[Cover photo courtesy of Cleveland International Records]
Wicked Cool Records and Cleveland International Records have partnered to release an Exclusive Limited Edition 7″ Vinyl of Ronnie and the Savoys previously out-of-print single “Domino” (b/w “Slappin’ Rods and Leaky Oil”). The tracks were originally recorded in 1958 at Cleveland Recording Company in Cleveland, Ohio.
Wicked Cool Records founder Stevie Van Zandt says:
Steve Popovich was one of my lifelong best friends. He signed the Asbury Jukes among other things. I knew he had a band when he was young, but he hadn’t mentioned that he’d recorded with that band. So I was thrilled when his son Stevie Junior not only discovered the record, but that the record turned out to be so great!
More about Ronnie and the Savoys:
Ronnie and the Savoys worked hard, something which reflected their blue collar roots. Drummer Ron Zupancich grew up in a coal mining town in Pennsylvania and quickly grew to love polka music — especially the albums of Frankie Yankovic, but also, big band — and before long, rock and roll, thanks to James Brown and Little Richard. In his teens, he formed an important musical bond with bassist and vocalist Steve Popovich, himself a product of another coal mining area elsewhere in PA. As Zupancich recollects, it was a crucial meeting — Steve had been playing Croatian music in a Tamburitza band while also singing in a high school quartet, The Satellites. With the addition of Popovich, the drummer’s band, initially known as The Polka Kings, finally had the versatility to move into playing rock and roll — and eventually, rhythm and blues. Whether he was playing electric bass or the more traditional acoustic stand-up bass, there was nothing Popovich couldn’t handle.
Paired with Zupancich, they were a devastating rhythm section. The Polka Kings, eventually to become known as Ronnie and the Savoys, were loaded for bear and then some. By the end of the ‘50s, they had relocated to Cleveland, Ohio. They had already performed on Yankovic’s Cleveland-based television show, Polka Varieties and were attracting label interest. The five-piece band entered Cleveland Recording and laid down tracks for two songs, “Domino” and “Slappin’ Rods and Leaky Oil.” Largely instrumental, “Slappin’ Rods and Leaky Oil” is infectiously energetic, driven by a swaggering piano part and relentless backbeat that makes the running time, barely two minutes in length, all too short. “Domino,” on the other hand, has both a story — and a serious groove. “We were just thrilled to hear it on the radio,” Popovich later told author Carlo Wolff, regarding the airplay that “Slappin’ Rods” received. Ronnie and the Savoys built a solid profile in Cleveland, performing nearly every night at Leo’s Cafe, a blue collar bar in a local Polish neighborhood. Larger venues would follow and although long-term success proved to not be in the cards, the group’s important output has now been preserved thanks to Cleveland International Records and Wicked Cool Records.
