When New York First Rocked Around the Clock
New York Groove: An Inside Look at the Stars, Shows, and Songs That Make NYC Rock Book Excerpt
The Pythian Temple was built in 1927 as a meeting place for the city’s 120 lodges of the Knights of Pythias, a fraternal order popular in the early 20th century. Its facade is decorated in brightly colored, glazed terra cotta and historical figures. As its popularity waned in the 1940s, the lodge leased part of the building to Decca Records. The third-floor auditorium was transformed into a recording studio where some of the seminal rock and roll songs were produced.
Decca producer Milt Gabler wanted Bill Haley and His Comets to record “Thirteen Women (And Only One Man in Town)” at the band’s first session at the Pythian. The B-side recorded almost as an afterthought was “Rock Around the Clock.”
“On April 12, 1954, we drove from Chester, Pennsylvania to New York City to record our first session for Decca Records,” Comets bassist Marshall Lytle recalled in For Bass Players Only. “We were a little late in arriving and only had three-and-a-half hours to record two songs. The first one was called…
