The Dinks
The Dinks - 60's garage band from Kansas
Group from United States
Genres: Rock and Roll
Similar artists via Last.fm
Joe Cota
About The Dinks
The Dinks were a mid-1960s garage rock band active in western Kansas, known for their songs with jibberish phrase like “Nina-Kocka-Nina” (1965) and "Kocka-Mow-Mow" (1966). The band was started by Steve Kadel, from Beloit, Kansas. Its members were Pat Waddell (lead vocals) who was replaced by Dean Dietz, Steve Kadel (lead guitar) replaced by Bill Hollingsworth, Bob Bergmann (rhythm guitar and vocals), Gail Scanlon (organ), Bruce Brown (bass) and Mike Morrand (drums). The Dinks’ “Nina-Kocka-Nina” takes the repetitive nonsense of “Surfin’ Bird” and adds a bizarre parody of an Asian accent. The soft-spoken opening has the Japanese inflection down well, even if most of the words are gibberish. Once the song gets going the tone shifts to something that sounds like no real language except variations on “papa ooh mow mow”. The few lyrics in English, “get out your pencils, get out your books, try to catch all the teacher’s grubby looks” and “I’m taking English, History, Biology and Chemistry” imply that school is turning him into a raving idiot! Ironically, the writer of the song would become a teacher himself after leaving the Dinks. “Penny a Tear Drop” is very different, and the contrast between the twelve-string guitar and organ sounds great. It’s something of a shame that the success of “Nina-Kocka-Nina” put the Dinks into the novelty category and ended their chances of making it as a sincere pop act. Song writing credits for “Penny a Tear Drop” go to Ray Ruffin (a variation on Ray Ruff’s name I hadn’t seen before) and Jack Dunham, whose name also turns up on the Dinks second 45. Needing a follow up to “Nina-Kocka-Nina” they predictably cut another song in that vein. “Kocka-Mow-Mow” lacks the magic of the first record. Instead of being a band original, it was knocked off by two of Ray Ruff’s associates: Jack Dunham again, and Royce Taylor, a singer who had his own 45 for Sully as part of Gaylen & Royce, “I Can’t Stay” / “Modern Day Fools”. Oddly it comments directly on their first disc: “all the DJs across the nation, thought we had a bad creation, they just thought we were up in smoke, but that’s kind of funny because we’re on all the charts” … “radio stations started getting calls, they said our band made their skin crawl, they didn’t like the music ’cause it made them sick, but everybody wanted to hear it, kids” … “they said ‘Nina-Kocka-Nina’ was the most … you better think twice before you put this one down.” On the flip is an incredibly insensitive song by Royce Taylor, “Ugly Girl”, sung in the sweetest voice. They were originally called the Regattas when they went to record, but Ray sent our contract back and changed our names to The Dinks because Ragging Regattas didn’t match the “Nina-Kocka-Nina” song. The Dinks were mainly an instrumental band. The song list was very long and mixed between vocals and instrumentals. The main songs were by the Ventures, and other instrumental groups, many from England. They recorded an album of instrumental songs at Sully Studio after the two 45s, but it never came out. After a few years, Bill Hollingsworth replaced Steve on lead guitar, and Dean Deetz replaced Pat Waddel on vocal. The Dinks went on a year or so before some of its members were drafted. After that, they split company and two bands were started, one of them called The Beasts. On March 7, 2009 the Dinks were inducted into the Kansas Music Hall of Fame in Lawrence, Kansas.
Taken from Last.fm
1,095 listeners · 4,256 plays via Last.fm