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Ron Ross

Ron Ross

Ron Ross began his career in the music business at Record World magazine, then one of three weekly trades in the U.S. As an assistant editor responsible for the album and FM radio charts, he became intrigued by David Bowie upon his initial RCA release, Hunky Dory. As a result of Ron's raves in RW and other pubs, RCA sent him to London to cover Bowie's first Ziggy tour. The result was Bowie’s first ever national cover story in Phonograph Record Magazine, preceding Rolling Stone's by some weeks.

Encouraged by Greg Shaw and Marty Cerf, who, under the auspices of United Artist Records, published PRM, Ron leveraged his Max's Kansas City connections. Cover story firsts for the New York Dolls and Todd Rundgren followed. Meantime, Ron moved on to a full-time editorial position at Circus and Circus Raves. Ron also served briefly as Big Star's minder on their live in the studio radio tour of the Northeast.

Though trained as a writer, Ron had his eye on a particular major label position he felt uniquely qualified to fill. It so happened that preparation met opportunity when he became Bowie's product manager at RCA just as his first number one single, 'Fame', was bubbling under the Top 40. After national marketing campaigns for first Young Americans, then Station to Station, Low, Heroes and The Lodger, Ron's portfolio grew to include Iggy Pop, Hall and Oates, and Robert Gordon. A highlight of the time with RCA was Ron's collaboration with Andrew Loog Oldham and Mick Rock on the marketing of two Werewolves LPs.

Upon leaving RCA, Ron joined forces with producer Richard Gottehrer at Instant Records. Among the artists they worked with were the GoGos, Marshall Crenshaw, Holly and the Italians, the Fleshtones, Mental As Anything, Levi Dexter and Joan Armatrading.

After a hiatus away from the music business, Ron was asked by Andrew Oldham, then removed to Bogotá, to edit his autobiography, Stoned.

 
 

43 articles

List of articles in the library

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David Bowie: Phallus in Pigtails, or the Music of the Spheres Considered as Cosmic Boogie

Essay by Ron Ross, Words & Music, July 1972

MIGHT ONE suggest that "the longer one studies life and literature, the more strongly one feels that behind everything that is wonderful stands the individual, ...

David Bowie: Fleeting Moments In A Glamorous Career

Report by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, October 1972

WITH NOT SO much as the Ed Sullivan Show, Shindig or Hullabaloo, a Winky Dink screen or a fifth-Spider like Murray the K to add ...

David Bowie: Bowie Neat-O At Carnegie Debut

Live Review by Ron Ross, Record World, 14 October 1972

David Bowie: Carnegie Hall, NYC, 28 September 1972 ...

Gary Glitter: Glitter

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, November 1972

THE APPLE'S BEEN a teeming teen-town lately, what with the Dolls, Teenage Lust, Eric Emerson's Magic Tramps, and Ruby and the Rednecks shaking it down ...

Peter Hammill: Fool's Mate

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, February 1973

WITHIN A DOUBLE-FOLD checkerboard of good natured psychedelia that would make sweet 1967 blush at her staying power, Peter Hammill, late of the morbidly super ...

The Nazz, Todd Rundgren: The Inauguration of Todd Rundgren

Profile and Interview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, March 1973

NOO YAWK, NU YORK — Beneath the red fluorescence of Max's Kansas City, where the boys wear lipstick and the girls have nails, Alice Cooper, ...

Alice Cooper: The Spectrum, Philadelphia

Live Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, April 1973

DIDN'T IT STRIKE you as strange, even back then before Peter and Gordon or the color series of Beatle cards, that they could call a ...

Genesis at Philharmonic Hall, New York

Live Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, May 1973

IN A MUSICAL WORLD dominated by dueling banjos, pop boys, wimpoid artist and Soul Train, is there a place for a British group that writes ...

David Bowie: Aladdin Sane

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, June 1973

FRESH FROM HIS second campaign in the American rock wars, our once and future pop boy fave David Bowie delivers Aladdin Sane as Phase III ...

New York Dolls: The New York Dolls: An Insider's View

Profile and Interview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, October 1973

THE NEW YORK DOLLS are going to prove to be the ultimate rock critics' band, because, along with David Bowie, Lou Reed, Alice Cooper, and ...

David Johansen, Lou Reed: The Head Doll talks about Lou Reed's Berlin

Interview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, December 1973

Note: Marty Cerf and I conceived of a series of these for Phonograph Record: I think Iggy may have done Aladdin Sane for PRM. I ...

New York Dolls: Too Much, Too Soon

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, April 1974

"WE DON'T PLAY too good, but we dance as bad as we want," Archie Bell once said by way of introduction to his fabulous Drells ...

The Rolling Stones: Rolling Stones: "Are They Too Rich To Rock?"

Report by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, May 1974

The Rolling Stones: Ladies and Gentlemen: The Rolling Stones ...

David Bowie: Diamond Dogs

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, July 1974

RUFF-RUFF-BOW-BOW: Bowie's bewitched, bothered, bewildered and back to play – 25 eastern cities in an intense five week tour concluding mid-July with his single biggest ...

Sparks, Sweet: Sparks vs. Sweet: The Battle for Britain

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, August 1974

The Sweet: Sweet Fanny AdamsSparks: Kimono My House ...

Raspberries: Starting Over

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, September 1974

IT'S A TEEN-CLUB midsummer Saturday night at Papa Joe'sParlour-pizza, pinball, pretzels, and pop-available without I.D. Raspberries, with no fewer than three Top Forty hits in ...

Bryan Ferry: Roxy Music's Sleek Sheik Of Pop Chic

Profile by Ron Ross, Creem, November 1974

BRYAN FERRY is a pop artistic multi-talent with a faultless ear, an extensive library of Fifties and Sixties singles inherited from his big sister, and ...

Utopia: Todd Rundgren’s Utopia

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, November 1974

1974 WAS A year that saw many artists grow up to the reality of a soft music market and a seemingly softer teenage head. While ...

Yes: "A Rearranged Yes Says 'No' To Standing Still"

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, December 1974

JON ANDERSON'S normally composed features clouded, as the mouthpiece for Yes, rock's foremost progressive quintet, recalled with a shudder his first case of critical cold-shoulder. ...

Bad Company Eat Up The Road On Their First American Tour

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, December 1974

THERE WAS THE TIME veteran road manager Clive Coulson saved Led Zeppelin from a stadium riot in Milan, Italy. "Zeppelin was the only English band ...

David Bowie: Bowie Throws A Bone To His 'Dog' Fans

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, December 1974

WHILE HARSHER CRITICS said his music was being lost behind his many theatrical masks, Bowie was planning the live album that would reveal him as ...

Stackridge: Pinafore Days (Sire)

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, December 1974

AS A DURABLE metaphor for teen enthusiasm and articulate emotion, the Beatles' musical vocabulary has proven itself time and time again, even as the Beatles ...

Roxy Music: Country Life (Atlantic)

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, January 1975

YULETIDE LAST, energy starved Britons accustomed to tacky displays of teen ostentation were wished a "Ferry Merry Christmas," as Bryan Ferry, Roxy Music's ubermensch, unveiled ...

David Bowie: Who Will I Be Now?

Report by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, February 1975

TWO YOUNG black men with Afros and Yes T-shirts gazed at the art-deco murals and shrugged their shoulders. As they awaited the debut of David ...

Genesis: The Future of Rock Theatre

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, February 1975

THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY is a short story that comprises no fewer than 48 different plot movements, and a stage show with 3000 ...

Bad Company: Paul Rodgers Builds Bad Co. On Ballsy Basics

Profile and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, February 1975

Forceful yet relaxed, Bad Company have left the fads, ego trips and tribulations of the sixties behind, and forged what the self-assured Paul Rodgers calls ...

Jack Bruce Soars Beyond Cream And Out Of The Storm

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, March 1975

FROM A REMOTE retreat in rural England, surrounded by his books and the stillness of nature, Jack Bruce pondered the challenge of his fourth solo ...

Queen's Four-Fold Strategy for Global Conquest

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, March 1975

FROM A SINISTER MOAN, like a furious fiend lurking in a deep cave, Brian May's fed-back power chords slid up to a piercing demonic howl. ...

Genesis: Will America Swallow The Lamb? Why Genesis wouldn't chop up The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, March 1975

For years Genesis had dreamed of cooking up a recipe of their most powerful surreal visuals and most mesmerizing music. Yet they feared their ambitious ...

Led Zeppelin: Zeppelin '75

Overview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, March 1975

PICTURE YOURSELF in a seat in a stadium, with ten thousand teens going mad on all sides. Something's announced and you look up quite swiftly: ...

David Bowie, Mick Ronson: Mick Ronson: "It's Strange Being On Your Own"

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, April 1975

WHEN MICK RONSON set down his guitar and stepped out of the London studio where he was serving as "musical director" for lan Hunter's first ...

The Faces: Faces Survive Solo Syndrome

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, May 1975

The Faces were afraid America might forget them while they were busy getting some individual ambitions out of their system. But their first Stateside tour ...

Jethro Tull invade America with a vengeance

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, May 1975

WHILE A bizarrely costumed quartet of musical madmen generated waves of sonic splendour, Ian Anderson scowled at his congregation of fans and hopped about like ...

The Rolling Stones, Ronnie Wood: Ron Wood Joins the Rolling Stones

Report by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, June 1975

WITH THE SUDDEN decisiveness of an eagle that spots its unsuspecting prey from hundreds of feet away, the Rolling Stones are touring North and South ...

Roxy Music: Will They Rule America?

Interview by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, June 1975

THE LOBBY OF Howard Stein's Academy of Music was buzzing with expectation as a standing room only crowd counted the moments remaining until Roxy Music's ...

Ian Hunter, Mick Ronson: Hunter-Ronson: Once Bitten, They're Twice Shy

Profile and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus Raves, July 1975

AFTER ALL those years in suburban Kent, last autumn Mick Ronson finally moved to a new house right off Hyde Park, the hub of Central ...

Blue Öyster Cult, KISS: Stanley Kissed Off At Cult

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, July 1975

THE FLAMING ROCK 'n' holocaust that Kiss brings to the stage has caused many intimidated headlining groups to ban the New York nitro-rockers from appearing ...

Ian Hunter, Mick Ronson: Hunter and Ronson Tie The Knot

Report and Interview by Ron Ross, Circus, August 1975

IF NEW YORK and Los Angeles are the nerve centers of rock 'n' roll in America, Cleveland is its heartbeat. ...

Eric Carmen: Eric Carmen - Brian Wilson with Strings Attached

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, November 1975

ERIC CARMEN isn't sorry that he asked us to go all the way with the Raspberries, but real life has its own way of intruding ...

Abba: Belly to Belly, Butt to Butt, Sweden Sends Us Rock and Roll Smut

Report by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, December 1975

A LOT OF PEOPLE didn't like Napoleon, but nobody doesn't like gurls. Which may account for the success with which Abba's top five smash of ...

Roxy Music: 'Love Is The Drug' in Bi-centennial Year!

Essay by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, March 1976

ROXY MUSIC, once scorned here as the last frontier of glitter'n'glam, may now become the one group capable of closing the two gaps which have ...

Dr. Feelgood: Dr Feelgood: Frighteningly Authentic Punk Posture

Profile and Interview by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, June 1976

THEY'RE EASY-GOIN' guys, but they always gotta have their way: when they tell you it ain't right you know you got to agree. ...

Bryan Ferry: Let's Stick Together

Review by Ron Ross, Phonograph Record, October 1976

WHILE THE POLITICS of self-exposure are evident in every album Bryan Ferry has made, with or without Roxy Music, his solo albums have consistently been ...

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