The Cake
Biography
The Cake are a 1960s girl group made up of Jeanette Jacobs, Barbara Morillo and Eleanor Barooshian. They were managed and produced by Greene & Stone, two Sunset Strip impresarios who also managed Sonny & Cher, Buffalo Springfield and Iron Butterfly. The Cake formed in New York in 1966, starting out as an a cappella vocal group singing at Steve Paul's The Scene. Barooshian and Morillo both appeared in You Are What You Eat, a 1968 documentary film produced by Peter Yarrow. In the film, Barooshian...
The Cake are a 1960s girl group made up of Jeanette Jacobs, Barbara Morillo and Eleanor Barooshian. They were managed and produced by Greene & Stone, two Sunset Strip impresarios who also managed Sonny & Cher, Buffalo Springfield and Iron Butterfly.
The Cake formed in New York in 1966, starting out as an a cappella vocal group singing at Steve Paul's The Scene. Barooshian and Morillo both appeared in You Are What You Eat, a 1968 documentary film produced by Peter Yarrow. In the film, Barooshian performed the Sonny & Cher hit "I Got You Babe" with Tiny Tim. She sang the male part, while Tiny Tim sang the female.
What set The Cake apart from other girl groups of the time is that they recorded their own material, as well as a number of R&B standards. Their own songs were in the vein of 1960s baroque pop with intricate madrigal-style vocal harmonies. They released two albums on Decca Records, The Cake (1967) and A Slice Of Cake (1968). Both were recorded at the Gold Star Recording Studios in Los Angeles.
Their debut single was the Jack Nitzsche and Jackie De Shannon penned song, "Baby, That's Me". The production of the song, which was arranged by Harold Battiste, aped the Wall of Sound technique created by Nitzsche and Phil Spector. Barooshian also contributed back-up vocals to "Why Are We Sleeping?", a track on The Soft Machine, the 1968 debut album by the British psychedelic rock band of the same name.
Following the break-up of The Cake in 1968, Jacobs and Barooshian toured with Dr John, who was one of the session musicians on their albums, and subsequently moved to the UK, where they became part of Ginger Baker's Air Force. Barooshian also recorded an album in Japan with Tetsu Yamauchi.
Jacobs married Chris Wood of the English group Traffic in 1969. Jeanette Jacobs-Wood died on January 1, 1982, aged 32.
The Kevin Ayers song 'Eleanor's Cake (which ate her)' from the LP 'Joy of a Toy' released in 1970 was written about Barooshian.
In 2006, after a thirty seven-year hiatus, Barooshian and Morillo reformed The Cake, to perform at a one-off Jimi Hendrix tribute concert in New York, organized by Hendrix archivist and documentary film-maker, David Kramer. The show also featured Buddy Miles, Johnny Winter, Jose Feliciano and Leon Hendrix. Their two Decca albums have been re-released on CD by Rev-Ola Records.
Eleanor Barooshian (April 2, 1950 – August 30, 2016), also known as Eleanor Baruchian and as Chelsea Lee, was a member of the band the Cake (formed in New York in 1966). In 1967, Barooshian appeared in You Are What You Eat, a documentary film produced by Peter Yarrow of folk group Peter, Paul & Mary. In the film, Barooshian performed the Sonny & Cher hit "I Got You Babe" with Tiny Tim. She sang the male part while Tiny sang the female. Yarrow cast them after seeing them perform at Steve Paul's The Scene in New York.
Following the break-up of the Cake in 1968, Barooshian and fellow Cake member Jacobs toured with Dr John and subsequently moved to the UK, where they became part of Ginger Baker's Air Force. Barooshian also recorded an album in Japan with Tetsu Yamauchi.
The Kevin Ayers song "Eleanor's Cake (Which Ate Her)" from the LP Joy of a Toy (1970) was written about Barooshian.
She died on August 30, 2016 at the age of 66.
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