The Stowaways were:
Arturo Longoria – vocals, guitar
Pat Buckley – vocals, guitar
Norma Longoria – keyboards
James Buckley – rhythm guitar
Wendall Maloy – drums
Wendall Maloy sent in the clipping above and wrote to me about the Stowaways:
This is the first “garage band” to play the Grapefruit Bowl in Sharyland, TX. The photo is from The McAllen Monitor and mentions our parking lot dances in front of Carl’s Minimax in Mission. The photo was taken before the Pharaoh record we cut where the name of the group was changed.
Mr. Longoria paid for the record. On the record, we were listed as Arturo and Pat with the Invaders. Jimmy Nichols, owner of Pharaoh Records, never signed a group and paid for their recording. He always got paid for studio time and pressing, in other words … he never invested in an artist or group. Anyone could cut a record with Pharaoh if they had the money. If I remember, it was about $500 for 500 records turnkey.
Romolo Montalvo was a great lead guitar player. I played with Romolo, Juan Guerrero (bass guitar) and Oscar Villareall (vocals) at the Grapefruit Bowl after Romolo and I left Arturo and Pat. I soon left the Valley to attend college in Victoria, TX.
Oscar got a record deal with Falcon Records and had a successful career. He was killed in an accident while touring and his records started selling like crazy. I know that Juan played with Oscar’s band. I lost touch with most everyone, except Juan. He played with several Tejano groups like Los Fabulosos Quatro and later had his own group Los Sheekanos. He is in the Tejano Music Hall of Fame.
The best group from the Valley was the Playboy’s of Edinburg. They had a top 40 hit with “Look At Me Girl.” The song was recorded at Pharaoh and later released on Columbia. Bobby Vee covered the song, had it out at the same time on Liberty Records and kind of screwed them out of having a bigger hit.
I got drafted in 1967 and while serving as NCOIC of the Radio-TV Section at the Ft Hood Information Office, got the Playboys assigned to me when they came for summer camp with the National Guard. We are still close today.
Wendall Maloy
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