Mark Lindsay

Singer, saxophonist, songwriter, and producer Mark Lindsay is best known as the frontman for Paul Revere & the Raiders, who scored a series of hits from the 1960s into the early '70s. Although the band was named for keyboard player Revere, it was Lindsay who was the most identifiable member, and as time went on, he took over songwriting and producing chores for the group. Lindsay left in the mid-'70s, after which he pursued a career largely out of the limelight, though he periodically performed his old hits, and by the 1990s he was back to recording independently. Lindsay grew up in Idaho, where, in his teens, he joined a band led by Paul Revere Dick as its lead vocalist and saxophone player. By 1960 they were exploiting Dick's first and middle names to reference the Revolutionary War hero and calling themselves Paul Revere & the Raiders. (Eventually, they would take to wearing Revolutionary War uniforms on-stage). That was how they were billed when their first single, the instrumental "Like, Long Hair" on the tiny Gardena label, reached the national Top 40 in 1961. Their progress was interrupted when Revere was drafted and, as a conscientious objector due to his Mennonite religious beliefs, spent two years working in non-military government service. But they reorganized in the state of Washington afterwards and began to attract attention regionally. Their recording of "Louie, Louie" was released on Sande Records shortly after the hit version by local rivals the Kingsmen and was overshadowed even though it was picked up for national distribution by Columbia Records. Nevertheless, Columbia signed the act. A series of singles starting with "Louie - Go Home" (co-written by Lindsay and Revere) followed over the next year and a half, all of them "bubbling under" the...