You Only Rock Once: My Life in Music

by Jerry Blavat

Overview

Jerry Blavat's rockin' life story pulses with celebrity names, infamous episodes and "offers readers an insider's view into the golden era of rock and roll and pop music and entertainment" raves Publishers Weekly.

The long-awaited autobiography of entertainment icon Jerry Blavat, You Only Rock Once is the wildly entertaining and unfiltered story of the man whose career began at the age of 13 on the TV dance show Bandstand and became a music legend. Lifelong friendships with the likes of Sammy Davis Jr. and Frank Sinatra, a controversial relationship with Philadelphia Mafia boss Angelo Bruno that resulted in a decade-long FBI investigation, and much more colors this amazing journey from the early 60s through today.

Now, some 50 years after his first radio gig, Blavat puts it all in perspective in this uniquely American tale of a "little cockroach kid" borne out of the immigrant experience who lived the American Dream.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780762443628
Publisher:	Running Press Book Publishers
Publication date:	07/26/2011
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	428,588
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Jerry Blavat was one of the early rock-and-roll deejays who revolutionized the profession and invented the "Oldies" format. He had national success in the '60s as host of the popular CBS-TV dance show The Discophonic Scene, but is best known as a high-energy oldies deejay on the air and at live events throughout the Middle Atlantic region. With a successful nightclub outside Atlantic City, NJ (Memories); regular radio shows on 88.5 FM WXPN in Philadelphia, 92.1 FM WVLT in South Jersey, and 98.3 FM WTKU in Atlantic City; and scores of sold-out live dance events every year, Blavat is as popular as ever. He lives in Philadelphia, PA. Please visit him at geator.net.

Table of Contents

Foreword Dick Clark 13

Acknowledgments 14

Prologue 16

1 Trouble on the Home Front: Louis the Gimp 17

2 Lifeline: Radio and TV 21

3 The Bandstand Years: Local Celebrity 35

4 The Street Was My Classroom 55

5 Road Managing: Danny and the Juniors 76

6 Breaking in as a Disc Jockey 101

7 The TV Years 167

8 Pied Piper: Going National 186

9 The Lean Years: Memories in Margate 223

10 Loyalty 265

11 Trouble with the Law 271

12 Beyond Teens 310

Index 348

Editorial Reviews

Writing a narrative that teems with zest and hipness, Blavat invites readers to accompany him on the inside track through the early days of doo wop and R&B to his national stature as an influential figure on the pop scene. Bandstand icon Dick Clark, in his foreword, spells out how much clout Blavat wielded in the heyday of the top acts of the '60s and '70s, rising from a teen "committee member" of the popular TV show to a powerhouse DJ on the East Coast from his studio built in his garage in Philadelphia, and later a top-rated TV stint. He discusses his ground-breaking Alan Freed–sponsored shows at the famed Paramount, his friendships with black doo wop and soul groups before the Jim Crow barrier came down, and his hobnobbing with Hollywood royalty including Sinatra, Frankie Avalon, Tony Curtis, and Sammy Davis Jr. He doesn't shy from talking about his wild ways with the ladies and the run-ins with the law concerning his mobbed-up pals. This soulful memoir by a "little cockroach kid from South Philadelphia" offers readers an insider's view into the golden era of rock and roll and pop music and entertainment. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly
“This soulful memoir by a “little cockroach kid from South Philadelphia” offers readers an insider’s view into the golden era of rock and roll and pop music and entertainment.”

Publishers Weekly, 7/15/11
“Writing a narrative that teems with zest and hipness, Blavat invites readers to accompany him on the inside track through the early days of doo wop and R&B to his national stature as an influential figure on the pop scene…This soulful memoir…offers readers an insider’s view into the golden era of rock and roll and pop music and entertainment.”

Philadelphia Daily News
"Trust us, it's a page turner...chock-full of family drama, music, business dirt, celebrity encounters, mob connections an even some juicy sex."

Peter Thornell, Hingham P.L., MA,

From the Publisher

A longtime disk jockey spins a stack of memories about rock, the mob and surviving the music business.

Blavat spent the '60s crafting a fast-talking, larger-than-life radio persona that attracted hordes of teens to the record hops he hosted around Philadelphia. A sworn enemy of bubblegum and pop, he nicknamed himself the "Geator"—a portmanteau of "alligator" and "heater"—and assembled playlists stuffed with pugnacious rock 'n' roll. (He once played the Beatles on air just to field angry phone calls, showing a friend how much he'd encouraged his fans to dislike them.) Experienced, successful and now apparently eager to boast a little, Blavat spends the early chapters of his debut memoir tracking his rise from hardscrabble Jewish-Italian stock and how music provided a way out. He became a star dancer on the American Bandstand, a local program before Dick Clark took it national; before he was out of his teens, he'd road-managed Danny and the Juniors and launched his DJ career. Fame got him plenty of attention, both in the music industry and with women—Blavat's not shy about cataloging his sexual conquests. The author's equally interested in paying homage to the A-listers he hung out with, and the book is larded with genial remembrances of Frank Sinatra, Joan Crawford and Sammy Davis Jr. In the '80s and '90s, Blavat's acquaintances with mob types attracted the scrutiny of investigators; he was never charged with a crime, but he is compelled to clear his name regardless. That candor is admirable, but his narcissism, combined with his generally plodding prose style, saps much of the youthful energy of the early chapters.

Blavat has an excellent perspective on four decades of the music industry, though his remembrances too often drift into self-hagiography.

Kirkus Reviews