No Means No: 'Nobody But Me' by the Human Beinz

‘200 Greatest 60s Rock Songs Vol. 2’ Book Excerpt

Frank Mastropolo

Capitol

The Youngstown, OH band that scored a №8 hit in 1968 with “Nobody But Me” was named the Human Beingz when they signed with Capitol Records. Rhythm guitarist Ting Markulin described on his website what happened next.

“When our contracts arrived, it said ‘The Human Beinz’ and we were upset. We were told the name would be changed when the contracts went back to Capitol. We recorded ‘Nobody But Me’ in June of 1967 and waited for a release date. In September, they sent us a copy of ‘Nobody But Me’ by ‘The Human Beinz.’

“Pissed is not a strong enough word to describe how we felt! We told them to change it! They said it was too late, because of all the pressings they already ran. Capitol then told us, if this record is not a hit, we’ll change the spelling on the next release. ‘Nobody But Me’ was a hit and we were stuck with a name we couldn’t stand.”

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“Nobody But Me” was written by O’Kelly, Rudolph, and Ronald Isley and first recorded by the Isley Brothers in 1963. The Isleys’ version failed to chart. The Human Beinz updated the names of the dances when they recorded their version at Cleveland Recording with Lex de Azevedo as producer.

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“We played ‘Nobody But Me’ the same way that we did it live,” said Markulin. “When we did this song live it was about seven minutes long and we did a huge jam in the middle. Dick Belley did all kinds of leads. I did all kinds of feedback and Mel Pachuta was a wild man on the bass.

“We played the song this way in the studio for Lex and when we finished he was very excited and said, ‘That’s it! That’s the song! That’s a hit!’ The first thing Lex told us was that the jam would have to be eliminated to make the song about two minutes long for airplay.”

In a record that will probably never be broken, the word “no” is sung more than 100 times in a song that only runs 2:16.

Frank Mastropolo is the author of 200 Greatest 60s Rock Songs Vol. 2, part of the Greatest Performances series. For more on our latest projects, including our new book, New York Rock & Roll History: The 1950s, visit Edgar Street Books.