Kal Mann

Some argue the true birthplace of rock and roll was Philadelphia in the early 1960s when Dick Clark’s American Bandstand launched what seemed like an endless parade of singers and groups. The writing teams of Mann & Appell and Mann & Lowe, working for the fledgling Philly-based Cameo Parkway Records, fed songs to nearly all of this region’s young artists and were responsible for no less than 25 charted hits from 1960-1964.

The teams’ output included Chubby Checker classic “Let’s Twist Again” as well as hot hits “Pony Time,” “Slow Twistin’,” “Dancin’ Party,” and “Dance The Mess Around”; Bobby Rydell’s breakthrough hits “Wild One,” “We Got Love,” and “Do The Cha Cha Cha”; The Dovells’ classic “Bristol Stomp”; The Orlons’ three big hits, “The Wah Watusi,” “Don’t Hang Up,” and “South Street”; and Dee Dee Sharp’s playful “Do The Bird” and “Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes).”

Perfectly evocative of the first half of the 1960s and lyrically appropriate for a wide variety of uses, songs from this catalog are continually active in film, television, and advertising campaigns. The Spirit creative team has placed catalog songs in national campaigns for Verizon, Toyota (in a spot performed by ‘American Idol’ finalists), television’s ‘Dancing With The Stars’ and ‘The Critic’ as well as the opening scene in the debut episode of AMC’s acclaimed series, ‘Mad Me