Stories was a rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 and pop music

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

 band

Musical ensemble

A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...

, based out of New York

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 in the early 1970s. The band consisted of keyboardist

Keyboardist

A keyboardist is a musician who plays keyboard instruments. Until the early 1960s musicians who played keyboards were generally classified as either pianists or organists. Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical instruments with keyboards have come into common usage, requiring a more...

 Michael Brown

Michael Brown (rock musician)

Michael Brown , is an American keyboardist-songwriter. The son of violinist and arranger Harry Lookofsky, he is best known as the principal songwriter for the 1960s baroque-pop outfit The Left Banke and for writing their two hits "Walk Away Renee" and "Pretty Ballerina".After internal band...

, bassist

Bassist

A bass player, or bassist is a musician who plays a bass instrument such as a double bass, bass guitar, keyboard bass or a low brass instrument such as a tuba or sousaphone. Different musical genres tend to be associated with one or more of these instruments...

/vocalist

Singing

Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...

 Ian Lloyd

Ian Lloyd (musician)

Ian Lloyd is an American rock singer and songwriter, best known as the lead singer of the band Stories, whose single "Brother Louie" was No. 1 on the Billboard Top 100 chart in 1973. Lloyd attended Hartwick College during the 1960's where he performed with a band called "The Section" using the...

, 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...

 Steve Love, and drummer

Drummer

A drummer is a musician who is capable of playing drums, which includes but is not limited to a drum kit and accessory based hardware which includes an assortment of pedals and standing support mechanisms, marching percussion and/or any musical instrument that is struck within the context of a...

 Bryan Madey, and had a Number 1 hit

Hit record

A hit record is a sound recording, usually in the form of a single or album, that sells a large number of copies or otherwise becomes broadly popular or well-known, through airplay, club play, inclusion in a film or stage play soundtrack, causing it to have "hit" one of the popular chart listings...

  with a cover

Cover version

In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...

 of Hot Chocolate's "Brother Louie."

Band history

Lloyd (b. Lloyd Buonconsiglio, 1947, Seattle) and Brown (b. Michael Lookofsky, April 25, 1949, Brooklyn) were introduced by their fathers, two old friends who had worked together for years as session

Session musician

Session musicians are instrumental and vocal performers, musicians, who are available to work with others at live performances or recording sessions. Usually such musicians are not permanent members of a musical ensemble and often do not achieve fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders...

 violin

Violin

The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

ists. Lloyd had been singing for years and had attracted local notice recording

Sound recording and reproduction

Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...

 as Lloyd London. Brown had led, wrote and played with his group The Left Banke

The Left Banke

The Left Banke is an American baroque pop band that formed in New York City in 1965 and disbanded in 1969. They are best remembered for their two U.S. hit singles, "Walk Away Renée" and "Pretty Ballerina"...

, which had made the U.S.

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 charts

Record chart

A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, Hot 100 or Top 40....

 with "Walk Away Renee

Walk Away Renee

"Walk Away Renée" is a song made popular by the band The Left Banke in 1966 , composed by the group's then 16-year-old keyboard player Michael Brown and Tony Sansone...

" (#5, 1966) and "Pretty Ballerina

Pretty Ballerina

"Pretty Ballerina" is a song written by pianist Michael Brown and was a number 15 hit for his band The Left Banke on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The original Left Banke version of the song, released December 1966, was sung by Steve Martin Caro...

" (#15, 1967).

The two set about becoming a Beatles

The Beatles

The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...

que band. They recruited New Yorkers Love and Madey and located an interested record label

Record label

In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...

 in Kama Sutra

Kama Sutra Records

Kama Sutra Records was started in 1964 by Arthur "Artie" Ripp, Hy Mizrahi and Phil Steinberg as Kama Sutra Productions, a production house. The word "Kama Sutra" is a Sanskrit terminology....

. A self-titled album

Album

An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...

 and a single

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

  – "I'm Coming Home" (#42, 1972) – followed.

Afterward, the band started work on their second LP

LP album

The LP, or long-playing microgroove record, is a format for phonograph records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry...

 with producer Eddie Kramer

Eddie Kramer

Edwin H. Kramer is an audio engineer and producer who has worked with, among others, Led Zeppelin, Triumph, Kiss , Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Spooky Tooth, Peter Frampton, Curtis Mayfield, Santana, Anthrax, Carly Simon, Loudness, and Robin Trower.-1960s:Eddie...

, About Us (1973). After the album's release, Brown left the band to pursue another project.

About Us did relatively well, but it did not initially include the group's new single, "Brother Louie." The song about a black girl and her white boyfriend had been a UK

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 hit for Hot Chocolate earlier that year. Once issued as the Stories' second single, it became a big hit, reaching No. 1 in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. It spent two weeks at No. 1 and remained in the Billboard chart for 18 weeks, with an R.I.A.A.

Recording Industry Association of America

The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...

 gold disc

Music recording sales certification

Music recording sales certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped or sold a certain number of copies, where the threshold quantity varies by type and by nation or territory .Almost all countries follow variations of the RIAA certification categories,...

 awarded on 22 August 1973.

"All of a sudden," Lloyd explained to Triad's Russel Wiener, "we had a big hit with a song that did not represent our music and the direction we were trying to go in. I didn't think it would affect me that much, but it did. Consequently, I decided that I had to remove myself from that, so that I could come back and show what I really can do."

A new version of the LP was issued which did include the hit single, and the album proceeded to sell well. In some cases old copies of the LP which did not include the single were shipped inside album covers that did list the single.

Lloyd did remain with Stories for one more album – Traveling Underground (1973). Bassist Kenny Aaronson

Kenny Aaronson

Kenny Aaronson is an American bass guitar player.- Early life and career :He started playing drums at the age of eleven, following in his older brother's footsteps. Kenny switched to electric bass at the age 14 after becoming enamored by the bass on Motown records and was strongly influenced by...

 (b. April 14, 1952, Brooklyn

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...

) (formerly of Dust

Dust (band)

Dust was an American hard rock band active in the early 1970s.Dust was formed in the late 1960s by Richie Wise and two teenagers, Kenny Aaronson and Marc Bell. Additionally, Kenny Kerner wrote the group's lyrics, and acted as their producer and manager...

) and keyboardist Ken Bichel

Ken Bichel

Ken Bichel is an American actor, composer, pianist, and synthesizer musician. Bichel attended the Juilliard School where he graduated with a Bachelors degree in piano performance in the late 1960s...

 (b. 1945, Detroit) stepped in to fill the void. The new group made 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...

 with "Mammy Blue" (#50, 1973) and "If It Feels Good, Do It" which was a cover of a song by the band Climax

Climax (band)

Climax was an American band formed in 1970 in Los Angeles, California, most noted for their 1971-1972 hit song "Precious and Few," which peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart and #1 on Cashbox magazine's Top 100 singles chart...

 (#88, 1974). Before the group's break-up, Love left and was replaced by Richie Ranno.

Lloyd has since recorded several solo albums and done studio

Recording studio

A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...

 work for Foreigner

Foreigner (band)

Foreigner is a British-American rock band, originally formed in 1976 by veteran English musicians Mick Jones and ex-King Crimson member Ian McDonald along with American vocalist Lou Gramm...

, Fotomaker

Fotomaker

Fotomaker was a power pop group based on Long Island, NY which released 3 albums between 1978 and 1979. It was considered to be somewhat of a supergroup of power-pop musicians, featuring what would become some future members of the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame, albeit for their work with previous bands...

, and Peter Frampton

Peter Frampton

Peter Kenneth Frampton is an English musician, singer, producer, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist. He was previously associated with the bands Humble Pie and The Herd. Frampton's international breakthrough album was his live release, Frampton Comes Alive!. The album sold over 6 million copies...

. Lloyd was also one of the first artists to cover songs by Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams, is a Canadian rock singer-songwriter, guitarist, bassist, producer, actor and photographer. Adams has won dozens of awards and nominations, including 20 Juno Awards among 56 nominations. He has also received 15 Grammy Award nominations including a win for Best Song Written...

, which led to the 1984 formation of Fast Forward, involving several persons directly or indirectly associated with Adams. The resulting album, Living in Fiction

Living in Fiction

Living In Fiction is an album by Fast Forward, released by Island Records in 1984. Fast Forward was formed by Ian Lloyd...

, featured several of Adams' songs. Brown went on to form The Beckies, another Beatlesque band. Love reappeared in the early 1980s as Landscape. Madey, after a two album stay with the Earl Slick Band

Earl Slick

Earl Slick is a guitarist best known for his collaborations with David Bowie, Jim Diamond and Robert Smith, although he has also worked with other artists , John Waite, and even released some solo recordings.In the early 1970s, Earl Slick gained his...

, provided accompaniment for Peggy Lee

Peggy Lee

Peggy Lee was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, composer, and actress in a career spanning six decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local radio to singing with Benny Goodman's big band, she forged a sophisticated persona, evolving into a multi-faceted artist and...

. Aaronson has remained busy. He was co-founder (with Carmine Appice

Carmine Appice

Carmine Appice is an American rock drummer of Italian background and is the older brother of drummer Vinny Appice by 12 years. He received a classical music training and was influenced by the jazz drumming of Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa early on...

's brother Vinnie) of Axis, and he did sessions for Hall & Oates

Hall & Oates

Hall & Oates are an American musical duo composed of Daryl Hall and John Oates. They achieved their greatest fame in the late 1970s and early to mid-1980s. Both sing and play instruments. They specialized in a fusion of rock and roll and rhythm and blues styles, which they dubbed "rock and soul."...

, Billy Squier

Billy Squier

William Haislip "Billy" Squier is an American rock musician. Squier had a string of arena rock hits in the 1980s. He is best known for the song "The Stroke" on his 1981 album release Don't Say No...

, ex-Mountain

Mountain (band)

Mountain is an American hard rock band that formed in Long Island, New York in 1969. Originally comprising vocalist and guitarist Leslie West, bassist Felix Pappalardi and drummer N. D. Smart, the band broke up in 1972 before reuniting in 1974 and remaining active until today...

 Leslie West

Leslie West

Leslie West is an American rock guitarist, singer and songwriter.-Biography:Originally named Leslie Weinstein, West was born in New York City, grew up in Hackensack, New Jersey, and in East Meadow, Forest Hills and Lawrence. After his parents divorced, he changed his surname to West...

, Foghat

Foghat

Foghat are a British rock band that had their peak success in the mid- to late-1970s. Their style can be described as "blues-rock," or boogie-rock dominated by electric and electric slide guitar. The band has achieved five gold records...

, Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

, Tom Guerra

Tom Guerra

Tom Guerra of Hartford, Connecticut is an American guitarist.Since the late 1970s, Guerra has been a popular guitarist on the New England club circuit, playing with a host of leading blues, rock n' roll and R&B acts...

, and Rick Derringer

Rick Derringer

Rick Derringer is an American guitarist, vocalist, and entertainer.-1960s:When he was seventeen years old, his band The McCoys recorded "Hang on Sloopy" in the summer of 1965, which became the number one song in America before "Yesterday" by The Beatles knocked it out of the top spot. The song was...

. Bichel has done session work, and so has Love. Ranno found later success as a member of Starz

Starz (band)

Starz was a 1970s heavy metal and power pop band from New Jersey, United States. Despite a lack of big commercial success, the band has a lasting cult following and has been cited as a major influence by bands such as Mötley Crüe, Poison and Twisted Sister....

.

Raven Records

Raven Records

Raven Records is an Australian record label that specializes in retrospectives and reissues or recordings by American, British and Australian artists.Raven Records was established in 1979 by Glenn A. Baker, Kevin Mueller and Peter Shillito....

 released Stories and About Us on a single CD

Compact Disc

The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...

, including the bonus track "Another Love", being the last single by the group, released in 1974.

Albums

• 1972 Stories (Kama Sutra) #182
• 1973 About Us (Kama Sutra) #29 (charted after it was reissued with "Brother Louie" added to the end of side two)
• 1973 Traveling Underground (Kama Sutra) #208
• 1993 Traveling Underground (One Way) CD Reissue
• 1996 About Us (Buddah) CD Reissue
• 2007 Stories/About Us (Raven Records)

Singles

• 1972 "I'm Coming Home" b/w "You Told Me (Kama Sutra 545) #42
• 1972 "Top Of The City" b/w "Step Back (Kama Sutra 558)
• 1973 "Darling"(see below) b/w "Take Cover (Kama Sutra 566) #111
• 1973 "Love Is In Motion" b/w "Changes Have Begun" (Kama Sutra 574)
• 1973 "Brother Louie" b/w "What Comes After?" (Kama Sutra 577) #1
• 1973 "Mammy Blue" b/w "Travelling Underground" (Kama Sutra 584) #50
• 1974 "If It Feels Good, Do It" b/w "Circles (Kama Sutra 588) #88
• 1974 "Another Love" b/w "Love Is In Motion" (Kama Sutra 594)

Note: different mix than the album version on "About Us"