"No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)" is an

instrumental An instrumental is a recording normally without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through semantic widening, a broader sense of the word song may refer to instru ...

composition Composition or Compositions may refer to: Arts and literature *Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography *Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include v ...

recorded in 1965 by

The T-Bones The T-Bones were an American, Liberty Records recording group, existing from 1963 to 1966. The studio recordings of all of their albums but the last were done by American session musicians, The Wrecking Crew. They should not be confused with ...

and released as a single the same year.

Composer

The record itself lists Granville Sascha Burland as the composer, but

ASCAP The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) () is an American not-for-profit performance-rights organization (PRO) that collectively licenses the public performance rights of its members' musical works to venues, broadca ...

says the composer is Lou Bideu aka

Lew Bedell Lewis Joseph Bedell (March 21, 1919 – July 6, 2000)
Retrieved 14 February 2013 was an American

History

In 1965,

Dave Pell David Pell (February 26, 1925 – May 7, 2017) was an American jazz saxophonist, bandleader and record producer. He was best known for leading a cool jazz octet in the 1950s. Biography Pell played in his teens with the big bands of Tony Pastor, B ...

wanted to record songs based on music from recent TV commercials and release them on 45 RPM singles to see if he could get radio airplay and maybe a hit record. Previously,

Liberty Records Liberty Records was a record label founded in the United States by chairman Simon Waronker in 1955 with Al Bennett as president and Theodore Keep as chief engineer. It was reactivated in 2001 in the United Kingdom and had two previous revival ...

had used "The T-Bones" as a group name for instrumentals recorded by Los Angeles session musicians The Wrecking Crew, and Liberty told Pell to use it again for his project. In 1965, Pell went into the studio with members of The Wrecking Crew and recorded "No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)," a song based on music used in an

Alka-Seltzer Alka-Seltzer is an effervescent antacid and pain reliever first marketed by the Dr. Miles Medicine Company of Elkhart, Indiana, United States. Alka-Seltzer contains three active ingredients: aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) (ASA), sodium bicarbonate ...

TV commercial. When the single became a hit, Liberty Records needed the T-Bones to go on the road to promote it, but the original session musicians weren't willing to go. They were making a considerable amount of money doing sessions in Los Angeles. So Liberty created a different "public" T-Bones group to appear on record covers, TV, and in concert. The "public" T-Bones were

Judd Hamilton Judd Hamilton is an American singer, musician, former band leader, writer, film producer, actor, inventor, company director. As a musician he has recorded for the Dolton, Liberty, American International, United Artists and RCA Victor labels. He ...

Dan Hamilton Dan Hamilton is a fictional character from the BBC medical drama '' Holby City'', played by actor Adam Astill. He first appeared in the series thirteen episode "Blue Valentine", broadcast on 15 February 2011. Dan is a consultant orthopaedic s ...

Joe Frank Carollo Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds were a 1970s soft rock trio from Los Angeles. The original members were Dan Hamilton (guitar/lead vocal), Joe Frank Carollo (bass/vocal), and Tommy Reynolds (multi-instrumentalist/vocal), all of whom had previousl ...

, Tommy Reynolds, and Gene Pello. None of them played on the hit record but later they would achieve fame as the soft rock trio,

Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds were a 1970s soft rock trio from Los Angeles. The original members were Dan Hamilton (guitar/lead vocal), Joe Frank Carollo (bass/vocal), and Tommy Reynolds (multi-instrumentalist/vocal), all of whom had previousl ...

Chart performance

The single spent 13 weeks on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100, reaching No. 3, while reaching No. 1 on

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

's ''

RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or with the notation min−1) is a unit of rotational speed or rotational frequency for rotating machines. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 defines a unit of rotation as the dimensionl ...

'' Play Sheet. The album spent seven weeks on ''Billboard''s chart of

Top LPs The ''Billboard'' 200 is a record chart ranking the 200 most popular music albums and EPs in the United States. It is published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine and is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of art ...

, reaching No. 75.Billboard Top LP's
, ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

'', March 26, 1966. Accessed July 28, 2016.

Personnel

, leader *

Perry Botkin, Jr. Perry Botkin Jr. (April 16, 1933 – January 18, 2021) was an American composer, Record producer, producer, arranger, and musician. The tune "Nadia's Theme", composed by Botkin and Barry De Vorzon, peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100, ''Bil ...

, OM, arranger *

Tommy Tedesco Thomas Joseph Tedesco (July 3, 1930 – November 10, 1997) was an American guitarist and studio musician in Los Angeles and Hollywood. He was part of the loose collective of the area's leading session musicians later popularly known as The Wrec ...

, guitar *Victor Fledman 'sic'' presumably

Victor Feldman Victor Stanley Feldman (7 April 1934 – 12 May 1987) was an English jazz musician who played mainly piano, vibraphone, and percussion. He began performing professionally during childhood, eventually earning acclaim in the UK jazz scene as ...

Hal Blaine Hal Blaine (born Harold Simon Belsky; February 5, 1929 – March 11, 2019) was an American drummer and session musician, thought to be among the most recorded studio drummers in the music industry, claiming over 35,000 sessions and 6,000 singles. ...

, drums *

Julius Wechter Julius Wechter (May 10, 1935 – February 1, 1999) was an American musician and composer who played the marimba and vibraphone. He also played various percussion instruments. He composed the song "Spanish Flea" for Herb Alpert and was leader of The ...

, percussion *

Ervan Coleman Ervan F. "Bud" Coleman (July 7, 1921 – May 26, 1967) was an American guitar and mandolin player, member of Baja Marimba Band, worked with Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass, and who wrote the hit track, "Tijuana Taxi". On the liner notes of Herb A ...

, *

Buddy Clark Buddy Clark (born Samuel Goldberg, July 26, 1912 – October 1, 1949) was an American popular singer of the Big Band era. He had some success in the 1930s, but his career truly blossomed in the late 1940s, after his return from service in Worl ...

Carol Kaye Carol Kaye (née Smith, born March 24, 1935) is an American musician. She is one of the most prolific recorded bass guitarists in rock and pop music, playing on an estimated 10,000 recordings in a career spanning over 50 years. Kaye began play ...

, electric bass guitar *

Lyle Ritz Lyle Joseph Ritz (January 10, 1930 – March 3, 2017) was an American musician, known for his work on ukulele and bass (both double bass and bass guitar). His early career in jazz as a ukulele player made him a key part of the Hawaii music scene ...

, upright bass * Harold "Lanky" Lindstrot, engineer *

Evelyn Roberts Evelyn Roberts (28 August 1886 – 30 November 1962) was an English stage and film actor. He made his stage debut in 1918 after serving in WW I; and his theatre work included the original Broadway production of R.C. Sherriff's ''Journey's E ...

* Martin Berman *Roger Harris, copy *Robert Ross, copy *

Joe Saraceno Joseph Saraceno (May 16, 1937 – October 15, 2015) was an American record producer. He was a producer for The Ventures The Ventures are an American instrumental rock band formed in Tacoma, Washington, in 1958, by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. T ...

, producer

References

{{reflist 1966 singles Songs based on jingles Pop instrumentals 1960s instrumentals