Artists

It's October 1969 in Austin, Texas. Sonobeat co-founder/producer Rim Kelley records rock band Plymouth Rock in sessions that culminate in Sonobeat's 16th 45 RPM single release (R-s114), Memorandum backed with Just A Start. Plymouth Rock's is the first of only two 45 RPM singles commercially released by Sonobeat in monaural rather than in Sonobeat's signature "solid state stereo", but we'll get to that in a moment. The catchy Memorandum, with its power guitar intro hook, is John Inmon's composition and the shuffling, jazzy Just a Start is a collaboration between bandmates Johnny Schwertner and Frank Harrison.

Plymouth Rock (not to be confused with the Plymouth Rockers, a '60s Seattle band), named as you might guess as a play on the place the Pilgrims landed in 1620 and the musical genre the band plays, rapidly becomes one of Austin's most popular bands, playing wall-to-wall gigs at University of Texas fraternity parties and Austin night clubs catering to both college and high school crowds. A solid and seasoned group of musicians, Plymouth Rock is made up of Kenny Hoelscher, Frank Harrison, South Canadian Overflow exes John Inmon and Donnie Dolan, and Lavender Hill Express ex Johnny Schwertner. John and Johnny previously are bandmates in The Reasons Why, another popular mid-'60s Austin rock band that also features John Inmon before he moves on to South Canadian Overflow. Johnny, Plymouth Rock's lead vocalist, takes over keyboards when Frank is drafted into the Army, but it's Frank who plays keyboards on the Sonobeat single. The band is managed by Paul Harrison, an Austin rock 'n' roll radio deejay and Sonobeat friend (we lose Paul on December 2, 2012).

The basic instrumental tracks for Plymouth Rock's single are recorded at First Cumberland Presbyterian Church's basketball-court sized auditorium in northwest Austin, and additional instrumental and vocal overdubs are recorded at Sonobeat's Western Hills Drive studio, also in northwest Austin.

Because of how the instrumental backing is originally tracked as well as the complex overdubbed harmony vocals and additional instruments – including John Inmon's double guitar solo on Memorandum – Rim focuses on creating a balanced monaural radio mix. Although today Rim recalls experimenting with stereo mixes for the 1969 release, he admits creating a balanced stereo version at the time proves too elusive, so Memorandum and Just A Start are released only in their mono mix versions. We can't locate Rim's experimental stereo mixes from 1969 in the Sonobeat archives, and even the band's work tapes in the archives are monaural mixes. The single's label says "MONO VERSION", as if there's also a stereo version, but no stereo version is ever released on vinyl. Somewhat enigmatically, but probably just a simple labeling mistake, the Plymouth Rock single is numbered R-s114. In Sonobeat's commercial release cataloging nomenclature, "s" means "stereo", so the single is mislabelled and should have been issued as R-m114.

In 1973, John Inmon and Donny Dolan join Lavender Hill Express exes Rusty Wier and Gary P. Nunn in Jerry Jeff Walker's celebrated Lost Gonzo Band, a seminal band that helps launch Austin's cosmic cowboy movement – country music strongly influenced by late '60s hippie culture.

In September 2015, Sonobeat Historical Archives reissues a restored, remixed, and remastered digital version of Plymouth Rock's 1969 single on iTunes and Amazon Music. This marks the first time the single is available in stereo, made possible using today's sophisticated digital audio workstations. The stereo remixes are made from 88.2KHz/24bit digital transfers from the original half-inch 4-track analog session masters, and each of the four individual tracks is then broken up into component stems that are remixed to create the first "official" stereo version using Logic Pro, Adobe Audition, a half-dozen specialty audio plug-ins, and iZotope's Ozone mastering suite. But wait, there's more!

In celebration of its 50th anniversary, in November 2019 we give Memorandum a brand new, wider stereo remix. Remastered by Colin Leonard at SING Mastering, Atlanta, Georgia, using SING Technology^® (Patented), the single is now available in a spectacular Apple Digital Master (formerly Mastered for iTunes) version on iTunes and Apple Music. In addition, the 50th anniversary reissue is available on all major music digital dowload and streaming platforms worldwide. We've added some interesting (we think) audio excerpts from our 2019 remix sessions below , along with an excerpt from the official Apple Digital Master reissue.