Audio Autopsy, 1987: The Williams Brothers "Two Stories" Album, Warner Bros.
Part of a generational singing family, these Williams Brothers started out as teen idols. As they grew, so did their musical reputation & respect. Just ask Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty's Heartbreakers.
Necessary Differentiation
The 20th century show-biz firmament was filled with stars who, genetically anyway, were forced to be known as “The Williams Brothers” (apparently none of them could foresee an internet with a helpful identifier called Wikipedia, rendered muddled by housing several groups with the same name). So as not to clutter this page with “not to be confused with”s, we’ll pass out the name tags now:
The Williams Brothers
The Willliams Brothers is a traditional Black gospel group from Jackson, Mississippi, who began in 1960, and are still going! That should make it easy to tell them apart from the subject of our article here….except these Williams Brothers once spent time on Warner Bros. Records, just like our former teeny-bopper Williams Bros! OK, we can do this! Here are those fine singers, The Williams Brothers, who, with various members through the decades, have released some 2 dozen albums:
The Williams Brothers from 1997 and their album, Still Standing, on Blackberry Records, “I’m Too Close,” featuring Stevie Wonder, who produced:
The Williams Brothers
The Williams Brothers (Bob, Don, Dick, and Andy Williams) formed a singing quartet in the mid-1930s in Wall Lake, Iowa. The act broke up in 1951, but not before reaching a fair amount of fame with their singing on radio, on record, and in nightclubs and films. In fact, they can be heard on Bing Crosby’s 1944 hit, “Swinging on a Star”:
The Williams Brothers (Andy and David)
Don Williams passed away December 30, 2022 at age 100. Along with singing with Andy and his other two brothers (particularly on Andy’s TV Christmas specials for many years), he was an agent and manager. His client list included Mary Tyler Moore, and country/pop singers, Ray Stevens and Roger Miller.
Don’s twin boys, Andrew Williams and David Williams, were born on February 22, 1959, in Henderson, Nevada, and they grew up in “The Valley,” the San Fernando Valley/L.A. suburb of Sherman Oaks (with a dog, Heathcliff, who had to put up with 4 cats!). They were 14 when they taped an episode of The Partridge Family, called “Two for the Show,” in that sitcom’s fourth season. Hilarity no doubt ensued when the singing twins both managed to fall for Susan Dey’s “Laurie” character. A clip:
Things moved quickly for the twins as they got signed to Kapp/MCA Records for a 1973 album called Meet Andy and David Williams:
Produced by Jackie Mills (also a jazz drummer), the sessions were held at Mills’ newly-acquired Larrabee Sound Studios in W. Hollywood. Mills bought the studio in 1969 from original founders, songwriters, Carole King and Gerry Goffin.
The album was arranged by fellow veteran pop arrangers, Artie Butler (now 80) and Al Capps (who arranged and produced for the boys’ Uncle Andy, Liza, Cher, The Osmonds, among many others), the lads lay down a sugary confection of sweet pop and jaunty bouncers.
Highlights include Bacharach and David’s “Make it Easy on Yourself,” Carole King’s “Satisfied,” the Paul Williams/Roger Nichols Carpenters cover, “I Won’t Last a Day Without You,” plus nine others.
They cobbled together a fan club, too, and once issued this special, rare Fan Club record (recorded in October 1973), featuring a snippet of them singing (phonetically) in Japanese when they toured overseas with Uncle Andy:
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