didn’t tour in their later years. I think they didn’t really like playing to such screaming chaos.
Well, after the first wide-eyed year, the second year when they wanted to meet Elvis they did two shows at the Hollywood Bowl and sold them out. Bam. And the third year, Brian Epstein decided he wanted them to play stadiums, so we went to Dodger Stadium. But it was difficult. You could tell it was waning a bit. We couldn’t sell the centerfield bleachers, so we put speakers out there and gave tickets to blind children. And then they went on to Candlestick Park [in San Francisco], and that was the last time they ever sang for money together. It held 50,000, and they only sold 22,000. I was surprised, but they were tired back then. There were no monitors. They couldn’t hear themselves. They felt their singing was getting worse. They thought their instrumentation was getting worse. And that was it for them. I’ve put together a show now called “Backstage with the Beatles,” by the way. I have a Beatle band onstage with me, and I tell never-before-heard stories that lead up to music. It’s been very successful. I’m really happy with it.
Any stories you can tell me now?
Oh, well… Debbie Reynolds came up to me and she says, “I want to meet the Beatles. I love the Beatles.” And I walked into the dressing room and there’s John Lennon sitting with Lauren Bacall. I said, “John, Debbie Reynolds is out here, she wants to meet you.” And he looked at Lauren Bacall and she went, “Nah.” So, John says, “No, I don’t want to meet her.” And I said, “But John, she loves you!”
He blew Debbie off? Oh, man.
Yeah. Here’s a funny story: At Dodger Stadium, I put a tent behind the stage and in the tent was a Lincoln Continental. And I said to the guys, “When you’re done” — and they always ended with “Long Tall Sally,” the Little Richard song – “get in that car, we’ll take you out the centerfield bleachers.” We brought them in in an armored car, but while they were onstage, someone let the air out of the armored car’s tires, so they had to go down to the 76 gas station. So, they get off the stage, get into the Lincoln Continental, zoom out towards the centerfield bleachers, and there’s about 5,000 kids waiting for them. And they had to turn around and come back in. And like an idiot. I’m standing onstage, going, “The Beatles have left the stadium!” Well, I looked and here’s the Lincoln Continental going, boom, boom, boom, boom. They’d been sprung.
So, we get them out and put them into the Dodger dugout, and Lennon and I got into it pretty good. He said, “We want to get out of here. We’re going to a party.” I said, “Dude, there’s 40,000 kids out there!” We said, “We don’t care.” I said, “OK, I’ll get you out.” So, I took them upstairs and we put them in the back of an ambulance. I told the ambulance driver, “Just drive right down through the crowd. You’ll be fine. Go down to the 76 gas station.” And so, he just edged through the crowd, then finally broke loose and he hit the accelerator. Then he hit a speed bump and the radiator fell out of the ambulance. Now, all of a sudden, here comes the armored car and the kids realize what’s going on. So, we get the Beatles out of the ambulance and into the armored car. I’ll never forget it. The security guard is up on the hood, and he grabs this little girl and he pulls her hair. She was wearing a wig – he thought he’d scalped her! There was a mound of girls on this armored car, and all of a sudden — I have no idea where this came from — the Hell’s Angels showed up. The Hell’s Angels circled the armored car, and the girls got scared and they got off. And the Hell’s Angels led the Beatles out of Dodger Stadium. And that’s the last time I saw the Beatles — or the Hell’s Angels.
You worked with the Rolling Stones as well, right?
Yeah. In ’65, Stones at the Long Beach Auditorium; I paid them $4,500. In ‘66, I paid them 20 grand, but Jagger and I had had some problems. He was very difficult to get along with, just ego. When the Beatles came over here and they were so successful, that’s when the whole English migration came over. I remember I had Herman’s Hermits at the auditorium in Anaheim, and we had an opening act that I didn’t want to buy; they were too expensive. So anyway, I walked into the dressing room of that opening act and here was some underage girls. I said, “Out! Get out.” And so pretty soon I look up and here’s the drummer of the opening act, pulling his bass drum in and it’s making grooves in the floor. So, I walk up and I kicked the top of it off, and there’s a girl curled up in the bass drum. I said, “You guys will never work for me again!” He said, “You wanker! You’re right!” And that was Keith Moon.
I had a feeling that was who you were about to say! So, I assume that was the only time you worked with the Who.
Yeah! But I had the Stones for two years. Also Dave Clark Five, uh, Herman’s Hermits, Donovan…
So, was the Beatles/Stones rivalry a real thing?
No, I didn’t see any of it at all. I really didn’t have a preference. I love the Stones’ music. And McCartney was always so nice. He was such a cool guy. Many years later, the president saluted Merle Haggard and Paul McCartney at Lincoln Center, and I got big tears because I produced Haggard’s concerts for 10 years. That was kind of nice.
Tell me about these youth nightclubs you mentioned.
What happened is there was a nightclub in New York called the Peppermint Lounge and they had a band, Joey Dee Lee and the Starlighters. Joe Pesci was their guitar player, by the way. They had a hit record called “The Peppermint Twist” and it was big deal, big deal, so what we did out here [in L.A.] is we opened a young adult nightclub called the Cinnamon Cinder. No booze,18 to 25. It cost a buck and a half get in, 30 cents for a Coke. I would have a talent night and book Ike and Tina Turner, Chuck Berry, the Rivingtons, the Coasters, all of those people. We opened one club in North Hollywood, then we opened one in Long Beach and then one in Alhambra.
Any fun memories of some of the people that performed at these clubs?
Oh, yeah. I remember Tina Turner. The cops were all over us because we were a dance place, so I said to her, “Do me a favor and just be calm.” Then she’d get up onstage, look at me and wink, and just turn it on. [laughs]
You started doing radio here in Los Angeles, right?
Well, I started radio at a 250-watt radio station in Oxnard, Calif. I was in the middle of an orange grove talking to myself. In fact, I actually went on and bought two LPs and I did what I thought all the big guys do, and had a rock ‘n’ roll album giveaway contest. I must have mentioned it 200 times. And I finally said, “OK, I’ll give them to the first person to calls.” And nobody called! So, I made up a name and took the records home. And I figured that I’m sitting out there by myself in the orange grove and I’d better do something else. This was 1958. That was a very exciting time in radio. Rock ‘n’ roll was a very new thing. … But you know, God works in strange ways. One morning I got off the air in my little Volkswagen. I was working midnight to 8 in the morning. And I drove to the hot news station in Los Angeles, KRLA. I wanted to see what the guys look like. And I’m sitting in the lobby and as fate would have it, they were having a disc jockey meeting. And the all-night [DJ] had a sore back and nobody wanted to sit in for him because he worked six hours and the rest of them worked three. So, I walked up to the program director, who must have had a hundred tapes on his desk from guys that wanted to work there, and I said, “Oh, hi, there I’m a disc jockey.” And he said, “You belong to the union?” I said, “No, but I can.” I borrowed $360 [to join the union] and went on the air that night. And I was there seven years to the day.
Wow! What are your memories of working at KRLA during that special time?
Well, I will tell you this, sometimes you’re judged by the people you run with. I was there with Dick Biondi out of Chicago and Casey Kasem from Detroit and Wink Martindale from Memphis… and then there was Bob Eubanks from Oxnard. So, I figured I’d better make myself important. That’s when I opened in the nightclubs and started promoting dances and things like that.
Were you friends with Casey?
Yes, he was such a good guy. He did a television show and he would always say, “Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars.” I sat in for him on his television show one time and I said, “Keep your feet in the stars and keep reaching for the ground,” and that made him mad! And he wouldn’t invite me back! But he was a wonderful guy. I’m very sad for what happened afterwards.
Did you get to hang out with a lot of fabulous rock stars on those days?
No, I did not. I’ve always been in the business world. I wasn’t necessarily someone who just was mesmerized by them. The Beach Boys, I dealt with a lot, Stevie Wonder. I played ping-pong with Chuck Berry once and he just whipped my butt. I said, “Where’d you learn to do this?” He’s like, “Man, I just spent seven years in jail. All I did was play ping-pong.”
I understand you worked with Bob Dylan in some way.
Yes, 1965. I did one bill, one Dylan concert. It was the first time I’d ever seen hippies. We had Dylan at the Hollywood Bowl, and he went out with his acoustic guitar and sang and everybody kept singing, “Like a rolling stone, like a rolling stone.” That was his hit record at the time. And he said, “Oh man, I don’t have a G harmonica,” and about eight of them hit the stage. Then we went to intermission, and came back out with electric guitar, and half the audience walked out.
So, you obviously weren’t ever a hippie yourself.
No, and I didn’t get into that whole San Francisco thing. In fact, that’s when I got out of rock ‘n’ roll, in ’69, because the whole San Francisco music thing was coming in, all of the drugs and all of that. In ‘72, I got back in, but I went into country music, and that’s when I signed Merle Haggard. I was with Haggard for 10 years, and he and I never had a cross word in 10 years. He was wonderful. I did George Jones and Tammy Wynette too.
Since we’ve discussed urban myths, is that story about George and the lawnmower true?
Yeah, that’s true. They took his car away from him and they took his license away from him. He was arrested on the turnpike, on his riding lawnmower, going into town to get a drink. He knew he wanted to go to the bar, so he brought his lawnmower.
Didn’t you also work with Elton John in some way?
OK. There’s two acts that I had difficulty with. One is Barry Manilow, and other is Elton John.
I want to hear all about both!
I had Barry Manilow at the Anaheim Convention Center. He made me remove 316 kids behind the stage so he could make a ten-second walk. I put him in San Francisco and I call Bill Graham up there and I said, “Do you want to cope with me?” And he said, “Nah, he’s a pain in the butt.” So, right before the concert, [Manilow] made me move the front row because he said it was too close. And to this day, when he walks out onstage, the stage crew guys have to turn their backs. He’s just very difficult. And I don’t know why.
I would not have guessed that. What about Elton?
I did one Elton John concert in Las Vegas. I had thousands of kids there. And all of a sudden this guy comes up to me and he says, “We have a problem.” I said, “What’s your problem?” He says, “Elton hates cops. And he won’t go onstage if you can see a cop in a uniform.” Oh boy. So, I go to the Las Vegas Police Department and I said, “Guys, disappear for me till I get this jerk on this stage” So, they disappeared, but when he came off the stage, I had six uniformed cops waiting for him at the bottom of the steps! [laughs]
Why doesn’t he like cops? Is there a specific reason?
Who knows? [Rock stars] had strange things. Like, once we got in a real tussle with Queen at the airport [in Vegas] because we couldn’t get the limo close enough to the airplane and that made them mad. … Some of the bands from England were very difficult, very difficult. They wore T-shirts that were obscene, you know, that kind of a thing. … I booked an act and I forget who it was, but they said, “It shall ‘snow’ on day of concert.” I said, “Wait a minute, we’re playing Las Vegas. It’s going to be about 104 degrees! What the hell do you mean, it shall snow?” They were asking for cocaine.
Did you ever any weird rider requests?
Just “it shall snow” and things like that. The first year of the Beatles, they were not very demanding. They wanted clean towels. That’s reasonable. And then the second year, they wanted clean towels and a case of Coke — and they meant actual Coca-Cola, soft drinks. They love Dr Pepper, by the way.
Interesting. Cher really likes Dr Pepper too.
Oh, really? Sonny Bono was a record promoter and he used to come over to the station and he’d bring this little brunette with him who would sit there and just look around. That was Cher.
Wow, so you met Cheryl Sarkisian when she was not famous yet. Did you get a vibe that she was going to be a superstar?
I did not. I couldn’t pick a hit if it hit me in the mouth. I was more in the business end of it.
What made you want to get into radio as a career, then?
Oh, I always wanted to be in radio when I was young. I wanted to be a disc jockey. I only had one real job. One time I worked at Lockheed Aircraft for three days. I’m the most unlucky, cynical human being that God ever put on the Earth, and I was supposed to build radar racks for Electra jets for three days. And then the last two, I was supposed to install them, and I’m walking in on the third day and I have no idea what I’m doing. And a guy drops dead in front of me! And I step over his body. I go get my toolbox and I get out of there. And that was the last “real” job I ever had. My next job was at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. I used to work at the Egyptian. That’s where my star is on the Walk of Fame, right in front of the Egyptian.
Are you still a music fan? You said you got into country after rock. Do you like modern country music?
Well, to me. “current” is Garth Brooks. Garth is great. But I listen to “Willie’s Roadhouse” [on SiriusXM]. I’m a Willie Nelson fan. I find it interesting that Johnny Cash is no longer with us, Merle Haggard is no longer with us, Waylon Jennings is no longer with us, but maybe that stuff that Willie’s been smoking is keeping him on the road. He’s still traveling. You know, one time in Dallas they found some pot on his bus and the judge sentenced him to sing “Always on My Mind” in the court. And one time he got in trouble with the Internal Revenue Service and Darrell Royal, the football coach, bought all of his stuff and then gave it back to him. I love Willie.
When you look back at all the artists that you worked with in any way, what is your fondest memory?
My fondest is putting the concerts together. It’s kind of like my way of being artistic. I didn’t like management — you know, you get calls in the middle of the night about hairdressers and things. Management was not for me. But I did love putting together a concert and it being successful.
Do you have a top artist-specific memory?
Oh, yeah. Haggard and I, we got along so well. And before I die, I want to do his movie. Here’s a guy that was raised in a boxcar. He escaped from 13 institutions. By the time he was 18, he’d spent two years and nine months in San Quentin. He lived in every hobo jungle in the country. And in 1972 he became Entertainer of the Year. And I took him to the White House in ‘73. It’s a wonderful story. President Nixon invited us there for his wife’s birthday. I took a group called the Osmond Brothers with me and Merle Haggard, and it was funny watching me and those funny people clap off hands. … We got to go throughout the whole White House, even upstairs where his apartment was. That afternoon [Richard Nixon’s] press secretary came to me and he said, “Would you like to meet the president?” I said yeah, and I met [Nixon] and toured the White House. It was a very interesting evening, to say the least. But then that afternoon, the secretary said, “I have to go. The president has a meeting.” And that was the infamous Watergate meeting that day.
The above interview is taken from Bob Eubanks’s appearance on the SiriusXM show “Volume West.” Archived audio of that conversation is available via the SiriusXM app.
