David Thomas Ackles (February 20, 1937 – March 2, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, pianist, and child actor. He recorded four albums between 1968 and 1973.
Born into a show-business family, David Thomas Ackles became involved in performance at an early age. He started out in vaudeville as young as four, and then took the role of Tuck Worden in four Rusty films for Columbia Pictures (My Dog Rusty, 1948; Rusty Leads the Way, 1948; Rusty's Birthday, 1949; Rusty Saves a Life, 1949).
Having studied English literature at Edinburgh University, Ackles took a degree in Film Studies at the University of Southern California before working in musical comedy, theatre, film and scriptwriting for television. By the late Sixties, he was writing songs that were of great delicacy and Elektra, on the basis of his "Blue Ribbons", employed him as a songwriter.On August 25th 1970 at the Troubadour in Hollywood, Elton John was being introduced to the world.
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He was scheduled to be the opening act for a man named David Ackles. But a record exec switched the order and Ackles opened for John, which he did without a murmur.
His persuasiveness led to a more elaborate contract, which resulted in three highly praised albums - David Ackles (1969, later reissued as Road to Cairo), Subway to the Country (1970), American Gothic (1972). Ackles had a richly textured, but unusual, voice for rock music. Whilst he had a tender approach to ballads, the vocal tone could develop into an angry rasp or a scornful snarl, depending on the subject matter.
He shared with Harry Chapin and Randy Newman the ability to write in character and to construct stories around an individual. He was the prisoner returning home to find his love had not waited for him ("Down River") and the drifter who couldn't face returning to
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his family ("Road to Cairo"). But he drew the line at singing in the first person about the wounded soldier who sought to damage children's minds by slipping them pornography ("Candy Man").
Many of Ackles's songs related to the downtrodden or to those who had created difficult situations for themselves. His music ranged from simple melodies to complex arrangements that could have come from the pen of Bernstein or Gershwin.
The title track of American Gothic said in four minutes what it took David Lynch a complete television series to describe. He then went on to produce a series of vignettes that summed up life in his home country in the late 20th century. Interestingly, the album was made from the perspective of living in England.
Despite critical acclaim, his unusual voice and eclectic style were not to the taste of the general public. Something of an artist's artist, Ackles had a number of songs covered by others; and, although he reached a critical apogee with American Gothic, he was dropped by Elektra.A switch to Columbia for his fourth album, D.T. Ackles: Five & Dime (1973), didn't assist his musical career. Perhaps Columbia was looking to promote him as another Leonard Cohen, but the result was a good album that few people bought. The contract was terminated and nothing more was heard of David Ackles until Elektra re-released their three albums on CD in the mid-Nineties.
Ackles completed the score for a musical about Aimee Semple McPherson, Sister Aimee, in the early Nineties. He settled on a six-acre horse farm near Los Angeles and worked as a professor of theatre for USC. He was involved in student theatre production and had a success with Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's Threepenny Opera in 1997. A practising Christian, Ackles had a strong commitment to help others, both directly and through his writing.
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Ackles died of lung cancer on March 2, 1999, in Tujunga, California at the age of 62.
(Edited mainly from obit by Brian Mathieson @ The Independent)
Here’s some very rare footage of the singer-songwriter, made for Norwegian TV in 1968. Four songs and an interview:- 0:00 Down River; 3:31 The Lotus Man; 6:02 Blue Ribbons; 9:58 interview; 12:32 His Name is Andrew. Ackles was an acclaimed and influential songwriter, influencing Elton John, Elvis Costello and many others. His 'Road to Cairo' was covered by Julie Driscoll & Brian Auger, and he was also covered by Elton John, Elvis Costello, The Hollies, Spooky Tooth, Howard Jones and Martin Carthy.
Bernie Taupin said of Ackles's style: "There was nothing quite like it. It's been said so many times, but his stuff was sort of [like] Brecht and Weill, and theatrical. It was very different than what the other singer-songwriters of the time were doing. There was also a darkness to it, which I really, really loved, because that was the kind of material that I was drawn to." Taupin went on to produce his 'American Gothic' album. Broadcast December 20 1968. These songs were on his first, eponymous album from 1968.