Television Appearances

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Brewer & Shipley appearances on National TV Shows

The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson - April 21, 1971
Joey Bishop guest hosted the night we appeared. John Kahn flew out to New York from the West coast and joined on bass but the show didn't want to pay to show John. Also, they neglected to turn on his microphone, so he was there and he played, but couldn’t be seen or heard. To add insult to injury Tom's wallet was stolen out of his hotel room that was furnished by The Tonight Show. Ah, showbiz!

Other guests: Shelly Berman, Abe Drazed, Ashley Montagu, Romina Power

The David Frost Show - 1971
Performed "One Toke Over The Line"

Top of The Pops (London) - 1971
The show wanted us to perform "People Love Each Other" and because of some British law we had to re-record the song with the band, “Southern Comfort”, and they had to be on the show with us. The only thing live were our vocals, only they neglected to have Tom's voice up loud enough to be heard. Nobody was plugged in, but just playing along with the recording. We’d recorded it on the first 16 trk board to come to San Francisco, which, was quite an undertaking at the time, but had to re-record it live in London on an antique 4 trk machine. Oddly enough, it sounded better than the original. Go figure. Then, again, The Beatles recorded everything up to “Sgt. Pepper” on 4 trk machines. Sometimes “new” isn’t necessarily “better”.

The Dick Cavett Show - 1971
Just before going on, a publicity agent from LA we were working with at the time came to our dressing room and made us do a “bad” thing, which, made us perform our song like a blue grass tune; far too fast. Seconds before the curtain went up and we were under the bright lights, we were told we had to edit 20 seconds from the song. Without even a chance to discuss it, somehow we edited exactly 20 seconds from the song. Are we good or what? Dick Cavett wanted to interview us, but we knew all he’d want to talk about was the controversy, so we passed on the couch.

The Nixon administration kept a nasty eye on our show... Cops would come by - often just in time to see the act they wanted to see." ~ Dick Cavett

The Ian Tyson Show (Toronto) - 1971
Other guest include Sylvia Tyson and Bobby Bare.

The Flip Side - 1971
Hosted by Buddah Records president, Neil Bogart. Also starring Johnny Maestro. Brewer & Shipley performed their single "Tarkio Road."

Midnight Special - March, 23, 1973
Brewer & Shipley performed "One Toke Over the Line"

Midnight Special - June 29, 1973
Brewer & Shipley performed "Black Sky" & "Yankee Lady"

Don Kirshner's Rock Concert - 1973
After spending hours and hours at an old theater called “Banana Fish Gardens” in Brooklyn, we were told it wasn’t going to happen that day so we went back to Manhattan to our hotel. Shortly thereafter, we got a call saying it was going to happen after all so we turned around and went back. After spending more hours and Steve Stills and Mannassas playing way over their allotted time, we finally got to go on in the wee hours of the morning. Randy Newman, who had been there for the duration in a tiny, funky makeshift dressing room finally got to go on and said, “I hope I haven’t lost my edge”. Funny guy.

All Things Brewer & Shipley