Sonny Before Cher (TWC #1)

Sonny Bono's first words to Phil Spector:

I want to be your West Coast promotions man.
He was hired.

Sonny Bono's last words to Phil Spector:

I think we need to change the sound.
He was fired.

Spector shot him down.

Sometimes foreshadowing is a toothless ogre. But only after a fair maiden pirouettes across the floor.

Ray Avery/Getty Images


The Bono quotes are from THE WRECKING CREW by Kent Hartman. This is a book that gave my highlighter a headache but the red ink above links to a band that had Zero to do with Mr. Hartman's book. The Rolling Stones, however, had Infinite admiration for the subjects of THE WRECKING CREW.

This Sonny Bono story is not from THE WRECKING CREW but it was told to me by Rip Spencer. He told me the story when he was approximately the same age as he appears in photo at left but the Sonny Bono incident occurred when Rip was a teenage doowop singer.

The Valiants, as photographed here, were Rip's singing group. He is pictured second from the left.
An abstract of the following story takes a "racist cliche" and sends it through the looking glass:


A white man steps out of an elevator and sees two black teenagers. The man runs away from them. Was he afraid they were going to steal his money?


As the story goes, Rip Spencer was one of those teenagers
and the man stepping out of the elevator was Sonny Bono.

Evidently, Sonny–before dueting with Cher–succeeded as a West Coast promotions man.

That is, he recorded rock bands and doo wop singers. But sometimes, he neglected to pay them.

Sonny Bono was not running out of fear from being burglarized. He ran away from Rip Spencer because Sonny owed Rip money and he wasn't ready to pay the talent.

The next Wrecking Crew page is here.