Pop and rockObituaryCory Wells obituary
Singer and musician who co-founded the American band Three Dog NightCory Wells, who has died aged 74, was a founder member of the pop vocal trio Three Dog Night. Despite never being the band of choice for hip insiders, they enjoyed huge chart success in the late 60s and early 70s, scoring 21 consecutive Top 40 singles in the US between 1969 and 1975, including three No 1 hits. Their albums also earned a string of gold discs.
Three Dog Night’s success was built on the collective vocal skills of Wells, Danny Hutton and Chuck Negron, but it was Wells who sang the lead part on their best-remembered hit, Mama Told Me Not to Come, a Randy Newman song that they took to the top of the charts in 1970. Wells recalled that Newman, ever the professional songwriter, phoned him after its success and said: “I just want to thank you for putting my kids through college.”
Wells performed this tale of a naive innocent in the midst of a debauched party with an air of shellshocked bemusement, and in recent years, when the band continued to play well‑received shows, he would stretch it out with comic monologues and interludes of rap.
Their other No 1 hits were Joy to the World (1971), a rock-gospel version of a Hoyt Axton tune with an exuberant feelgood message, and Black and White (1972), a 1950s song commemorating a supreme court decision to outlaw racial segregation in public schools. This had previously been recorded by Pete Seeger and Sammy Davis Jr, and Three Dog Night performed it with an easy-listening reggae lilt. The band’s other big hits included Liar and An Old Fashioned Love Song (both 1971), Never Been to Spain (another Axton composition, 1972), Shambala (1973) and a pumping version of Leo Sayer’s The Show Must Go On (1974).
They put 12 albums into the Top 30, including the live recordings Captured Live at the Forum (1969) and Around the World with Three Dog Night (1973), which successfully conveyed the contagious energy of their concert performances.
Wells was born Emil Lewandowski in Buffalo, New York. His father died when he was a small child and his unmarried mother gave him her surname, though he later contracted his father’s surname, Wellsley, to Wells. After high school he joined the US air force, and while in the service he formed a mixed-race band that sang pop and doo-wop numbers.
Out of the air force and back in Buffalo, Wells was recruited to the Vibratos, who travelled to California to try their luck with a musical career. They changed their name to the Enemys, and, arriving in a vibrant LA music scene alongside the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield and the Doors, they were able to pick up regular club gigs, eventually becoming the house band at the Whisky a Go Go. They recorded several singles, including a version of Hey Joe produced by Hutton. After the Enemys split in 1967, Wells and Hutton formed Three Dog Night with Negron. The band’s name is reputedly an Indigenous Australian term describing the technique of keeping warm by sleeping in a hole in the ground while cuddling up to dingos for warmth, a “three dog night” being especially cold.
Three Dog Night disintegrated in 1976 with Hutton’s departure, but re-formed in 1981. In 1985 Negron was dismissed after a relapse into drug use, and the guitarist Paul Kingery took over his vocal duties. The group’s recording activities became sparse, though in 2002 they released Three Dog Night With the London Symphony Orchestra, and 2004 brought the 35th Anniversary Hits Collection featuring the LSO as well as The Complete Hit Singles. Three Dog Night: Greatest Hits Live appeared in 2008, and the following year the group released the new songs Heart of Blues and Prayer of the Children. They had recently been recording an album of new material in between concert dates.
Outside the group, Wells was a keen fisherman who wrote articles on the subject for several magazines, had appeared on the TV show The American Sportsman and often participated in charity fishing tournaments. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he “never took drugs and he hated alcohol”, according to his daughter Dawn.
Wells was diagnosed with cancer in late September, and as a result Three Dog Night cancelled a string of October concerts.
He is survived by his wife, Mary, and by Dawn, another daughter, Coryann, and five grandchildren.
Cory Wells (Emil Lewandowski), singer and musician, born 2 February 1941; died 20 October 2015
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