[AH3RD]

Mon Dieu! This latest comp is revised and reedited for better quality (improved over the last edition), and expanded to include 2 extra cuts in this barrage of variants on Cut #8 of PAMS' Series 30. (One cut substitutes an actual male voiceover instead of the traditional Tom-O-Vox effects, though.)

Viva le France!

UPDATED: June 13, 2009, to include the 1989 GEM-AM variant.

PAMS N Set French Sig Montage!

[IainJohnstonMember]

And there was me, Ken Justiss, Jon Wolfert, Steve England, and
10 million other people thinking its called a “Sonovox” not a “Tom-o-vox”!

[AH3RD]

Wixy1360 wrote:
And there was me, Ken Justiss, Jon Wolfert, Steve England, and
10 million other people thinking its called a “Sonovox” not a “Tom-o-vox”!

That info I got from 560.com – Jingles.

[IainJohnstonMember]

From the very first paragraph on the above-linked page on the (excellent and well-known) 560.com Site, I quote…

“One thing I noticed right away were the unusual (to me) jingles they played. They had this weird voice singing the station’s ID, “Wonderful WQAM”. I was fascinated. I called the station and asked how they made that sound. I wasn’t aware that the jingles were used on stations all around the country and the world. The DJ explained to me that the sound was produced by a Sonovox. The singer held “speakers” against his throat while a musical instrument played the station’s id through the Sonovox. He then sang the jingle and the sound of the instrument, piano, sax, trumpet, guitar, whatever, came out of his mouth producing the “weird” sound I heard. I found out that those jingles were made by a company in Dallas called PAMS. The name of the series was “Series 18 Sonosational”.

On this photo (from the excellent JAM Website “Photo Albums” Pages) is Jon Wolfert “doing sonovox”, just as he has done for me and for many other JM'ers!…
http://www.jingles.com/jam/pix/album80/89_sono.jpg

Someone else on JM has previously mentioned “tom-o-vox” – but thats something else!

[LenGroat]

…. there were so many FUN jingles in the 'classic' PAMS packages..

… but this cut was just 'superb nonsense'

It sounded GREAT on the radio, with the light vocals, sonovox, and stab end

http://www.4shared.com/file/109333048/ef301b26/26_Track_26.html

I wanted to get the German and Spanish cuts too for GEM-AM (1989) but had to balance the package.. so we never got the German one…

Interestingly, when we recorded it for GEM (at TM studios Dallas in the days before JAM got PAMS 'back') the 'Da Dah Dada dada Daaah' was not on the track, but Jackie and the other singers sang it EXACTLY like the original!

[LenGroat]

This was a good PAMS topic and to keep it fresh I wonder if anyone out there has a good quality copy of the 'pre-records' of this series?

Here's one that I always found VERY useful in lots of ways.

http://www.4shared.com/file/111057544/99becb46/08_Track_8.html

PAMS in their 'prime' really did give a station a complete package which covered jingles from every angle, including this concept of 'pre-records' given free when you bought a package.

[IainJohnstonMember]

Len, I have a dub of the Series 30 pre-records from a copy of one of the KenR CDs, so I'll have a look for it – though I suspect its not the best of audio quality.

Pre-records & similar “included with..” bundles probably merit a New Thread in their own right, as some were substantial – e.g. TM Productions 1970 classic Phase II came with a very big supporting instrumental production pack; Pepper-Tanner would chuck-in the “corresponding instrumentals” i.e. usually (but not always) the main cuts but with a solo instrument doing the logo/vocal melody.

[AH3RD]

LenGroat wrote:
…. there were so many FUN jingles in the 'classic' PAMS packages..

… but this cut was just 'superb nonsense'

It sounded GREAT on the radio, with the light vocals, sonovox, and stab end

http://www.4shared.com/file/109333048/ef301b26/26_Track_26.html

I wanted to get the German and Spanish cuts too for GEM-AM (1989) but had to balance the package.. so we never got the German one…

Interestingly, when we recorded it for GEM (at TM studios Dallas in the days before JAM got PAMS 'back') the 'Da Dah Dada dada Daaah' was not on the track, but Jackie and the other singers sang it EXACTLY like the original!

Thanx, Len! I recently inserted it into the montage.

Hence the BUMP!

[theniceguy]

Speaking of sonovox.. here are some sono over intro examples made by TM productions

http://jinglemad.com/e107_files/public/1244920917_3989_FT71679_tm_sono_over_intro_examples.mp3 filename:tm_sono_over_intro_examples.mp3

[IainJohnstonMember]

Maarten – never knew that TM Productions must have created a form of sonovox “power intros” THIRTY YEARS before other people THOUGHT they'd invented them!

I very rarely heard TM using sonovox “actively” in that era – maybe because they wanted “to be different” from the “PAMS sound” (understandably).

I may be wrong but possibly the earlier TM sonovox on BRITISH radio was the (late) Kenny Page at Radio Clyde in its early days, who bought himself a small set of what would now be called “Personal Cuts” which included one with sono “Cuddly Kenny Page” to the “WDRC” logo on the TM “Listen to the Music” package, of which he also bought one full sung cut (the “Two-Sixty-One” Group vocal mix-out of which was truely “murdered” by other Clyde DJs for a long time after).

And the less said about Pepper-Tanner's use of (a form of) sonovox, the better!

Good sonovox lives on with Jon Wolfert!

[theniceguy]

The TM sonovoxing was done by Ken Justiss of course, as he still does for them. Carrrying around his own sonovox-set bought in 1970 (from memory). See this recent photo from TMstudios twitter

http://twitpic.com/2xaca

[IainJohnstonMember]

Indeed so Maarten – Ken did some sono for another JM'er & I a wee while back via Ben Freedman, and I still have my 1970 tape cut done by him via MCP (and now “digitally-restored”).

Ken back then literally WAS a “Travelling Sonovox Player” and would hire himself out even to small companies like MCP in the middle of nowhere on a regular “tour” rotation, so that each time he arrived at a client's studios for a session they would have built up a waiting-list of material for him to produce.

His session out-takes these days are still full of his gentle humour, and a LOT of creativity & ability.

Top guy!

[theniceguy]

Agreed. Ken let me use his sonovox once when i met him. Fun thing to do. And i was able to speak a sono with my own name. And he showed me his old synth. The one that was used on many TM productions packages in the 70's, like TM Airworks.
Stil cherish his old KGJ material for RNI and several US stations from the days before (and during) his work at TM.

[LenGroat]

Aaron

THANKS for adding our GEM version to the compilation – it's an honour to be in such audio company!

All the versions of the cut are good – on ours you can REALLY hear Jackie Dickson in the group – THE lead voice of PAMS for many years…

[smg560]

AH3RD;c-33638 wrote:

Wixy1360 wrote:
And there was me, Ken Justiss, Jon Wolfert, Steve England, and
10 million other people thinking its called a “Sonovox” not a “Tom-o-vox”!

That info I got from 560.com – Jingles.

That’s my website. Of course I call it a Sonovox everywhere on the site EXCEPT, the PAMS Series 28 Cut sheet does call the Sono cuts “Tom-O-Vox”. But that’s the only case I know of.

[IainJohnston]

Can’t believe we’re on a response to a12 year old post !
Did I really make that “10 million…” remark that long ago?

[m_hodgeyMember]

smg560;c-75459 wrote:

Of course I call it a Sonovox everywhere on the site EXCEPT, the PAMS Series 28 Cut sheet does call the Sono cuts “Tom-O-Vox”. But that’s the only case I know of.

Yes, I’d noticed this in the KenR PAMS Bible (http://jinglesamplers.com/PAMSBible.pdf – see page 114).

So what’s the difference between “Tom-O-Vox” and “Sonovox”? Just a different set of equipment or some guy called Tom on the Sonovox!

[JAM / PAMSMember]

m_hodgey;c-75461 wrote:

“So what’s the difference between “Tom-O-Vox” and “Sonovox”?

There is no difference. There is also no such thing as a Tom-O-Vox.

You’re missing the obvious: The reference to Tom-O-Vox was on the PAMS Series 30 lyric sheet. Series 30 was all about Pussycats (because it was in the era of “What’s New Pussycat”?… the movie and the song). They even called the group of 4 girl singers on that package “The Gold Pussycats”. So to stay with that theme, they called the Sonovox the “Tom-O-Vox”…. like a Tom Cat. Get it?

It was just a sales gimmick. No one ever really called it that.

[nleibo]

LenGroat;c-34150 wrote:

Aaron

THANKS for adding our GEM version to the compilation – it’s an honour to be in such audio company!

All the versions of the cut are good – on ours you can REALLY hear Jackie Dickson in the group – THE lead voice of PAMS for many years…

LenGroat;c-34150 wrote:

Aaron

Now, THAT is a GREAT Jingle…

[m_hodgeyMember]

JAM / PAMS;c-75462 wrote:

The reference to Tom-O-Vox was on the PAMS Series 30 lyric sheet. Series 30 was all about Pussycats (because it was in the era of “What’s New Pussycat”?… the movie and the song). They even called the group of 4 girl singers on that package “The Gold Pussycats”. So to stay with that theme, they called the Sonovox the “Tom-O-Vox”…. like a Tom Cat. Get it?

Yes, it all now makes perfect sense – Thanks Jon

[omproMember]

LenGroat;c-33849 wrote:

…

I wanted to get the German and Spanish cuts too for GEM-AM (1989) but had to balance the package.. so we never got the German one…

May I ask, who produces Sonovox in German?

[Apollo]

It seems like Tom-O-Vox would be referencing Tom Jones.

[Author]

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