Jill Gibson
Encyclopedia
Jill Gibson is an American
singer, songwriter, photographer and painter. She is mostly known for having once briefly been a member of the famous 1960s rock group The Mamas & the Papas
.
on June 18, 1942. She is half-English. Gibson attended University High School in Los Angeles. She is a former model.
In 1975 Jill gave birth to a son, Mattia Borrani. Borrani has followed into his mother's musical footsteps and is the lead singer and rhythm guitarist
for the indie rock group trio Oslo
.
and Roger Christian, a Los Angeles-based radio disc jockey who also wrote with Brian Wilson
of The Beach Boys
.
In 1962 Jan Berry decided to create a female answer to Jan & Dean called Judy & Jill, featuring Jill Gibson with Dean Torrence's girlfriend Judy Lovejoy. Demo recordings such as "Come On Baby" (written by Gibson & Lovejoy), "Eleventh Minute" (written by Gibson & Altfeld), "Just For Tonight", and "Baby What's It Gonna Be" were cut and produced by Berry for Liberty Records
. Gibson performed most of the leads on these unreleased demos. But nothing major happened with the Judy & Jill recordings, and Gibson switched to providing background vocals on several Jan & Dean album cuts. Meanwhile she studied visual arts
at the University of California at Los Angeles.
In 1963, Gibson appeared on the Jan & Dean track "Surf Route 101," and the next year she performed backing harmony on a song she wrote with Don and Horace Altfeld called "When It's Over" for a Jan & Dean album. She then recorded two vocal duets with Berry that she had written with Don Altfeld that year, "It's As Easy As 1,2,3" and "A Surfer's Dream". The tracks appeared on 2 different 1964 Jan & Dean albums.
Jill Gibson released her first solo recording in 1964, a cover version of her own song "It's As Easy As 1,2,3" backed with "Jilly's Flip Side", written by P.F. Sloan and issued on Imperial Records
. Jan Berry produced and arranged both tracks. She also sang backup on Jan& Dean's hit "Ride the Wild Surf."
In July 1965, a hit song Gibson had co-written with Berry and Roger Christian, called "You Really Know How To Hurt A Guy", peaked at #27 for Jan & Dean on the Billboard Hot 100
singles chart.
By the time Gibson sang vocals on Jan & Dean's last studio album, Jan & Dean Meet Batman in 1966, her personal relationship with Berry was ending; they had gone their separate ways by the album's March 1966 release but remained friends. Shortly after their breakup, Berry was involved in a serious motor-vehicle accident on April 12, 1966, which he survived. Gibson often visited in the hospital during his long, difficult recovery. Later Gibson dated Lou Adler
, whom she had known since 1959 when he was the executive producer and manager of Jan Berry and Dean Torrence. Adler had recently separated from his wife, actress and singer Shelley Fabares
.
"Eleventh Minute" was briefly released in 1997 as the B-side of a 45 rpm record on the Maltshop Records label. The licensed recording was soon withdrawn from sale (300 of the 500 red vinyl copies subsequently destroyed) due to questionable ownership of copyright and mechanical rights, as well as numerous label inaccuracies – most notably the performing artists are identified on the label of Maltshop 2 as "Jody & Jill". To make matters even more confusing, the A-side recording, "Come On Baby," is not the ballad demo offered to Liberty Records but an up-tempo surf rocker by an unknown male singer and band.
, a highly successful band Adler produced in the late 1960s. Occasionally, Gibson would visit Lou Adler in the studio while he was producing the band, who had just begun work on a new album. Gibson found herself in the right place at the right time when the leader of the group, John Phillips, fired his wife, Michelle Gilliam Phillips
, from the band on Saturday, June 4, 1966, for having had an affair with Gene Clark
of The Byrds
. Instead of the group breaking up, they asked Jill Gibson to join The Mamas & the Papas as their newest member "Mama Jill". Shortly after joining the band, The Mamas & the Papas, along with Lou Adler, left for Europe
for several weeks to begin working together.
Arriving in London, England, Gibson, Cass Elliot
, John Phillips
, Denny Doherty
, and Lou Adler rented the top half of a large house in Berkeley Square
to work in (the downstairs part was rented to Mick Jagger
and model Chrissie Shrimpton
. Over the next three weeks Gibson rehearsed with the group in London for the recording of the band's upcoming second album and for a few live shows. While in England
, the band had a series of business meetings, but still made time to party with John Lennon
, Paul McCartney
, Keith Richards
, Brian Jones
, and Mick Jagger at Dolly's (the private London rock club that catered to the stars). Upon returning to the United States
, the group, their manager Bobby Roberts, their attorney Abe Somer, and their label Dunhill Records
officially fired Michelle Phillips on Tuesday, June 28, 1966. Jill Gibson was hired two weeks earlier, just before the band left for England.
Beginning in early July and continuing through part of August 1966, Gibson, Cass Elliot, Denny Doherty, John Phillips and Lou Adler recorded the band's second LP at Western Studios
in Los Angeles, California
with Bones Howe
as the engineer. Fourteen tracks were recorded for the proposed second album, with twelve making the final cut. The first single "I Saw Her Again" was issued in late June but was recorded before Gibson was hired. The single peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100
Singles Chart on July 30, 1966, while Jill Gibson was a member of the band. The group had been in the middle of recording their sophomore album when Michelle Phillips was fired. Once Gibson was hired they re-recorded the songs and also recorded new tracks with her at Western Studios. It was decided the album would be called Crashon Screamon All Fall Down and was scheduled for a late August release. The American record buying public had already ordered more than half a million advance copies of this album before it came out, and it was said to have been the most eagerly awaited record of that year.
Prior to Michelle Phillips having been fired, the band was photographed for the cover of their second LP inside the window frame of an abandoned house in the desert. This was soon changed by their label Dunhill Records
who asked the original photographer Guy Webster, to photograph Jill Gibson alone in the exact same pose as Philips' had been in, and then to superimpose Gibson's image over Phillips'. The record label was not satisfied with the finished product and therefore ordered an entire new album cover to be shot by Webster. Webster shot a new cover with Gibson, John Phillips, Denny Doherty, and Cass Elliot with a fan outside in a field of grass against a white picket fence. The label was pleased with this new album cover and it was used as promotion for the upcoming new LP inside of the music trade papers, as well as on large billboards across the country.
A promotional campaign to introduce Jill Gibson as the newest Mama soon followed with articles in such publications as Newsweek magazine who did an article on the group where they referred to Gibson as "skeletal, modish, blonde and beautiful". Another article called "New Mama is definitely Jill" was published in Melody Maker
followed by a cover story on Jill Gibson that was featured in The BEAT with the headline reading "Brand New Mama". The new Mama also did several television show appearances with The Mamas & The Papas to promote their latest single, "I Saw Her Again".
The Mamas & the Papas hit the road with Gibson for a few concert dates beginning on July 1 in Dallas, Texas
(the Dallas show was supposed to be on June 18 but was postponed until July 1) and ending in Phoenix, Arizona
. Other dates included Forest Hills, New York and Denver, Colorado
. Simon & Garfunkel opened for the band on some of these dates. Things according to Gibson had gone smoothly, as if the fans had accepted her, and she was comfortable performing on stage with the group and enjoyed singing all of the songs in the band's forty-minute set. But according to John Phillips and other sources, the chemistry within the group was not there with Jill Gibson. He decided in late August 1966, it would be best that Gibson be let go and that his wife Michelle Phillips be reinstated. Michelle Phillips would admit that Gibson had sung well and had done a very good job as a member of The Mamas & The Papas.
Jill Gibson was relieved to be free of the chaos that followed this supergroup and she felt betrayed by John Phillips, she had been told that her position in the group was permanent, it was not so. The band and their label Dunhill Records
gave Gibson an undisclosed lump sum for her three-month stint as Mama Jill. The album the group recorded with Gibson was pulled by the label to accommodate Michelle Phillips' return. No copies of Crashon Screamon All Fall Down featuring Jill Gibson were officially released to the public; the only copies circulating were pre-released copies. The copies with Jill Gibson are valuable collectibles today and it is believed that anywhere from ten to twenty thousand went out. These promo copies are the Crashon Screamon All Fall Down cover with the white picket fence picture of the band.
With Michelle Phillips back in the mix, several tracks were re-recorded for the second album. The LP was re-named simply as The Mamas & the Papas and it hit the stores in September 1966, with Michelle's image on the cover. In 2002, Jill Gibson claimed that she recorded ten of the tracks for the second album, while Lou Adler claimed that same year she recorded only six of the songs, one being "Trip, Stumble and Fall". Session sheets of the actual recording dates state that Jill Gibson recorded seven songs. In 2006, Gibson said she still believed her voice remained on many of the songs. Michelle Phillips claimed she had no idea who sang on the album, while author Matthew Greenwald confirmed in his book that Jill Gibson recorded part of the LP and did, in fact, appear on several of the final tracks of the final released version. The LP was certified Gold and peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard 200
Albums Chart without Jill Gibson receiving a Gold copy herself. A second single (not featuring Gibson), "Words of Love," was released from the LP and it hit the Billboard Hot 100
peaking at No. 5 in late 1966.
After having been ejected from The Mamas & the Papas, Gibson wrote the songs "I've Got A Feeling For Love" and "How Can I Be Down" with producer Gary Zekley
for the psychedelic band The Yellow Balloon
; Gibson did background vocals for the band's one eponymous. She also co-produced with Don Altfeld a cover version of the Bo Diddley
song "Who Do You Love" for the blues
-rock group The Woolies. Around this same time Gibson returned to photography, which she had begun to take seriously back in 1965 when she met photojournalist Ralph Gibson
(no relation). During this same period, Gibson studied with Edmund Teske
, a photographer working with the technique of solarization.
In June 1967 Gibson attended the first ever Monterey International Pop Festival
with Lou Adler
, where she was an invited member of the press. Over this three-day period in sunny Monterey, California
, which later became historical, she photographed nearly every act on the bill, and her photographs of celebrities such as Jimi Hendrix
, Janis Joplin
, Jefferson Airplane
, the Mamas & Papas, and Brian Jones
have been published around the world. One of Gibson's photos of Jimi Hendrix made the front cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Gibson can be seen twice in the film version of this festival, Monterey Pop
, by D.A. Pennebaker.
Jill Gibson took the photographs for the psychedelic rock
group Fever Tree
's self-titled debut album cover and its liner pictures for the band's 1968 LP released on Uni Records
.
In 2008, Jill Gibson recorded the duet ballad "When It's Over" with Cameron Michael Parkes
for the Jan Berry tribute album Encomium In Memoriam Vol. 1. The song “When It’s Over” was originally written and recorded by Gibson with Jan Berry in 1964 that was issued as the B-side of Jan & Dean’s hit single “Sidewalk Surfin’.”
, owner of the famous rock club the Whiskey A Go-Go in Los Angeles, Gibson went to New York City to study art at the Art Student's League with classical artist Frank Mason. After two years there, and a short stint in the desert of New Mexico, she left for Florence, Italy in 1970. For the next five and a half years Gibson painted while living in the Tuscan hills, studying briefly at The Simi Studio in Florence before returning briefly to California in 1973. On that return visit Jill Gibson made her American debut as a painter where her art was showcased for the first time at the DeVorzon Gallery in Hollywood for a week, and such guests as Jack Nicholson
, Roman Polanski
, former love Lou Adler, and Michelle Phillips were in attendance. Lou Adler purchased an original Gibson painting for $450 at the time while Nicholson also purchased two originals.
Jill Gibson's developing style as an artist is influenced by her interest in Renaissance art, natuare, and the feminine. Many of her original art works are in the private collections of Max Factor
, Guy Webster, Michael Savage
, The Seattle Museum, Jack Nicholson
, and a fifteen foot photo montage in The Los Angeles Free Clinic.
In 2002 Gibson's past as a singing former Mama came briefly full circle when she recorded a cover version of "California Dreamin'" with San Francisco singer-guitarist Ace Andres
for his Cowboy Hat Blues album. On this version of her former band's pop hit, the song was turned into a hard rock song.
Today, Jill Gibson is a full-time artist with her own studio, Gibson Artworks, located in Oakland, California
. Over the last twenty-five years her art work has been displayed in galleries in Italy
, the Netherlands
, Germany
, and in the USA.
Her paintings, sculptures, photography
, planters, plaques, fountains, and bowls can be viewed on her official website . She divides her time between her homes in Oakland
, Los Angeles
, and San Mateo Rio Hondo
, Oaxaca
, Mexico.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
singer, songwriter, photographer and painter. She is mostly known for having once briefly been a member of the famous 1960s rock group The Mamas & the Papas
The Mamas & the Papas
The Mamas & the Papas were a Canadian/American vocal group of the 1960s . The group recorded and performed from 1965 to 1968 with a short reunion in 1971, releasing five albums and 11 Top 40 hit singles...
.
Early life and personal life
Jill Gibson was born in Los Angeles, CaliforniaLos Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
on June 18, 1942. She is half-English. Gibson attended University High School in Los Angeles. She is a former model.
In 1975 Jill gave birth to a son, Mattia Borrani. Borrani has followed into his mother's musical footsteps and is the lead singer and rhythm guitarist
Guitarist
A guitarist is a musician who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselves on the guitar while singing.- Versatility :The guitarist controls an extremely...
for the indie rock group trio Oslo
Oslo (band)
Oslo is a rock band based in California. They have existed together since 2001 as a trio, with a core of Mattia Borrani, Kerry Wayne James, and Gabrial McNair. They have since added keyboardist Damon Ramirez and went through twelve drummers, settling on original drummer Charlie Walker, who...
.
Jan & Dean with Jill
Jill Gibson was studying at University High School in Los Angeles, California when she met Jan Berry of Jan & Dean fame in 1959. The two were an item for the next 7 years. Together they wrote over a dozen songs and through Berry, Gibson got more involved with the music scene. Eventually she began composing songs with other known songwriters such as Don Altfeld, George TiptonGeorge Tipton
George Aliceson Tipton, also known as George Tipton is an American composer, musical arranger and conductor.Among Tipton's works are the theme songs for the TV shows Benson, It's a Living, I'm a Big Girl Now and Empty Nest, plus incidental music for numerous shows, including The Courtship of...
and Roger Christian, a Los Angeles-based radio disc jockey who also wrote with Brian Wilson
Brian Wilson
Brian Douglas Wilson is an American musician, best known as the leader and chief songwriter of the group The Beach Boys. Within the band, Wilson played bass and keyboards, also providing part-time lead vocals and, more often, backing vocals, harmonizing in falsetto with the group...
of The Beach Boys
The Beach Boys
The Beach Boys are an American rock band, formed in 1961 in Hawthorne, California. The group was initially composed of brothers Brian, Dennis and Carl Wilson, their cousin Mike Love, and friend Al Jardine. Managed by the Wilsons' father Murry, The Beach Boys signed to Capitol Records in 1962...
.
In 1962 Jan Berry decided to create a female answer to Jan & Dean called Judy & Jill, featuring Jill Gibson with Dean Torrence's girlfriend Judy Lovejoy. Demo recordings such as "Come On Baby" (written by Gibson & Lovejoy), "Eleventh Minute" (written by Gibson & Altfeld), "Just For Tonight", and "Baby What's It Gonna Be" were cut and produced by Berry for Liberty Records
Liberty Records
Liberty Records was a United States-based record label. It was started by chairman Simon Waronker in 1955 with Al Bennett as president and Theodore Keep as chief engineer. It was reactivated in 2001 in the United Kingdom and had two previous revivals.-1950s:...
. Gibson performed most of the leads on these unreleased demos. But nothing major happened with the Judy & Jill recordings, and Gibson switched to providing background vocals on several Jan & Dean album cuts. Meanwhile she studied visual arts
Visual arts
The visual arts are art forms that create works which are primarily visual in nature, such as ceramics, drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking, design, crafts, and often modern visual arts and architecture...
at the University of California at Los Angeles.
In 1963, Gibson appeared on the Jan & Dean track "Surf Route 101," and the next year she performed backing harmony on a song she wrote with Don and Horace Altfeld called "When It's Over" for a Jan & Dean album. She then recorded two vocal duets with Berry that she had written with Don Altfeld that year, "It's As Easy As 1,2,3" and "A Surfer's Dream". The tracks appeared on 2 different 1964 Jan & Dean albums.
Jill Gibson released her first solo recording in 1964, a cover version of her own song "It's As Easy As 1,2,3" backed with "Jilly's Flip Side", written by P.F. Sloan and issued on Imperial Records
Imperial Records
Imperial Records is a United States based label started in 1947 by Lew Chudd and reactivated in 2006 by label owner EMI.- The independent and Liberty Records years :...
. Jan Berry produced and arranged both tracks. She also sang backup on Jan& Dean's hit "Ride the Wild Surf."
In July 1965, a hit song Gibson had co-written with Berry and Roger Christian, called "You Really Know How To Hurt A Guy", peaked at #27 for Jan & Dean on the Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
singles chart.
By the time Gibson sang vocals on Jan & Dean's last studio album, Jan & Dean Meet Batman in 1966, her personal relationship with Berry was ending; they had gone their separate ways by the album's March 1966 release but remained friends. Shortly after their breakup, Berry was involved in a serious motor-vehicle accident on April 12, 1966, which he survived. Gibson often visited in the hospital during his long, difficult recovery. Later Gibson dated Lou Adler
Lou Adler
Lou Adler is an American record producer, manager, and director.-Life and career:Adler was born in Chicago, Illinois in December 1933, and raised in East Los Angeles. In 1964, Adler founded and co-owned Dunhill Records. He was President of the label as well as the chief record producer from 1964...
, whom she had known since 1959 when he was the executive producer and manager of Jan Berry and Dean Torrence. Adler had recently separated from his wife, actress and singer Shelley Fabares
Shelley Fabares
Michele Ann Marie "Shelley" Fabares is an American actress and singer. Fabares is known for her roles as Donna Reed's oldest child, Mary Stone, on The Donna Reed Show , and as Craig T. Nelson's love interest and eventual wife, Christine Armstrong Fox, on the sitcom Coach. She also was Elvis...
.
"Eleventh Minute" was briefly released in 1997 as the B-side of a 45 rpm record on the Maltshop Records label. The licensed recording was soon withdrawn from sale (300 of the 500 red vinyl copies subsequently destroyed) due to questionable ownership of copyright and mechanical rights, as well as numerous label inaccuracies – most notably the performing artists are identified on the label of Maltshop 2 as "Jody & Jill". To make matters even more confusing, the A-side recording, "Come On Baby," is not the ballad demo offered to Liberty Records but an up-tempo surf rocker by an unknown male singer and band.
The Mamas & the Papas
It was through Adler that Gibson met the rock group The Mamas & the PapasThe Mamas & the Papas
The Mamas & the Papas were a Canadian/American vocal group of the 1960s . The group recorded and performed from 1965 to 1968 with a short reunion in 1971, releasing five albums and 11 Top 40 hit singles...
, a highly successful band Adler produced in the late 1960s. Occasionally, Gibson would visit Lou Adler in the studio while he was producing the band, who had just begun work on a new album. Gibson found herself in the right place at the right time when the leader of the group, John Phillips, fired his wife, Michelle Gilliam Phillips
Michelle Phillips
Michelle Phillips is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She gained fame as a member of the 1960s group The Mamas & the Papas, and is the last surviving original member of the group.-Early life:...
, from the band on Saturday, June 4, 1966, for having had an affair with Gene Clark
Gene Clark
Gene Clark, born Harold Eugene Clark was an American singer-songwriter, and one of the founding members of the folk-rock group The Byrds....
of The Byrds
The Byrds
The Byrds were an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1964. The band underwent multiple line-up changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn remaining the sole consistent member until the group disbanded in 1973...
. Instead of the group breaking up, they asked Jill Gibson to join The Mamas & the Papas as their newest member "Mama Jill". Shortly after joining the band, The Mamas & the Papas, along with Lou Adler, left for Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
for several weeks to begin working together.
Arriving in London, England, Gibson, Cass Elliot
Cass Elliot
Cass Elliot , born Ellen Naomi Cohen and also known as Mama Cass, was an American singer and member of The Mamas & the Papas. After the group broke up, she released five solo albums. Elliot was found dead in her room in London, England, from an apparent heart attack after two weeks of sold-out...
, John Phillips
John Phillips (musician)
John Edmund Andrew Phillips , was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter and promoter . Known as Papa John, Phillips was a member and leader of the singing group The Mamas & the Papas...
, Denny Doherty
Denny Doherty
Dennis Gerrard Stephen Doherty was a Canadian singer and songwriter. He was most widely known as a founding member of the 1960s musical group The Mamas & the Papas.-Early career:...
, and Lou Adler rented the top half of a large house in Berkeley Square
Berkeley Square
Berkeley Square is a town square in the West End of London, England, in the City of Westminster. It was originally laid out in the mid 18th century by architect William Kent...
to work in (the downstairs part was rented to Mick Jagger
Mick Jagger
Sir Michael Philip "Mick" Jagger is an English musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist and a founding member of The Rolling Stones....
and model Chrissie Shrimpton
Chrissie Shrimpton
Chrissie Shrimpton is a former 1960s English model and actress. She is the younger sister of model Jean Shrimpton and was the girlfriend of Mick Jagger from 1963 to 1966.-Films:*G.G...
. Over the next three weeks Gibson rehearsed with the group in London for the recording of the band's upcoming second album and for a few live shows. While in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, the band had a series of business meetings, but still made time to party with John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
, Paul McCartney
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...
, Keith Richards
Keith Richards
Keith Richards is an English musician, songwriter, and founding member of the Rolling Stones. Rolling Stone magazine said Richards had created "rock's greatest single body of riffs", and placed him as the "10th greatest guitarist of all time." Fourteen songs written by Richards and songwriting...
, Brian Jones
Brian Jones
Lewis Brian Hopkins Jones , known as Brian Jones, was an English musician and a founding member of the Rolling Stones....
, and Mick Jagger at Dolly's (the private London rock club that catered to the stars). Upon returning to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the group, their manager Bobby Roberts, their attorney Abe Somer, and their label Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records was started by Lou Adler, Al Bennett, Pierre Cossette and Bobby Roberts in 1964 as Dunhill Productions, originally for the purpose of releasing Johnny Rivers recordings on Imperial Records. It became a record label in 1965 and was distributed by ABC Records...
officially fired Michelle Phillips on Tuesday, June 28, 1966. Jill Gibson was hired two weeks earlier, just before the band left for England.
Beginning in early July and continuing through part of August 1966, Gibson, Cass Elliot, Denny Doherty, John Phillips and Lou Adler recorded the band's second LP at Western Studios
United Western Recorders
United Western Recorders, often abbreviated to UWR, was a renowned recording studio complex in Hollywood, California, which became one of the most successful independent recording studios in the world in the late 1950s and 1960s....
in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
with Bones Howe
Bones Howe
Dayton Burr "Bones" Howe is a Grammy-award-winning record producer and recording engineer associated with 1960s and 1970s hits, mostly of the sunshine pop genre, including most of the hits of The 5th Dimension and The Association, as well as music supervision of several films...
as the engineer. Fourteen tracks were recorded for the proposed second album, with twelve making the final cut. The first single "I Saw Her Again" was issued in late June but was recorded before Gibson was hired. The single peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
Singles Chart on July 30, 1966, while Jill Gibson was a member of the band. The group had been in the middle of recording their sophomore album when Michelle Phillips was fired. Once Gibson was hired they re-recorded the songs and also recorded new tracks with her at Western Studios. It was decided the album would be called Crashon Screamon All Fall Down and was scheduled for a late August release. The American record buying public had already ordered more than half a million advance copies of this album before it came out, and it was said to have been the most eagerly awaited record of that year.
Prior to Michelle Phillips having been fired, the band was photographed for the cover of their second LP inside the window frame of an abandoned house in the desert. This was soon changed by their label Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records was started by Lou Adler, Al Bennett, Pierre Cossette and Bobby Roberts in 1964 as Dunhill Productions, originally for the purpose of releasing Johnny Rivers recordings on Imperial Records. It became a record label in 1965 and was distributed by ABC Records...
who asked the original photographer Guy Webster, to photograph Jill Gibson alone in the exact same pose as Philips' had been in, and then to superimpose Gibson's image over Phillips'. The record label was not satisfied with the finished product and therefore ordered an entire new album cover to be shot by Webster. Webster shot a new cover with Gibson, John Phillips, Denny Doherty, and Cass Elliot with a fan outside in a field of grass against a white picket fence. The label was pleased with this new album cover and it was used as promotion for the upcoming new LP inside of the music trade papers, as well as on large billboards across the country.
A promotional campaign to introduce Jill Gibson as the newest Mama soon followed with articles in such publications as Newsweek magazine who did an article on the group where they referred to Gibson as "skeletal, modish, blonde and beautiful". Another article called "New Mama is definitely Jill" was published in Melody Maker
Melody Maker
Melody Maker, published in the United Kingdom, was, according to its publisher IPC Media, the world's oldest weekly music newspaper. It was founded in 1926 as a magazine targeted at musicians; in 2000 it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.-1950s–1960s:Originally the Melody...
followed by a cover story on Jill Gibson that was featured in The BEAT with the headline reading "Brand New Mama". The new Mama also did several television show appearances with The Mamas & The Papas to promote their latest single, "I Saw Her Again".
The Mamas & the Papas hit the road with Gibson for a few concert dates beginning on July 1 in Dallas, Texas
Dallas, Texas
Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the ninth-largest in the United States. The Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is the largest metropolitan area in the South and fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
(the Dallas show was supposed to be on June 18 but was postponed until July 1) and ending in Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix is the capital, and largest city, of the U.S. state of Arizona, as well as the sixth most populated city in the United States. Phoenix is home to 1,445,632 people according to the official 2010 U.S. Census Bureau data...
. Other dates included Forest Hills, New York and Denver, Colorado
Denver, Colorado
The City and County of Denver is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Denver is a consolidated city-county, located in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains...
. Simon & Garfunkel opened for the band on some of these dates. Things according to Gibson had gone smoothly, as if the fans had accepted her, and she was comfortable performing on stage with the group and enjoyed singing all of the songs in the band's forty-minute set. But according to John Phillips and other sources, the chemistry within the group was not there with Jill Gibson. He decided in late August 1966, it would be best that Gibson be let go and that his wife Michelle Phillips be reinstated. Michelle Phillips would admit that Gibson had sung well and had done a very good job as a member of The Mamas & The Papas.
Mama Jill exits
According to Jill Gibson fans did not scream out for Mama Michelle during every live concert with her; it occurred only once, at a show in Forest Hills, New York, when a male fan shouted out, "Where's Michelle?" Billboard magazine, who reviewed the August 6th, 1966 Forest Hills concert, said there were a number of hecklers in the audience.Jill Gibson was relieved to be free of the chaos that followed this supergroup and she felt betrayed by John Phillips, she had been told that her position in the group was permanent, it was not so. The band and their label Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records
Dunhill Records was started by Lou Adler, Al Bennett, Pierre Cossette and Bobby Roberts in 1964 as Dunhill Productions, originally for the purpose of releasing Johnny Rivers recordings on Imperial Records. It became a record label in 1965 and was distributed by ABC Records...
gave Gibson an undisclosed lump sum for her three-month stint as Mama Jill. The album the group recorded with Gibson was pulled by the label to accommodate Michelle Phillips' return. No copies of Crashon Screamon All Fall Down featuring Jill Gibson were officially released to the public; the only copies circulating were pre-released copies. The copies with Jill Gibson are valuable collectibles today and it is believed that anywhere from ten to twenty thousand went out. These promo copies are the Crashon Screamon All Fall Down cover with the white picket fence picture of the band.
With Michelle Phillips back in the mix, several tracks were re-recorded for the second album. The LP was re-named simply as The Mamas & the Papas and it hit the stores in September 1966, with Michelle's image on the cover. In 2002, Jill Gibson claimed that she recorded ten of the tracks for the second album, while Lou Adler claimed that same year she recorded only six of the songs, one being "Trip, Stumble and Fall". Session sheets of the actual recording dates state that Jill Gibson recorded seven songs. In 2006, Gibson said she still believed her voice remained on many of the songs. Michelle Phillips claimed she had no idea who sang on the album, while author Matthew Greenwald confirmed in his book that Jill Gibson recorded part of the LP and did, in fact, appear on several of the final tracks of the final released version. The LP was certified Gold and peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
Albums Chart without Jill Gibson receiving a Gold copy herself. A second single (not featuring Gibson), "Words of Love," was released from the LP and it hit the Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
peaking at No. 5 in late 1966.
After having been ejected from The Mamas & the Papas, Gibson wrote the songs "I've Got A Feeling For Love" and "How Can I Be Down" with producer Gary Zekley
Gary Zekley
Gary Zekley was a former West Coast record producer and songwriter associated with 1960s, 1970s and 1980s bands and songs in the bubblegum, rock and roll, sunshine pop, and surf genres....
for the psychedelic band The Yellow Balloon
The Yellow Balloon
The Yellow Balloon was an American sunshine pop band, produced by Gary Zekley. The group is notable for featuring Don Grady of Mouseketeers and My Three Sons fame. Other band members hailed from Oregon and Arizona...
; Gibson did background vocals for the band's one eponymous. She also co-produced with Don Altfeld a cover version of the Bo Diddley
Bo Diddley
Ellas Otha Bates , known by his stage name Bo Diddley, was an American rhythm and blues vocalist, guitarist, songwriter , and inventor...
song "Who Do You Love" for the blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
-rock group The Woolies. Around this same time Gibson returned to photography, which she had begun to take seriously back in 1965 when she met photojournalist Ralph Gibson
Ralph Gibson
Ralph Gibson is an American art photographer best known for his photographic books. His images often incorporate fragments with erotic and mysterious undertones, building narrative meaning through contextualization and surreal juxtaposition.Ralph Gibson studied photography while in the US Navy and...
(no relation). During this same period, Gibson studied with Edmund Teske
Edmund Teske
Edmund Teske was an American photographer noted for his experimental techniques and work with the architect Frank Lloyd Wright....
, a photographer working with the technique of solarization.
In June 1967 Gibson attended the first ever Monterey International Pop Festival
Monterey Pop Festival
The Monterey International Pop Music Festival was a three-day concert event held June 16 to June 18, 1967 at the Monterey County Fairgrounds in Monterey, California...
with Lou Adler
Lou Adler
Lou Adler is an American record producer, manager, and director.-Life and career:Adler was born in Chicago, Illinois in December 1933, and raised in East Los Angeles. In 1964, Adler founded and co-owned Dunhill Records. He was President of the label as well as the chief record producer from 1964...
, where she was an invited member of the press. Over this three-day period in sunny Monterey, California
Monterey, California
The City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 27,810. Monterey is of historical importance because it was the capital of...
, which later became historical, she photographed nearly every act on the bill, and her photographs of celebrities such as Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
, Janis Joplin
Janis Joplin
Janis Lyn Joplin was an American singer, songwriter, painter, dancer and music arranger. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company and later as a solo artist with her backing groups, The Kozmic Blues Band and The Full Tilt Boogie Band...
, Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band formed in San Francisco in 1965. A pioneer of the psychedelic rock movement, Jefferson Airplane was the first band from the San Francisco scene to achieve mainstream commercial and critical success....
, the Mamas & Papas, and Brian Jones
Brian Jones
Lewis Brian Hopkins Jones , known as Brian Jones, was an English musician and a founding member of the Rolling Stones....
have been published around the world. One of Gibson's photos of Jimi Hendrix made the front cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Gibson can be seen twice in the film version of this festival, Monterey Pop
Monterey Pop
Monterey Pop is a 1968 concert film by D. A. Pennebaker that documents the Monterey Pop Festival of 1967. Among Pennebaker's several camera operators were fellow documentarians Richard Leacock and Albert Maysles...
, by D.A. Pennebaker.
Jill Gibson took the photographs for the psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or influenced by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in United States and the United Kingdom...
group Fever Tree
Fever Tree
Fever Tree is a former American psychedelic rock band of the 1960s, chiefly known for their anthemic 1968 hit, "San Francisco Girls ".-History:...
's self-titled debut album cover and its liner pictures for the band's 1968 LP released on Uni Records
Uni Records
Uni Records was a record label owned by MCA Inc. The brand, which long featured a distinct UNi logo, was established in 1966 by MCA executive Ned Tanen and developed by music industry veteran Russ Regan...
.
In 2008, Jill Gibson recorded the duet ballad "When It's Over" with Cameron Michael Parkes
Cameron Michael Parkes
Cameron Michael Parkes is an American composer known primarily for his work in Film and Television. He is a graduate of the film scoring program at UCLA and a member of ASCAP....
for the Jan Berry tribute album Encomium In Memoriam Vol. 1. The song “When It’s Over” was originally written and recorded by Gibson with Jan Berry in 1964 that was issued as the B-side of Jan & Dean’s hit single “Sidewalk Surfin’.”
The artist
Gibson and Adler would break up as a couple in late 1967. After briefly dating Elmer ValentineElmer Valentine
Elmer Valentine was the co-founder of two famous nightclubs on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, California: the Whisky a Go Go and The Roxy Theatre.-Early life:Elmer Valentine was born in Chicago on June 16, 1923...
, owner of the famous rock club the Whiskey A Go-Go in Los Angeles, Gibson went to New York City to study art at the Art Student's League with classical artist Frank Mason. After two years there, and a short stint in the desert of New Mexico, she left for Florence, Italy in 1970. For the next five and a half years Gibson painted while living in the Tuscan hills, studying briefly at The Simi Studio in Florence before returning briefly to California in 1973. On that return visit Jill Gibson made her American debut as a painter where her art was showcased for the first time at the DeVorzon Gallery in Hollywood for a week, and such guests as Jack Nicholson
Jack Nicholson
John Joseph "Jack" Nicholson is an American actor, film director, producer and writer. He is renowned for his often dark portrayals of neurotic characters. Nicholson has been nominated for an Academy Award twelve times, and has won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice: for One Flew Over the...
, Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski is a French-Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA, he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers."...
, former love Lou Adler, and Michelle Phillips were in attendance. Lou Adler purchased an original Gibson painting for $450 at the time while Nicholson also purchased two originals.
Jill Gibson's developing style as an artist is influenced by her interest in Renaissance art, natuare, and the feminine. Many of her original art works are in the private collections of Max Factor
Max Factor
Max Factor & Company is a cosmetics company, founded during 1909 by Maksymilian Faktorowicz , Max Factor, a Polish-Jewish cosmetician. Max Factor & Company was a related, two-family, multi-generational international cosmetics company before its sale in 1973 for $500 million dollars...
, Guy Webster, Michael Savage
Michael Savage (commentator)
Michael Savage is a conservative American radio host, author, and political commentator. He is the host of The Savage Nation, a nationally syndicated talk show that airs throughout the United States on Talk Radio Network...
, The Seattle Museum, Jack Nicholson
Jack Nicholson
John Joseph "Jack" Nicholson is an American actor, film director, producer and writer. He is renowned for his often dark portrayals of neurotic characters. Nicholson has been nominated for an Academy Award twelve times, and has won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice: for One Flew Over the...
, and a fifteen foot photo montage in The Los Angeles Free Clinic.
In 2002 Gibson's past as a singing former Mama came briefly full circle when she recorded a cover version of "California Dreamin'" with San Francisco singer-guitarist Ace Andres
Ace Andres
Ace Andres is an American songwriter, guitarist, vocalist, political activist and 2012 Wikipedia donor. He is atypical of rock musicians in that he is overtly conservative politically...
for his Cowboy Hat Blues album. On this version of her former band's pop hit, the song was turned into a hard rock song.
Today, Jill Gibson is a full-time artist with her own studio, Gibson Artworks, located in Oakland, California
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
. Over the last twenty-five years her art work has been displayed in galleries in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, and in the USA.
Her paintings, sculptures, photography
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
, planters, plaques, fountains, and bowls can be viewed on her official website . She divides her time between her homes in Oakland
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, and San Mateo Rio Hondo
San Mateo Río Hondo
San Mateo Río Hondo is the name of a town and municipality in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico.It is part of the Miahuatlán District in the south of the Sierra Sur Region.It is 2,300 meters above sea level...
, Oaxaca
Oaxaca
Oaxaca , , officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Oaxaca is one of the 31 states which, along with the Federal District, comprise the 32 federative entities of Mexico. It is divided into 571 municipalities; of which 418 are governed by the system of customs and traditions...
, Mexico.
