Chuck Negron
Three Dog Nightmare
The story of Chuck Negron is an amazing saga. It is a story of how music saved his life not once but twice.
Chuck Negron grew up on the mean streets of the Bronx in New York. That's when rock'n'roll first made a difference in his life. In his teens, Chuck became a street-corner crooner ? a Doowop wonder boy. How good was he? It's Amateur Night at Harlem's legendary Apollo Theater. The audience is pummeling a young female singer with a barrage of catcalls and tomatoes, driving the unfortunate girl from the stage. A stone-cold silence ensures, the curtain rises on The Rondells, featuring a 15-year-old Chuck Negron. "We were not just the only white group on the bill, we were the only white people for 10 miles!" Chuck recalls. By the second verse, the audience was cheering."
The Apollo show was Chuck's first lesson that "Music transcends everything."
Soon after his Apollo triumph, Chuck began haunting Manhattan's famed Brill Building, where he sang for one song-smith after another. "I got to know who all the writers were. Neil Sedaka, Carole King, Barry Mann, Leiber & Stoller. I watched and listened. And I realized. ? They're great writers, but I can really sing.' I knew I had a voice." Chuck wasn't just a gifted your singer ? he was also a star basketball player being heavily recruited by colleges nationwide.
By 1961, it was decision time about his future. What do you do when you can sing like an angel and dunk a basketball like the devil? Chuck did both. Chuck accepted an athletic scholarship from Hancock College in Santa Maria, California, was later recruited by Bill Sharmen, coach at Cal State L.A., and signed a recording contract with Columbia Records as a singer ? "Chuck Rondell."
Four years later, his hoop dreams behind him, Chuck arrived in Los Angeles to make a reputation as a kick-ass vocalist. In 1968, Chuck, Cory Wells and Danny Hutton formed a vocal trio whose roots would be in the harmonies of the ?50s, but whose music would be totally of the ?70s.
Built around the pop/soul pyrotechnics of Wells, Hutton and Negron, and backed up by the best musicians from around the country and Canada, few bands were as daringly eclectic or as consistently popular as Three Dog Night. When the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Sly & The Family Stone were storming the charts, Three Dog Night had, by 1975, sold 50 million albums.
Chuck's soaring, soulful lead vocals and his uncanny knack for finding exceptional material written by a new generation of songwriters like Elton John, Harry Nilsson, Laura Nyro, Randy Newman, Paul William, Hot Acton and others put the band ahead of the crowd. Singles were the band's forte and they hit hard with a phenomenal 18 consecutive Top 20 hits and 21 Top 40 hits, Chuck's voice can be heard singing on most of those hits, songs we all remember. "One," "Easy To Be Hard," "An Old Fashioned Love Song," "The Show Much Go On, " "Joy To the World" and many others.
Few bands were as popular in concert as Three Dog Night. Selling tickets by the bale-full, they pioneered stadium extravaganzas ? prompting Rolling Stone, in it's 1972 cover story on the band, to exclaim, " More Gold Than the Stones! Bigger Crowds Than Creedence! Fatter Purses Than Elvis!"
But by the mid-?70's, the band's magical "Shambala" existence was under intense interpersonal strain. "Rock star arrogance and drug use ? much of my own." admits Chuck, "had a lot to do with it." Three Dog Night called it quits in 1977, with only Chuck, Cory Wells and Jimmie Greenspoon remaining of the original seven members.
With all the time in the world, more money than God, and a voracious appetite for self-destruction, Chuck forged a new career for himself as a hard core drug user, a pursuit that dragged him down to a depth of existence few of have ever encounters. No amount of humiliation or rehabilitation programs ? 37 in all ? could steer him away from drugs, and the love of his rapidly deteriorating life. Sleeping in abandoned buildings, suffering from emphysema, the former 6'1" 185 lbs. Rock idol had, by 1991, shrunk to a cadaverous 126 pounds.
When everyone else had given up on him, Chuck's sister-in-law took him to his 37th and final rehabilitation clinic. "I only went because it was either rehab or jail.. I chose rehab.." It was at Cri-Help, a long-term drug rehabilitation facility, that Chuck had an epiphany. It happened one afternoon, when for a few hours, he slept peacefully and awoke with no jones for a fix. "Suddenly it dawned on me," he says, "that if I was so willing to die, why not be willing to live?"
Chuck is the first to admit, the story of his rise and fall is a cliche worthy of the Rock'n'Roll Hall of Shame. But his nine-month stay at Cri-Help was a come-from behind victory, a buzzer beater, that changed his life profoundly and made him realize. "There was something I craved to do more than drugs. The one thing that had always made me feel good inside. I wanted to make music again."
Dedicating himself to a strenuous training program, Chuck restored his body to a healthy 185 pounds. Chuck accepted an invitation to record the "Golden Girls" TV theme song, then embarked on a series of well-received live performances, including opening for comedian Howie Mandel's acclaimed 1994 Atlantic City show. It was there that Chuck impressed critics and audiences with a four-octave range that is, incredibly, one octave higher today than it was originally. "Live performance can be like an athletic event," Chuck explains with a laugh, "I utilize a vocal coach whenever necessary."
By 1996, Chuck had returned as a complete entertainer. "I'm connecting with the crowds now," he says, "I'm more relaxed, I'm enjoying myself. I even change the set sometimes for the audience."
While the other two Three Dog Night vocalists Wells and Hutton perform as "Three Dog Night," Chuck has gone on to pursue his solo career and record new music to critical and commercial success. "The hits I sang are definitely part of who I am," says Chuck. "But audiences today, even though they love to hear me sing the hits, they always come up and ask me to do more of my new stuff."
And, it's no wonder. Chuck's 1996 debut album of all new material, "Am I Still in Your Heart" showed Chuck was in his best voice ever. In 1996, Chuck released a holiday CD "Joy to the World," the critics raved about his renditions of old classics done in a new and fresh way. In 1999, Chuck's book "Three Dog Nightmare" and the companion CD "The Long Road Back" were released and Chuck's book was on the Los Angeles Times Best Seller list. And in 2001 Chuck released his "Live In Concert" CD. Chuck's live performance of a song written by him about his drug addition, "Took Me Under" was nominated for a 2001 Prism Award. A full slate of live concerts are planned for next year, and it would seem that Chuck has enough on his plate. But, there's more. A full-length autobiographical documentary for airing on network television is in the works also.
Chuck remains active with Cri-Help, the Musicians Assistance Program (MAP), and MusiCares, which aim to keep drugs out of the music industry.
"It's a total gift to have been able to come back this way," beams Chuck. "It's just amazing to have the opportunity to perform and record again. And I'll tell you, I'm enjoying every minute of it."