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| THOMAS SHIPLEY
was born on April 1st, 1941 in Mineral Ridge, Ohio. He grew up
listening to early rock ‘n’ roll and
played trumpet in high school. He gave up his trumpet for guitar after
hearing Pete Seeger and falling in love with folk music. While in
college Tom played "open mic" nights at various beatnik coffee houses.
After college he hit the road and played the American folk circuit including
venues in Canada. Tom first met his future musical partner Michael Brewer at the Blind Owl Coffee House in Kent, Ohio in 1964. Over the next three years Tom and Michael occasionally crossed paths on the folk circuit. When Tom drifted into L.A. in 1967 to check out the emerging west coast music scene, he looked up Michael and ended up renting a house around the corner from Michael's. Tom's next door neighbor was Jimmy Messina. Tom first recorded a single with Ruthann Friedman under the group name of The Garden Club, although the single failed to attract much attention. Tom was splitting time writing songs with Friedman in David Crosby’s basement and also working on songs with Michael Brewer.
Michael
already had
a gig as a songwriter for
Good Sam Music, a publishing offshoot of A&M records,
and soon Tom was also hired as a staff writer
for Good Sam. As staff songwriters, Brewer & Shipley wrote songs that
were recorded by
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band,
Glenn Yarbrough,
The Poor, H.P. Lovecraft, Noel Harrison, and Bobby
Rydell. Their demo tapes for the publishing company exhibited such a
sound and style of their own, that A&M suggested they record their songs
themselves. Their debut album
Brewer & Shipley Down In L.A.
was released in 1968 on A&M Records. Jimmy Messina and Leon
Russell were musicians on their first album. |
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Tarkio,
Shake Off The Demon,
and
Rural Space.
Tarkio
was a breakout album for
Brewer & Shipley and contained
the now classic rock anthem "One Toke Over The Line".
Eventually, they moved to Capitol Records and
recorded two more albums
ST11261
and
Welcome To Riddle Bridge.
In 1980, after more than a decade of writing, recording, traveling, and performing as a duo, Brewer and Shipley amicably parted company to pursue separate personal interests. Tom became a television producer/director, eventually forming his own production company Tarkio Communications, which has done projects for industry, commercial television, and PBS. He later founded the Oral History of The Ozarks Project, a not-for-profit organization producing documentaries about life in the Missouri Ozarks. He has produced several award winning documentaries. |
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In 1987, at the request of a
Kansas City radio station, Brewer & Shipley reunited for a concert to
celebrate the station's first birthday. Unsure of what to expect after
being out of the public eye for so long, the duo was overwhelmed as they
walked on stage to over 10,000 cheering fans welcoming their return. Having come full circle
from their days as staff song writers for A&M Records, Brewer & Shipley
began writing together again. Their first project was the soundtrack for
Tom's award winning documentary "Treehouse - An Ozark Story". They have
since released two albums of new Brewer & Shipley material (Shanghai
and
Heartland) on their own One Toke Productions label |
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Borders (EWB) in Bolivia, was the recipient of “Best Short Form Film Award" in the EWB-USA International film competition. Some of Tom's videos are available on Google Video or on Tom's YouTube site. |
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Tom is still active as a singer/songwriter/musician doing regular Brewer & Shipley shows. He resides in the Ozark mountains in southern Missouri. |
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