Baltimore’s 1960s “Sunshine Pop” band The Peppermint Rainbow

By Tom Warner (Accelerated Decrepitude, 10/15/2012)

The Peppermint Rainbow

Thanks to Johnny Dollar for reminding us of Baltimore’s forgotten 1960s “sunshine pop” band The Peppermint Rainbow (1967-1970). JD scored the group’s lone LP Will You Be Staying After Sunday at a Joppa Road Salvation Army store and posted the cover on Facebook, leading us to scratch our heads as to why we had never heard of them.

A quick Google search informed us that the band – formed in 1967 under the name New York Times before changing their name to Peppermint Rainbow in 1968 and featuring sister singers Bonnie and Pat Lamdin – was discovered by “Mama” Cass Elliot (Baltimore’s own Ellen Naomi Cohen), who caught one of their performances (and later sang a medley of The Mamas & The Papas tunes with them on stage) PeppermintRainbowGlossy and was responsible for getting them signed to Decca Records, where their songs were produced by Paul Leka (who composed the No. 1 hit “Green Tambourine” for The Lemon Pipers and produced Steam and The American Breed). It was a logical fit, as Peppermint Rainbow played the same sort of sunny-tempered SoCal soft-rock as the Mamas & Papas, The 5th Dimension, and Spanky and Our Gang. (In fact, many see their hit single “Will You be Staying After Sunday” as a kind of sequel to Spanky’s 1967 #9 hit “Sunday Will Never Be the Same” or 1968’s “Sunday Mornin’.”)

Continue reading “Peppermint Rainbow” at Tom Warner’s Accelerated Decrepitude.

This entry was posted in 1960s, Baltimore Songs, Music, Oldies and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink.

One Response to Baltimore’s 1960s “Sunshine Pop” band The Peppermint Rainbow

  1. Hello!
    Thought you might get a kick out of this recent piece – “Baltimore in Song” – a fairly comprehensive gathering of tunes that reference ‘Baltimore’ in the song title:

    http://www.zeroto180.org

    Cheers!

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