Ravens 'Sleepless Nights' by The Ravens is an excellent song that mixes up-tempo stomping with lingering balladry.  As a result, it's instantly unforgettable and a favorite of garage rock collectors.  Hailing from Danbury, Connecticut and managed by Bert Clark, The Ravens regularly performed at the area's hotspots, as well as across the border into New York.  They wrote many original songs, but only recorded two singles that contained three of them.  In 2009, bassist John Anthony helped launch an excellent Ravens Web site, offering these songs and more as free downloads.  The site also provided information that led to many of the questions that we asked him.  Anthony graciously filled in some of the holes for 60sgaragebands.com. John Anthony An Interview With John Anthony 60sgaragebands.com (60s): How did you first get interested in music? John Anthony (JA): It began one summer day in 1963 when I heard electric guitars playing across the road from our home in New Fairfield, Connecticut. I followed this cool sound up to the top of what's called Joyce Hill and found a band playing outside a house. I was happy to find that I knew one of the guys from school, the drummer, Jeff Annunziata. I learned guitar from watching the band on the hill every chance I could and from Hans the head guy in the band who gave me pointers on guitar.  I joined this band at the end of 1963 when the rhythm guitar player left and the band became known as The Tor-Ks. 60s: Where and when was The Ravens? JA: In 1964 after The Tor-ks broke up, Jeff and I joined up with Ritchie O'Connor and Les Brent, also from a recent group break-up to form The Ravens in New Fairfield. The original band was: Jeff Annuziata – drums; Les Brent - lead guitar and vocals; Ritchie O'Connor - rhythm and vocals; John Anthony - bass guitar and vocals; and Bert Clark – manager. The original Ravens, 1964, at The Elks Lodge in Danbury Les left near the end of 1964 and Bert Clark found Bruce Bogie from Ridgefield to come in on lead guitar and vocals.  Ritchie O'Connor was drafted into the Army in 1966 and again Bert found a rhythm guitar and singer in Joe Gracia from Danbury. Ritchie was badly wounded and lost his right leg in Vietnam. He came back to the band in 1968 and we became a five-man band. 60s: How would you describe the band's sound? What bands influenced you? JA: I would call our sound Americanized English rock. We had solid, strong instrumentation and full, rich vocals—often with two-part and sometimes three-part harmony behind strong lead singing.  The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Animals, The Who, The Yardbirds, The Zombies and The Dave Clark Five influenced us.  60s: What was the Danbury rock and roll scene like in the '60s? JA: It was great. We had the best bands the world has ever seen pumping out hits as fast as we could learn them. There were many good bands in the area that made for tough competition, which pushed every group to its highest level. The Ravens, 1967: Joe Gracia, Bruce Boege and John Anthony 60s: Where did The Ravens typically play? JA: We initially played schools, parties and any venue Bert could find. Eventually we played clubs in New York just over the line from our base in Connecticut—fiirst at Todd's Supper Club in Peach Lake, New York, and later on at Carroll's Barn in Putnam Lake, New York.  We opened for The Doors in 1967 as well as The Vanilla Fudge, Blue Magoos and Mitch Ryder at other venues. We opened for Mitch Ryder at Norwalk Community College in February 1967. The thing I recall about the Ryder show was a lot of equipment moving. Besides The Ravens, another group, The Berries, played ahead of The Detroit Wheels. We had set up our respective gear on opposite sides of the stage. When Ryder arrived he insisted that the stage be completely cleared. We took everything down and then set it all back up again after his road crew had set up his groups equipment and stage props. In January 1968 we opened for The Vanilla Fudge at The Candlewood Playhouse in New Fairfield.  Their style was different and ahead of the times. Our last opening for any group was with The Blues Magoos at The Danbury High School auditorium in August 1968. Two things stick out in my mind about this show: The Blues Magoos wore black jackets that had green clusters about 2-3" inched in diameters all over them. During the show the stage lights went down and these clusters lit up and pulsed along with the music as they played 'We Ain't Got Nothin' Yet,' which looked kind of cool. The other thing was the difficulty we had performing well at this show. Bruce Bogie, who played lead guitar and was an integral part of our vocal sound, had left the group with little notice a couple of weeks prior to this. This left a huge hole in our sound which we never recovered from. We'd had a good five year run and the writing was on the wall. The band slowly wound down and dissolved by year's end. In August of 1967 we opened for The Doors at the large auditorium of Roger Ludlowe High in Fairfield.  They were rapidly rising in popularity and were almost legend already. I've written about this on the 1967 history page of our Web site.  60s: How did you hook up with Bert Clark?  JA: I knew Bert from the time we were kids and he knew of the early Ravens as he lived near Jeff and me in New Fairfield.  He was very active in promoting us and got us good press as well, which helped us move up in the local scene. 60s: Did you play any of the local teen clubs? JA: We opened a teen club in Danbury called The Trend in 1966 and played there a few times after that.  The night we opened the Trend, a very heavy, pea soup fog blanketed the Danbury area. We drove at a slow crawl and made it there. As we set up our equipment, the owners were very concerned about a low turnout due to the extremely poor driving conditions. We were all pleasantly surprised as over 300 teens braved their way over and packed the house. Everyone had a great time, especially the relieved owners! 60s: How far was the band's "touring" territory? JA: We mostly played in around Western Connecticut and bordering New York state but we went to New Jersey and Florida on two different gigs. 60s: Did The Ravens participate in any battle of the bands? JA: We did participate in a few. The bands we competed with were The BlueBeats, The Boss Blues, The Nomads and The Hereafters. The Ravens at Carrol's Barn, 1967: Jeff, Joe, Bruce and John 60s: What were the circumstances leading to the recording of the Haven Records 45? JA: Sol Goodman owned a record store in Danbury and sold a lot of records. He found out about us and wanted to get involved in recording us. He fronted the money for the Haven recording and pressed records that sold very well in our area. I don't believe the recording went to bigger markets. 60s: Where did The Ravens record? What do you remember about the recording session(s)? JA: The Haven recording of 'Sleepless Night' and 'Workin' For The Man' were recorded at Jack Russell's studio in Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1965. I remember that it was a very small studio. We were all packed in very tight—not much room to move around at all. We did each song—music and vocals live—in one take. In 1967 we recorded two songs, 'My Man' and 'What You Want' at Synchron Studios in Wallingford, Connecticut. That was a big, spacious, modern (for the time) studio and we were able to layer the recordings as is typically done today. 60s: Who was the band's primary songwriter? JA: All of the singers wrote songs. Only mine and Bruce's were fully completed and recorded.  60s: According to your Web site, The Bram Rigg Set recorded 'Sleepless Nights' as well.  How did that come about? JA: That is a good question. I wrote 'Sleepless Nights' in 1964 and we recorded on Haven in 1965. When Joe Gracia and I did the Ravens Web site in 2009, Joe found a recording of The Bram Riggs set on YouTube doing 'Sleepless Nights.' Prior to that none of us were aware this recording existed. Note: According to Mike Markesich, the YouTube version of 'Sleepness Nights' is not by The Bram Rigg Set but was actually a re-recorded version at Synchron by The Ravens.  When informed of this, Anthony responded, "We may have done a version of Sleepless Nights at Synchron. I listened to the song a couple of times and it could be us. I just don't recall doing it at Synchron.  I heard from Joe and he doesn't remember us recording 'Sleepless Nights' at Synchron. I have not heard back from Bruce yet. But Joe and I agree after carefully listening to the recording that it does sound like The Ravens. Based on this and the input from Trod Nossel/Synchron, we believe that it is our recording." However, according to Patrick Lundborg, a Connecticut band named The Reverbs did record a version of the song, and released it on their 1965 Chalk Up LP.  60s: There was another record released around 1966 by a band named The Ravens and also reportedly from Danbury.  It's on Bowery Records and includes a cover of The Barbarians' 'Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl' b/w 'Imagine You And Me.'  Do you know anything about that group/record? JA: I have seen this song credited to The Ravens on some Web sites but I don't know anything about this Ravens group. It definitely was not our Ravens group that did it. 60s: An article on your site lists songs by the titles 'Don't Say,' ' What's Right,' and 'Cory.'  Do recordings of these exists?  JA: Ritchie wrote 'Don't Say.' Joe wrote 'Cory' and I penned 'What's Right.' We played these out a few times but never recorded them. Signing with Eddie Dean at RCA in 1968 60s: According to your site, after Bert hooked up with New York producer Eddie Dean, Dean proposed a name change.  Do you recall what name he wanted to bill the band as?  Did the name change ever happen? JA: Eddie originally wanted to call us The Coming Storm because our sound was powerful. But, no, the name change never occurred.  60s: Do you recall the song titles that The Ravens recorded in New York for RCA?  Why were these never released?  JA: Eddie Dean had a couple of songs we worked up demo recordings on called 'Toll The Bell' for Henry Hollaway and 'Back in Nagasaki.' We also did one of Bruce's songs called 'Incomplete Girl.' We had recorded a number of songs as demos at RCA over the summer of 1968 and had more lined up to do. Bruce left the band around this time and Eddie Dean at RCA was very upset about this unexpected midstream change in personnel. Finding a good singer or a good lead guitar player was doable. However, finding a replacement who excelled at both was a much more difficult task and the time, effort and good fortune this would have required was beyond what we collectively had left in our reserves.  60s: Did the band make any local TV appearances? JA: No TV appearances and no home movies. Unfortunately we can't locate any tapes of live performances. All we have are the recordings.  60s: What year and why did the band break up in the '60s? JA: In late 1968 Bruce Bogie left the band one day for reasons he never really stated. He was an excellent lead player and singer. We had developed synergism by this time and his departure left a huge hole in our sound. By year's end we had neither the heart nor the drive to try and replace him. The band slowly wound down and eventually drifted apart.   60s: How do you best summarize your experiences with The Ravens? JA: It was an overall great time! We had ups and downs like every group does. We came out in mid 1964 right about the time Beatlemania really took off. We got to play during this transformational period—not only in music, but in culture and society at large. We had very good success in our area and made good money too. We loved it and had a lot of fun doing it.  Special thanks to Mike Markesich and Patrick Lundborg for providing information on Ravens and Ravens-related recordings... Bert Clark Recalls The Ravens Signing with a record company in the old days was like sellling your soul.  Those who made it big, usually had to do that. The producers themselves often wanted the bands to get hooked on drugs so they would stay on the road, for their habit. They wanted them to get enslaved to the drugs and them. If you left a company, they owned your name, they would replace all the band members if need be. I am glad that stuff is almost over. The band members of The Ravens always had the last say when I managed them. They had girlfriends, wives, and were paying their way through college with their performances--as was I. What brings me most joy is that most all of them had a somewhat normal life; also, other jobs, loves, marriage and children--and yet still kept alive their music and passion to perform. To ruin the rest of one's life for one's passion to be at the top is a form of possession and, like (Jim) Morrison, you pay a huge price.  It's not the wisest thing to do, but myriads have, including myself.  I respect modern celebrities who make the right decision before they ruin their relationships, marriages, families, and self distruct...all they have to do is say no to certain choices, even now and then.  Note my assesment of Morrison and The Doors on stage.  They were fried at the beginning of their carrier, and walking dead...but artists still.