The band was formed by guitarists Don Dannemann and Tom Dawes, while studying at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. The band’s drummer was Marty Fried. They were originally a “frat rock” band called The Rhondells; but were later discovered and managed by Brian Epstein, who was better known as manager of The Beatles, with John Lennon providing the unique spelling of their new name. They were produced by John Simon. In the summer of 1966 they opened on fourteen dates for the Beatles during their U.S. tour. The Cyrkle is best known for their 1966 song “Red Rubber Ball”, which went to #2 in the Billboard Hot 100 chart; it was co-written by Paul Simon of Simon and Garfunkel and Bruce Woodley of The Seekers. It was released on the Columbia record label. The band had one more Top 20 hit, “Turn-Down Day” later in 1966. After the release of the debut album, Red Rubber Ball, they recorded a second album, Neon, in late 1966 and a movie soundtrack, The Minx in 1967. They followed that with various singles, then disbanded in late 1967. Dawes later wrote the famous “plop plop fizz fizz” jingle for Alka-Seltzer. Both Dawes and Danneman became professional jingle writers following the demise of The Cyrkle. Fried is a bankruptcy attorney in metropolitan Detroit. |
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