Gary Usher (December 14, 1938 – May 25, 1990) was an American surf rock musician, songwriter, and record producer.
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Usher's early life was spent in Grafton, Massachusetts. He attended Norcross Grammar School with his sister, Sandra, who was in the same class and was likely his twin. Gary was kiddingly called "Chicken Feed" by his male classmates. He graduated from high school in Westborough, Massachusetts in 1957.
Though a musician in a number of California bands in the late 1950s, Usher gained notice in the early 1960s, writing and producing a number of hits for various surf rock artists. He was the earliest outside collaborator of The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson, a Hawthorne, California neighbor of his uncle, co-writing more than ten songs (among them "In My Room", "409", and "Lonely Sea"). According to Beach Boys biographer Steven Gaines, Wilson's domineering father Murry Wilson clashed with Usher and discouraged Usher's close personal friendship and working relationship with his son.
Usher also produced a lot of fictitious surf groups or hot rod groups mixing studio session musicians with his own troops (Chuck Girard , Dick Burns and others). Later in the decade, he produced records for The Byrds, Dick Dale, and Sons of Adam, as well as being the force behind a number of "studio-created" bands, including The Hondells, The Super Stocks, and Sagittarius. He also made varying attempts to record vocal sides for himself (including two co-produced by Brian Wilson: "That's Just the Way I Feel" b/w "Sacramento). His second record "Tomorrow" (regarded by some music historians as the forerunner to the surf/hotrod genre of rock n' roll) b/w "Lies" was written and produced by Zane Ashton (aka Bill Aken), another young artist who was on the Lan-Cet Record Label at the same time. One legend that grew out of this association was that Usher and Ashton once tried to convince actor Lloyd Bridges to trade his Cadillac convertible for Usher's Volkswagen, all in the spirit of clowning around. He also discovered the seminal comedy group The Firesign Theatre, using them on several of his projects for Columbia Records and producing their first album.
After being fired by Columbia Records, he decided to form a record label called Together Records in 1969 with friends Curt Boettcher and Keith Olsen. After talking to Motown Records for some time, in the hope of sealing a deal that never materialized, they signed a contract with Mike Curb's Transcontinental. Though several albums were released through the label, only the modest but visible success of Preflyte by The Byrds helped to pay for all their other projects. The label then folded when their distributor backed out of the deal in early 1970. Though his career waned after the 1960s, Usher continued to produce and write songs.
In the 1970s, he produced the first two Wackers albums. He also produced a very strange concept album for a folk band called The Ship; most of the songs were quite long and contained no drums. He co-produced with Curt Boettcher The California Album in 1976-1977 (not released at the time), and his own personal project: a book with a record called Beyond a Shadow of Doubt, which only demoed at the time in 1972, along with collaborator Dick Campbell. Most of his time was taken by religious duties. Beyond a Shadow of Doubt was released in June 2001 in Japan on compact disc.
His most personal album was issued in 1984, under the name of Celestium. The synth-laden LP was called Sanctuary and featured Tom Kelly as singer, Mike Meros and Alan Pasqua on keyboards, and Brent Nelson on drums on two songs (most of the other drums being digitally programmed). The engineer, Bill Fletcher, was also the bass player on a few cuts. He also worked with Brian Wilson again in 1986 but clashed with Wilson's controversial therapist Eugene Landy; most of this work has never been released. One of the last songs co-written by Gary Usher was "Let's Put the Fun Back in Rock n Roll", co-written with singer-songwriter/producer Joseph Nicoletti in 1985. It was recorded by The Golden Boys (Frankie Avalon, Fabian and Bobby Rydell) and performed for President and First Lady Reagan at the Ford Theater in a "command" performance on December 6, 1988.
The definitive biography on Usher's life, The California Sound: An Insider's Story - The Musical Biography of Gary Lee Usher, was written by Stephen J. McParland and published by CMusic Books.
Gary Usher was the father-in-law of noted Disney character animator Eric Goldberg.
Produced by Gary Usher
The California Sound: The Musical Autobiography of Gary Usher - Vols. 1-5 (edited by Stephen J. McParland, published by CMusic Books, Australia)
The Wilson Project by Gary Usher (edited by Stephen J. McParland, published by CMusic Books, Australia).